The Long Road Home

Note and Disclaimer: I obviously don't own the character to C.S.I., but the character of Maggie O'Keefe DOES belong to me, so if want to use her, please email me with permission. This is, also, a story without the Nick/Greg slash and it's very different. It's VERY cheesy, but I need opinions. Thank you!

Prologue: January 3, 1991

This has been such a great holiday season. I can't believe that she's going away again, so soon. But we'll have her back come June and finally be a family, together, again. She'll be happy here, with us, and not with those people she's hated for years.

Las Vegas Officer, Michael J. O'Keefe, stood looking out the tall, lanky windows of his living room out into his backyard, listening to the sounds of Las Vegas beyond his residential neighborhood. His wife Julie was sleeping next to him in the rocking chair that became the highlight of the room, a center spotlight of the skylights above. It was a scene of peace and tranquility, but his world was far from the picture people might peek into.

It was late, around midnight, and their children – ages sixteen, twenty-three and twenty-four, respectively – slept soundlessly upstairs in their bedrooms, all living together because of the need for each other. Their grandson Robert, who had been born just barely two months ago, slept in his portable crib next to him, deaf and motherless. The poor child's mother, his eldest son's wife Helen, ran from the hospital as soon as the child was diagnosed with a hearing-impairment. It had been a day after he was born and the woman was either frightened or angry about the child, running off erratically as soon as she could. Helen was not seen or heard from ever since and her marriage to his son was considered null and void afterward.

The retired Las Vegas cop – still tall, handsome and peppering white in his thick black hair at age fifty-eight – reflected upon the life that he has had to deal with ever since he had met up Julie, the love of his life. As he stood daydreaming at the windows, he pictured the scenes and smiled. He and his wife had met back east, in a Connecticut college, in 1956. She has been the twenty-year-old stubborn, independent woman who had refused all advances and offers of marriage. She wanted to prove, to all at the college and to her very conservative family, that she too could receive a college education and land herself in a career and full-time job. She didn't want to be washing dishes, having children and playing housewife her whole life. She wanted a life of her own.

And Julie did. The equally stubborn and persistent Michael hounded her for years. He even accepted the offer of friendship from her for a while, knowing that it might be all he could get out of her. But he never gave up. It was only after nine years after meeting, and seeing each other through their conflicting careers (Julie had completed her degree in Library Science), that they married and settled down. Later the next year (1965), their first son, Christopher, was born, and the following year it was Eddie. The children kept both parents busy, but it was Julie – who had feared being tied at the house – that took care of them. Michael was constantly working and his income seemed to hold the family together financially.

Their lives, staying conservative, sheltered in a tightly-knitted community and away from the crime that Michael fought, were on the move always, traveling from one state to the next as Michael was promoted and locked to his desk. Julie and Michael were not happy to be moving their sons around constantly, but it had to be done so Michael could have a job. Even though Julie contemplated restarting her career as a librarian, Michael calmed her and reassured her that someday, the family will settle in someplace more stationary. He kept that promise eventually.

It was only after their only daughter, Margaret, was born in 1974 that Michael decided to move as less as possible and try to settle down as chief of police someplace, but it was not to be. In the following short years after Margaret (who preferably dubbed herself Maggie) was born, the family noticed that she had been acting strange, in the sense that it wasn't the conservative norm. A wild personality from the start, the child rose academically by the age of five, but was also highly reclusive. She looked like a normal child, but was small for her age with the same black hair as her brothers and the pale, gaunt features of her mother. But what Michael found that wasn't normal was how she would stay in her room for hours on end, rocking back and forth in Julie's rocking chair, cutting her wrists with any sharp object and not talking or eating for hours. Maggie had never even displayed any of her feelings of affection except on those rare occasions when he or Julie needed help.

Even then, Michael thought as he looked back at his sleeping wife, she was quiet. It was like she had a life on her own and we were just people who lived in close proximity with her.

Christopher and Eddie had protected Maggie, of course, but it wasn't enough to make her stop this strange behavior. When she started Kindergarten, she was pushed further to the edge. Her teachers had no idea what her problem was, her fellow peers shunned her because she was so strange and every doctor she was taken to could not tell the frantic parents what was wrong with their child. They shrugged their shoulders, explaining that the child might be better locked up. "She might be a danger to society and to her fellow students," one had said, echoing an opinion that a teacher at the school had given to the parents. "It might be best to put her into an institution and be done with it."

What a nightmare it had been. Michael remembered the day one of the neighbors suggested that Maggie be tested by a psychologist instead of a regular doctor. He and Julie immediately went in search for one (at the time they were living in San Diego), and when they did find one, they drove Maggie there. What was diagnosed was much worse than they had accepted. Maggie had depression, a "major case", which was explained to Michael as "a chemical imbalance in her brain", etc, etc. It also meant that she had to be admitted to a hospital for examination and schooling. Maggie was to be allowed home for short periods of time. She was not allowed visitors unless there was permission.

Michael remembered the day Maggie was to leave home to the institution: September 14, 1980. It tore Julie apart when she had to separate herself from the silent child, sobbing and saying, "She can't go and she can't leave us!" Michael had to reassure her that it was for Maggie's own good and that she will get better, as he had so many times before.

The final straw came at the airport, where Julie and Michael, both in tears, said goodbye to Maggie. It had, indeed, taken so many attempts to pry the sobbing mother off of the stoic child, but Julie eventually let go. Maggie stood there, stoic still, and just followed the social worker, who took her by the hand and led her to the group ahead. The institution, situated in Portland, Maine, was too far to travel for the parents and they didn't have the money to visit Maggie anytime they could.

Every year afterward, Michael had looked forward to Maggie visiting home and would tell everybody in whatever force he worked with about her and what fun they could have when she came back to whatever home was. He could even count the number of days in his head: the second weekend in March, Maggie's birthday on April sixteenth (it didn't matter what day of the week it was), the last weekend in June, any family day trip in August, Halloween (again, it didn't matter what day of the week it was), Thanksgiving weekend and Christmas vacation, which usually lasted until the Monday after the first weekend in January.

At first, Michael felt as if he, too, would have been sick and clingy for his daughter, but, a week after she left home, he received letters from her and progress reports from her counselors and teachers at the institution. Later, he and Julie were sent pictures of Maggie, drawings she drew of her frustration and reports and projects she created and concepts she mastered as the years went on.

The child was still advanced for her years. Her letters home were, at first, full of dull details of her activities and what she had learned. Her lettering was fully developed and her words too scientific to understand. As the years went on, however, she opened up to her father through these letters and shared her many interests, downgrading her words and talking more of herself and what she loved to do. Maggie surprisingly developed a keen interest in football, cooking, gardening and playing instruments, drawing her notes and then playing favorites songs of her brothers'. She developed into a lovely teenager and lost the pale, thin face of her childhood years. She grew her black hair out and gained enough weight to play football with Eddie and Christopher. Her brothers enjoyed her visits so much and put over her a shell of love she never knew before: brotherly protection and public intimidation when she was threatened.

Michael and Julie were even amazed, as Maggie developed herself outside of her family, that she was growing out of her shell. She had fewer and fewer nights she spent in her room, smaller scratches on his wrists and more times she talked to people, more times she uttered some noise. Michael smiled to remember the day, Christmas Day 1985, when Maggie hugged him and Julie and said, "I love you." That night in bed, Julie cried to think that her little girl, the one that had never spoken, had told her parents that she loved them.

But the recent years had brought Maggie home more and more than the usual restricted vacation times because the institution thought her ready. By the end of the school year in June, she was going to transfer and enter a real high school for her senior year in September, something that Michael was looking forward to. Just to picture her in high school was terrific (Maybe with some friends?) and to see her in a real cap and gown at her graduation was going to be amazing.

Michael's thoughts were suddenly disrupted by a loud noise outside the window he was standing next to, which sounded like a gunshot to him. He jumped and acted quickly, intuitively peering through the windows carefully to the backyard beyond the deck, where the noise was coming from, and saw nothing but the moving shadows from the streets lights and the usual car lights moving to and fro the streets, something not unusual in Las Vegas. Moving from the window and turning to face the other side of the room, he noticed that Julie stirred from her sleep and sat up, taking her feet off the footrest.

"Michael, what was that?" she asked, obviously frightened. Julie always remembered the horror stories of violence in big casino and gambling cities like Las Vegas. She constantly had Maggie shadowed by Christopher and Eddie (who, she was proud, carried brass knuckles and throwing knives just in case of any attacks on her only daughter) when she went out and was always afraid for the safety of her family. She was also eager and enthusiastic on the idea of moving away from the big city and always kept a gun, an heirloom of her family's, beside her at all times. Michael noticed that she even carried it with her indoors and saw it, winking at him on the floor under the rocking chair.

"Nothing, Julie," Michael answered slowly, calmly. "I didn't see anything outside."

Something was not right, though. The family dog, Freckles, usually barked at loud noises like that. The faithful dog, who sat in his doghouse under the oak tree in the backyard by their small creek and bridge, is always sensitive to things such as that. The dog went as far as to watch Maggie above him, who always climbed that oak tree to dizzily heights when she was upset.

Another loud noise outside had Julie jump to her feet. It almost sounded as if it was –

The window shattered as gunshots erupted into the living room.

Michael moved quickly again and pushed his wife to the ground, protecting her from the deadly spray. She started screaming just as Robert woke up to shriek, feeling the vibrations and rolling himself away from the glass. Laying in a fetal position in his crib, the baby stayed on the far end of the crib.

Michael was worried for the child, but he had more pressing matters to attend to. Who the hell would harass us at this ungodly hour? He still stayed over his wife, making sure that she was safe and not hurt by the glass. He knew, however, that if he checked on his grandson, that he himself might be a good target to whoever was outside.

Events conspired quickly enough. Michael, over this entire ruckus, heard footsteps in the house, which were coming down from the front on the house. They were light and quick, so he knew who the person was. He saw, through the window that divided the living room and kitchen, that it was only Maggie, as he had thought previously, crossing over to see what happened.

Maggie, go back upstairs, stay with your brothers, please go Maggie! That was Michael could think through this episode, thinking of his daughter's safety and what the hell was going on. Then, he heard her small, childlike voice, a strong indication that she was going to get hit and be a good target to the intruder, "Mom? Daddy? What's –"

The back door, situated in the hallway next to the living room, suddenly collapsed from some extraordinary strength. Maggie, sensing danger as she entered the kitchen, ducked her body in the room and hid herself under the table behind a chair, only catching a small glance of the man who came in, dressed all in black and wearing a dark ski mask. From under the table, she wanted to get a better look at their intruder, but knew that any noise or stupid actions could get her hurt or killed.

But to Maggie, it was worth the gamble for her life, a life that she had to build up because of how she acted and thought. She peered from the chair she was hiding behind, moving as silently as possible so that she couldn't be seen. The man was build like her brothers, muscle-like and heavy. He was tall…swift moving…

He also held a gun.

Maggie felt like she as in slow motion and that the few seconds that pasted were but hours. The man, lifting the safety off his gun, walked towards her parents, who were still stunned on the floor of the living room and covered with glass. Robert was still shrieking in his crib, unaware of what was going to happen next. He still was laid in his corner of the crib.

Oh no, Robert! Maggie thought. But she knew it was too late to save her nephew, or even her parents for that matter. Maggie closed her eyes as she heard some fighting, screaming and struggle and then noise: one…two…three…four shots. There was silence.

Maggie still kept her eyes closed.

She heard footsteps…she felt the chair in front of her move…she sensed somebody standing over her, she couldn't tell who it was. What it the killer? Was it her parents who might be alive, her brothers here to save her from this nightmare? Whoever it was, he or she seemed to whisper a simple phrase, something that would haunt Maggie for many more years to come. "I'll come back for you."

It was all Maggie could remember before she passed out completely. She let the darkness take her over.