Eccentric Seeming Emotions Chapter 9: Scrap, a csi fanfic

Disclaimer: It's been a year; hopefully by now everybody knows: CSI: Crime Scene Investigation does not belong to me.

Author's Note: For Mr. Hathaway; for b8kworm and Sun Mee who give me nothing but support. For Mark, I count everyday of my life with you in it as a blessing; always remember that. For the people who do or ought to belong to nagging.com - Angie, Manda, Marianne, and Rita. Will you ever cut me some slack? Thanks, Mena, for the song. Many, many thanks to Beth for permission to use Bleak; we did it! Thank you for inspiring me. There is no chronological order to these chapters; consider it a stream-of-thought.

Summary: Tonight, something had changed and he sincerely cursed the near perfect memory that made his job easier while his heart became a wrenched mess.

Rating: PG-13

Archives: the Graveyard, mine. Anybody else, email me.

Pairing(s): G/C

Spoiler(s): Early Rollout and Getting Off.

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Title: Eccentric Seeming Emotions

Author: Laeta
Email: ladylaetayahoo.com

Chapter 9: Scrap

Bleak and lonely, the depths of one's soul.
The deep abyss of emotion shattered before them in one explosive cry for help.
The screams - love is life; love is lost.
The reckless tumble of eccentric-seeming emotions quake as they erupt to the surface.
We fall.
Our life is our love and we have nothing without it; a mere carcass of emptiness.
Our now broken soul cries and the tears are our last emotions.
We stay fallen, yet rummaging for hope;
A scrap of our shattered self.
--- Bleak by Bethany Evans

He stopped just within the lobby and trained his gaze on the sleek convertible idling at the curb. Pausing only a moment to appreciate the vehicle, his gaze transferred its admiration to the slim, feminine form walking towards it. Gil arched an eyebrow as he noted how well the figure fit the car; it was a perfect match.

He did not recognize the man, but he would know Cath anywhere - be it her voice, her presence, her scent, or her form - he would know.

Separated once again by their glass walls, Gil felt confident in his isolation to drop a few mental walls. She never looked back on the regrets filling her life; there was no reason she would look back for him when she had happiness directly in front of her.

He unintentionally lowered a few more barriers, a cascade starting in response to the initial allowance. Then, a few more disappeared from his armor. Soon enough, he was left with only one barrier preventing him from a broken heart.

Gil felt wave upon wave of unfamiliar sensations crash upon his mind. He intuited their nature but was at a loss of naming any of them. At once powerless in their wake, he reeled in confusion at the energy flooding his body. It drummed his blood to act, to do something - anything - to prevent Catherine from leaving his sight.

His hand made it to the push bar on the door before he stopped himself.

Jealousy. Loss. Need. They were but a few sensations spurning his forward movement.

It was too late. Catherine was gone; the car had disappeared into the waning night as Gil fought his inner battle.

Gil nearly sank to his knees as solitude became loneliness.

And he knew he should have been able to predict this moment. The moment when these emotions would be his downfall; it was why he had avoided them all his life. They made people risk everything they had to lose and do unusual things.

Point in case? His entire life was an example of the futility of emotions, those strange entities that inspired and motivated, pained and bewildered.

He wondered how he lived so many years thinking he was outside their reach when, all the while, he had reacted as they had dictated. Or more specifically, he had reacted on the dictates of a particular woman's emotional wishes: one feeding off the other, except now, she no longer needed him to sustain herself.

He had to stop himself emotionally, as he had physically, from always looking to her for that missing aspect of himself.

He needed to move on, to move beyond this truce between desire and habit. Knowing full well what the repercussions were, Gil was determined to break his heart. It was the only way he knew to find a sense of self independent of Catherine.

.....

He drove on a whim with his windows rolled down to listen to the city's pre-dawn sounds. It was hushed, not quite the full-volumed hustle and bustle one associated with Las Vegas at night, but it directed his drive all the same. Gil followed the initial impulse, which had propelled him away from the lab, away from his home. Especially away from that monumental catalyst of his decision.

He spotted that car with its female passenger idling at another curb, u-turned, and slowed to a stop some distance from it. She rested her head on her hand, and the breeze gaily played with her hair. Her companion exited the quaint boutique with a small bag dangling from his fingers; Gil heard her laughter even at this distance.

The man did not rejoin her in the car, instead leaning against it where Catherine sat and waited for him. She accepted the bag from his hand; Gil fervently wished she would smile like that for him. Someday, if he was brave. Never, if he was realistic.

Attention caught again, Gil watched in cathartic suspense as the man leaned down to kiss Catherine. Gil knew he would not make the same mistake again; he would accept all he had not during her relationship with Eddie. It broke his heart, but he managed to continue his drive without indulging in the desire to approach the couple.