SOMETHING WORTH FIGHTING FOR

Disclaimer: The characters in CSI: New York do not belong to me. No infringement is intended, no profit is made.

Summary: 'Are you just going to give up, or are you going to fight for what you want?' Some choice words from a family member spur Lindsay Monroe into action over her increasingly shaky relationship with a certain Danny Messer...

Notes: Hi! Was sorting through my old computer back-ups the other day and came across some unfinished stories that I started experimenting with just before the inspiration for 'What Might Have Been' struck. They were all Season Four-based, but this particular one caught my eye because it was a little bit different to the rest. Rather than dealing with the aftermath of Danny sleeping with Rikki, it is set before it happens. I liked what I'd written and it captured my muse so I decided to finish it off. It's sort of a 'What If?' and it's split into a number of mini-episodes. Not quite sure how many just yet, but it's not going to be an epic – I'm guessing somewhere between four and six chapters.

If you're reading 'Hold Me Now', you'll have already met Lindsay's sister, Mel. This story contains an early incarnation of her – she's a psychologist in this story rather than a doctor, but other than that, it's essentially the same character.

Anyway, I think that's enough introduction, don't you? Time for Episode 1…

OOOOOO

Episode 1: Intervention

'Are you just going to give up, or are you going to fight for what you want?'

With her elder sister Melanie's words still ringing in her ears, Lindsay Monroe headed up the steps from the subway station and out onto the busy street above. Taking a sharp turn to the right, she started out on the short, three-block journey to her intended destination.

The emotional phone-call with her sibling – during which she'd finally confessed all that had been troubling her for the past few weeks – had been the impetus that had galvanised her into this belated action. Mel was right - she could either sit back and let it happen, or she could do something about it before it was too late. The latent fear that it was already just that made her feel sick to the stomach, but she pushed it aside in favour of a more positive outlook on the situation.

It had been a horrible couple of months so far, but she wasn't ready to give up the fight just yet. She'd been way too passive up until now, the fear of doing or saying the wrong thing causing her to hold back the storm of emotion that had been simmering, unspoken, inside of her for far too long. Under the circumstances, she felt as if she wasn't entitled to feel this way, that her pain was nothing compared to that of the others involved in this tragedy. But what she felt was real - she hadn't cried herself to sleep on a regular basis over the last few weeks for nothing. It was time that her part in this was properly acknowledged by all concerned.

A few short weeks ago, she could have never imagined what was about to befall her. In a split second instant, everything had changed. The outward ripples from that single moment in time had ricocheted throughout every aspect of her life and left devastation in its wake. Lindsay was still a little shell-shocked by it all. It was a storm that had arrived out of nowhere, a tornado that had whipped her up in its whirlwind and left her battered and bruised at the side of the road.

How could she have known that it would come to this? That she'd be fighting for the affection of the one person she thought she could trust above all others? That she'd be questioning his integrity, his honour, as well as his commitment to the relationship that she had believed to be so happy? A little boy's tragic death shouldn't have changed that, but it had. She no longer knew where she stood. She no longer knew whether she was even a part of this at all. Danny had shut her out of his life so effectively that sometimes she doubted whether what they had together was even real.

It broke her heart, but he was going through hell and she hadn't wanted to make it worse. So she'd accepted, stepped back, and given him some space to sort his head out. The only problem was, it was slowly killing her and she couldn't take it anymore. She needed him to acknowledge that this was affecting her too, that even though her pain couldn't equal his or Rikki's, it was nonetheless a factor that deserved consideration.

Danny's growing connection with Rikki Sandoval was what scared her the most. She'd met Ruben's Mom a couple of times before this, but she'd never once considered her a threat. She was just a neighbour from across the hall, someone Danny shared a casual acquaintance with because he'd befriended her son. But now… now the two of them had locked themselves away in their own private world of shared grief. It was a bubble that no-one could penetrate because, as far as they were concerned, nobody else could understand what they were going through.

It hadn't been an issue in the beginning. At first, Rikki had pushed away all Danny's attempts to console her, making his guilt worse but maintaining the emotional distance between the two of them. But then she'd done a complete u-turn, deciding that he was the only one who could lessen her pain. Danny had been sucked in before Lindsay had even realised what was happening. His need to make up for the tragedy he believed to be his fault had driven him to make himself over as Rikki's knight in shining armour, despite the consequences to everything and everyone else in his life.

It was emotional blackmail, pure and simple, but it wasn't the calculated kind. In spite of everything, Lindsay could be objective enough to see that Rikki didn't really know what she was doing. She was just reaching out and grabbing hold of the nearest life-buoy in the shifting sea of her storm-wrecked life. But that life-buoy just happened to be Lindsay's boyfriend and he was gradually slipping through her own fingers as a result.

Danny and Rikki's relationship had become increasingly insular in recent weeks and that had only served to exacerbate the situation. Whenever Lindsay made an attempt to spend some quality time with her partner, he was always too busy, had something else to do. Translation – Rikki needed him and he wasn't going to let her down, not even for his endlessly patient girlfriend. She hated herself for thinking it, but she was beginning to suspect that his relationship with the bereaved mother was starting to move beyond the purely platonic.

Flack had not calmed her fears in this respect. The dark-haired police detective was about the only person Danny would confide in right now and when she'd questioned him about the situation with Rikki, he'd been deliberately evasive. It had sent her imagination into overdrive. She'd been physically sick at the thought of the two of them together and the sobs that had wracked through her body had been almost painful in their intensity.

It was then that she'd realised the undeniable truth. She loved him, she loved him beyond anything she'd ever felt for any other man in her life. He was 'the one' if ever there was such a thing and she was about to lose him. Their relationship up until now had been fun and spontaneous. He'd been her best friend and her lover all rolled into one. It had been everything she ever wanted so it had never occurred to her to ask for more. She hadn't known that they were living on borrowed time. If she had, maybe she would have expected more from him.

Like they'd always had done though, they'd been taking things slowly, one baby step at a time. The commitment, the expectations for the future - that would come later. At that particular moment in time, they were simply having fun and getting to know each other on a more intimate footing. They were letting things progress at their own pace because they had all the time in the world for happily-ever-afters.

You never knew what you had until it was gone. It was a cliché but it was the true. Lindsay hadn't known. Not back then. And now? Now she couldn't escape from the painful reality of what she could lose. For a few days, she'd drowned in the agonizing inevitability of it all, but a tearful phone-call to her sister and a few pieces of pointed advice had pulled her back from the brink.

"Lindsay, you have a right to what you feel," Melanie had told her, "Just because she's lost her son doesn't mean it should all be about her. I have the greatest sympathy for her – being a mother myself, I can imagine the hell she's going through right now – but the point is, Danny is your boyfriend and his priority should be you. I'm not saying that he shouldn't help or support her, but there has to be some balance. You have to let him know how much he's hurting you. I know you – sometimes you're stoic to the point of appearing unfeeling. He probably has no idea what he's putting you through."

"But what if it's too late? What if he and Rikki…," she'd trailed off unable to say the words.

"Do you honestly believe that?"

"I don't know, Mel! A few weeks ago, I would never have believed Danny capable of something like that. But now? Now, I just don't know."

"Then you have to ask him. I know it's painful but surely it's better to know the truth. And if it has gone that far then I guess you have to decide whether you can forgive him or not. If he'd cheated on you under normal circumstances, I'd be telling you to walk away and save yourself the bother. Leopards don't change their spots in my experience. But these aren't normal circumstances, are they? If Danny feels as responsible as you say he does then maybe he's gotten himself so wrapped up in his guilt and pain that he can't see beyond it to anything else."

"Spoken like a true psychologist."

"Maybe – but I think you of all people should know about the pull of survivor's guilt. It's a dangerous cycle and he needs to be jolted out of it before it gets out of hand. Right now, you're just sitting back and letting it happen. Force him to confront the truth of what he's doing to you and then maybe he can finally find some proper perspective on it all."

"I guess," Lindsay agreed somewhat dubiously.

"And I mean the truth, Lindsay, okay? It wouldn't hurt to let those tears you've been holding back flow a little. Men have an inherent fear of crying women. It'll freak him out big time."

Lindsay laughed in spite of herself. "Isn't that kind of manipulative?"

"Only if the tears aren't genuine and yours are."

"But I…"

"How many times have you locked yourself away somewhere private and sobbed your heart out over him recently?"

Lindsay let out a resigned sigh at her sister's on target insight. "I think you know me too well, Mel," she complained.

"I'm your big sister. It's my job. I know how you insulate everything, but, honey, that's not going to work with this. You've got to be more open about the way you feel. He's not a mind-reader, you know. And right now, with what he's going through, he's probably not all that perceptive about how this is affecting you either."

Lindsay closed her eyes as a single tear escaped to run down her cheek. "It's hard."

"I know, but you have to do it. Are you just going to give up, or are you going to fight for what you want?"

Back in the present, Lindsay stood on the sidewalk and looked up at Danny's apartment building. She'd made her decision. She was going to fight. She just wasn't sure how best to go about it…

OOOOOO

A couple of hours earlier, Danny's apartment…

"Are you decent yet?" Don Flack asked in strident, no-nonsense tones.

At the grumbled humph of confirmation, he stepped into the centre of the archway that led through into the bedroom. Danny stood in front of the closet, dressed in a pair of sweatpants, but otherwise bare-foot and bare-chested. Don couldn't say he'd ever spent that much time studying his friend's body but it only took a cursory glance to figure out that Danny had shed too much weight in recent weeks. He'd lost a good proportion of his normal muscle tone and his ribs were slightly too prominent under the paleness of his skin.

Don moved further into the room. "Well, at least you no longer stink like last week's garbage," he observed acidly.

"Is there a point to this?" Danny demanded irritably, the irrational anger that was simmering just below the surface threatening to break free. He impatiently tugged a blue NYPD t-shirt down over his head, mussing up his hair which was still damp from the shower that Flack had dragooned him into taking fifteen minutes earlier.

Don leaned against the wall and folded his arms across his chest. "Call it an intervention," he said, which to all intents and purposes was exactly what it was.

He'd watched his friend go to hell and back over the last few weeks, and, for the most part, had felt helpless to do anything about it. After Ruben's death, Danny had closed himself off from everything that had previously mattered to him, locking himself away in a prison of his own making to serve out his penance for a crime that he didn't commit. His days now consisted of work, very little food or sleep, and being on hand to support Rikki whenever she needed it. That was Danny's life now, and it wasn't nearly enough to sustain a healthy mind, body and spirit.

What made it worse was that he was dragging other people down with him. Flack was still haunted by the stricken look that he'd been forced to witness on Lindsay's face a few days before. She'd asked him some subtle but probing questions about Danny's relationship with Rikki, and, try as he might; he hadn't been able to reassure her that her fears were unfounded. He didn't think there was anything untoward going on, but he couldn't be absolutely sure. He couldn't be sure of anything where Danny was concerned these days.

So, when Danny had mentioned the fact that Rikki would be out of town visiting her brother for a couple of days, he'd jumped at the opportunity to drag his friend – albeit kicking and screaming - back out into the light of day. It wouldn't have been possible at any other time – Rikki was a convenient excuse and one that was difficult to argue with under the circumstances. The fact remained, the woman had just lost her only child and she needed support in coming to terms with that. Don wasn't sure that Danny was the best person to give it, but it would be an exercise in futility to try and convince him of that so he'd reluctantly had to leave the thorny issue alone.

"I thought we'd go shoot some hoops for a while, then maybe grab a slice and take in a movie or something. Then I figured we could call up Lindsay and Angell - treat them to dinner and a club. Linds likes to dance, right?"

He'd debated which way to approach this for hours, finally deciding that the best thing to do was to simply ignore the obvious and act as if everything were normal. He'd already called Angell the night before to rope her into his scheme, and he didn't think Lindsay would turn down the invitation. She'd been desperate to spend some time alone with Danny for weeks now. If they made it a double date then it would take some of the pressure off.

Danny's response was a supremely non-committal "Yeah, I guess," but it was better than nothing at least.

"That's the plan then," Flack decided. He grabbed the sports bag sitting by the chest of drawers and threw it in his friend's direction. "Come on. You owe me a rematch and this time you're going down, Danny boy."

OOOOOO

Her nerves causing her heart to hammer wildly in her chest, Lindsay walked slowly down the corridor to the door of Danny's apartment. She hesitated for a moment before she lifted her hand to knock on the painted wood.

No answer. She knocked again, a little more insistently this time. Still no answer. He was probably out somewhere with Rikki, she thought miserably. She'd screwed up her courage to come here and confront him, and now he wasn't even home. She turned away dejectedly.

"You looking for Danny, honey?" a voice asked from behind her.

Lindsay turned to be confronted by a grey-haired woman in her late-sixties. One of Danny's other neighbours – she wracked her brains for a name – Mrs Kowalski that was it. A widow of more than twenty years, Danny claimed that she lived with around a dozen cats for company. Of course, it was entirely possible that he was joking about that. Whatever the truth though, she was apparently the resident busy-body. Lindsay bet she was having a field-day with this. An untimely death and a growing love triangle right on her doorstep. She must be in gossip heaven.

"Yes," she said politely. "Looks like I missed him, huh?"

"He left a while ago with that cop buddy of his. Mr Tall, Dark and Handsome – you know - the one with the come-to-bed eyes?"

Lindsay smiled at the description. Apparently you were never too old to appreciate good genes. "You mean Flack?" she said.

"Mmm – said something about going to shoot some hoops."

"Ok, thank you." Lindsay started to turn away but she wasn't quick enough.

"Tragic about the Sandoval boy, wasn't it?"

Lindsay froze in her tracks. "Yes," she managed over the sudden lump in her throat.

"Danny's been a tower of strength for his poor mother, you know."

Lindsay bit her lip. "He's a good guy."

"Not seen you around much lately."

The remark was off-hand but there was no mistaking the inference. Lindsay drew in her last reserves of strength and forced herself to remain calm. "No, well, things have been busy for both of us."

"Guess you'll be glad to get him to yourself for a while, huh? What with young Rikki away visiting her brother in Maine for a few days an' all?"

Lindsay tried not to let her reaction to this news show, but she wasn't sure she entirely succeeded. She was certain that Mrs Kowalski's eyes narrowed with glee at being able to impart this hitherto unknown information.

"It'll be good to spend some time together," she agreed mildly. She forced a smile. "Anyway, nice to speak to you again, Mrs Kowalski, but I should get going. I have a few errands to run."

Outside, she drew in several calming breaths as her mind absorbed what she'd just learned. Danny wouldn't be able to use Rikki as an excuse to avoid her now. One way or another, she'd find out where they stood. She started back towards the subway station, and then stopped and headed in the opposite direction. Mrs Kowalski had said that the two men had gone to shoot some hoops and she knew where they usually played. She'd sat and watched them any number of times. Danny had suggested she got herself a cheerleading outfit once, but had thought better of it when she'd shot daggers at him.

"That means I'm not getting any tonight," he'd told Flack mournfully.

Lindsay felt tears well in her eyes as she remembered that playful jest. He never teased her like that anymore. It was a miracle if he spoke more than a few words to her these days. He'd forgotten her birthday the other week and what's more…

'Stop!' she inwardly admonished herself. 'Stop playing the victim. You deserve better than that. You are not going to let him get away with any lame excuses this time around, all right? He's gonna hear what you have to say whether he likes it or not.'

Her resolve strengthened, she quickened her walk and headed determinedly in the direction of the outdoor basketball court a couple of blocks away...

To be continued…

AN2: I think I've recycled the odd line of this into some of my other posted stories. They fit those particular works too, but this is the context in which I originally wrote them so I've decided to leave them as is and not attempt to change things.

Anyway, hope you liked it - CharmedBec x