Used To, a csi fanfic

-Used To-

Okay, written in an angsty mood, when I was sick. Song is the property of Chris Daughtry and not me. CSI's don not belong to me, either. These disclaimers are so pointless. --. Enjoy!

You used to talk to me like
I was the only one around.
You used to lean on me like
The only other choice was falling down.
You used to walk with me like
We had nowhere we needed to go,
Nice and slow, to no place in particular.

"Nicky…" The soft voice coming from the bed the two shared startled him, as of late he was usually at work by the time Greg even thought about getting up. "Can we talk?"

He finished tugging on his jeans, turning for the door. "Sorry, Greg, I gotta go."

"Bull. Shift doesn't start for another two hours. I know you're not working any cases, either." The younger protested, climbing out of bed and standing in front of the door. "We need to talk…"

"About what?" He snapped, impatiently reaching for the doorknob. "You're keeping me from my coffee."

"About what? Nicky! Did I do something to piss you off? Are you sick of me?" He shouted, pushing the Texan's hand away. "God, tell me, Nick. What did I do?"

He shook his head, heading to the bathroom to exit out of that door. "I don't need this right now."

Greg's footsteps followed him into the kitchen, the younger man glaring at him as he leaned against the counter beside the coffee maker. "Well, when do you want to talk about it? This has been going on for months now…"

"What are you talking about? Nothing's changed." Nick retorted, grabbing his mug out of the cabinet behind him, robotically pouring the caffeinated liquid and adding the combination of cream and sugar.

"Some fucking C.S.I. you are." Greg scoffed, turning back to the bedroom, though his comment seemed to have finally drawn the attention of his lover.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

The lab rat turned on him, hurt by the elder's obliviousness to their problems. "It's everything, Nick. You don't act like you did when we first got together. You used to come visit me in the lab, invite me out to breakfast after shift with the rest of the team. You don't call me 'G', or 'Greggo' anymore…"

"You're upset because I call you by your name?" He blinked. It really was too early for this.

"No, you were the only one who ever did that… And you stopped. It's not even that… when we first moved in together… everything was so easy, and now… Now, I hardly ever see you. You leave before I'm up, you're asleep when I get home, I feel invisible." Greg hugged his knees to his chest after wandering to the sofa.

We used to have this figured out;
We used to breathe without a doubt.
When nights were clear
You were the first star that I'd see.
We used to have this under control.
We never thought.
We used to know.
At least there's you, and at least there's me.
Can we get this back?
Can we get this back to how it used to be?

"You're making a big deal out of nothing, Greg." Nick shrugged, flopping down across the other one.

"Maybe I am, but as much as I love you, I don't want to be invisible forever…" He didn't like what he was implying with that statement anymore than he was sure Nick did, but it needed to be said.

The Texan stared. "You'd… leave? Greg, you're not invisible! It's…. works been busy and hectic and everything's just been so…"

"You're full of shit." Greg sniped. "I work the same damn job as you do! I process what you're doing daily. You can't fool me with that." With that, he stood, returning to their bedroom briefly, slamming the door and cluttering about long enough to throw some clothes in a duffel bag and tug a pair of jeans and a t-shirt on over his boxers. "Good news for you, Nicky. You won't have to -pretend- I'm not here anymore. I'm gone."

I used to reach for you when
I got lost along the way.
I used to listen.
You always had just the right thing to say.
I used to follow you.
Never really cared where we would go,
Fast or slow, to anywhere at all

Nick caught himself staring at the empty lab for the tenth time in as many minutes, eyes on the door hoping Greg would walk in any second now. But, he wouldn't. Because he'd screwed up. And, yeah, he'd known he was up for the worst-boyfriend of the year award, and he sure as hell deserved it for the way he'd been acting.

He'd been scared, because no one had ever been as close to him as Greg had managed to become.

"Nick!" Warrick's irritated voice snapped him back to the evidence they were supposed to be investigating. "Can you just maybe focus on the crime scene photos for a minute?"

The Texan stopped himself from glancing toward the lab again, nodding reluctantly and staring intently at the picture. Only, that didn't work either because their victim looked a lot like Greg and that freaked him out enough to push it away.

This captured Warrick's attention again. "Nick?"

"What the hell did I do?"

"Well, whatever you did, it's affecting your work. So, please, go fix it so we can get this processed." The older male grumbled impatiently.

Nick pulled off his latex gloves, turning toward the door. "I'll be back later." He informed Warrick before heading to Grissom's office.

Finding Greg had not been all that difficult. Not since his parents had moved to Vegas, anyway. And, luckily for him, Greg answered the door, only to slam it shut again when he realized who it was. "Greg…"

"Go away."

"No. Just, let me talk to you." He begged, leaning against the door. "Please."

Greg pulled it open quickly, almost making Nick lose his balance in the process. "Oh, so, -now- you want to talk. Not three months ago. Not this morning, but -now-. Now you admit something's wrong?"

Nick let his gaze settle on the floor. "Yes. Something is seriously wrong. Can we please talk?"

The younger stepped aside, letting his lover into the house.

"Do you know why I chose today to make you hear me?" Greg asked, arms crossed as an invisible barrier between himself and Nick. He curled his feet beneath him from his spot in the arm chair, as far away from Nick as he could be in, as the Texan had taken a seat on the loveseat across the room.

"Because I'd been a complete ass for long enough?" He offered.

The younger man shook his head. "Two years ago today you asked me out for coffee after my burn victim case. Our first date." He pointed out, sadly, eyes not meeting his lovers.

Nick hung his head in shame. Great, not only was he an ass, he was a forgetful ass. "Look, Greggo…"

"Oh, now it's 'Greggo'."

"Please. Hear me out before you sick the labrats on me." When Greg nodded, he took a deep breath and began.

I look around me,
And I want you to be there
'Cause I miss the things that we shared.
Look around you.
It's empty, and you're sad
'Cause you miss the love that we had.

"I'm really sorry, Greg. I have known that something changed in our relationship. And, I don't know why you'd even want to consider staying with me, cause I sure as hell don't deserve you after the way I've been treating you. But, I hope to God you do cause I don't know how I'd get along without you anymore. And that's why I was acting like such a jerk-off." Nick shrugged, biting his lip. "You know I've never been with a guy before, never even been this serious with anyone. And it kinda scares me sometimes, that someone can be as close to me as you are."

Greg opened his mouth to say something but Nick held up a hand to stop him.

"Just let me finish, okay?" Greg nodded again and he continued. "I just want to know if there's anything I can do to convince you to come back. Come home. Because if you did, there's no way in hell I'd risk losing you again. So, Greg, can we go back to how things used to be?"

The younger man just sat there for a moment, seeming to absorb the words Nick had expressed in his utter desperation. "Nick…"

Suddenly sent into panic mode, the Texan's mind reeled for something to add, something to make Greg see that he wasn't kidding. "I'll prove it, I'll prove how much you mean to mean. I'll tell my parents. You can come with me to the ranch next month… Just… please, Greggo, don't make me let you go."

"You'd really tell them?" Greg asked, staring in shock. Nick had once sworn that he was never going to tell his parents, specifically his father, about his lifestyle. That declaration had come after the judge had gone off on some rant about a case he'd prosecuted that seemed like something out of Brokeback Mountain. Nick had spent the three days following that phone conversation drunk.

Nick nodded. "For you, yes. I would."

You used to talk to me like
I was the only one around,
The only one around

"You don't have to do that. All I want is the Nicky I knew back." He assured the older man, letting the barrier he'd built up around himself at the start of this conversation fall as he moved to the couch, sitting beside the other. "I just want things the way they were before."

"I can do that." The Texan agreed, his hand coming to rest on Greg's shoulder. "Do you want to go home now?"

"Yeah." Greg smiled, leaning over to kiss Nick for what felt like the first time in months.

"Good. Because we need to talk to Grissom about getting time off next month." He winked, telling Greg that he'd been serious when he said he'd tell his parents. "Because we have a trip to plan."