Chapter 9-I turn my collar to the cold and damp
Once again, Gil Grissom was dreaming. The past twenty four hours had finally drained enough energy from him that sitting still for more than ten minutes caused him to nearly collapse. But this time it was different. The haunting dream that infected his sleep was replaced by a new, even more frightening illusion.
It began much in the same way the first did. His father, Roy, came bounding in the front door with a large suitcase, but he didn't look the same. When he left, Roy was a healthy, middle aged man. Two years later, he looked like their near invalid neighbor. And he didn't smile the evil smile that has plagued Grissom's dreams since childhood.
Gilly, who was starting to get tired of the name, looked much different as well. His sandy brown hair was beginning to curl at the ends, as if he had been hanging his head out the car window for too long. His thick, misdiagnosed glasses were replaced with thinner frames, proving that his eyes weren't the size of magnifying lenses.
His mother still retained her youthful appearance. She was happy to see her husband, but cautious upon approaching him. She did not fear his anger, she feared his touch. Any sudden movement he made caused the both of them to jump in alarm. It was like walking on the edge of a balcony with random gusts of wind.
A week or so later and the same on-edge feeling persisted amongst the family. Dinners were always quiet, with not so much as a glance between Gil and his father. He often looked to his mother, though, searching for some inclination as to how long he would stay this time. But she barely looked up from her plate as well.
One night Roy decided to talk to his son. Being in and out of the home since Gil was two had never really given them a chance to bond. But tonight was going to be the night, or there would be no more opportunity for either of them to get to know each other.
So they sat in the living room for twenty minutes without saying a word. The blank walls were not as bare as the blank expressions that narrated their faces. The seconds ticked by in pure silence. If Gil wanted to know what Mom dealt with every passing minute of her life, the silence between him and his father surely answered it.
Finally, Roy broke. "Look, Gil," he began, "We have to get over this. You're my son, and I want to get to know you better. I've missed you and your mother, and-"
"And what? You want to come home again? You want to try and make us a normal family? You've had your chance, Roy, and every time you've managed to screw it up," Gil shouted, his face reddening with anger. Roy looked down at his feet and sighed. But he couldn't give up hope now.
"You know, when you were born, I thought to myself 'He's the most perfect baby I've ever seen. A little small of course, but just wait till he's older. He'll probably shock the hell out of everybody.' I still think that, Gil. You're the smartest kid I know, and I'm sure you didn't get that from me. I've often wanted to just come home and have an old-fashioned game of catch with my son, but I know now that's never going to happen."
Roy ended his soliloquy and slumped back on the couch, a broken, excommunicated loner whose only friend was a bottle sitting in the refrigerator. His eyes looked tired, along with the rest of his body.
Gil wrenched his hands in nervous caution, thinking about what to say next. A wrong word could cause a ripple effect of arguments that can only escalate into something violent. He was in enemy territory now.
He looked towards the door. This could be his only chance for escape. Gil had to leave, he had to find Mom, he had to get as far away from his father as possible. But how?
Roy's eyes darted back and forth as he followed Gilly's line of vision. He could see where this was going. There was only one final chance to set things right. But how?
Gil stood and made towards the door as Roy began to protest. They were both on their feet, each wanting to put in a final word, but not daring to interrupt the other. Suddenly Gil turned around once more and raised his hands
"We don't have a football."
Grissom jumped as a hand was placed on his shoulder, tapping lightly, not sure if it wanted to wake him or not. He turned his dozing face to Catherine Willows as a beam of sunlight hammered into his eyeball. I get the picture, I'm awake, dammit!
Yawning, he checked his watch. 11:32 in the morning. Less than four hours of sleep in the past 38 hours. It felt like he hadn't slept at all, and the dream was nothing more than a figment of his imagination. Was he dreaming of sleep?
"Morning, Sherlock. I figured that instead of the usual cocaine you could work on this kid's case to pass the time. How does that sound?" she asked, unusually cheerful despite the ungodly hour. Catherine slapped the manila folder on Grissom's knee while retrieving his glasses from their resting place on the floor.
"Holmes took cocaine because of boredom, if you remember correctly. And besides, I would've passed the time with a little more sleep, but that's out of the picture now. What are you-" He stopped mid-sentence as he remembered where he was.
Bare, white walls. Machines steadily beeping. People running back and forth. Sterilization. Shouts of anguish, tears of joy. Redemption and Hell.
He was in a hospital. Doctors were bustling about trying to answer patient's needs, while Lysol was busy attacking his nostrils. It smelled a lot like the lab. Yet it made him think: At one end there were people dying, at the other, some proud parents are having their first child. Two very opposing extremes.
But Jack was in Limbo.
He lay on a small bed in a very small room guarded by a lone officer. Straps held his arms in place while thick bandages covered the skin. His face was ridiculously pale, to the point that he almost looked blue. And he was cold. Icy cold.
Jack was neither dead nor alive. He breathed, but not on his own. Tubes ran in and out of him like an intestinal maze, while blood circulated from a plastic bag dangling three feet above him. He was the definition of a bionic man.
"Jesus, what did he do?" Catherine asked, noticing the machinery that pulsed steadily at a high octave. She picked up his chart lying at the foot of the bed and glanced over it. "A spring? How can anybody commit suicide using a bed spring?"
"Ask him when he wakes up. He's certainly a very resourceful kid," Grissom replied, recalling his own brush with death only hours ago. It was true, though; Jack would win the award for most unusual suicide method.
Opening the file, Grissom poured over the dozens of pictures that made up the bulk of the folder. Gruesome scenes of blood spatter and bits of brain matter had congealed on the thick concrete floor, leaving the dark red shadow of a young man who was not much older than Jack. The body of Tyler Benson lay at odd, random angles that were impossible for any normal human to bend to without snapping a limb. Grissom had never seen anything like it.
Catherine was busy looking over Jack's history, stopping occasionally to glance at the pictures. As far as she could tell, he had been a normal child (or as normal as he could be under the circumstances); there was no history of depression or any serious mental disorders. He made average grades at a school that could probably care less about him. Yes, Jack could be considered the poster-child of urban adoption.
But there was something strange about him. Jack's counselors have often described him as 'anxious' and 'fidgety', once to the point of testing him for Tourette's Syndrome. He has expressed on numerous occasions the feeling of guilt, yet there was no apparent reason for it.
Other than the evidence filed last night, there was not much the team could work with. The hair had been run through DNA, but there was no record in the database. There were no useful fingerprints they could use to prove or disprove Jack's innocence, and his little…remark didn't help his case much either. It was impossible to go back to the scene now; the only thing they could rely on was pictures.
It was an average office with average gymnasium equipment. Soccer balls and baseballs lined a wall, while a championship football had a space all to itself. Grissom stared at the football for a few moments, thinking wildly about past events.
The day his father died. Suddenly the vision was clear in his mind again. Every detail was as plain as when he was there. The radio was on again, playing a haunting tune that was nearly banned from the station after they played it.
Gil went in search of Mom, never stopping to think how horrible the rest of the day would unfold. Instead he found his father standing in front of a bathroom mirror. In one hand were two small, white pills that were no bigger than grains of rice; in the other he held a tall glass of water, swirling the clear liquid in the glass, preparing to down it. Gil stepped forward.
"What are those for?" he asked, indifference flooding his voice. Roy snapped his head in Gil's direction just as the glass reached his lips. A flash of anger darted through his eyes, but was instantly replaced with the same forlorn expression first seen only a week ago as Roy returned from wherever he went.
"It's nothing; just for headaches." Gil shrugged his shoulders as he turned to go, catching the last bit of the song before it became inaudible:
Yes, I'm lonely…Want to die…
An hour later Gil returned to the living room, creeping in slowly as not to disturb his father. It was known that Roy was a heavy sleeper, and often slept through Mom's Revielle of an alarm clock. It was as if he could completely turn off his senses while he slept and forget about the rest of the world. If only it was that easy.
Gil sat in an armchair that easily engulfed him. The day had gone by in a blur, as if Father Time was trying to erase the day of its existence. For all Grissom could care, Father Time can do whatever the hell he wants with it. July 17th. If only it wasn't there.
Mom had been mixing drinks in the kitchen for the past twenty minutes. Alcohol was not her favorite drink by choice, but since Roy returned, she often went for it over the usual glass of water. She was a different person when he was here. If only he didn't return.
The rest happened very slowly, like a slideshow. Mom came in with the tray of drinks and attempted to wake Roy, but he never moved. She flipped the light switch a number of times, tapped his forehead (something he abhorred), shook his arms. But there was nothing. She stopped shaking him for a few seconds, grabbing at Roy's wrist, growing impatient as she failed to find what she was looking for.
She dropped his wrist long enough to tell Gil what to do, but Gil wasn't there. He had gone automatically into the bathroom, searching for the medication Roy had taken earlier. Mom was the only one who took regular medication, but she kept it upstairs in her dresser. There was only one prescription bottle left sitting on the sink.
An empty bottle of Vicoden. 500mg. As Gil turned to leave, though, he noticed sitting on the hamper a single, brand-new football.
If only…if only…
The next time Grissom awoke, it was to the sound of blaring machines and high-pitched alarms. Catharine was shaking him much more violently this time, screaming into his ear, doing her best to wake him up. Grissom was visibly startled by her hands, shoving them away and sliding his chair back a few paces. Satisfied, she ran out the door.
It didn't assimilate instantly that something was wrong. Grissom heard it, but nothing registered. He looked back and forth as a light in the hallway blinked rapidly, tossing beams of red rays all over the floor, splashing nurse's faces with demonic orange hues.
Suddenly his mind clicked and he was in the hospital again, shaking the sleep from his eyes. He turned to the right, only to find the source of the confusion and chaos.
Jack was convulsing uncontrollably, flailing his arms, trying to be free of the straps that bound him to the bed in case such an episode as this occurred. His eyes were ablaze with both panic and fever, while his head darted back and forth. The heart monitor was beeping madly, along with every other alarm in the hospital.
Both occupants of the room were terrified. They shared a common fear, though; Jack for his own life, Grissom for Jack's. The animation in the room was electric, alive with machine and human energy. Movement was all over the place. They both just wanted to yell 'stop', but at totally different things.
It wasn't a normal seizure, though. In most, brain activity runs off the chart, but Jack's was very flat, seldom varying above or below the danger lines. To contrast this, his heart rate was running in circles, the thick green line shaking as if in an earthquake.
The bed was beginning to creak from the constant tugging by the straps. Hinges were popping left and right, while blood was beginning to seep through the bandages. Thick scarlet spots dotted his arm while beads of sweat streamed down his face. Jack was going to explode from the inside.
It was a dangerous thing to do, but Grissom had no other choice. Grabbing Jack by the shoulders, he pushed nearly all his weight on the young man's thin frame. Seconds passed with nearly no result, but gradually the spasms began to slow. After only a minute, they stopped completely. Jack carefully opened his eyes.
"What was that all about?" asked Grissom, cautiously undoing the straps. Jack shook his head, trying to be rid of the intense weight he felt behind his eyes. He felt the enormous pressure covering the rest of his body, especially in his arms. Try as he might, he couldn't raise them. Slowly, he fingerspelled everything.
"I was scared."
Doctors came rushing in, but stopped at the door, relieved to see that everything was under control. It was too early in the morning for anything such as this. Catherine shoved her way past them and sat next to Grissom, reminding him of their earlier conversation.
"How'd you do it, Jack?" Jack took his time, trying to remember every detail. His blue eyes searched the room, as if watching the events on a screen.
"I kicked out a few of the bedsprings, found the sharpest one, and went to town." Fine time to tell jokes. Grissom repeated his phrase for Catherine's benefit, causing her to snicker. She was beginning to like this kid. He could teach Grissom a thing or two about his sense of humor.
They chatted for a few minutes more about random things; school, work, family. All three gradually began to warm up to each other, though careful not to touch on any personal subjects. Grissom was especially careful not to ask about Jack's name again. When the conversation was beginning to wear thin, Grissom asked about the day Tyler Benson was murdered.
"I cleaned everything like I usually do with this brush that's older than dirt; hardly any bristles on it. You'll have better luck with a paper towel than with that thing. Anyways, I made sure there wasn't anything I missed, and then left."
"Was anyone else there?"
"I waved to Brian before I turned off the lights. That's about it."Jack was beginning to gain use of his hands again, speeding up the conversation and adding a bit more color to his face. The blood that dotted his bandages was now beginning to darken as it congealed under the cloth. Jack's probably going to need new stitches. Catherine asked if he would tell a little more about Brian.
"He's very short, with thick glasses and a pudgy nose. If my school ever did 'The Lord of the Flies', he'd be a good Piggy." Jack yawned deeply, trying his best to fight off the sedatives running through his system. As he closed his eyes, Grissom nodded towards Catherine, signaling to her that it was time to go. They both needed some sleep.
Gathering the scattered pictures, they both headed towards Catherine's car, the bright sunlight burning their eyes once more. There was nothing important to discuss as they both climbed into the front seats. Catherine's stomach rumbled with hunger. She turned to Grissom, but stopped just as she was about to speak.
He was already asleep.
Yeah, so that's chapter 9. I'm starting to lose faith in my stories (I have another one going as well), they're not being read like in the good old days...sigh...Oh well, we'll see what happens in the next chapters. Until 10 (If I haven't given up on this fic til then)...