You Mentioned Her Name

Chapter Six: Take Out

by angellwings

It had almost been a week since she'd been in Texas. The day after the barbecue Nick, Warrick, and herself caravaned back together and, despite her protests, the guys helped her set up and move in. Warrick had gone back to work the next day, but Nick was off for the entire following week. He'd spent most of his at her place while the contractors repaired his attic and ceiling. Their relationship was back to where it had been in high school.

Best friends with an edge and a wish for something more.

It was Saturday and she started work on the upcoming Monday. Nick was due back to the lab on that day as well, and his house would be good as new by Tuesday. She had ordered dinner in while Nick went out to rent the DVDs. He'd picked out where they ordered from and she had picked out the movie. Which meant Chinese food and, her guilty pleasure, "I Know What You Did Last Summer". There was a knock at the door and she went to answer it. She assumed it was the Chinese delivery guy. Security had called and asked if they should send him up about ten minutes ago. She opened the door and was pleasantly greeted by Nick Stokes holding a brown paper bag covered in sporadic grease stains, and a white plastic bag holding two, thin, rectangular cases.

Melissa quickly grabbed the Chinese food out of his hands, and headed to her tiny half-kitchen.

"I ran into the guy downstairs and just went a head and paid for it." He told her as he set the plastic bag down on her glass coffee table, and walked over to the corner of the room where Melissa kept the TV trays.

"How much do I owe you?" She asked as she set it down on the counter, and separated her sweet and sour chicken from Nick's Chicken and stir fried vegetables. Both came with Fried rice and egg rolls, but Nick never ate his fried rice and she despised egg rolls. So they would trade, and she would save his fried rice for later.

"Don't worry about it." He said as he set up the trays, and made his way to the kitchen.

"Nick," She said in a reprimanding tone, "How much?"

"It's fine, Red, don't worry." He said with a light laugh.

"You can't pay for both the food and the movies. I won't allow it." She said as she handed him his take out container and the egg rolls, "By the way, you are still willing to give me your baby corn right?"

He grinned and nodded, "I'm not a big fan, so yeah. Besides it's a tradition, remember?"

"Good, the Chinese place in Maine never had baby corn. I feel like it's been forever since I had quality, Chinese take out." She said as she picked up her chicken and container of sweet and sour sauce and headed to the TV trays, "Theres beer in the fridge if you want one."

"Is that a hint for me to get you one while I'm over here?" He asked.

"Well, you do have one more free hand than I do." She said with a wink.

She set her food down on the tray and popped in the DVD. She went back to the counter just as Nick was setting down his food and the beers.

"If you had to go back to the kitchen why did I grab you a beer? You could have done that yourself." He whined half heartedly.

"I like taking advantage of your chivalrous side, okay? So sue me." She said with amusement as she grabbed one of the fried rice containers and headed back to the couch.

"I just might, but only because you're making me watch this cheesy ass movie." He said as he rolled his eyes at her.

"If they're so 'cheesy ass' then why did you rent the sequel, Sparky?" She said as she dangled the second case in front of his face, "Besides this is pay back for not letting me pay for my food."

"In that case, it's perfectly fine with me." He said as he flashed her those gorgeous Stokes dimples.

She glared at him, "You're only paying because you know it annoys me."

He nodded and smiled, "Yep."

"Evil," She muttered as the main titles started.

He nodded again, "Yep."

She shook her head and laughed, "Oh! I got a call from Tabitha today after her shift."

"And?" He asked in anticipation.

"She passed. She is now a CSI level 1." Melissa told him with pride.

"Way to go, Tabs. I'll have to call her before she goes in for her shift tomorrow and congratulate her." Nick said as he got a forkful of vegetables.

"She was stoked." Melissa said with a cliché waggle of her eyebrows.

Oh, yeah, I've never heard that before." Nick said sarcastically.

"Sorry, couldn't resist." She said with a chuckle, "Hey, do you mind if I fast forward? I want to get to the good stuff."

Melissa reached for the remote but it was snatched away by Nick, "No way, I paid for these rentals and we're watching the whole ridiculous movie."

"Yeah, but this part is boring. It doesn't get good until they hit the guy." She whined.

"No way. It's all or nothin', Darlin'." He said with his thick, Texan drawl.

"You don't even like this movie so what do you care?" She pouted as she tried to steal it from him.

He raised his eyebrows and held it high above his head, "Go ahead, Munchkin, get it if you can."

"I will win, I will." She said with a determined glare.

"Not this time, Little Red." He said stubbornly.

She stopped struggling to get past him and to the remote, and gave him the saddest, most pathetic puppy dog face she could muster, "Please?"

He clicked his tongue against the roof of his mouth and looked away, "I hate it when you do that."

"No you don't. You love it. Admit it. You secretly think it's extremely adorable." She said as he forked over the remote, "That's why it works every time."

"I hate you," Nick mumbled with a mock glare.

"Nuh uh, to quote the amazing Sandra Bullock, 'You think I'm gorgeous. you want to kiss me, hug me, and mar-"

Her song was cut short by a fork full of baby corn from Nick's vegetables. When she gave him a shocked look his only reply was, "You said you wanted my baby corn."

She began to chew and shrugged her shoulders. Little did she know how true that song actually was.

The phone rang, and Nick instinctively got up and answered the kitchen phone.

"Yello?" He asked quickly.

"Hey Dimples, is the Mrs. Home?" A playful female voice asked.

He laughed, "Hello to you to Angela."

Melissa perked up and craned her neck to see Nick in the kitchen, "That calls for me Nicky, don't you dare make her hang up."

"Can you hand the phone to Mel, please?" Angela asked patiently.

"I don't know, see, we're kind of having dinner at the moment." He teased.

"Okay, Mr. Confederacy, I will leave the two of you to you're oh so romantic evening as soon as you hand Melissa the phone." Angela said sarcastically.

Melissa stood up from the couch and moved to stand behind Nick as he held the handset. She glared at the back of his head, "Stokes, give me the damned phone."

He turned to face her and grinned, "You know on second thought, Angie, I think she went out. Yeah, yeah, we ran out of ice."

"The refrigerator has an ice maker, dumb ass." Melissa said with a grin and a roll of her eyes.

"She can't be out, I just heard her insult you." Angela said quickly as she called his bluff.

"Fine, Ms. Montenegro," He said as he attempted to sound cold, "I here she is."

"Aw, no hard feelings Nicky-boy, you know I still love you." Angela said with a chuckle.

"Yeah, yeah," He muttered dismissively as he tossed Melissa the hand-set. He sat back down as she began to chat away. Angela Montenegro was Melissa's room mate from her study abroad in Paris during the second semester of sophomore year. Angela, from what Melissa had told him, worked at the Medico Lab at the Jeffersonian Institute in DC. She handled facial and historical reconstruction and painted on the side. Melissa said she was trying to commission some of her paintings for the gallery. But did she have to try and arrange it now?

"Ang, I haven't even started my actual job yet, and believe me I have TONS of respect for Dr. Brennan, but there is no possible way that I can fly to DC to help you reconstruct a face and be back by Monday." He heard Melissa argue rationally, "Just e-mail me what you've got so far and I'll tell you what I think."

"I don't work with pencils and sketch pads any more, sweetie." Angela told her with a sigh, "And I doubt your computer can hold all of the data Temperance has given me."

"You don't use a sketch pad? Then how do you do it?" Melissa asked in confusion.

"The Angelator." She said simply.

Melissa grinned, "Nice name, must have taken a while to come up with." She said sarcastically.

"Ha ha, it's a holographic computer. I design the face using Brennan's measurements and then display them in 3-D." She said in a bored tone.

"Okay, you didn't build that." Melissa said in disbelief.

"No, my ex did, but I designed it AND it's patent pending." She said proudly.

"Well, if the data can't come to me, and I can't go to it then I'm afraid I can't help you, Angie." She said as she shook her head.

"Fine I'll let you get away this time, but next time I will not give up this easily." Angela said with a sigh, "I guess I'll let you get back to you're platonic dinner with the incredibly, hot, Texan ex-boyfriend."

Melissa ran her tongue across her front teeth in aggravation, "Give it up, Ang. It more than likely won't happen again."

"You don't know that." Angela said pointedly, "Why else would the boy be over there on a Saturday night? I hate to break it to you, honey, but he's still head over heels for you."

"I'll talk to you later, Angie." She said through gritted teeth.

"Yeah, okay, I get the picture. Call me tomorrow." Angela said as she hung up.

Melissa shook her head and sighed. She headed back to the couch and sat down beside Nick, "Sorry, she wanted my opinion on a skull she can't quite make sense of."

"Yeah, those skulls they can be a real problem." He said sarcastically just before his own cell phone went off.

She raised an eyebrow in his direction, "You'd better answer that."

"I know," He said begrudgingly as he stood up and walked back to the kitchen.

"Stokes." She heard him say into the phone, "Woah, yeah, boss, I'll be there right away. Nah, I understand. You can't be short handed when you've got that many bodies."

She heard him hang up and walk back over to the couch, "Save my food for me, will you? PD just found five bodies, and Gris needs me to come back a little early."

"Yeah sure, no problem." She said with a smile and twinge of disappointment.

"I'm sorry, Mel, I don't mean to ditch you, but . . ."

"Don't worry, it's fine. Go catch the bad guy." She urged him with a smile as she stood and walked him to the door, "I'll see you later."

"Do you want meet me and the gang in the morning for breakfast?" He asked her as he stood in her doorway.

"Sure, After your shift right?" She asked.

"Yeah, I'll call you when we leave the lab." He said as she watched him walk down the hall, "See you in the morning."

"Yeah, in the morning." She said with a forced smile and a sigh.

This was going to be an interesting adjustment. What with her best friend working through the night and part of the day (if he so chose), and her working from 9 in the morning to 5 in the afternoon. They'd hardly get to see each other, she thought as she closed her door.


Just a little filler, fluff chapter to move the time line along and establish what Nick and Mel are like together. What did you think of my slight "Bones" cross over? That's my other favorite crime show. Any way, I think the next chapter is going to be Tabitha centric. BTW there will be time jumps in this story simply because I want to get to other events in other seasons, but I will try to make the jumps very clear so there is no confusion.

angellwings