An idea for a one-shot that has been gathering dust in my mind- inspired by the song "Friends, Lovers or Nothing" by John Mayer.
Set in Season 10.
Hope you like it, please review.
Disclaimer: I own nothing.
Pouring Tears into Drying Eyes
Leaves the colour of blood oranges clung to trees standing defiant against the violet winter sky, the colours of suburbia.
The clicking of her heels against the pavement was the only sound to be heard this far away from the city. She had made this walk so many times in the past few months that she knew all of the houses she passed like the back of her hand.
A lump built up in her throat, and her breathing became uneven as she neared the end of her walk; the flaking paint of his front door, the dim glow from the lamp in the living room came into view. Without giving it a second thought she knocked on his door
She had been rehearsing the speech she planned on giving all day but her mind had went blank with fear as he appeared in front of her.
Not a word escaped his lips as he looked at her with heart stopping contempt.
Friends
The Las Vegas heat had gotten under everyone's skin as they attempted to go about their usual day shaking off the feeling of foreboding that came with the sight of the sun in a city full of nothing much but sin.
The crime lab was the same as it had always been; there was nothing different about the sound of footsteps seeking answers or printers vomiting up responses. No one was particularly happy. No one was particularly depressed. There were no treats waiting for everyone in the break room. It was like any other day.
He saw her standing at the end of the hall way greeting their co-workers with a coy smile that did nothing to hide the truth of the happiness she had found. He had known she was coming back; it had been something he'd anticipated but seeing her there, in person, had caused him to skip a heartbeat.
Having spent the past few months hoping to over hear her name being mentioned in conversation and waiting on responses to his emails that never came it was almost as if she had fallen out of existence to her old life in Vegas.
He had wasted evenings with a bottle of Merlot wondering what escaping from the city like she had done would feel like; living life without death as company or a requirement, seeing the sun as the start rather than the end.
She turned to face him, and it was her eyes that stopped him in his tracks, the intense coffee colour had not lost their depth or glint. When she smiled her appearance lit up in a way he could barely remember, her devilish expression causing a reaction in his core. They fell into each other's arms sharing a casual hug as if they had never been apart.
She looked beautiful he thought with a melancholic smile. The ring on her left hand glinted under the lights like an insistent reminder that it was too late. He should have said it earlier. He should have made a move. He should have not let go. He attempted push aside the thoughts that had haunted his memories and dreams to focus on the woman in his presence.
"Do you want to grab a drink after shift? Catch up?" she asked before she disappeared into the chaos of Vegas. That one question had relit the sparks that he had been laying dormant within him while she had been away.
"Sure." He responded casually hoping that he voice hadn't shaken too much, and that he hadn't answered too quickly. All of these years of unrequited love had made him unsure of himself in ways that he had previously found hard to imagine.
They went their separate ways getting through their days with senses of both exhaustion and achievement. He had glanced at the clock every so often the reminder that he had something to look forward to after shift as opposed to returning to an empty flat causing a smile to tug at his lips.
It felt good to have his friend back.
Lovers
Neither one of them knew how it had happened.
How after showing restraint they had found themselves in bed together.
Their night had started off like any other, they had met at work shared a coffee in the break room while chatting about current affairs. It had been almost two months that she had been back and it felt to them as if she had never been away. Conversation over coffee turned into working a case. As each day passed, she slowly found herself reminded of what had been her reasons for leaving Vegas in the first place. But he was there.
He was always there with a sympathetic smile, a touch of the hand to let her know it was going to be okay. That it wasn't going to be like last time. Over the weeks she had found herself relying on him; his smile, his smell, his warmth as a form of comfort when it seemed like too much.
The man that had once been the crazy lab tech still dredging through the angst of his teenage years had turned into a man before her very eyes but it had taken her this long to see. She recalled guilty noting that he looked good in the suits he had taken to wearing.
Every night she would return to an empty house, embraced by nothing but silence. She would blame the constant loneliness for the way she suddenly found herself feeling for her friend. He could tell there was something wrong. He had always been able to tell when she wasn't feeling herself.
Just a drink. One drink.
That one mistake had led to another that perhaps they would never be forgiven for. The heightened emotions they had both been experience became the very source of the passion they found themselves sharing between the sheets.
She had slipped out while he'd was still asleep the guilt she'd felt was like a crushing physical pain that seemed to slowly intensify. Between her head and her heart she had found herself lost amongst rules and promises.
They had taken it too far.
Nick sat between them in the break room the next morning preventing them from being able to have a conversation about what had happened. Every so often they would look up meeting eyes. But it wasn't enough- there was too much to be said.
It had been that one decision they had made that had changed everything. It had been that one move that had made the two friends lovers.
They couldn't help themselves. That one mistake had turned into so many more. They found that they could hardly control themselves in each other's presence. The intensity they felt when making love was like nothing else either had experienced before.
He took the space of the loneliness and reminded her of what it felt like to be so besotted that the world seemed to change, melt away even. He gave her the chance to live the things she had not experience in her relationship with her husband; spontaneity and passion to such degrees that they both would find themselves seeing red.
And he had gained the one thing he had ever wanted; her.
Or
She stood in the empty car park, a cigarette burning slowly away between her fingers.
An earlier conversation with her husband had seemed to put her in her place. She was punishing herself because he couldn't. She had hurt her husband in ways that she couldn't bring herself to register. The guilt overwhelmed her as she thought of her lover. She would break his heart- it was inevitable.
She could hear his footsteps approach her causing a lump to build up in her throat.
He knew where she was; she had always had her spots and over the years he had learnt her habits and behaviours like the back of his hand. He had made himself as familiar with her preferences as he was with his own. And as he walked into the humid Vegas air, he could see her facing away from him, staring into the distance.
"What do you want from me?" he demanded to know through gritted teeth as she stood two feet away from her firmly planted to the ground. She turned to him an almost blank expression on her face.
"I don't... I don't know." she responded glancing at the ground before taking another drag from her cigarette.
She didn't love him; that much was clear.
She never had. And she never would.
"Then why are you doing this to me Sara?" He asked his voice suddenly softening, his weakness making itself apparent.
"I'm sorry Greg." she apologised not knowing what else to say.
"Don't say sorry, just tell me why."
The same eyes that could make him melt; looked at him with nothing but despair. She had used him in the way he had always wanted her to use him. It was not until now he realised just how much it hurt. It was not until now he realised just how much he wanted her- wanted her completely.
But there was silence.
Nothing
She stood in his door frame with dark eyes that were melting into the tears that were forming just behind her eye lashes. She wore the smell of gin like perfume, her dress dipping and clinging in all the right placed leaving her feeling exposed and vulnerable in way that in recent times had disappeared into the diaries of her younger years.
"Let me in." her voice cracked as she pleaded with him in a way neither had imagined was possible. There was a moment silence as he took in the situation, meeting her eye to see if this was in fact real.
"Go home Sara." were his only words in response as he held the door firmly in the space between them.
It was the right thing to say. It was the right thing to do. He reminded himself as he could feel his heart lurch into his throat.
Silence fell like rain in a storm and as much as they wanted to neither one of them could make another move. This complex game they had been playing with each other was close to chess-mate but had it been worth it?
She stepped away from the door the sound of her heels clicking against the pavement a sound effect to what they had slipping slowly away. Her eyes were focused on him and him only, attempting to appeal to that part of him that would never stop loving her.
"Don't do this." he whispered for the first time being able to let go of something, someone that had plagued him for ten years.
As he watched her walk away from his house turning every so often to see if he would stop her it felt as if the world had stopped turning, the oxygen seemed scarce and the pain in his chest was like nothing he had experience before.
He realised all of their attempts at blurring and then identifying lines had left them as simply nothing.
No, Go, Lying
It took him less than a minute to realise "nothing" was not where they should be. He needed to stop her. He needed to tell her.
He flung his front door open stumbling past the very spot where she had been standing before. The thick storm clouds that had been looming over them all day finally rumbled threateningly. He ran as fast as he could the sound of his feet pounding against the ground and his heart against his chest filled his ears. She sat the bus stop, her hands folded on her lap, her eyes focused on the ground, out of both shame and disappointment.
"Sara." he shouted to get her attention as he slowed nearing her. She stood up, her legs shaky and began walking towards him in slow steps.
"I love you." he exclaimed breathlessly in his raspy smokers' voice that shivers down to her core. It took a few seconds before they collided like waves on the shore into an unforgiving embrace. They kissed with an honesty that hurt and a passion that seemed enduring.
Rain drops started falling harder hitting the ground glimmering under the street lamps like glitter scattering and covering the floor. The sky above them gave another unsettling growl but neither one of them cared, the rest of the world melted away when they were together.
Everything seemed to dissolve, and the moment seemed suspended in time, as stood there locked in each other's arms as if there was no place else for them to be.
The End