A/N: Happy Birthday, Mr. Petersen! This story takes place in the future, all fluff and fun, with a family and old friends. We don't own CSI, most of these characters, just having a good time putting them in a happy place. Read, enjoy, and remember to review! New chapters posted every 2-3 days.
A Few Days with Friends: Chapter 1
A future day…
Overhead long wispy clouds traced across the cerulean sky and mixed with trails of jets flying east and west. Bees and butterflies flew over and around the mix of wildflowers, purposefully grown, before settling on nectar bearing blooms of red and pink, yellow and orange. There were three houses on the property, well placed and set back from the paved road; each house had its own driveway branching from one turnoff. Trees planted over the past decades shaded the shared yards and blended the houses into a pleasing neighborhood. The house in the middle was the oldest of the three but appearances were deceptive as its style of windows and muted colors with a deep porch made it timeless and indistinguishable from the newer homes.
Inside the center house, a young woman moved some of the trinkets displayed on a shelf and pulled a photograph forward. She smiled, her blue eyes sparkling; seven people, a family—her parents and siblings; yet none were looking at the camera. She backed up and sat down holding the framed picture remembering the day it was taken.
Paris—the year she was eleven, or was she twelve, she couldn't remember. They were standing with the Eiffel Tower behind them, a clear, azure sky beyond the familiar landmark, and Aunt Catherine had been the one with the camera. A sudden wind gust had lifted their father's cap, he had yelped, everyone had looked up at him or the cap, and the camera caught their expressions. One of her sister's was pointing, another laughing, the two boys were in mid-jump, and her parents were looking at each other—it was a glimpse of their life and her mother had chosen this one to display as a remembrance of the trip.
As a child, she had not understood the enormous undertaking of traveling with five young children. She did not comprehend parenthood and the problems and rewards; one never does until one becomes a parent. She smiled and let her finger trace the images behind the glass. Her older brother was a few inches taller than she had been; her younger brother, Will, was still a little kid. She remembered the trip as one often remembers a dream—certain things were a blur, other things she recalled with crystal clarity.
Ava had gotten lost in a department store and they had all gotten new dresses; hers had been white with grey dots. Her mother had gotten an award—a medal that still hung on the wall—and she and her mother had walked through an old cemetery. Funny what memories one had of childhood—she could not remember visiting any museums but she remembered dancing along the mirrored hall of Versailles.
Elizabeth Grissom, called Bizzy by everyone who knew her, smiled at her thoughts. At the time, much to her mother's dismay, she was wrapped up in learning about religion and churches and saints. Later, her mother would tell her how it had worried her to have a child so interested in religion.
The Paris trip had been the first of many—by the time she was a teenager, they had traveled to the rain forest in Costa Rica and to the Galapagos Islands. Bizzy stood again and looked for a memento from that trip. No photograph—probably because they wore the same clothes for days at a time and everyone ducked when their mother raised her camera. She found it—a little woven fish made from a native leaf. Her fingers touched it but she didn't pick it up, afraid the fragile souvenir would disintegrate. A native woman had shown them how to weave birds and fish from grasses and leaves; this one survived to return home.
The entire shelf was filled with keepsakes: several other photos—she was in several with her brothers and sisters, one of her dad in a tacky straw hat, one of her brothers standing on the bow of a ship—she remembered that trip too. They were on the ship for a week and she was sea sick the entire time. Her brother had found his passion on that trip; even now, he was living the life of a sailor—no, she corrected her thought, he was a captain. She picked up a shell, turning it over several times, remembering trips to beaches and unable to pinpoint where the shell had been picked up. There was a small glass boat no larger than her little finger, from Venice, she knew from the story of her parent's honeymoon. She laughed at that—her parent's honeymoon had lasted all of her life. Even at their current age, she was sure the passionate romance that had begun when her mother was—she frowned as she thought—younger than she was now, continued every day.
A sudden thought came to her mind; there had been a box in this room. She looked around but didn't see it. Once her sisters had opened the box and she had read her mother's diary, or a few pages of it. She smiled as she remembered how she bawled thinking her dad was not her real dad, and he thought she had started her period. She giggled out loud; later, when she did have her first period, she had announced the fact at the dinner table. Her dad had choked; her mother smiled, and her brothers and sisters acted like they had not heard her announcement.
She pulled another framed picture from the shelf. All the people in the photo would be here later today—with one exception—the others had been included in every family celebration of her entire life. The one she did not know—Warrick Brown—had died before she was born, but she loved his son as her brother. She had not seen Eli in months but he would be here today. As she looked at the faces in the photograph, she realized how much Eli looked like his father—thinner, more wiry than muscle—but with the height and hair and eye color, anyone who knew his father saw the likeness.
Her thumb rubbed across the face of her father. Eli wasn't the only one who favored his father; her younger brother's face grinned in the photo. Her dad and her brother, Will, looked more alike every day. The others in the photograph had aged over the years but each was easily recognizable.
Aunt Catherine would always have blonde hair, softened now with platinum highlights, still slim and wearing classy clothes. Bizzy knew Catherine Willows was very wealthy; she also knew she owed her aunt for the education she had completed at a private college. Aunt Catherine had called it a "gift" as she had made the financial arrangements; only later did Bizzy realize how generous the gift had been.
The grin on the faces of Uncle Nick and Uncle Greg had not changed over the years. Nick had married—one of the girls from the lab; they had adopted two children who would be here tomorrow. Just as Nick was their 'uncle', his children were their 'cousins'. Nick was retired and spent his time on golf courses around the country as he and Mandy drove the highways in one of the new hybrid recreational vehicles.
Bizzy smiled as she thought about his ability to charm all the women. Uncle Greg was another story. He had continued working for the crime lab long after he had accumulated considerable wealth as a successful author. He had married, divorced, married again, and divorced. She and Eli had spent six weeks with him one summer working in the lab and during that time, she had realized Greg lived with a secret. He loved her mother.
It had happened one morning as they ate breakfast and Eli asked why Greg did not have lots of girlfriends—he had a beautiful house, nice cars, money—what a young man considered necessary for getting women. Greg had been exhausted from long hours or a troublesome case or some other reason the two did not understand, or he probably would not have said what he did. He had lowered his fork, and quietly said, "I've loved your mother for years." They had laughed, as he had, but, later, when she thought about the conversation, Bizzy knew he spoke the truth—he loved her mother.
The man she called Uncle Jim was the last man in the row of laughing people. He would be here later today; he had not missed coming to this house every week for years. After he retired from Las Vegas Police Department, he realized there was nothing to keep him in the desert city. He had moved to a large retirement community an easy drive from the Grissom home, and he came as a regular visitor to eat, to laugh, to play the stubbornly fake curmudgeon uncle to Sara's children, and they loved him for his true character.
Bizzy could hear her sisters downstairs. They were 'in charge' of the kitchen and the food. Knowing those two, they would eat half of what they cooked and forget to prepare half of what was planned. She ambled around the room. This had been her mother's workplace for years but now she kept a little desk downstairs. She opened blinds and looked at the yard below seeing her husband and two little boys playing on a swing.
Along the shelf under the window were several books—she removed one slim volume and opened it. The book was a family treasure, one Uncle Greg had written and published just for them. She sat down in her mother's chair and turned the pages of a book written and illustrated for children. It was a love story.
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