A/N: Anyone order a pizza? I've got the extra cheese…

After a lazy lunch and an even lazier afternoon, Nick and Sara lay together on his sofa, flicking channels on the muted TV, though neither one of them was really paying attention. Sara had her head laid against Nick's chest, his beating heart beneath her ear creating a soft rhythm to which she found herself breathing in sync. Nick's left hand rested on Sara's back, his fingers twirling over her shirt, his right hand quickly flicking through the channels on the screen. He moved his head slightly to look down at Sara, upon hearing her giggle slightly.

"Something funny, Ms. Sidle?"

She shook her head slightly. "Uh, no… I told you that you flick channels fast. Is that just a guy thing, or what?" She too moved her head to look up at him, smirking at his mock-exasperated expression.

"Sara, I have over three-hundred channels. Do you really want me spending a minute on each one, so we can analyse what's on, give its pros and cons, discuss if we've seen it before, what we thought, and remember its number before moving on? We'll be here forever."

"You say that like it's a bad thing." Sara emphasised her point by sliding her hand up his arm and around his neck, gently pulling his head towards hers.

They broke apart a few minutes later, a smug smile upon Nick's face. "I guess being here like this forever wouldn't be quite so bad."

Sara smiled, snuggling herself back up against his chest, appreciating the warmth of his skin. The comfort of his touch was just one of the many things about him that she found herself adoring more every day.

They stayed on the couch in silence for a while, their quiet, almost synchronised breathing the only sound in the room. Sara felt herself almost drifting off, despite the extra sleep she'd been getting lately, and she closed her eyes for a second, before the shrill sound of her cell phone emitted from her bag over by Nick's front door. She groaned slightly, peeling herself off Nick and shuffling over to retrieve the offending gadget, stretching her arms over her head as she did so.

She answered on the fourth ring, right as her voicemail was about to kick in. "Hello?"

"Sara." Catherine tried to keep her curiously from leaking through in her voice. "Uh, you busy?"

Sara rolled her eyes, wishing facial expressions could be transmitted through phone signals. "No, Cath, not really." She spoke Catherine's name a little louder, gesturing to the phone at Nick's questioning expression. "What's up?"

"Okay, the good news is, our case is closed. He's at PD now- just gave it all up. The bad news is…"

"…You need us in at work?" Sara silently prayed that her guess was way off.

"Unfortunately, yeah. There's been an incident at McKinley High, and Grissom wants everybody in, ASAP. You can meet us there. Tell Nick?"

"Ugh." She sighed grudgingly. "Yeah, sure. We'll see you in twenty." She resentfully poked her phone back in her bag before retreating to the living room once again, sitting back down with Nick and putting on her whiniest voice. "I don't wanna go to work…"

Nick chuckled at her. "Sweetheart, I never thought I'd hear you say the words." He wrapped his arms around her and rested his chin on her shoulder. "Twenty minutes, huh?"

"Yeah. We can meet them at the scene. McKinley High."

"Remind me never to send my kids there- it seems every teen that walks through those gates ends up dead." He lowered his voice conspiringly as he brought one hand up to play with the strap of her bra through her shirt. "You know, I know for a fact that if I drive fast, I can reach McKinley High in just ten minutes from here."

"Hmmm?"

"Yeah. So that gives us almost ten spare minutes, to–"

"Nick!" Sara giggled, and he giggled back at her, squeezing her just a little tighter.

"What? I was going to say, almost ten spare minutes to make sure our kits are all packed. I forgot my swabs last time."

Sara turned to face him. "Yeah, yeah… Nice save there." She began to lean her mouth towards his. "But, if you're sure we have a little time to spare…"

"You're late." Catherine's blunt greeting was responded to only by two guilty smiles from Sara and Nick. "By ten minutes."

Sara raised her hand in correction. "By eight minutes, actually. We were stuck in traffic."

"Of course you were. Don't worry, I won't tell. Anyway, Grissom's already inside, and Warrick's on his way. Do you guys want to handle witness interviews, or leave that to me and you guys do processing and collection?"

"How 'bout we stick around out here, you head inside, and then when Warrick arrives, we'll discuss with him?"

"Sounds like a plan. Basic overview: fight between three fifteen-year-old girls broke out, and now Jade Harrison is dead; contusion to the skull. She's in classroom 24B. Other two girls, Erin Matthews and Kelly Buckley, have been taken to Desert Palm; they're pretty beaten up. From what we can tell, it was just three girls getting way too violent during one lunch period, but we need to check it out. Their homeroom teacher's over there."

Catherine walked away, leaving Sara and Nick to work the small crowd that had gathered on the outside of the yellow crime scene tape. Sara turned to Nick. "I'll take the teacher, you take the kids?"

"Cool." They went the separate ways.

Neither Nick nor Sara was feeling in particularly high spirits after almost two hours of questioning witnesses on the horrific events that had transpired at the school. With a few leads as to the reasons behind the outburst, but nothing concrete, the twosome went to find the rest of their team, still inside the school building.

The area around the body of the teen was still being processed, and her belongings being looked through by Warrick. Sara looked down sadly at the still body.

"Pretty girl." Nick sensed Sara's emotion in her voice, and silently slipped his hand into hers. It was cool to the touch.

Warrick's glum tone was evident in his response. "Didn't seem to help her much. She's got a bunch of hate notes in the front pocket of her bag, and Grissom's checking out her locker now." A voice from the doorway interrupted them.

"Hey, you almost ready for us?" Without even turning around, Nick and Sara both knew exactly who it was.

Across the room, David looked up from his clipboard. "Those the EMTs? Great. We've been ready for a while for you guys; just getting a head-start on the processing around her." David's friendly demeanor turned cold when he saw who was at the door.

Hank's glance turned almost sneeringly towards Nick's holding of Sara's hand, an action that did not go unnoticed by Sara herself, and she felt all her fury towards the man come flooding back. Nick squeezed her hand even tighter, and she suddenly felt an overwhelming urge to just get out, and get away from him and everyone. Instead, she quietly slipped her hand away, and wordlessly walked out of the room, down the empty, echoing corridors and out of the building, turning a corner and leaning herself against a brick wall near the car park. She hoped to herself that Nick wouldn't follow her – she just wanted to be alone right now – but she knew in her heart that he would, and she wasn't wrong.

"Sara?"

She stayed quiet, but heard him approaching, not turning to look at him, and only making eye contact when he was standing directly in front of her.

"Are you okay?" She sighed, still not speaking, not sure of what she was going to say, or what she was even thinking, exactly. Nick held on to her shoulders.

"Sara's, it's going to take some time. But you're going to be okay."

She finally found her voice, and blurted out the first thing she thought of, although regretting it instantly.

"Nick, I can't do this."

He tilted his head in confusion. "Do what?"

"This. Us. Relationships. They don't work for me." She suddenly felt a huge rush of emotion, and found herself rambling on about everything she'd been trying to push out of her mind.

"When there's me, there's relationship trouble. I don't want to have to go through that again. I don't want to have to put you through that. I can't do relationships. I'm not one of those people. I– " She found herself close to tears, and Nick pressed his finger to her lips, urging her to stop talking for a moment.

"Sara, I know. I know it's soon. I know you didn't want to get into something like this so soon. I know you're scared. I'm scared, too. I never thought this would happen – but I never would have let it happen if I didn't really think we had something here."

Sara finally found the words. "But all you get is me. Just me. I'm never enough for anybody."

A feeling of huge sadness washed over Nick, at the idea of how she could ever think that about herself. He brought his hand up to the back of her neck, whispering to her before he kissed her.

"You're more than enough for me."

Fin.

The super-dooper final A/N: And there we go! For my first chapter fic, this was a lot of fun!

(clears throat) I'd like to thank my agent, the academy, and everyone who reviewed this- thank you, thank you, thank you for all the nice comments and everything. You guys are awesome. :)

Special thanks to Claire and A Christy for constantly cracking me up, and for giving me something to aspire to, with your great writing. :D