Confessions on the Rooftop
By Henrika
Henrika- I was considering being very cruel and splitting this into two chapters, despite them being kind of short, but I decided to be nice to the good reviewers and give you it all in one chapter. Looks like there should only be one chapter after this. The response for this fic has been great and I just wanted to thank everyone who's reviewed and, aww heck, everyone who lurks around and reads it. Enjoy and Review!
Grissom had driven to the hospital the next day after a restless night and a phone call from Dr. Harper saying that he had removed the tube and that Greg was able to speak, though he was still disoriented from the sedatives. He also said he was prescribing Greg a psychiatrist, though he didn't say why exactly. He mentioned a note that the night nurse had found, but didn't explain further. As he turned into the parking lot, Gil tried to go over every interaction he had had with Greg in the past few days, finding such instances severely lacking.
And the few encounters he did recall were almost muted, like his hearing was finally gone this time. Muted. He mused over the word, deciding that is described Greg nowadays. The young man had abandoned loud music, loud shirts, wild antics, and all but the occasional joke. He'd become quieter. Muted.
He felt the slight rush of air and realized that he had entered the sliding doors of the hospital. He went to the elevator and pressed the correct floor button. He tried vaguely to remember the composer of the elevator music that hummed gently in the compartment, still pondering it as the doors chimed and he stepped onto the floor. He made his way to Greg's room and opened the door, greeting himself with a sight that was all too familiar since last night. An empty room.
He stayed objective as possible as he checked either side of the bed and around the room. It wasn't until he caught sight of the IV lines leaking on the bed that he truly realized that Greg was gone. He leaned partially out of the door and yelled, "Nurse!"
A petite brunette came running to his side. "What's wrong?"
"Where is he?" Grissom asked, calming his speech to ask more concisely, "Where's the patient that was in this room?"
The nurse peeked past him and squeaked, scurrying back to her station and picking up a telephone. Grissom followed her; slightly appeased when he found out she was locking down the hospital and sending security to look for him. Hanging up, she turned back to him. "I just checked on him 15 minutes ago. The sedatives were wearing off, but he still shouldn't have been able to walk." She said, sounding perplexed and guilty all at once. "And he wasn't scheduled for any tests today. All we did was take the tube out of his throat."
"You're positive?"
"Yes sir."
Grissom stood there for a moment, contemplating his latest mystery. "Does the hospital have roof access?" he asked suddenly.
"Yes, but…"
"Where is it?"
"A flight of steps up after the last elevator stop. But what does that have to do with the missing patient?" She asked.
"Everything." Grissom said, already heading for the elevator.
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He didn't remember what had compelled him to find the rooftop. But once the urge had seized him, he couldn't sit still and had risen from the bed, not really feeling the IV lines as he pulled them from his arm. His throat felt vaguely like sandpaper, but it didn't occur to him to care much about it. He had searched out his clothes, knowing that the gown wouldn't be suited for the roof. Greg had snuck from his room and traversed upward, knowing that once he was on the roof everything would be fine. He didn't understand the faint sense of deja-vu he was getting, but it didn't particularly upset him once he had burst out into the fresh air.
He searched out the edge of the roof and peered over, trying to remember why he was here. Fresh air? His mind offered and he took the explanation, gulping in the dry, warm air for several minutes. He took a seat on a conveniently shaped piece of pipe and attempted to piece together what he doing.
He was at a hospital. He had fainted. He had been on the roof. He had been so tired lately. Grissom had found him. Team had come to see him. Team was going to interrogate him.
Panic hit him as his explanation did. Running. I'm trying to run away.
He heard a door slam open. He tried to get up and a wheezing breath knocked him right back into his makeshift chair. He remembered spitting up blood in his shower two days ago, a date that seemed ages away now. He remembered spots bursting over his vision as he tried to hold down the meal he had ordered into the lab yesterday. He remembered failing miserably and kneeling over porcelain. He remembered Papa Olaf's funeral weeks before. He remembered throwing himself into his work. He remembered blasting heavy metal until the neighbors threatened to call the cops on him, then lulling himself into an uneasy sleep with classical. He remembered Grissom standing over him and blinked, realizing that Grissom was standing in front of him.
"Greg?"
He didn't remember pitching forward and sobbing into his boss' shoulder. He only half-remembered the awkward little pats and garbled words of comfort.
But he did remember that he hadn't felt quite that clean in a long time.
Henrika- Wait a minute. Papa Olaf is dead? I killed him! With no explanation! Ooo, bad authoress. Very bad!