Disclaimer: I do not own CSI.
Notes: Please don't steal my follow up to the Atom Joke that Greg uses - I came up with that myself and I am rather happy with that thing. Have fun with it, but if you like it and are going to use it in a story, please ask first.
Also, please don't be insulted by the jokes cracked at Nevadan or Californian drivers – it's all made in good fun.
Warning: Nick/Greg pairing
-o—o—o-
The Atom that Walked into the Bar
Chapter 4
-o—o—o-
I nervously approach him, fiddling with my hands the entire time. He's half sprawled out under one of the large trees spotted across our campus. God, he still looks amazing to me, spotted with the sunlight that filters through the leaves, shirt just beginning to ride up as he naps on the grass.
My palms are sweaty (and steadily growing worse); I can feel the rest of my skin beginning to follow suit, adapting a light sheen to the paleness.
It's not that it's hot – Northern Californian weather is to die for (especially Palo Alto) this time of year. But Jeremy and I haven't been close lately- not like a couple.
I'm rightfully nervous because I'm about to break up with him.
I mean, we haven't kissed in something like two weeks (not that I'm one to count days, or anything). And it's not that our relationship is based on kissing (or the physical at all, though it certainly was nice while it lasted), it's just that I know something has changed.
When you've been close to someone for a long time, you know when you're pulling apart. You might fight it and deny it, but you still know it down in your heart.
And in my heart, I know that Jeremy and I aren't the same anymore.
I make it to his side without too many second thoughts (at least not enough to make me turn back) and sit down beside him in the grass. I just have to keep telling myself what I already know; we don't love each other like that anymore.
We've been the closest of friends for almost two years now, dating for half of one. There has never been anything the two of us couldn't share.
And now I'm going to share this.
"Hey, Greggy!" he says, suddenly sitting up onto his arms with a flurry of motion that surprises me. I hadn't realized he was awake and so fully aware.
I turn to look at him, placing a smile on my face that I'm not sure my heart's behind. I'm still so scared of hurting him, even though he's so strong.
And then his lips are suddenly on mine, soft skin brushing skin in a quick, chaste smooch that leaves me staring wide eyed at him as he pulls back.
Well, so much for that excuse.
"H-Hi, Jeremy," I reply back shakily, trying to find my footing again. This is what I was so nervous about. Jeremy's always been able to read me – to know exactly what I need and to be able to give it to me, even if it isn't what he really wants to do.
He's always about making other's happy and knowing just what is needed to get them there.
"Whoa," he starts out suddenly, sitting up more fully as if in all seriousness. His voice captures my attention as I turn to him, eyebrows knitting. "What's wrong?"
I frown further, not understanding what he means. But, then again, it's Jer, so he probably knows that something is wrong. Nevertheless, I still ask back, "What do you mean?"
"Well, you're wearing that expression – that 'Don't hit me with the newspaper because I'm wagging my tail really hard and trying to look really cute for you' expression," he replies longwindedly as I just stare. "Oh, that and you used my full name. You never do that."
Why couldn't he have just skipped the first half? He's always doing that! I sigh, though I'm not really irritated; it's always a bit of a cat and mouse argument between us (no pun intended). "Why does every look I give you have to be acquainted to a dog?"
Jeremy's grinning as he leans towards me. "Because you have such big," he kisses my right cheek- "brown," he kisses my left cheek- "puppy dog eyes." I moan slightly as he kisses me once more on the mouth, tongue just darting out to entice me further.
No! No! No! Remember why you're here. Remember that when you're not emoting desperate need for love and attention, you know Jeremy makes a better friend than love interest!
I've thought this all over a hundred times when I'm not around Jer. It made sense then, I know it still makes sense now: it just doesn't make sense when I try to make sense of it now.
It's that thing that always happens with Jeremy. His ability to always do the right thing at the right time (like kissing me just now – knowing I was craving that affection!) is what makes this so hard.
But Jeremy is still talking about my eyes and I tune back in. "-that are just craving attention...and a little bit of sadness..." he trails off in almost contemplative silence before picking right back up with the same vigor he's so well known for. "So, what's up?"
I stare at him for a moment, convincing myself that I really do know what I'm doing. I really have thought this over.
I love him, but I love him as a brother and a friend and a man I used to love.
"Well..." I begin shakily, gaining strength as I manage to convince myself that we both know this is coming to an end. At least, I hope he does. "You've heard the one about the atom that walked into the bar, right?"
Jeremy stares at me for a moment, nothing readable floating across his face but he does raise an eyebrow at me. He says and does nothing for such a long, singular minute that I begin to once more doubt my decision.
And then he suddenly grins, practically from ear to ear. "Yeah, I mighta heard of it."
I smile back a little. "Well," I say once more, nodding to myself to keep me going strong. I'm doing the right thing. "Say that atom decides to split and go to two different bars..."
I watch his reaction carefully. He raises an eyebrow at me, but it isn't in anything more than curiosity, so I continue, "Will there be a nuclear reaction?"
Once more he stares at me with no emotion that I can read. And then he blinks once, twice, and then several times rapidly, as if each time helps him process the idea I just threw out.
A chuckle escapes him, surprising me. And then a laugh. And then he keeps laughing. I stare in shock as Jeremy falls back to the grass, clutching his sides as he's racked with his mirth.
Jeremy is laughing himself to tears and I don't know if it was because I'm breaking up with him, or because I'm using the corniest science joke in the world to do so.
I like to think it's the latter.
When he's recovered, cheeks still wet and shining from what sun streaks through the big tree above us, he just grins at me.
It would be a 160-watter on my scale.
"Alright," he acquiesces with a bit of a nod. "No nuclear reaction, but I hope you know those atoms are maintaining a chemical bond."
"Only the strongest," I agree.
"Like the hydrogen bond!" he suddenly declares, giddily wrapping his arm around me. I glare at him, smacking him over the head with my own.
"You idiot! That's one of the weakest bonds in chemistry!" I hit him again for emphasis, insulted by the insinuation that our friendship could be so weak.
"Ow!" he whines, grabbing at his head. "Leave me alone, I'm a philosophy major!"
...That was my sophomore year; Jeremy's junior. We stay the best of friends through my senior year. Even though he's graduated, he comes to the grounds often – like today.
We lay opposite each other, our heads pressed together. His fingers are curled in my dark blonde hair, playing with strands as we stare up at the stars. It would be romantic if we weren't long over our relationship – me knee-deep in new one and he dawdling around with a possible.
"Hey Jer?" I turn my head even as he turns his. Our foreheads are pressed together as we glance at one another, him questioning and me searching. "What's the joke about the atom mean? I know it means something."
Jeremy just stares at me for a moment, the ghost of a smile playing over his lips. His fingers resume playing with my hair before he smiles fully and mysteriously replies, "You still don't now, Greggy?"
-o—o—o-
The midday sun wakes me from my dream first as it blinds me through my eyelids. I should have closed the blinds.
Not that it really would have helped, considering the pounding on my front door was the second thing to wake me up, and would have become the first by default had I been intelligent enough to close the blinds before falling asleep.
Actually, I don't remember falling asleep. I recall packing; it's all I've been doing for two days straight. Well, that and avoiding thinking about what I'm doing.
Speaking of such, someone is still hammering away on my door. Hard.
It's probably Grissom. He's been by here twice now. The first was to offer me my job back, which was more than he should have done. I'm sure he went through hell with Ecklie to do it, too.
And I didn't even apologize for switching to days in the fist place. I really should do that.
The second time he stopped by was with Catherine, who apparently dragged him along when she learned that not only had he failed to bring me back to the lab, but I was apparently moving somewhere as well.
She was less than happy about that, but I convinced her it was for the best, as was her silence towards the others.
But back to Grissom. I wonder what brings him this time.
Ruffling my hair (talk about bed head – how long have I been sleeping on the couch?) and stumbling around for a shirt (giving up, too – you'd think it'd be easy to find in an apartment full of nothing but boxes), I answer the door in nothing but rumpled jeans.
And meet face to face with Not-Grissom. Come to think of it, he's not the type to pound on a door.
Despite my embarrassment and deep red blush, I have to admit a bit of smug satisfaction that Not-Grissom (which you surely know by now is Nick Stokes) had his own flush and somewhat distracted gaze.
"Nick?" I ask, bringing his eyes back up. My grip on the doorknob looks to be about as white-knuckled as his grip on the doorframe. Best to make this quick before it gets awkward.
"Uh...you...you took so long to answer, I was afraid..." Nick trailed off, obviously having his thoughts jumbled within his own head and then jumbled some more by my state of appearance.
"I told you I wasn't going to do anything stupid again, remember?" I come back dryly, trying to make a joke of all of this. He doesn't laugh.
So much for saving us from awkwardness.
"Did you...er...need something?" I try again, deciding this time that I'll just keep it serious. Maybe pretend like it never happened? Yeah, like that ever works. And here I've been preaching all the time to drop the Romance Novel crap.
Nick just nods immediately, giving me the impression that whatever he wants to say is urgent. However, it looks like his mouth doesn't really want to work as well as his neck. "Look," he starts, just as shakily as I did, "I-"
I can hear the tightness in his own throat trying to choke him and briefly close my eyes. Enough. He shouldn't have to go through this – this that obviously pains him – because I fucked up.
Several times, actually.
"It's alright, I know what you're going to say, Nick," I interrupt, keeping him from having to continue. I allow the smallest of smiles to cross my features, though I think it's a pathetic excuse of the gesture. "You don't have to say it."
I can see that he's tempted by my offer, by the escape route that I'm giving him. He could take it and turn around, leave and never have to deal with the ache this all causes.
Which is what I'm trying to make him do. Some might say its selfless – it's not. Some might say it's pathetic – maybe. Honestly, it's purely selfish.
Seeing him in pain is painful to me and knowing what he's about to say is ten times worse. Part of me (most of me) doesn't want to hear it said out loud, because then it'll be true.
With his words they'll be no hidden hope left for me to feed on when I'm down and alone, hiding once more from my own truths.
But his eyes harden and grow cold with something akin to anger, much to my surprise. He shuts those beautiful brown eyes and gives his head a firm shake. "No."
He repeats it, as if it wouldn't go right through my head (and my chest) the first time, "No, you may know what I'm going to say, but I still need to say it!"
Well, I have to admire him for that. There's so much force and strength in his words that I can only nod and cast my eyes downward. I can't look him in the eye because I truly do know what he's going to say.
But that's fine, because he isn't looking me in the eye either.
He struggles to say it, grinding his teeth through a tightly clenched jaw. I give him all the time he needs – I've got nowhere pressing to be. "I'm sorry, Greg, but...I-I can't return your feelings...I...I don't feel that way."
That way. He doesn't say it with any sort of infliction in his voice at all, but I can still hear the disgust. It isn't that he's disgusted by it, not that I think anyways, but more so that he doesn't understand it and never could.
Not my straight-laced Texan boy.
And even when you know the words are coming, even when you convince yourself that you can handle them, they still hurt like hell. I keep my eyes down, focused on a particularly odd grain in the wood of my door, which is blurring in and out with the tears I am desperately blinking away.
I know why I'm crying but, as I told Nick, I also knew this was coming.
"But," he continues, enough emphasis on the word that I am forced to pay attention but not to hope. I still know what comes next, even without my Nana Olaf's psychic powers. (For those of you still tied to that desk, that was a joke.)
"But," he repeats, his voice having broken up in his first attempt to continue. There are tears in his eyes now too. "I still want you to live. You can call it selfish but-"
"I don't call it selfish." My interruption immediately stops him and I finally meet his eyes, trying to mask as much of my pain as I can. He doesn't need to see what he's doing to me right now. I don't need him to see what he's doing to me right now. "I understand, Nick. I really do, and I thank you for coming and telling me face to face."
I know it all sounds rushed and rehearsed (to you and to him, I'm sure). It is. I'm not good at on-the-spot interaction under the stress of emotions. The only time I could ever even half-ass it was with Jeremy.
And as I said with the half-ass comment, I still wasn't very good at it. It took me two weeks to script out how to break up with him.
Nick looks pained that all I have to say is that, but what did he expect? Should I tell him instead of the pain I now have at what he said?
Where would it get us, exactly, but right where we are.
"Greg, I-" Nick stops himself this time, another thing I wasn't expecting, as his eyes focused on something over my shoulder and behind me. I turn my head to trace his gaze and see nothing but boxes.
Oh.
"Are you moving?" His voice is suspicious – accusatory.
"Yeah, actually," I reply weakly, trying to keep my voice as normal and almost nonchalant as possible. I don't want to break down in front of him. I can't stand the thought of being lowered any further in his eyes. "Back to San Francisco."
His eyes widen and I can instantly see the pain of betrayal followed by the anger. The white-knuckled grip on the frame is back (not that it ever really went away). "Why?" he practically hisses as he leans forwards.
I can't help but pity him and I'm sure the sorrowful, regretful look shows on my face. And I'm sure he hates it. But I'm not going to hold it back – he needs to hear this just as much as I need to get it off my chest.
"Because this isn't a Disney movie, Nick. You want me to like you, but you don't want me to love you." I hold up my hand, forcing him to withhold his own interruptions. "That's fine. I'm willing to try, but I can't do it here – I've already failed once and look where it got me."
"I'll help you!"
"You're going to help me forget you?" I ask dubiously, allowing the cold sarcasm to drip into my voice. I watch him flinch. It's painful and hurtful to us both, but we need it.
We've been living in our own fantasy worlds; me believing I could live without him while still being with him (figure that one out) and he thinking that everything could be wiped away like a blackboard.
I'm not made of slate and my feelings aren't the consistency of chalk. I like to think I'm more substantial than that.
"Greg, you don't have to-"
"But I do, Nick." My voice is forceful. I'm not going to deal with this because I know that I can't handle it. I look away. All he would have to do is ask me to stay and look me in the eyes at the same time and I would be his.
But he wouldn't mean it. He wouldn't even know that he was doing it. Damn him and his Captivation Stare.
"I've made my decision. I'll come back in a few years, perhaps," I continue, nails all but digging into the doorknob now. "It'll be just like old times, if Grissom gives me my job back, of course."
Nick doesn't laugh and I'm not surprised. His jaw is clenched so tightly that I can see the veins beginning to stand out. Even his skin is beginning to tint red.
The regret begins to fill me like a faucet and a cup. I wonder how deep my glass goes and what will happen to me when it overflows.
I know that he is furious and, though I feel he has a right to be, I still can't help but be pained. This isn't how I wanted us to part ways.
Yet I stick out my hand for one of the most awkward handshakes in my life. His grip is numb at first and then bone-crushingly tight, as if he hopes to awaken me from all this by breaking my hand.
"You're just running away."
Those are the last words Nick Stokes says to me before turning around and walking away from my apartment.
I can't blame him, but it still hurts like hell.
"No, Nick," I whisper now to only myself. "I'm not running away anymore."
It's about five before the moving truck is completely packed (luckily, I don't have that much crap to pack up) and able to head out and six-thirty before I'm good to go. By now, I have to say, I'm feeling like complete crap.
I won't lie. I'd love to say that I was already on the mend – starting to heal, but it is waaaay to early for that.
-o—o—o-
The sun is heading towards the horizon, just beginning to sink behind the mountains. By the time I pack my own car up and climb into the driver's seat, the strip is cast in orange light, the multi-colored buildings turning deep shades of the light.
I'm on the road immediately and all at the end of Rush Hour. I used to live in California (and learned to drive there), though, so this really isn't anything. My only complaint is that people here can't drive worth crap. They just plain suck at it.
I mean, I know that they say Californians are crazy at driving, but that's just because they're aggressive – willing to weave back and forth, do so at high speeds, and deal with a lot of very frustrating traffic all at the same time.
But Nevadans can't do it. They don't know how to handle traffic and changing lanes with the efficiency of California drivers. Being one of the latter, it's a real pain in the ass to deal with and has sincerely affected me for the past eight years.
But now that I'm just getting used to it, I get to go back to California, where I'll be considered one of these completely wimpy drivers because I've adjusted to Nevada standards.
Though, I have to say, these roads are so much nicer. Las Vegas actually paves their streets. California pot-holes theirs.
It's the only state that could turn "pot holes" into a verb. Quite an accomplishment, I must say.
Okay, I admit that joke was pretty lame, wasn't it? I guess I should really apologize. If you're that poor person still chained to a desk (and, man, have you been there for a long time now) then you must not only be extremely bored and irate, but also feel ridiculously cheated.
I told you almost five weeks ago you wouldn't have to deal with me much longer, yet here I am, still bantering away.
I suppose if I'm a voice inside you're head, telling a story like the good little lab rat (who can't tell a good story if my life depended on it), then I'll eventually fade away when the story ends but, unfortunately, I don't know when that'll be anymore.
I thought it would be when my life ended, but...well, we all know how well that worked.
And I'm not going to be stupid again – I'm not going to end my story on my own. I'll let the writer do it however they see fit. Perhaps that'll be today, now that I've learned my lesson, confessed and confronted Nick.
So...I guess it might seem pointless, but I want to thank you. Having someone to talk to, even if I don't really know whether you're there or not; even if you can't answer back; it's been helpful.
Thanks for listening to me and my story. I don't know how it's going to end, but I've enjoyed telling it (and I didn't do that badly, right?), however long and boring it was for you.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
...You still there?
Damn.
I tried.
Okay, you've got me, I've no idea how to made it end, so I guess you're stuck with me in your head and you chained to that desk until my life ends on its own.
I hope you don't mind me narrating my story because I'm going to be around for a lot longer.
...Do me a favor and laugh at my jokes, though, however lame. Humor me, it makes me feel better.
Oh shit! Sorry, the asshole in front of me just cut me off. JERK! Hold on while I flip him off...Now that that's done...Jeez, this stupid guy in a white truck just weaved in front of me and I had to slam on my breaks to avoid him.
Not to mention because of him I pushed the wrong button on my iPod and got Metallica instead of Marilyn Manson. Now I'm really upset – never, and I mean Never take away my Manson.
Although, it reminds me of the one good thing that came from all this mess: now I no longer have to succumb to the evils of Country Music for Nick Stokes.
Score one for Sanders.
I smirk as Manson fills the car. Muuuuuch better.
The asshole in front of me is stepping on the gas to fly by the semi to the left of him (I'm hanging back – don't want to be in the blind spot of that big thing.) I shake my head to myself.
That guy is going to get someone killed with his insane driving. It's not Nevadan or Californian. It's Assholean.
He's weaving again (I suppose he would call it "changing lanes") in front of the semi. I think I'll pass him and the semi at the same time, get as far away from Whitey as possible.
I don't want to be anywhere near him. The last thing I need right now is an accident.
I know you need these detailed descriptions of my life (I'm stepping on the gas now, if you cared to know) but if you're stuck with me for the rest of it, I think I should try and make the best of it, right? (Passing the semi now.)
Oh fuck, the assholes back in my lane again! Shit, he's losing control of his vehicle – he must have hit another car when he merged. Hold on, this isn't going to be prett-
-o—o—o—
The Atom that Walked into the Bar
Chapter 4
End
-o—o—o-
If you didn't get the ending of this chapter: Greg is speaking directly to the reader. When he stops thinking, trails off, or loses consciousness his narrative stops.
Hence the chapter stopped.
Please review guys. I'm really proud of this story, and we're really really getting close to the end. I'd really love your reviews, your feedback, your thoughts!)