Author's Note: Again, apologies for the short chapter. But enjoy.
At some point, Greg fell asleep. He didn't remember falling asleep, he only remembered waking up to a buzzer reverberating in his apartment. And the cat was curled up on his lap. Brushing his new pet aside, Greg yawned and then winced as he stretched out his aching jaw muscles. He rolled his eyes before reaching up to rub the sleep from them and rose to his feet, hitting the intercom.
"Yeah?"
"Greg, it's me. Can I come up?"
He sighed. He knew he couldn't avoid Nick forever. "Fine," he said, and buzzed the Texan in. He leaned against the door and watched his cat, who was moving to the kitchen, as if expecting food. When Greg didn't follow, he poked his head out of the kitchen, almost accusingly.
"Sorry, I'm out of rotting meat," said Greg.
And moments later, as predicted, someone was banging on his door.
"Calm down!" Greg called, opening the door. Nick Stokes was chalk white as he looked at Greg, who stared back calmly. "What's the matter with you?"
He sighed, shook his head and shrugged in reply. "Can I come in?"
"I guess..." said Greg, stepping aside to allow him to enter.
Nick took long strides into Greg's living room as the younger man closed the door behind him. And then, at the end of his track, Nick turned to face Greg. "You're hurt," he noted.
Greg's hand flew to the bruise on his cheek. "Oh, yeah, um... Funny story, actually—"
"Was it the guy who stole your phone?"
"No," said Greg. "Just some prep-school kid with a bully complex."
Nick was breathing heavily, his shoulders rising up and down. It was clear that something was on his mind, but Greg couldn't figure out what it was.
"You really need to stop worrying about me," he told the Texan.
"You've been beat up twice in two days," said Nick. "Before that, you saw a woman get shot. I think I have every right to worry about you."
"Hey, the first time, I wasn't beat up, just mugged," Greg clarified. "And as for tonight, well, I was the one who sent him off crying, so I'd call that a good night."
"You call getting into a fight a good night?" Nick asked.
"I call winning a fight a good night, yeah," said Greg.
Nick was stern. "Are you sure you're OK?" he asked.
Greg saw a tinge of purple creeping up under Nick's collar. "Are you off?" Greg asked, looking at his watch.
"I'm on a break," he replied, a little too quickly.
He bit his lip. "Grissom sent you home for that bruise, didn't he? What happened?"
Nick tugged at his shirt and turned away from Greg. "It doesn't matter."
Greg frowned. "You obviously came here for a reason, and it wasn't just to check on me. I told you about my battle scars, now you tell me about yours."
When Nick turned back to Greg, his eyes were glistening. Then, he scoffed. "I was careless," he explained, "at a crime scene. And for about five seconds, some guy's hand was around my throat, and..." Greg's frown deepened, but he said nothing as Nick grasped for the words. The Texan shook his head and laughed, out of the sheer need for it. "I had precisely one thought. Just one."
"What?" Greg asked.
But whatever that thought was, Nick wasn't ready to divulge the inner workings of his mind. "Nothing, I mean... Greg, bad things can happen to anyone at a crime scene, OK? I just want you to know that what happened to that woman... It's not your fault that she died."
"But you just said that what happened to you occurred because you were careless..." Greg said quietly, feeling his heart leaping up into his throat and trying to ignore it. Why was it that Nick could always make him face things he never wanted to face? Maybe Nick could fix it. Maybe Nick could help. "I was careless, too."
Nick took a sharp breath but held it a moment, as if he didn't know what to say.
And that's when Greg realized that he couldn't make everything all better. Greg wasn't sure why he had believed, even for a moment, that Nick could solve his problems with a few simple words, but suddenly he understood that it was impossible.
"Unless there's something else..." Greg began, "I think you should go."
The cat trotted out of the kitchen and sat on the middle of the floor, swishing its tail again as it took in both Nick and Greg. The Texan looked from the cat to Greg.
"You kept it?"
Greg shrugged. "I don't know, he just kind of... hangs around."
"Did you name it?" Nick asked.
"Yeah," said Greg.
"What's it called?"
"Liver."
Nick frowned. "What?"
"Like the organ. Liver," Greg explained.
Nick looked back at the cat. "Kind of a gross name for a cat, don't you think?"
"He's kind of a gross cat," Greg replied. "I mean, look at him."
The feline was in the process of licking its paw when it began to wheeze. After a moment, it stopped, and a small ball of black fur tumbled from its mouth.
A wan smile graced Nick's lips. "I see what you mean." He faced Greg and his eyes were wide. He took a step towards the younger man, who instinctively stepped backwards and his back was against the door. Nick stopped. "We do what we can with what we got," he said. "And we make mistakes. But the fact of the matter is, we're still here. That has to be worth something, right?"
Greg swallowed to open up his constricting throat and his hand groped for the doorknob. He turned it and pulled the door open. "Are you done?"
Nick sighed, and nodded, heading towards the door. "I'll see you tomorrow?"
"You will," said Greg, and he closed the door behind Nick and leaned against it. Inch by inch, he shrank, his body sliding against the door until he was on the ground hugging his knees. Nick's words echoed in his head, and he thought of all the mistakes that had been made in his past, and not all of them were his own mistakes.
It was a mistake for Warrick to have left Holly Gribbs alone.
It was a mistake for Catherine to have placed that chemical next to the fume box.
It was a mistake for Nick to have gone to that false crime scene Gordon had set up.
It was a mistake for Grissom to have allowed Sara to become a target.
And it was a mistake for Sara to have left.
With the exception of Warrick's mistake, these were all nonfatal. But they were still painful. Even he had managed to survive his own mistakes. He tried to pinpoint when it had all began to go wrong. It wasn't the lab explosion. That had rattled him, but if he'd have just gotten over it, he could have handled things in the lab. No, it must have been when he had made the move to field work. He had underestimated how dark and dangerous the real world was outside of a sterile lab.
Fatal mistakes. Warrick had made the fatal mistake.
Greg wondered if their old friend had been on Nick's mind when the Texan talked about being strangled earlier. They never talked about it. No one ever talked about it. Because talking about it would be acknowledging his absence. And Nick couldn't do that. Ever since it happened, Nick had been unhinged. Sharper, more withdrawn, distracted by his job... His protection over Greg had definitely grown, and it bothered the younger man, especially as he couldn't understand why. Maybe Nick believed that with Warrick gone, Greg was all he had left.
Liver padded quietly over to Greg and rubbed against his knees, meowing imploringly for food. Greg reached out dazedly, mechanically stroking the course, patchy fur as his mind tried to digest everything that seemed to be going on wrong in his life.
It could all be linked to one, simple thing: he tried too hard to be the hero. Camellia had been right after all.
But had she been right about everything?
Greg's eyes focused on the hall that led to his bathroom and knew exactly what lay beyond the closed door. Drugs. Most of them, fairly harmless. If he was careful, Valium could be fairly harmless, too. If he was careful. And Greg was always careful.
Valium was used to treat anxiety and Greg was anxious. Technically, he was just filling a need. Any doctor would have said the same thing. It was the most logical decision. He looked at his cat.
"What do you think, Liver?"
The cat did not reply.
"I don't think it could hurt, either."
He rose to his feet and sighed before making his way to the bathroom and opening the door. He saw himself in the mirror again, the shiny new bruise on his cheek a constant reminder of the price of chivalry. He scoffed and opened the mirror to see the orange bottle staring at him, tauntingly.
It's one little pill, Greg reasoned with himself. Maybe it'll help you sleep better. Distract you a bit. Calm you down.
He chewed on his lip. He knew the drug had a chance of being addictive, but he was only going to take one pill, this one time anyway, so he didn't need to worry about that. And the fact of the matter is, there were plenty of worse drugs out there than Valium that he would never touch. Lyle was worse off, with the cocaine. No. Valium was harmless. One pill was harmless.
He took out the bottle and uncapped it, and a tiny pill fell into his open palm. He stared at it, with the tiny V in the middle of it, before replacing the bottle in the cupboard behind his mirror. He tossed it in his mouth and downed it with a glass of water. He stared at himself in the mirror. He waited for the drug to take effect. He knew from experience that it would happen fast.
He made his way towards his bedroom and turned off all the lights, making sure, first, that his blackout curtains were tightly drawn. He put his cell phone on the end table and crawled into his bed, staring at the wall.
Soon enough, colored swirls began to dance across the plane white surface he concentrated on, reminding him of shooting stars or some cosmic parade. Time became irrelevant and he became intensely fascinated with the wall. He closed his eyes tight then opened them again and saw the explosions of spots spatter the wall as if he had thrown paint at it. A small smile crept onto his face as he exhaled, rolling onto his back and closing his eyes.
There was nothing he needed to be doing, and no one he was particularly worried about. Everyone was perfectly capable of taking care of themselves, and he understood that now, with a strange clarity he hadn't had before. If Nick was upset about Warrick, well, he would deal with it. It didn't concern Greg. In fact, nothing concerned Greg. Not when he was in the warm, comfy folds of his Valium high.
His mind was still fairly coherent. He could string thoughts together, but he couldn't focus on them for long. He tried to concentrate on his breathing, which seemed slower than normal, but again, this didn't concern him.
Greg liked not having concerns.
There was a ringing that echoed in his head and it took him a moment to be able to figure out that it was actually coming from his cell phone and not his imagination. He lazily reached for his phone, unsure of how long he had been lying on his bed. His arm felt heavy, and moving was becoming increasingly difficult.
He held the phone to his ear. "'Lo?" he greeted.
"Greg?" came an ethereal voice from the other end.
"Who's this?" he asked, curiously, although it could have been a serial killer and he wouldn't have cared.
"It's Sara. I heard you had a little trouble at a crime scene the other day. I just wanted to make sure that everything was OK with you. Also... you haven't called me in a while..."
"Oh yeah..." Greg mumbled, stretching out his facial muscles. "S'on my ta-do list."
"So how are you?" Her voice echoed in his ears.
"Good, good," he said. He felt as if he were talking much slower than her, but shrugged it off. "Got a cat. You like cats?"
"Cats are OK..." she replied. "What's its name?"
"Name's Liver."
"Like the organ?"
He smiled. "Yup."
He heard her sigh. "But you're doing alright, then?"
"Never better," he said honestly.
"You sound... a little odd."
"Sleepy..." Greg said with a yawn. "Caught me at a..." He forgot to finish the sentence, until Sara probed him.
"Bad time?"
"Funny time," Greg corrected. "Just... it's funny. You'd laugh."
"Then tell me," she urged.
He rubbed his eyes and a grin spread across his features. "How's Frisco?"
"Sunny," she replied.
"Hope you're having a good time..." he mumbled. And he meant it. "Frisco is fun."
"Are you sure you're OK?" Sara asked. "Last time we talked, you were still bitter about the whole thing..."
"Aw, I've no reason to be, that was stupid," said Greg. "You're just looking for what makes you happy, right?"
"... Right..." She seemed slightly confused. "You sound really tired. Maybe it would be better if I let you get some sleep."
"K," Greg said. "Whatever works for you, Sar..." He yawned.
"OK, Greg. I'm glad you're OK. And you sound happy. That's good."
"Yup," Greg agreed.
"I'll talk to you later," she said, and then there was a click.
Greg was still holding the phone to his ear. It took effort to consciously put down the phone and he closed his eyes, listening to his breathing, his mind completely blank. It was a relief not to be able to think. Greg surmised that if someone had asked him to go skydiving at that moment, he would jump at the chance. What was the danger in skydiving anyway?
Sooner or later, he grew rather tired, and he found his lids growing heavy. He hadn't moved in what felt like hours, because it felt like too much of a hassle. Instead, he stared at his bedroom ceiling and tried to remember what stars looked like. He painted constellations in his mind, and none of them were correct, but it was his own personal Zodiac, and it was brilliant. Works of art materialized in his mind, creative animals adorned the sky above his bed, and one even bore a striking resemblance to Buddha. But in the morning, Greg would not remember the masterpieces he had created in his mind.
And soon enough, he was fast asleep and dreaming of stars.