Rated PG
Disclaimer: This is based on CSI, which is owned by CBS, A. Zuiker, and Atlantic/Alliance, et al. I don't make any profit or make any money from this. No infringement is intended. This is just for fun.
Synopsis: An 'alternative' view of one of Grissom's interpersonal relationships. In this chapter, we are surprised by a rare side of Grissom.
Notes: Thanks to Escher and Trap for tech support, & Eric
and Disempi for their help working out logistics. & Bron for ideas
:)
The songs are both by the Newsboys from the "love, liberty, disco"
CD.
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2-Dancing, Disco and the Full Monty
"Gillian!" Grissom actually shouted at her, something he rarely did, even in private. He lowered his voice to a more conversational level. "You shouldn't have been there, you are too young."
"I was there to dance. Greg is the only guy I talked to. And like I told Tracie, even if I were old enough, there had to be something wrong with him." Gillian frowned at Grissom. "And now I know what it is. He works for you. Just my luck, I find a smart, sexy guy, who isn't intimidated by my brains and he works for you."
"You shouldn't have been there in the first place." Grissom was fighting a losing battle with his temper. His voice was hard and rose ever so slightly. "You lied about your age. That's dishonest."
"I didn't lie, he assumed because I was a student at the university, I was old enough. I wasn't trying to deceive him." Gillian put down the potato and the knife and faced him. Her voice was placid and her explanation, reasonable. "I'm sorry. I was bored and lonely. I didn't think you'd be to thrilled about me hopping in a taxi coming over here at 11:00 at night all by myself, and the school library was closed, so I tried to be sociable. Just once I'd like to fit in somewhere. I'm not much of a people person, that's why mom pushed so hard for me to be in the dorms instead of here with you. She said I need to get out more and not spend all my time with my nose stuck in a book like...."
"...like me?" Grissom finished.
Gillian walked across the kitchen and put her arms around Grissom's neck. "Yes," she admitted in a sad soft whisper. "I never could understand why she hated you. She was furious the day I told her I wanted to study forensics. She didn't talk to me for a week after I told her I wanted to attend UNLV so I could spend some time with you."
"Your mother only wants the best for you, Gillian." Grissom replied gently. "She wants you to have every advantage possible."
"And she wants to punish you for loving her."
"That's not fair." said Grissom in a tolerant manner. "Your mother has worked hard to make sure you get the best education."
"And where has it gotten me?" Grissom could feel Gillian's tears on his shoulder. "I'm barely a year out of high school and instead of planning which party to attend this weekend, I'm writing a ten page paper on the use of entomology in forensics."
"What's wrong with that?"
"Nothing, but she wants me to be a genius, without being socially reclusive."
"Again, what's wrong with that?"
"Nothing, if I were the same age as my peers, but most of them are 3 or 4 years out of high school. I surround myself with adult responsibility all day and she wants me to act like a kid. I can't do both. That's why I'm here." She sank onto his lap. "You can relate."
At 5'1" Gillian was still small enough for Grissom to hold her in his arms. He held her for a long time before he spoke. "Forget dinner for tonight. We'll order take out. Just be a kid tonight. I'm sure we can find some mind numbing movie on TV and you can lay on the couch and eat popcorn while I read the paper and we'll watch it together."
"I love you."
"I love you, too, sweetheart."
Grissom stood in the doorway watching Gillian dance around the kitchen, singing. He was glad to see that she had inherited some of Miranda's more endearing qualities. Knowing these moments were rare and fleeting, Grissom leaned against the doorpost and took it all in.
"turn the page can't turn the light out every word every line carries to my soul dark letters on page singing so loud where did I go wrong not hear your.. eighteen years guess it was alright I let you do the thinking I just bide my time father to..." She paused in her song as she glimpsed him from the corner of his eye. "Oh, hi; I'm sorry. Is the music too loud?"
"No." Grissom gave her a half-smile. "Just happy to see you inherited your grace and beauty from your mother."
Gillian rolled her eyes as she replied. "And thankfully everything else from you."
Grissom frowned. "Gillian, don't talk about your mother like that."
Gillian held up her hands in surrender. "Okay, no mom-bashing today."
The next song started and Grissom raised an eyebrow at his daughter. "Disco?"
"Not really. Come dance with me." She grabbed his hand and dance with him. "...do you feel the love that invites us the liberty excites us the disco has just begun has just begun give me love give me liberty disco...."
Grissom moved awkwardly and felt stiff next to the fluid grace of his only child. He could see why Greg had referred to her as an angel. She was breathtaking, smart and had a beautiful voice. Her mother had been like that when he first met her. Miranda had just ended a rough relationship, she was young and found herself pregnant and unwed, so she had stayed with the father until she couldn't live with the abuse any longer. Her small boy, Ian, adored Grissom. They had married, and then shortly before Grissom received the offer to work in Las Vegas, Miranda had the union annulled. Grissom was devastated. The day he left for Vegas, Miranda had informed him of her pregnancy. She had wanted to end it, but Grissom threatened to assert his parental rights. In the end, Grissom had paid for everything. Prenatal care, the hospital, lamaze, the works. But Gillian had been worth it.
Gillian notice the faraway look on her father's face. She stopped dancing and studied him. "What ya thinking about?"
"Just remembering why I fell in love with your mother." Grissom said wistfully.
"I'm sorry she fell out of love with you." Gillian sighed. "You still love her don't you? You know, hiding your feelings is different than feeling nothing at all."
"Don't tell my team that." Grissom gave her a rueful grin. "They think I'm made of stone. I don't feel anything, that's how Sara put it once."
"She's wrong and you know it. A scientist's job is to record
observations, a good one doesn't let his, or her, preconceived ideas get
in the way." Gillian grabbed a soda out of the refrigerator. She gave him a serious look, one that belied her youth. "It's like
Aryk told me once. You can't think about them as people, or about
their lives, because it eats away at your soul. He worked in the
morgue at the hospital."
Gillian lay sprawled out across the floor studying. Grissom was reading an article on the latest procedures in evidence recovery on victims. Gillian frowned at the paper she was working on.
"Okay, I'm stumped; how do you suffocate a victim without leaving marks?" The pensive frown grew deeper. "That is a stupid question. There is always some evidence on the body that explains how the victim was asphyxiated. There has to be marks or something."
Grissom looked at her. "Are you sure?"
"What do you mean?" She had obviously not been asking him to answer her question. She may not have even realized she was speaking aloud.
Grissom looked at her neutrally. He tilted his head to the side and quirk a brief smile. "You'll figure it out." He returned to his article.
"This is a poorly written question. We use the evidence to tell us how the victim died, not the other way around." Gillian sat up, deep in thought. Grissom knew the look, he had done it often enough. She was putting herself in the situation. "Let's see, auto asphyxiation would leave marks. Anything putting sufficient pressure on the larynx would leave a mark. You'd have to press down hard to use a pillow, which would leave marks, unless....."
"Yes?" Grissom looked expectantly at his daughter.
"If the victim was already short of breath, theoretically one could occlude the airway without much of a struggle. That might not leave any external signs, like ligature marks, of suffocation." Gillian raised her eyebrow, gazing at her father with much skepticism. "That's not very plausible, but I guess it would work as far as the question is concerned."
"More or less." Grissom nodded. It was daunting to see how much Gillian was like he had been at 16.
She looked at him coming out of her reverie as fast as she had entered it. "Did you feed Monty this week?"
Grissom blinked at her. "What?"
"Did... you.... feed... Monty?" She rose to her feet.
"Yes," Grissom frowned at her. "I thought you were doing homework?"
"That's what made me think about it." She went upstairs and returned with a small snake about three feet long. "I need to ask a herpetologist if a constrictor would leave any externally visible marks on the body. That was my original answer, but I don't have the evidence to back it up.
"Poor, Monty." she cooed at the python wrapped around her arm. "Daddy probably didn't pay any attention to you did he?" Gillian looked at her father. "Thanks for letting me keep him here. Tracie thought she'd be okay, but the devouring of whole live rats got to her. I guess she's one up on mom. I thought she'd kill Ian when he gave Monty to me. If mom had her way, he'd be a snake skin change purse."
"That's not fair to your mother."
"Why are you defending her?"
"She's your mother, you need to respect her."
"Do you know what she says about you?"
"That's irrelevant."
"You still love her don't you?"
"Yes, Gillian, I do." replied Grissom in a matter-of-fact voice. Gillian put her hands on her hips, becoming cross. "But it didn't work out."
Grissom could see the tears in her eyes, tears he'd shed long ago.
"It's not fair." she blurted. "Why do you care after all the grief she's given you? She hates you. She has done everything in her power to turn me against you."
"Did it work?" Grissom was maddeningly logical when he knew Gillian just wanted to be angry at her mother for not allowing him in her life.
"No. But why is she like that?"
Grissom shrugged. "People are not my forte, honey. I guess your mother didn't want to compete with my job."
"That's bull shit!" Gillian exclaimed. She clapped her hand over her mouth. "I'm sorry, pop. But it's the truth. You've never forgotten a birthday or a holiday. Even Ian and Amy. And they don't belong to you.
"John treated her like..." Gillian searched for an appropriate word. "...feces. You know that, that's when you met her. He rarely ever sent Ian child support, let alone a birthday card. But you always remembered Ian's birthday.
"Mom refused to give me your name, because she wanted to hurt you for loving her." Grissom gave a slight nod, as she continued with her tirade. "She invited you to her wedding to Colin, just to prove that she was over you. And you came."
"I came to see you, Gillian, you know that."
She smiled at the memory. "I guess it really irritated mom to have you sit up front so I would walk up the aisle. I remember Ian telling me to walk to my daddy. And I remember dancing with you."
Gillian sank onto the couch beside him. "How can you not be angry?"
"Because that's exactly what she wants." Grissom was calm and rational. After he had gotten over the initial shock, he realized that he couldn't change the facts. And after Gillian's birth he hadn't really cared anymore. He smile at her and put his arm around her. "Do you want to know a secret?"
She shrugged. "Sure."
"You are all the compensation I need."
"That's corny."
"No it's not. Look at the facts." Grissom started ticking off points like evidence in a case. "You look like me, not like her. Everyday she sees a reminder of what we had. I did everything I could to make sure you had everything you needed, and I have supported your mother in every decision, concerning you."
"I know that got to her." said Gillian. "It drove her nuts that you wouldn't argue with her."
Grissom nodded and continued. "If she only knew. Did you know that she didn't want me in the delivery room when you were born? Colin got me some scrubs and a mask from a nurse and told your mother I was an intern. I don't think she ever found out."
"You lied to my mother!" Gillian smiled. "Wait a minute, did you say Colin? Like Dr. Colin O'Reilly? Like the one my mom is married to now?"
"The same." Grissom nodded, as he continued. "The
doctor that delivered you, handed you to me and told me to bathe you. You were a mess, slimy and bloody. But I fell in love. If I
knew then, what I know now, I still would have married your mother."
"Okay, enough sappy stories. I need to finish this paper."
Gillian dropped her books to the floor, pulling out her keys. She stood at an angle, her shoulder to the wall. She didn't like
the location of the room. It was at the end of a long hallway, near
the alcove that hid the fire escape. The corridor was usually deserted
and that made her uncomfortable. Her roommate Tracie said between
her father's gruesome job and the morbid classes Gillian was enrolled in,
it was no wonder she was always jumpy. Disempi said as Gillian continued
her training, her sensitivity to her surroundings would increase. Gillian felt a growing unease. Despite the late hour, she felt like
she wasn't alone. The hairs on her neck stood up and she felt the
tingle of her palm, like the soft brush of a feather. That always
meant trouble. Then out of the corner of her eye she glimpsed him
coming for her.