Title: Holding Out for a Hero

Summary: Nina enlists Greg's help in finding Marie.

Notes: This is the first Episode in The Ghost of a Good Thing Series. Everything's Not Lost is a kind of prologue to this, but you don't have to read it to understand this. All you need to know is that Nick is now living with Greg and this occurred after the Stalker episode.

IMPORTANT NOTE: Anything italicized means he/she is speaking in Italian. Oh and Padre means father and Madre means mother.

Chapter Two: Broken Candy

Can you help me I'm bent
I'm so scared that I'll never
Get put back together
Keep breaking me in
And this is how we will live
With you and me bent

--Matchbox Twenty 'Bent'

Crime Lab—Sunday March 14—11:45 pm

Shawn dropped off Nina at the crime lab with the promise that she would be over at his apartment as soon as she collected Cassandra. She stopped by reception to grab her visitors badge before retracing her steps through the maze of corridors until she arrived at the break room. Cassandra and Nick sat at the table playing go-fish. It was the only thing Nick could think of to do to keep her entertained. She had said she wasn't hungry, but he had gotten her a cup of Sara's grape juice just in case she wanted some.

"Cassandra let's go." Nina told her quickly upon entering.

"But can't I stay and play with Mr. Nick. We're playing go-fish. And shouldn't we wait for Aunt Marie to get back." Cassandra protested. Nick looked up and saw the fleeting look of pain cross her face at the mention of Marie.

"I'll stay here and wait for your Aunt Marie. You should go with your mom so you can go to sleep. When you come back we can play again, okay?" Nick told Cassandra. She nodded forlornly, but complied nonetheless. Nina stuck out her hand for Cassandra to take and they began to walk off. As they left Nina turned her head back to him and he swore he heard her say thank you, but he couldn't be sure. After all he had never heard her utter a word of English. Nick began to pick up the cards and he threw away the untouched cup of grape juice. His cell phone ringing broke the immense silence that had filled the entire lab.

"Hello?" he asked answering his cell phone.

"Nick is Nina still there?" Greg asked hurriedly.

"No, she just left with Cassandra. Why?" Nick asked concerned, "Do you want me to go after them?"

"No, I've got it. Don't worry about it." Greg hung up with out saying good-bye and for a moment Nick thought that was very un-Greg-like, but he shook his head and began to quickly leave the break room in search of Nina.

He caught up to her when she stopped to turn in her visitors pass and sign out.

"Nina!" Nick called out jogging over to her. She looked up at him questioningly. "Greg called. I think he wants you to wait for him. He sounded really upset." Nina took a deep breath as old memories fluttered through her mind. Waiting. Waiting. Always waiting.

"No." she suddenly said out loud. It sounded harsh and cold. Almost as if she had let out all the hurt in her life in that single word. Nick looked at her as if he didn't quite understand where this venom was coming from. She turned and dragged Cassandra after her, trying to get as far away from the building as possible. She almost threw Cassandra into the car in her rush to leave, but once in the driver's seat she just stared at the wheel.

This is where waiting got her. This is where love and friendship and memories had gotten her. Sitting in a car in the front of the crime lab running away. That didn't make any sense though. If he ran away first then right now she wasn't really the one running away and once again it brought her back to him. It had always been about him. Her entire life, her entire being. And then it had gone before she even realized it. A bang on her window brought her out of her melodramatic reprieve and she jumped, startled just a little bit. She rolled down her window and Greg looked just about ready to beg.

"Nina, listen to me-" Nina interrupted him as she continued to stare off into space. Almost as if she was searching for something and couldn't quite grasp what it was she was supposed to find.

"You know Greg, sometimes I think I might live in two universes. The one where I ought to fall in love, but I never would, never could, because. Just because. It was impossible. And then the other where it was too late because I'd fallen in love already. A long time ago." She didn't look at him to see the confusion in his eyes. She already knew it would be there. He had never quite understood her eccentric outbursts and this time she wasn't going to stick around and explain it to him. "I'll see you around." She told him and pulled out of her parking space. Leaving behind a lonely boy and a broken man. The thing she hadn't realized yet though was a thing that is broken can be fixed. Even if it was her heart and even if it was his soul.

Greg and Nick's Apartment—Monday March 15—4:26 am

On certain Sundays in November when the weather bothers me
I empty drawers of other summer's
Where my shadows used to be
She is standing by the water
As her smile begins to curl
In this or any other summer
She is something all together different never just an ordinary girl
And in the evenings on Long Island
When the colors start to fade
She wears a silly yellow hat that someone gave her when she stayed
I didn't think that she returned it
We left New York in a whirl
Time expands and then contracts
When you are spinning in the grips of someone
Who is not an ordinary girl
When you sleep you find your mother in the night
But she stays just out of sight
So there isn't any sweetness in the dreaming
And when you wake the morning covers you with light
And it makes you feel alright
But it's just the same hard candy you're remembering again
--Counting Crows 'Hard Candy'

Nick warily entered the apartment he shared with Greg. He dropped onto the couch seeing as how it was closer than his room and slowly began to drift off. Greg hadn't said a word to anyone after Nina's stunning entrance and exit. He finished all of his work in record time and had asked Grissom if he could clock out early. He hadn't said anything to Nick when he left. He had just gone. Nick was prepared to talk to him, just not right now. Maybe after they had both gotten some sleep he would, but not now. Not yet.

Greg had finally been able to go to sleep after tossing and turning for well over an hour. Greg wasn't one to usually have dreams, but he had nightmares. Not the usual kind of nightmares though. Once when they were all kids Nina had nicknamed them Night Terrors and that's what they were. Terrors that only came out in the night when he was alone and vulnerable and feeling like he'd rather be anyone in the world but Greg Sanders the deserter of friends. The thing about his Night Terrors though was that they weren't scary at all. In fact they usually consisted of happy memories back in New York, growing up with his best friends. But he had always thought good memories were worse than the bad ones. They hurt more than any bad memory ever would. Dreaming about what could have been tore at his soul. He had finally understood the meaning of heartache. The constant tightness of your throat, the unshed tears behind burning eyes, the constant pressure on your heart. It physically hurt to think of what might have been. It hurt too much to cry. It hurt to move, to do anything except to lay there and let his memories take him away until the pain was almost unbearable and then his alarm clock would save him.

He had another Night Terror that night. First one in fourteen weeks if he remembered correctly.

It had started off innocent enough. Remembering the day in the middle of senior year when he had gotten his acceptance letter. He had run out of the house and all the way to Central Park where he usually met the others. He clutched the letter in his hand like it was his last chance. But his last chance for what he still had yet to figure out. Nina and Marie sat on a bench watching as Cassandra crawled in between them. Shawn sat on another bench working on a drawing of some fantasy building he would build one day. He arrived breathless and the others greeted him with smiles. Nina was the first to notice the letter clutched in his hand.

"It came!" she yelled happily almost jumping up before she reached out her arms to keep Cassandra from crawling off the bench. Shawn put down his notebook and came to join his best friends. Marie stood up excitedly as they waited for him to open it.

"Hurry up." Marie whined as he slid a shaky thumb under the fold and ripped it open. He took it out and unfolded it. His face remained blank as the letters swam on the page before him.

"Well?" Nina asked.

"I got in." he whispered, "on a full scholarship." He added. He had to sit down. It was almost too much at once. Marie screamed and Nina jumped up, handing Cassandra to Shawn and the two girls began to jump up and down. Shawn smiled at him not quite knowing how to express his elated feeling, but knowing that Greg somehow knew anyway.

"That means we can use the money to send one of you to college." Greg said in realization.

"Coach Heralds seems to think I'll be getting a scholarship for baseball so girls it's up to you two."

"Well I've got Cassandra to look after I can't go to college." Nina told them a little upset at the thought, but hiding it behind a smile.

"Don't waste it on me I've all ready found my profession." Marie told her.

"I've got an idea." Greg exclaimed shooting up from his spot on the ground.

"Oh god everyone hide." Shawn joked as he bounced the baby in his arms to keep her happy.

"Seriously though man. I think I have the greatest idea of all ideas."

"You sound like we're back in first grade." Shawn reprimanded playfully. Greg rolled his eyes as he danced on the balls of his feet in excitement.

"We could use the money to put Cassandra in day care while Nina goes to school. I mean you're still eligible for that scholarship to NYU, right?" Greg asked. Nina's face brightened as he continued with all the details. It was amazing how he could recall the exact conversation in his dreams. The movements everyone made, the surroundings, the feel of the cold air in his lungs, the sounds of happy people in the park, the small squeaks emitted from Cassandra as she was twirled around by Shawn. It was almost as if he had stepped back in time and could relive every moment, but couldn't change it. And if he could he wouldn't. Except he might have told Nina how beautiful she looked when she was giving Cassandra her first bath or how she seemed to radiate when she and Marie got back from their morning run. Maybe he'd even tell her he did love her instead of just saying 'yeah like a sister and brother love'. God, that had to have been one of the most ridiculous things he had said to get out of an awkward situation. He didn't love her. That's what he told himself and even for a few days at a time he could go without thinking of her, of them, of New York. At least he didn't think he loved her. Nope, definitely didn't love her. Because if he did. Had. Then he would have been man enough to stick around.

Nick was jolted awake by Greg's yell. Did he just shout out that he didn't love her? Nick ran into his room to find Greg twisting and turning in his bed.  "Greg," he said calmly walking over to the bed and gently shaking him. He didn't wake up. "Greg," he called a little louder as he shook him a little harder. Still no response.

"I don't love her." He whispered unconvincingly.

"Greg, you're having a bad dream wake up." He shook him again, but to no avail. Nick tried for fifteen straight minutes to wake his friend and he failed miserably. The only response he got were Greg's repeated words of how he didn't love her. Nick went to his room and grabbed his blanket and a pillow before returning to Greg's room. He dragged the plush chair that sat by the window closer to the bed and got comfortable. Nick needed sleep, but he was also worried about not being able to wake Greg up from his nightmare so he decided to stay with him through the morning until the alarm went off at eleven.

Nick shot up out of the chair when he heard the alarm go off. He calmed his beating heart as he watched Greg lazily hit the snooze button. He rolled over and spotted Nick sitting in the chair.

"What are you doing here?" Greg asked as he sat up and rubbed the sleep from his eyes.

"You were having a nightmare last night and I couldn't wake you up. I got worried so I slept in here in case you did wake up."

"Yeah, it's some stupid thing I've had since I was kid. I've never been able to be woken up from a night terror." Nick nodded and the two sat in silence for a few moments.

"Well I'll go get breakfast ready." Nick said as he got up from the chair. He hid the stiffness in his back with a smile and a wave of his hand as he walked out of the room. Greg shook his head and got up to change. The smell of bacon wafted into his bathroom as he stood brushing his teeth.

"Is there something you're trying to ease the pain of?" Greg asked walking into the kitchen. He took a seat at their small kitchen table as Nick served a plate piled high with eggs, bacon, and toast.

"No, but you need a healthy breakfast and today we actually have time."

"There's an and at the end of that I can feel it." Greg told him before shoveling some of the bacon into his mouth and sighing in content. Bacon. He loved bacon.

"There's no and." Nick told him as he took a seat across from him. Silence ensued for a couple of minutes until Nick thought he would die if he didn't get Greg to talk. "What was the nightmare about?" Nick asked him. Greg smirked before answering him.

"It's not what you might classify a nightmare as."

"What is it then?"

"Just a dream."

"Well you were yelling pretty loud for just a dream." Greg raised an eyebrow. "What? You did. You kept shouting out that you didn't love her." Greg sighed and put down his fork.

"I don't love her." He repeated softly.

"Who are you trying to convince man? Me or you?" It was a simple enough question and all Greg had to do was tell Nick he wasn't trying to convince anyone because in all actuality he didn't love her. But there he had said it again. Me thinks thou doth protest too much, wasn't that the line?

"It's complicated. I don't have nightmares, I don't have dreams, I just have memories."

"What are they of? All your memories can't be bad."

"Yeah, that's the problem." Greg sighed.

"Care to elaborate."

"Good memories are the worst, Nick. They're all I dream about. And they're so real. Like I'm still there in that moment. It's like I'm there again. Back in New York. Last night I remembered one of the last moments I ever spent with them in New York. When I got my acceptance letter and found out I had a free ride. We had to figure out what to do with all the money we had saved. It was supposed to go to me for college, but I didn't need it anymore. God, we were so happy. All of us. It had to be at least ten below outside, but we were in the park anyway and the girls were jumping up and down screaming. Cassandra was wrapped up in about a hundred blankets. Shawn was drawing. And my hands were numb, but I didn't know if that was from the cold or the fact I was holding onto the letter so tightly because I thought if I set it down it would disappear. It was almost perfect." Nick saw the sadness and longing in his eyes. He looked like a lost little boy, maybe more like a lost little puppy. He sighed loudly and hid all the pain behind a smile. "But things change and people move on. And on that note we should get going too it's almost one thirty." Greg got up from the table and took his dishes to the sink.

"It's okay you know, to be scared of facing the past. The past is a scary place." Nick told him. Greg just stared out the window at the alley below. He heard Nick get up and leave the kitchen and it took all he had not to break down right then. Nick didn't understand because Greg really had run. He had left and never looked back and now all his demons had finally caught up with him and all he had was good memories.

"No, it's not okay." He whispered to the empty kitchen. Empty, yeah that's how he felt. Empty was the perfect word.