Take Me Back to Manhattan
By Tabby
-*-*-*-*-*-
I love to travel
Across the gravel
The more I sail the sea
The more I feel convinced of the fact
New York's the town for me
Greg sighed. The mass spectrometer couldn't have gone any slower if it wanted to. And if the results didn't hurry up and print out already, Sara was going to have his head. And Warrick was going to remove it for her.
He sighed again. He just couldn't keep his mind on anything today.
Or tonight, actually. This morning. He glanced at his watch. It was 3:02. AM.
He laughed softly. When he was at UC Berkeley, he would be thinking, "Why didn't I start studying sooner?!" about this time.
Usually when he'd done that, it had involved square roots and quadratics.
With another look at the mass spec, Greg stood up. He needed a jolt. He figured if he was high on caffeine, he was less likely to start thinking about… about certain things.
In the break room, he drew a cup of the swill the CSIs liked to call coffee. If only Nick hadn't broken into his secret stash of expensive blend.
He sat at the table and held his nose while choking down a sip of the 'coffee.'
"Is it really that bad?" a voice asked. Greg twisted in his seat, surprised. It wasn't like it was an especially busy day (or night), but everyone had something to do.
Like wait for the mass spec to get off its lazy power cord and spit out the results.
"'Cause that's what I've heard," said the voice's owner quickly. "And, umm, if it is that bad, I'll just get back to trace…"
"It's chewy, and tastes a little worse than the tires on Gris's Tahoe, but other than that, it's not too bad," Greg answered with a half-smile. "Go ahead – it won't kill you. Probably."
She giggled at this. "Maybe I'll just save my health for something a bit less toxic – like arsenic."
Greg's half-smile became a full-smile. "That's probably more dangerous – the coffee's only deadly went taken internally."
Another laugh, mixed with the sound of arsenic – umm, coffee – being poured into a Styrofoam cup.
Greg took a moment to analyze this person. She was short – probably only an inch or so over five feet – and built less like a Barbie doll and more like the bulb part of a pipette. Her hair was long and medium-brown, and she wore glasses. She wasn't your stereotyped geek girl – but she wasn't much beyond 'plain,' either.
"My name's Kelly. I'm an intern with the trace lab – today started my second week. They threw me out because they were on to something and I was getting underfoot."
"I bet I know who 'they' are," the lab tech said, rolling his eyes. "Greg. I'm in DNA."
Kelly's eyes widened slightly. "Greg Sanders?"
"Yeah."
"Grissom's favorite, right?" she blurted.
Greg shifted slightly. "Some say that."
Kelly flinched, pointedly dropping the subject. "I'm not used to these hours yet."
"You'd think a college student would be up at three in the morning all the time. I know I was."
Kelly grinned. "Yeah. Where'd you go? To college, I mean?"
"Berkeley."
"Oh. LVU for me. Are you from California?"
"Yeah."
"I'm one of them New Yorkers you always read about."
"New York?" Greg repeated, his curiosity jumping up and standing at attention (although Greg remained in his seat).
Its crazy skyline
Is right in my line
And when I'm far away
I'm able to bear it for several hours
"You been there?" she asked, grimacing at the coffee she held.
"Yeah. I lived there for a couple years," he said, thinking Three years, one-hundred-and-two days, thirteen hours, and fifty-seven minutes.
"Over three, actually."
Kelly blinked. "Queens? Bronx?"
And then I break down and say
"Manhattan."
Take me back to Manhattan
Take me back to New York
I'm just longing to see once more
My little home on the hundredth floor
"In fact, I knew a girl named Kelly. She spelled it with one 'L' and an 'I.'"
A dreamy smile. "I knew a guy who's full name was Gregory. We called him by his middle name, though. Lee."
Greg grinned. "Knew as in knew or knew as in knew?"
"Knew as in knew. Is that how you knew Keli?"
"Yeah. Yeah, I did."
Can you wonder I'm gloomy?
Can you smile when I frown?
I miss the east side
The west side
The north side
And the south side
There was a pause.
Kelly's head tilted to one side in a sympathetic look. "Do you want to talk about her?"
So take me back to Manhattan
That dear old dirty town
Greg nodded slowly, but made no further attempt at conversation.
"How did you meet her?"
"She was renting the apartment across from mine. We moved in within a week of each other. Helped each other settle in." With a glance at Kelly's suspicious look, he added, "Not like that, you little pervert."
"Hiya, Keli. Blackie's shedding on your coat again."
Greg picked a long, gray cat hair of Keli's dark purple coat. She smiled, and he felt his heart skip in its rhythm a little bit.
A little bit.
"Yeah, I know. My lint grabber ran out of sticky things."
Keli's smile made her hazel eyes crinkle up slightly. She didn't have dimples, and she wasn't a scrawny little stick. Unlike the lithe Greg.
Her hair was almost the same color as his, though.
Well, not really. It was a little more reddish.
Mr. Kingston, the building's resident geezer, called them the "odd couple." He was right, too, they seemed to be complete opposites. Even though they weren't really a couple, so to speak.
"C'mon, I need to drive you to… where is it you're working this week?"
Keli rolled her eyes. "The Flipping Burger Place. Stupidest name in existence. And I've been working there for over a month, dork."
Her grin told Greg she was kidding. She was kidding a lot.
"That doesn't sound like what we were talking about a minute ago," Kelly interrupted. She then blushed. "I'm sorry. I always do that. I try not to, but—"
"That's okay," Greg said, holding up a hand. "It would get boring after that for a while. Actually, for about a year and a half."
Take me back to Manhattan
Take me back to New York
I'm just longing to see once more
My little home on the hundredth floor
"Bet it wasn't boring to you."
"Nope."
Pause.
Can you wonder I'm gloomy?
Can you smile when I frown?
"So… is there anything else you want to talk about? I mean, dealing with her?"
Greg sighed. "A lot. A lot that I want to remember. Some…"
Kelly hesitated, and then smiled cautiously. "So, who professed their love first?"
Greg felt his face get red. "That would be me."
"Do tell. I'm a hopeless romantic."
With a sigh and a glance around the break room, he started, "Okay. It was spring. Summer. I don't remember exactly."
"How could you not?"
"I've spent a long time trying to forget it. Anyway—" here Greg shook himself "—it was spontaneous. We'd gone to dinner and everything before – well, not everything, like what I know you're thinking – but we'd never, you know, dated. I made the move and asked her one day, after I drove her home."
"That's not what I meant. I mean, when did you get the message across that you were serious?"
Greg sighed. That was apparently the part he wanted to talk about least.
It was strange.
There was a huge pause.
I miss the east side
The west side
The north side
And the south side
Greg made his decision.
"Okay. So, another year and a half passes. I moved up in my lab tech studies, Keli skipped around from job to job. She had finally gotten an idea of what she wanted to do with her life."
"A starving artist?"
"No, no, just an artist. A pencil artist."
"No paint?"
"Are you deaf? I said pencil."
"You're awfully moody."
Keli snorted semi-good-naturedly. "I've got my reasons."
Greg's eyebrows rose. "Something on your mind?"
Keli looked around the park. There were typical things there, like birds and old people. A couple walking hand-in-hand.
Greg and Keli were sitting on a bench. He can casually slipped his arm behind her, and she pretended not to notice while scooting undetectably closer to him.
"Yeah. Anything on yours?"
Greg paused, and tried to think of a meaningful way to say what he wanted to say.
"You… me… us… I mean…"
"Spit it out, Greg," she said with a giggle.
"Well... I… I really want to say something really powerful here, but I just can't think of anything."
Keli looked at Greg, first with a question, then with a realization.
"Are you trying to… to ask me something?"
"Yeah."
"Is it a major something?"
"Yeah."
"Life-changing?"
"Oh yeah."
Keli blinked slowly.
"Is it a you-me thing?"
"Uh-huh," Greg replied breathlessly.
"A… a thing that involves the 'L' word?" Keli asked, almost whispering.
Greg just nodded this time.
"Four letters? Does this… thing have four words?"
Greg swallowed. "Okay, Keli, I'll spill it: I love you, and I want to be with you. For the rest of my life, or your life, whichever comes first."
"You didn't say the words."
Greg blinked. Then he smiled, stood, and did one of the most un-Greg-like things he'd ever do: he knelt down and said, "Keli, will you marry me?"
Then he got back to being Greg.
"I don't have a ring or anything, I didn't really plan it like this or… or…"
Keli just smiled.
"So… will you?"
"Yeah. Provided I pick the date."
Greg laughed. He wasn't nervous at all anymore.
He stood and so did Keli. He leaned in and kissed her.
"You had that ranch salad for lunch again, didn't you?"
Keli blinked, and she sobered. Her face grew serious.
"Umm, Greg? I think I really should tell you something. Maybe you should sit back down."
It was his turn to blink. What was she talking about? She'd been positively ecstatic a few seconds and a long kiss ago.
"What is it?"
"I… do you remember a couple months ago, when we went to that party and someone spiked the punch? And, umm…"
"Yeah, I remember," Greg said quickly. "And we both agreed it was just a mistake, and nothing's happened since. But that doesn't matter now, right? I mean, in June it won't matter."
"Six months from now? I hope…" Keli swallowed. "Well… I… I missed my, well, you know, the next month. I know you don't like to talk about things like that but…"
Greg let this sink in for a minute. "You went to the doctor?"
"A couple weeks ago."
"And?"
"And…"
Greg stared at her for a second. He felt a smile spread across his face.
"You mean…"
A similar smile began to appear on Keli's face. "I was worried about how you'd react."
"What do you mean, you were worried? What you thought I'd go back to California? That I'd leave?"
"I guess."
Greg got serious again. "Don't ever, ever think that again, okay?"
Keli giggled. "Let's hit the library – what first, books on rings, or books on names?"
I miss the east side
The west side
The north side
And the south side
So take me back to Manhattan
Kelly (the modern-day Kelly) looked across the table at the lab tech. "She didn't make it until June, did she?"
"Actually, she wanted it to be in July. That was her birth month, you now, in more ways than one."
"What happened? Complications?"
Greg smiled sadly. "No. Today's the adversary of… of a hold-up of a bank. Keli was there, and she did something the… they didn't like. The… they… well, after that, I only stayed for two more weeks."
Kelly nodded.
"Why did I even tell you all this?"
"People say I'm easy to talk to."
"People say I talk too much."
Kelly gave him a kind (not pitying) look. She gave her coffee a disgusted glance.
"You were right about this stuff."
Greg rubbed his eye, then snapped back to reality. "Oh, I completely forgot!"
"What? That the coffe was bad?"
"The mass spec! Sara's going start screaming 'off with his head' if I don't get those results to her," he said, by way of explanation.
Kelly stood. "I better go see if they need me again in trace."
Greg tossed his (surprisingly) empty cup into the garbage.
As they parted ways, he said, "I'd appreciate it if you didn't tell anyone else."
"Right. I'll meet you in the break room some other time – tell you about Lee."
Take me back to Manhattan
That dear old dirty town
Greg smiled. Somehow, he felt a whole lot better.
He could remember.
But he could live, too.
A/N: Aww… that was sorta sad… I didn't really leave as much to your imaginations as I wanted to, but… oh well. Poor Greg. I have a theory: Greg is the most torture-able of the CSI characters. Just look around on FF.net – Greg is always getting the emotional and physical crap beat out of him.
Please keep in mind – I don't really know if anything in this is accurate. I don't know why (or even if) Greg was in New York. I don't know if he was in Manhattan, but I doubt he didn't have a girlfriend. So. There.