Open Season: A Challenge Response
by katydid13
Rated: K
Disclaimer: They are not mine. I'm just playing. This was written quickly with no beta so all mistakes are mine. I wanted to prevent Julie from making her story have a GSR ending. :-) The challenge is provided at the end.
Sara Sidle Stokes was cranky. She was five months pregnant, worked the night shift, wasn't allowed to drink coffee and her normally wonderful husband had apparently forgotten that he was supposed to meet her at the main county office building to tour the day care facility and to pick up information at the health insurance open enrollment fair. Sara hated things like picking health insurance, but they needed a family instead of two individual plans. The only thing that was keeping her from marching into the crime lab and taking Nick's head off was that she had run into Mandy Webster at the health insurance fair. Mandy was making her laugh. The limited edition Hershey's Kisses (autumn caramel) that one health plans was giving up had calmed her down. Plus, Mandy enjoyed all the stupid giveaways the health plans had and provided funny commentary on them. She pointed out many of them made no sense (a stuffed rhino?) and if the ones that did make sense changed your mind about health plans then maybe you were too dumb to be working for the county. So far, she had collected silly putty in an egg, a small stuffed rhinoceros, a plastic head the dispensed dental floss, a clip to close bags of chips, an eye glasses repair kit, and assorted odd shaped stress balls for Judy the receptionist's collection. (Everyone, even Grissom, thought it was and odd, but harmless habit.) Mandy had been able to get a tooth, a heart, a Blackberry, and a globe to add to Judy's collection.
Actually, Mandy was fairly cranky herself, but somewhat less so than Sara. Mandy was also pregnant (about ten weeks), worked the night shift, was not supposed to have caffeine, and still trying to figure things out with Greg Sanders, who was the baby's father. Greg and Mandy had a good friendship and casual dating relationship that one night after a few too many drinks produced a baby. They were kind of a couple and Greg was a very excited daddy to be, but they were still trying to gain their footing. They had had one of their dates/sessions to figure things out over a meal at the dinner. Mandy glared at Greg as he ordered coffee with his meal and glared even more when he ordered a large to go cup. That's when Greg stepped in it. He said, "It's not my fault you can't drink coffee." At that point, Mandy just walked out. After she left, she had to admit that she saw the some humor in Greg's cluelessness about what he said.
Sara and Mandy walked toward the break room. The door was open and as they were coming down the hallway they heard Archie announce "that basket makes the score Stokes 6 and Sanders 2." Apparently, the guys were playing nerf basketball in the break room again. Sara looked at Mandy and said while grinning at the guy's childishness "at least you were drunk. I actually thought it would be a good idea to have a baby with that man on purpose."
As Sara and Mandy entered, Nick and Greg tried to hide the ball and look like they were just sitting. Unfortunately, Greg fumbled the ball and it rolled over to Sara's feet. Mandy glared at Greg and said, "Having fun boys?" Sara said, "So much so that maybe you lost track of time?"
"Oh no! The tour and fair was today wasn't it?" asked Nick. Sara nodded. "I'm so sorry Sar', I just plain forgot. You can tell me about it, then I'll arrange another tour, and I'll read all the brochures and pick a plan for us. I'm really sorry baby."
Before Sara could respond to Nick, Mandy noticed that the coffee machine and said, "Why is there crime scene tape on the coffee machine?"
"I'm glad you asked," said Greg. "I have decided to ban coffee in the lab. Mandy, I'm sorry, I belittled how hard it must be for you to give up caffeine, especially since in spite of what I said, it is actually at least partly my fault that you aren't allowed to have coffee."
Greg went on to say, "it was Nick who helped me figure out what I had done wrong and he helped me with the ban. You will notice there is a sign explaining that we are banning coffee from the lab in solidarity with both Mandy and Sara."
"Thanks Greg. That's really sweet, but I don't think the whole lab should have to pay for your stupid comments," said Mandy.
"I agree," said Sara.
Both Greg and Nick looked relieved, until Sara spoke again saying, "We don't need the whole lab to give up coffee with us, just you two."
P.S. Open season is a real thing for federal employees and I received several of the items mentioned above at my agency's open enrollment fair last week. I have no idea if something similar exists for other employee groups. Several of the items mentioned are not open enrollment items, but ones other vendors have given me.
Challenge from Forensics Fan on CSINick-SaraFanfic Yahoo Group
Ok, here's the deal. I love stories that bring Nick and Sara together. Sort of a sucker for them actually, so this time, that is your premise. Then you have to pick at least 7 things from the list below:
a flood
a large fish
one of those stress balls in an odd shape (I have one shaped like a brain)
a method of destroying GSR
Warrick in a lip lock
Hodges in a lip lock
Archie providing a score
a mention of "Dancing With The Stars"
a fake TV show based on CSI
a movie star
a crush on a movie star
a strange dance (you can even make it up as long as you give it a name)
Greg bans coffee
the most unlikely person is caught dancing up a storm with their iPOD
an inversion table (one of those things that makes you hang upside down
a stuffed rhinocerous
Silly Putty
a freakish allergy
a turkey vs. tofurkey taste off
a lizard loose in the lab
a strange hobby even for Grissom
a limited edition flavor of Hershey's Kiss
something that looks compromising, but really isn't
something that is compromising, but doesn't look like it
Catherine having a bad hair day
if Hodges had a girlfriend