Title: Swaying in the Breeze
Author: nailbunny617
Fandom: CSI
Pairing: pre-slash with C/S to come
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: I own none of these characters and mean no harm by kidnapping them for a little bit. And note that there is femslash to come – perhaps not yet, but in time, my friend. Now consider yourself disclaimered, k?
A/N: Yup, this is the third in a series – the prequels being 'And Reality Bites Back' and then 'Deus Ex Machina.' Thanks for the bits of feedback I've received!
You know what they say about tempting fate, right? Well, so do I…but I guess I conveniently forgot it for a while.
I went back to work. And I'd like to say there was some big hoopla when I returned from my "vacation," but sadly the guys' idea of celebration involved going to a bar. I held no delusions that I was strong enough to successfully be surrounded by alcohol again. I politely turned them down. Catherine just nodded at me with a hint of a smile while striding down the hallway. Grissom squinted his eyes at me and said something strikingly bizarre by an obscure philosopher before shuffling back into his office to stare at bugs. I wondered what it meant that I knew the quote already.
Maybe he thought that my drinking was about him. I was realistic enough to know that I wasn't sure about that myself. I came to the inevitable conclusion that he would never be able to give me that validation I needed.
So I threw myself back into the routine, working overtime and doing my best to all-out avoid Catherine. Of course, this was made immensely easier when Ecklie, the self-loving asshole himself, got promoted and decided to break up the team. The man really is too insecure for his own good, if he thinks that splitting us up will make us less strong. I don't think I'll ever understand why people like him aren't taken to the outskirts of town and ritualistically stoned to death. And I think I just realized why people see similarities between Grissom and me.
The AA meetings were healing a part of me that I didn't know was broken. But I guess that's just how it is sometimes. So I kept going, even getting up one afternoon to tell my story. Compared to some of the other confessions I'd heard, mine was about as boring as they come. I hadn't hit anyone when I was drunk behind the wheel. I hadn't destroyed my life. I hadn't tried to commit suicide. I hadn't lost everything that had ever held any meaning for me. Despite that, people flocked around me with sad, understanding eyes and kind words. Like my life was somehow worse than theirs. Like my experiences deserved more pity than theirs. It made me more uncomfortable than I care to admit.
At the time, it didn't occur to me that they were thinking about my job. That they heard my voice faltering more when I was talking about all the victims I couldn't help than when I was talking about how desperately my mom tried to fuck up my life. Working in the crime lab was about the science, true, but the human element still stubbornly invaded the sterile environment. Grissom would say it like the people involved in the cases, suspects and victims alike, tainted the perfection of our jobs. I'd say it like I'm defeated and can't hold up my hands to defend myself anymore. Catherine would say it like the people are what matters most, with science just clearing things up at times. I think we'd all be right.
I tried as best I could to not think about Catherine. After a while, I realized that I was spending so much time telling myself not to think about her that I might as well just let my mind do what it wanted anyway. Thinking about her was better than thinking about how many days it had been since I'd had a drink.
So when Warrick, Nick and Greg cornered me one day in the hall and asked me why I wasn't going out with them anymore, I didn't know what to say. They were still pestering me, in that loving way I find annoying as hell, when I heard her voice from behind me telling them to knock it off.
I refused to look at her, instead staring at her shoes. My mom's favorite cruel joke about science geeks floated through my head and I cringed.
Q: 'What's the
difference between an extroverted scientist and an introverted one?'
A: 'When they're
talking to you, an introverted one will stare at their own shoes…an
extroverted one will stare at yours.'
I could even hear her venomous laughter ringing in my ears.
Catherine let my odd behavior roll off her shoulders, if she even noticed at all, and put her hand on my arm while telling the boys we were all going to grab a meal later on. It would be lunch for Greg and I, dinner for the rest – well if those words can carry any real meaning in the middle of the night. She left a scorched hole in my skin when she sauntered off, leaving me to rub unconsciously at the spot. Warrick looked at me with understanding, same as he'd done before when I'd come into work distracted and mulling over my latest AA meeting. That first time he'd looked at me like that, I panicked and left immediately to bury myself in my work – only to be starkly reminded of the meeting all the same.
The woman who'd offered to be my sponsor asked me something I'd never thought about before. She wanted to know if I realized I've been using my job as an escape long before I'd used alcohol to do the same. I stared at her numbly, jaw hanging slightly open, probably looking like somebody had just slapped me.
She nodded her understanding when I told her I didn't think I needed a sponsor. I explained in quiet words that drinking was just the latest form my problems have taken. A new mask to hide the same old shit.
She just smiled at me in that sage way of hers and told me that she'd be waiting.
Her name was Maggie. She smelled like earth and dressed in browns and greens. Whenever I think of Mother Nature, I see Maggie smiling back at me.
A week after the boys and Catherine had dragged me to lunch, I was running very late to my weekly meeting. I'd decided that, if she was willing, I'd be more than happy to have Maggie be my sponsor. I had sorted out all sorts of tidy explanations for my sudden change of mind, but I think what I really wanted was a mother.
When I saw the black Tahoe sitting in the parking lot, vague alarm bells started ringing. I stormed into the building, hoping against all hope that I was just being paranoid. The teary eyes, sad faces, and the sudden silence at my entrance told me I wasn't.
Immediately, about five people came over and hugged me, trying to hold their crying in check just long enough to tell me how sorry they were. Bob, a middle-aged office-type, held my shoulders and haltingly told me that Maggie had passed on. Passed on, those were his words. My brain flashed images of the most gruesome autopsies I've seen. I squeezed my eyes shut, trying to rid myself of the pictures.
The moment tears finally started slipping from my eyes was the exact moment I saw Catherine staring at me. There was the shock of understanding in her eyes. She looked away worriedly, and I followed her gaze to where it landed on Warrick and Nick interviewing people. I closed my eyes again and dropped my head, not caring. Maggie was dead – what did it matter if one of my worst secrets came bleeding out of this?
Bob backed away until I saw her standing in front of me, with her feet planted like she was expecting a fight. Looking over her shoulder, she grabbed my hand and dragged me out the side door quickly. I tried to form words, I tried to explain that it didn't matter, I tried to tell her that I didn't want to be alone with her. Nothing came out except silence.
She finally let go and sat us down on a bench. I stared at the shadow of a tree swaying on the sidewalk. Catherine asked all the right questions, like a good investigator, with a sort of tired compassion in her voice. It was so much a habit that it was comforting, despite the jarring realization that I was on the receiving end. I closed my eyes and let the slight wind wash over me – pushing me softly towards Catherine – while silently questioning if anything could ever make me clean again.
And then she hugged me, saying how sorry she was and I was crying into her shoulder, crying about Maggie and all the things I'd had to keep inside for so long. She finally held me out by my shoulders – probably so I wouldn't run – and looked into my soul when she told me that she understood. I figured that she really did, having a much more checkered and painful past than mine. I nodded and she turned so we were sitting side by side watching the traffic. I remembered that I used to strongly believe that none of us are given more than we can handle. I wondered if I still believed it.
Catherine told me solemnly, like she was promising to conquer the world for me, that she'd find whoever did it. I looked at her and waited until she was looking back to say that I didn't doubt it for one second. I think I surprised her, the most jaded member of our now-fractured team, with honesty.
Trembling slightly, I drank in her smile. She gently raised her hand to dry my tears and I flinched away from her. We sat there, awkwardly regarding one another for about a minute. I stood and quickly walked to my car, trying not to remember the flash of hurt in her eyes.