Disclaimer: They're not mine.
Rating: PG or K+
Summary: "Want me to tell you about the time Lindsey accidentally locked Gil in our bathroom?" she offered brightly. "She was about six. He was stuck in there until I came home from work four hours later."
Thanks for the excellent reviews again – this thanks goes out to: DrusillaBraun, piepretzelngreg, AngelJunkie, Ladybug07, CSI Battosai (how long were you stuck in a bathroom for?), charmed1818 (haha!), dArkliTe-sPirit, ibreak4csi (I second that motion!), D.M.A.S, Review1234, icklebitodd, Lizzy Sidle (At least you had a toilet, indeed! Bathroom's probably the best place to get stuck in, come to think of it...), Mrs. Rhett Butler and Krys33 – who I also have to thank for going on some form of Giant Reviewing Rampage and reviewed a whole bunch of previous stuff – so thanks for that!
It also appears that pretty much everyone had their own stuck-for-ages-in-some-room story so if not even to comment at all on the fic – I'd like to hear your "stuck" stories, so post away! Anyway, I love the Muppets. A bit of a long chapter this time, so apologies in advance if you get bored mid-way. I'm also continuing the Jackpot-style phone-call misunderstandings because, my good friends, it's just So Much Fun. Enjoy! Love LJ xXx
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One Mississippi. Chapter Three. No Tune Rage
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04.17
Gil presses one eye up to the keyhole of the bathroom door. Lindsey is still crying, rubbing her eyes on her pyjama sleeves and very much frightened by the whole situation in which she can't fully remember what's been going on but all she knows is that she's very much alone in the cold hall without her mother or any adult in sight.
"Lindsey...Linds, sweetie – don't cry," he attempts from the other side of the door. Lindsey crawls close to the door.
"I'm scared, Uncle Gil." she whispers through the keyhole and he smiles a supportive smile that she can't see.
"I know, honey, but there's nothing to be scared of," he tries to reassure her. "What can I do to make you feel better?"
Lindsey sniffs a few times, holds tightly onto her stuffed toy bumblebee named Elmer and blinks tiredly a couple of times. "Sing the song," she asks him quietly. And Gil feels a part of him sink. The song. He'd hoped she wouldn't say that.
"Are you sure, Lindsey?" he replies, uncertainly. "I don't think that'd make you feel..."
"Sing the song! Sing the song! Sing the song!" she chants with a small smile through her tears. Her voice echoes in the empty house and she shuffles closer, hugging the door in the darkness. A few more tears fall down her face and she begins to whine. "Uncle Gil, I'm scared. Will you sing the song, please?"
She knows, Gil thinks, she must know how much he hates singing. Gil sighs but, before he can respond, his ringing cell phone cuts him off.
"Sorry," Catherine begins immediately as soon as he brings the cell to his ear. "You caught me right in the middle of questioning a witness, but I'm free now."
"Good," Gil answers sharply. "So you can come home and get me out of here, right?"
Catherine bites her lip. "Uh – no, sorry. Not quite that free..." She hears him sigh on the other end of the line and so changes the subject. "How's Lindsey?"
Now it's Grissom's turn to awkwardly answer a question. "She's...erm...she's not quite asleep yet." And down the receiver, Catherine can hear the familiar little voice wheedle,
"Uncle Gil – can you sing me the Kermit song?" Six-year old Lindsey Willows, squinting curiously into the bathroom through the keyhole and wondering why her Uncle Gil is talking to himself.
"Gil! You didn't sing the song?" Catherine says sternly.
Gil fidgets uneasily on the tiled floor. "I can't sing." he mumbles. "You're the performer..."
"It's hardly the symphony, Grissom - she's six years old!" Catherine snaps exasperatedly. "And she's got school tomorrow so she needs to get some sleep!" Catherine exhales in irritation. "You're like a child. Put me on speaker-phone again; we'll do it together."
Feeling slightly less reluctant, Grissom presses the speaker-phone button and sets his cell phone on the floor.
-
Brass had caught up with Catherine in the halls of the crime-lab.
"A messy B and E in Henderson," he explained briefly. "Where's Grissom?"
"It's his night off – I'm covering." she'd told him.
"Night off, huh? It must be important," Brass grinned. "Okay – well, it's your call, who's on this one?"
Catherine opened her mouth to reply but was cut off as her cell phone began to buzz against her hip. Glancing at the screen, she offered a smile to him.
"That's Grissom now," she commented. "Grab Warrick or Nick and I'll meet you in the car." Brass nodded and headed off down the hall as Catherine stepped into the nearby break room, pulling out her cell phone to take the call. Opening it out and holding it against her ear, Grissom's voice came calmly and smoothly down the line.
"In your sheer eagerness to help me out of this situation, Catherine," he started with cheery undertones of sarcasm. "You forgot to tell me how, exactly, I'm meant to put your daughter to bed whilst we're on two different sides of a door."
She stopped dead in the middle of the hall. "What?" Catherine demanded. "She's not stuck in there with you?"
"No...she's not," Gil answered.
"Wait – wait, so let me get this straight," and Catherine's voice began to take on an aggressive edge. "My six-year old has got free run of the house which is like some unsupervised death trap and you can't do anything about it because you're trapped in the goddamn bathroom?"
Gil paused before speaking, tentatively. "I think you're overreacting a little bit, Cath."
"Overreacting?" she yelled, overreacting. "Overreacting!" She took a deep breath. "Right – okay, Gil. Where is Lindsey right now?"
"She's right outside the door," Gil told her instantly, pleased to have a question he can answer. "I do know where she is, Cath – this isn't an entirely hopeless situation."
"Not entirely? Oh, that's good to know," Catherine snapped back. "I feel a whole lot better now. How could you let this happen?"
"How? Cath – I didn't do it on purpose." he protested.
"You know that the bathroom door does that if you tug it – it's happened enough times," Catherine retorted and then, in the face of the silence that followed, sighed and relented. "Never mind, Gil. Do you have speakerphone on that thing?"
"Yep – do you want me to put you on?" Gil offered and pressed the speakerphone option on the cell phone, holding it out to the locked door. "You're on now."
"Thanks," Catherine's voice sounded tinny, bouncing off the tiled walls. "Lindsey? Linds, honey, are you there?"
Lindsey sat up immediately and scrambled over to the tightly-shut bathroom door, pressing spread palms against the unresponsive wood.
"Mommy? Mommy!" she called through the door.
"Hey baby, how are you? Are you okay?" Catherine's voice came back at her and Gil could hear, with a pang of guilt, the concern and anxiety etched into her voice.
"I'm fine, Mommy." Lindsey assured her brightly and then, after a pause, "Are you stuck in the bathroom too?"
Catherine chanced a soft laugh at the question. "I might as well be, sweetie." she answered. "But everything will be okay if you do this one thing for me, Linds – will you promise me that you'll do exactly what Uncle Gil tells you to do. Just for tonight?"
"Okay, Mommy." Lindsey replied, still pushing hard against the door with small hands, with her cheek and ear up sideways against the surface. Over at the Las Vegas Crime Lab, Catherine Willows sighed to herself. This, like everything seemed to be lately, was a mess. Why was it her with the defective bathroom door? Why was it her with the fault-seeking ex-husband? Why was it her, stuck here at work, with her best friend and daughter shut in her house, a wall between them at the most inconvenient of times?
Outside in the parking lot, Brass glanced at his wristwatch and, with a click of his tongue, nudged Nick in the passenger seat.
"Hey, Nick – will you go and grab Catherine?" he asked. "This scene isn't gonna wait just because Gil wants a chat."
Nick opened the car door and jumped out before turning with a frown. "Grissom? I thought it's his night off?"
Jim Brass rolled his eyes. "Yeah, but I guess the guy can't stay away – he's on the phone to Catherine. She's in the break room, I think."
Laughing and shaking his head to himself, Nick swung the door shut and jogged back towards the lab.
"Promise me, Linds. I mean it, baby – this is important." Catherine urged. "Promise me you'll listen to your Uncle Gil tonight."
Lindsey nodded fervently though her mother couldn't see her. "I promise, Mommy," she vowed earnestly. "I promise."
"Okay, honey," Catherine smiled grimly, not noticing Nick quietly pushing open the door. "Okay, well – goodnight, baby. I'll try and get home as soon as I can. I love you."
"I love you!" Lindsey called back through the keyhole.
Catherine sighed slightly. "Goodnight, Gil," she added and hung up. When she ran a hand through her fringe and tucked away her cell phone again, however, she found herself looking up to the face of a very stunned Nick Stokes standing breathless in the doorway.
"What's up, Nicky?" Catherine questioned him, suspiciously. "Are you okay?" Nick had opened and shut his mouth a few times and blinked before finding his words.
"I'm – yeah – okay. I – uh – Brass and – B&E." he uttered, muddled. "Came to get you."
Catherine raised an eyebrow warily before following him out to the parking lot. "Yeah, I'm sorry – I got a little held up by Gil on the phone." she explained briefly. Nick only stared some more and kept walking wordlessly out to where Brass was waiting impatiently for them in the parking lot.
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04.32
Once again, Catherine's voice crackles faintly from the speaker on Grissom's cell which he holds to the bathroom door as she clears her throat.
"Lindsey – sweetie, it's Mommy again," she begins gently. "Are you okay, honey?"
The six year old wipes her face on her pyjama sleeve and shakes her blonde head. "I'm cold and it's scary, Mommy." she whimpers. Catherine flinches slightly and sits down on the bench in the deserted locker room, staring hard at her locker door – wishing she could be there with her daughter and Gil more than anywhere else.
"Okay, baby, it's okay. Be brave for me, honey – Uncle Gil and I are gonna sing the Kermit song together for you," Catherine tells her, reassuringly. "Because you know how it gets you to sleep – and I promise you that when you wake up, I'll be there. Okay? I promise."
Lindsey clutches onto one of Elmer's feet and hugs it tightly. "Okay." she whispers and sinks to curl in a ball, leaning against the door, on the floor.
"Okay." Catherine repeats, determined. "Ready, Uncle Gil?" And Uncle Gil makes no willing response but she starts up anyway.
"It's not that easy being green," she sang, quietly at first, and self-consciously despite the empty room. "Having to spend each day – Gil, seriously –"
Gil rolls his eyes and reluctantly joins in with the singing. "– thecolour of the leaves. When I think it could be nicer being red, or yellow, or gold. Or something much more colourful like that..."
Despite the distance, it brings a small smile to Catherine's face. She'll be home soon, she can concentrate on that, and her little girl will still be safe – she will still be safe and sleeping and happy. She wasn't a bad mother. She wasn't a bad mother.
"...It's not easy being green. It seems you blend in with so many other ordinary things. And people tend to pass you over 'cause you're not standing out like the flashy sparkles in the water..."
Outside of the bathroom, Lindsey Willows slides her small thumb into her mouth and blinks slowly. She yawns. "Uncle Gil?" she mentions sleepily, drifting off.
"...or stars in the sky..." Gil pressed an eye to the keyhole. "Yes, what is it, sweetie?"
Lindsey shuts her eyes softly and yawns widely once again, curling up into a ball. "You sound funny."
On the other end of the line, Catherine grins as Gil gently explains, "That's because I can't sing, sweetie."
"...But green's the colour of Spring. And green can be cool and friendly-like..."
"Oh."
"...And green can be big like an ocean, or important like a mountain, or tall like a tree..."
Gil looks at the sleeping girl and smiles to himself. "...When green is all there is to be...I think she's gone, Catherine. It worked."
"Of course it worked," Catherine tells him, matter-of-factly. "It's never failed me yet." She ponders these words momentarily. "Just like you, I guess."
"...It could make you wonder why, but why wonder why?..."
"I'm not much of a singer, though," Gil comments wryly. "...Wonder, I am green and it'll do fine..."
"Lindsey doesn't mind," Catherine replies. "And I don't. I like your voice."
"You're just saying that because I'm stuck here on the wrong side of a bathroom door." Gil says and Catherine only laughs.
"...it's beautiful..." she finishes, absently playing with the zip on her leather boots as she sits in the darkened locker room. "...And I think it's what I want to be..."
"Well, Willows – it's nice to see you making good use of your time," CSI Three, Conrad Ecklie stands in the locker room doorway with a smirk on his face. Catherine spins around to see him, an angry blush rising in her cheeks.
And,
. . . . ."Crap."
. . . . . . . . . . is the last thing that Gil hears uttered from the speaker phone before Catherine hangs up.
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