TITLE: Music
CATEGORIES: General
RATING: PG-13 for language
A/N: Ah, well, not what I wanted for my first CSI fic, but it sorta threw itself out onto the page, and after a little refining, I decided to give it to you. Enjoy, and please play nice with my poor ego.
Why do I always play my music so loud?
I don't really get asked that question. People always just assume one answer or another. They think it's just another one of 'Greg's Oddities' or I'm some sort of head-banging heavy metal freak with the uncanny characteristic of intelligence. They're wrong, but I don't really see any reason to correct them.
This lab can get awfully depressing. It's like a hospital, but there's absolutely no chance that anyone we work on will leave alive. It's sterile and stark and full of ungodly chemicals and ghastly realities that could make us just as crazy as the sickos we try to put away if we don't find some sort of outlet.
Thus, the music. Yeah, yeah, it's true, I'm a party-er and a wanna-be 'Lady's Man' and a painfully obvious bachelor. And yeah, I do like the music and the noise; having to filter out the obvious distraction of the melody helps me get rid of other distractions from the evidence as well. If you can block out the big stuff, you can wipe it all out, you know?
Grissom doesn't like it; it annoys him. Grissom intimidates me and makes me doubt myself and my right to do the work I do. If Grissom said 'jump' I'd damn well be the first to say 'how high?' But when he gives me that 'turn-it-down-or-die' look, or turns my stereo off himself in an aggravated movement, I bow and scrape and then turn it right back on. Because, as much as I use it for myself, it's mostly for him, and for all he Graveyard shift.
As Sara would say, that's definitely some 'pretty twisted logic.' But it's the truth. I'm very particular about what I listen to in the lab. Honestly, I prefer things from Billy Joel to Creed against the stuff I blast out all night long. But that kind of music just wont do what I need it to. It'll make you sad or happy, or maybe afraid, but it doesn't get your blood pumping and make you feel angry. And I've found, in this line of work, you've got to stay mad to stay together.
You can't get frightened of your work or life, or feel sad for the butchered bodies and mangled lives of the victims. Happy music is just ironically sickening and undoubtedly inappropriate for this place. Peaceful music wont change the violent crimes committed. I guess death can be peaceful, but the crap we get here is far from it. It seethes hatred and anger and something almost...evil.
The only way to fight it is to get angrier than the results of the nut-jobs in Vegas. It isn't easy, and it doesn't always happen, no matter what Grissom tries to feed you. His 'detachment from the crime' bull-shit doesn't keep him warm at night when all he can see behind his eyelids is blood and bodies. I like to think him griping at me is a way, if only a small one, for him to get rid of it. I like to think the sound of raging electric guitars helps ward off the raging madness.
I'll be honest. The messy hair and weird attire and arrogant attitude is all me. So maybe the arrogance is a little bit of a defense mechanism, but still, I got so tired of meeting so many stiffs and boring, normal people, that I decided to be anything like that. I wear funky clothes, purposely make my hair look like the leftovers of a hurricane, have a cocky piss-off attitude and I check out semen, blood and all other nasty things for a living. I like to think I've succeeded.
But the music isn't really for me, or even about me. Warrick grins as he passes by me, nodding at my stereo. He got used to it after awhile. Catherine just shakes her head. She just looks at it like she would something with Lindsey; it's an annoying part of younger generations that you get used to, or they grow out of. Sara ignores it. That's ok, I always turn it off to flirt with her anyway. Grissom tries to ignore it, until he wants to get something from me, or has just had enough. He turns it off then and I turn it right back on.
But Nick saw through it after awhile. He's the only one who's ever asked me. While the day-shift gives me dirty looks at the end of my shift, and the rest of my crew tolerates it, Nick asked me why. 'Why do you play you music so loud all the time?' And I told him.
I told him about the blood and the gore and the death and the futility. About how it wears at us, tears at us a little every day. And the music builds us back. Or maybe, in Grissom's case, his annoyance at me help fortify him against all else. If one part is devoted to reprimanding me, that's one less piece of him that stares gauntly at a dead body.
No one ever asks, and I never tell. There's no need to. It's a busy night tonight, and as Nick passes by, I know by his face he's reached a dead end on a bad case. A 'Godsmack' track suddenly comes onto my cd. I turn it up a little louder. He smiles and gives me a nod, going past without missing a step as the blaring beat floats through the halls.
And the music goes on.
So, there you go. I was reading a fic, and suddenly, I just wondered. 'Why does he always play his music so loud?' so I asked him, and this is how he answered. Please tell me what you think, even though I know it isn't great.