Author's Note: Super long chapter today, so enjoy.
Despite the fact that he slept for twelve hours after that, Greg woke up feeling rather lethargic. But three cups of coffee later, he was at the lab, working at normal speed again. As predicted, Grissom and Catherine both expressed concern at the sight of his bruise, but Greg, in a much better mood, shrugged it off easily. After his relaxing session the night before, he felt oddly refreshed, as if all the worries and cares had been drained from him.
This feeling didn't last long.
He was sorting through crime scene photos when he noticed Nick stop out in the hall. He had accidentally bumped into a young, blonde lab tech Greg didn't recognize. Greg found himself watching them, Nick's hand on her shoulder as he talked to her with that big smile he only used on people he was trying to impress. Greg's bottom lip somehow found its way between his teeth as he watched the muted exchange. She nodded vigorously at a question he asked and answered enthusiastically. Greg unconsciously clenched his hands into fists. Nick let go of her shoulder and gestured down the hall, raising his eyebrows at her. She nodded again, and seemed to thank him, placing her hand on his bicep, before going in the direction he had gestured. Nick turned to watch her retreat, and his eyes moved up and down...
"Ow!" Greg exclaimed as a bead of blood dropped onto his tongue. He released his lip, which had been held captive by his teeth and shook his head, trying to focus on his job so he didn't think too hard about Nick. And that girl. He would have to figure out who she was, so he could...
So he could what?
He closed his eyes and let out a frustrated sigh. Why was he so tense all of a sudden? He had work to do.
He raked his hand through his hair and tried hard not to think, but every time he regained his focus, thoughts flooded back in to distract him. Thoughts of Nick, of Camellia, of that woman in the white dress, of the Valium, of his trip, of how he would never take the pills again, of how solving this murder wouldn't bring the victim back to life, and how ugly the world was outside these walls, and how beautiful Nick's eyes seemed when they were focused only on Greg, and—
"Dammit!" he exclaimed, throwing the photos across the table. He fell down into a nearby chair and took deep breaths. He had been fine, up until he had witnessed that scene between Nick and the lab tech. He wasn't sure why it was bothering him so much. He had long since come to terms with his feelings for the Texan. He'd had them for so long, he was almost used to the dull pang that would poke his heart when he saw Nick smile. It wasn't an issue; Greg had accepted that Nick was not the type to go for guys like Greg, or guys in general, for that matter.
Maybe he needed to go back to that club. Get drunk. Get laid. Maybe Camellia would be there. Maybe she could help him out on both those points.
Greg closed his eyes and thought about the little orange bottle in his medicine cabinet that he had sworn he would never touch again. One pill had been harmless, just as he had predicted. And he'd had his trip, and it was over. No more pills. He would wash them down the sink as soon as he got home, just to make sure of it.
"You done with those photos—"
Greg looked up to see Catherine's eyes all over the table, upon which the photos he had been sorting were now haphazardly scattered.
"It's part of a system I have," he explained swiftly to cover his ass.
"It better be," said Catherine, icily. "You've been working on this for an hour, Greg. Pick up the pace already, this should have taken you twenty minutes! If it's not done when I get back from my break, I'll do it myself, and you will be the one to sort through vomit and excrement for a key!"
"Yes ma'am!" Greg replied, and she was gone.
He sighed and looked at the mess in front of him. The stress was beginning to build, but he dealt with it. And he would continue to deal with it on his own, without the assistance of any anxiolytics. Greg was still very anti-drugs. For the most part.
Except for that one time I did Valium, he thought to himself sarcastically.
He would not take any more pills.
He would sort out these photos in twenty minutes.
He would not dwell on Nick Stokes.
He would not think of Camellia.
He would not be bothered by the atrocities in the world.
A few hours later, smelling like excrement and vomit, Greg had failed at every single one of his resolutions but the first one. Thus far. He stood poised over his bathroom sink, gripping the edge of it in one hand and the orange bottle in the other. The water was running, and the cap was off of the bottle, and all he had to do was tip it, and it was bye-bye drunk pills.
And yet, for some reason, he couldn't tip the bottle.
It wasn't that he needed them, it was that he wanted them. If one pill could relax him as well as it did the night before, then another could easily do the same. It was definitely helpful, and he was definitely tense. The more he took, the less the effects, so he would need to be wary of that, but so long as he did it sparingly, then there was no harm. There couldn't be any harm. Not if he was smart. Not if he controlled his doses, and how frequently he administered it. In controlled doses, Valium was shown to help dozens of patients who needed it. If he just... didn't take more than a few milligrams at a time, he would be OK.
Greg relied on logic more than anything else, and it was for that reason that he deduced that he didn't have an addictive personality. He had never been particularly addicted to anything in the past, physically or psychologically, and he was rather proud of his record.
Valium was a drug, a Benzodiazepine, an anxiolytic in point of fact. A controlled substance. A prescription was needed in order to obtain it. Unless one obtained it illegally. Easily abused. Sixty-four percent addictive. But Greg did not have an addictive personality. Greg was a chemist. He knew how to measure doses. He knew what he was doing.
Liver lazily slithered into the bathroom and looked up at him, curiously.
"I know what I'm doing," he said to the cat.
Why did that sound so familiar?
"But I do know what I'm doing. I've worked with chemicals before. I know how drugs work. How they trick people. I'm smarter than the drugs."
Greg was smarter than the tiny pills in the orange bottle. And Greg was talking to a cat, as if expecting an answer.
"I must be losing my mind..." he muttered, but he stared at the pill bottle in his hand all the same. His gaze rose to make eye contact with himself in the mirror. "I know what I'm doing," he repeated with confidence.
Just like he had said to Nick the night the woman in the white dress had been killed.
Greg gritted his teeth. A thought like that deserved to be banished by the Valium Fairy.
He turned off the water and tapped a pill out of the bottle defiantly into his open palm. His hands closed over the medication as he looked into the mirror again.
"I know what I'm doing."
Within four weeks, he was out. By the third week, he had upped the ante, taking twice his normal dosage. He recognized the risk. The original single pill had been losing its charm. He had predicted this; he had expected it to happen. But over the third week, it became less and less effective. Two worked quite well after that. And if he continued to space out his trips with a forty-eight hour period, he would do just fine. Even though the days between trips eventually became difficult to deal with. Greg found himself bored more often on those days, and television could not entertain him. Sometimes, he went out. Sometimes, he talked to his cat. But mostly, he just slept, and waited, insisting that he maintain at least the rule of spacing out his dosage, if not the rule of maintaining the dosage itself.
Every day, it became more difficult. But he did it, because Greg was smarter than the drugs. And stronger. He insisted he was stronger. There was no interference in his work or even his personal nights. In fact, the drug relaxed him so much, he actually found himself spending more time with Nick and Catherine outside of the lab than he had before he'd started taking it. If anything, Valium had become a welcome addition to his life, and he wasn't about to give it up.
He looked at the number on his phone, hesitating. He needed more pills, but he was afraid to dial her number.
No, he insisted. "Need" is the wrong word. I don't need them, I want them. Just want them, is all.
He challenged himself to go an extra few days without his Valium. He was tense and agitated, and seemed to sweat just slightly more than normal, although he attributed that to the Las Vegas heat. But it allowed his system to detoxify, which was vital if he wanted to remain in control. He needed to keep this a hobby, not a habit, and any physical signs of addiction must be dealt with, before they went too far.
So three days later, he was staring at his phone again. He took a deep breath and dialed.
"Yo," came the answer, her voice low and aggressive. "Who the hell is this?"
"Camellia, it's Greg."
"I don't know any Greg..." she said slowly, and it occurred to Greg that he had never introduced himself to her.
"The guy from Valhalla. I ruined your mark by spilling his drink?"
She paused. "Oh... Oh yeah, Greg, I remember you, cariño. So, tired of being the hero, are we?"
Greg held his breath. "I'm out."
"And you need more? Surprise, surprise."
"Yeah. Where can I meet you?"
"6328 Maple Drive. Bring cash, querido."
There was a click, and then she was gone.
The house was in a normal enough neighborhood, which surprised Greg. He expected that he would have to walk into some pretty shady places in order to meet with Camellia. But a boy was teaching his little sister how to ride a tricycle and a woman jogged with her iPod in her ears. Greg felt slightly more uncomfortable surrounded by such a wholesome atmosphere. Maybe it would have been better if Camellia had told him to meet her at a park, or in some dilapidated neighborhood. He moved up the walk and climbed the steps onto the porch of number 6328 before knocking, awkwardly.
Had she given him the wrong address?
Was there more than one Maple Drive in Las Vegas?
What would he say to the chipper soccer mom who answered the door with a toddler in her arms?
Luckily, Greg didn't have to worry about that, because the dark skinned woman who answered wasn't a soccer mom. Not even close.
She smiled. "Hey, sugar." She pushed the door wide open and beckoned him with her hand. "Come inside. I'll get you your stuff."
Greg entered the suburban home and realized that it probably looked fairly similar to any other home on the street. It was clean, with furniture from IKEA and even a few framed photographs of a happy family hung on the wall. He followed Camellia out of the entry hall and into a living room, where he stopped.
It would seem that he had just crashed some sort of laidback party. There were five other people in the room, most of them lounging about on the furniture, and one of them he recognized.
"G-man!" Lyle crooned, obviously intoxicated with something. There was the strange smell of something familiar, but Greg couldn't quite place it. A large dopey smile was on his face as he waved at Greg. "Good to see you!"
Greg supposed that he should have guessed Lyle was a frequent customer's of Camellia, as he seemed averse to doing anything about the games she pulled at Valhalla. But he hadn't expected to see the bartender there.
He waved weakly as Camellia vanished into another room. "Hey," he said. "What's, uh... what's going on?"
"Just chillin'," Lyle replied. Someone passed him what Greg realized was a joint and Lyle held the short stick to his lips before inhaling. There was a pause which everyone seemed to be waiting, and then the bartender exhaled, blowing smoke into the air. Greg was finally able to identify the smell that weighed thick and moist in the air.
"Right..." he noted as Lyle passed the joint on.
Camellia reentered the room holding a new orange bottle and shaking it. "Here you are, sugar," she said, sauntering over to Greg. She pressed her body obscenely close and took his hands in hers, pressing the bottle into his palm.
"Fifty bucks," she said.
"You're kidding," Greg groaned.
"You wanna go find another place to get them?" she asked.
Greg sighed and fished three twenties out of his back pocket. She snatched it from his hand immediately after it came into view and put it beneath the collar of her rather low-cut blouse.
"Hey—that was sixty. You got ten bucks for me?"
"How about next time, you only pay forty?" she asked.
Greg rolled his eyes and pocketed his pills, stepping backwards to put a little bit of distance between himself and Camellia.
"You're not going to sample the product?" Camellia asked. "For all you know, I could have given you junk."
"You gave me good stuff last time," said Greg.
"That's because I didn't know I would be selling it to you," said Camellia. "Or giving it, as the case was. You blackmailer, you." She was teasing.
Greg took out the bottle again and looked at it. "I have to drive home," he said.
"Aw, don't worry about that..." Camellia cooed.
"Yeah, don't worry about that," Lyle called, echoed by other cries of support. "Stay a while, G. Relax."
Greg rubbed his eyes. "I don't think that's a good idea..." he began.
"C'mon..." Camellia whispered, huskily. "We'll take good care of you. Promise." She gestured at a nearby armchair and lifted a bottle of water off of the table, handing it to Greg.
He glanced at his watch. "I have to be at work in three hours..." he said.
"You will be totally at baseline by then," said Camellia. "Have a seat. Try one."
Though verbally, he protested, he found his knees bending, his body sinking into the armchair. "I've never taken it this close before work..."
"Hush," Camellia whispered, swinging one leg over his lap until she was straddling him. She took the bottle from his hand and poured three pills onto her palm.
"That's more than I—"
"Sh..." she hushed again with a smile, and took one tiny yellow pill in between her thumb and forefinger, pressing it against Greg's lips until it slid into his mouth. She did the same with the other two, and Greg did not protest any more. She handed him the bottle of water. "Drink."
He placed the bottle to his lips and closed his eyes, swallowing the water and the pills. When he opened them again, Camellia's smile had turned into a grin.
"There," she said. "In a few minutes, you'll be feeling all better."
Greg bit his lip, still slightly nervous about taking three pills when he was used to taking two at most. Five milligrams a pill, with ten being the recommended dosage, that meant that Greg was halfway past that mark, and if he kept ingesting all these pills, then the buildup of the anxiolytic in his system would mean...
Would mean...
What had he been thinking about?
"Aw, man..." he breathed, closing his eyes and leaning back in his chair as chills dribbled down his back like hot fudge on a sundae. He was suddenly warm, his muscles relaxing as he sank deeper into the chair. He took a deep breath and exhaled as the familiar sense of contentedness flooded his whole body. His muscles tingled slightly, but not uncomfortably. It was as if someone was running a feather over his skin, soft and ticklish.
"Aha, there we go, man!" Lyle exclaimed as Camellia climbed off of Greg and situated herself between Lyle and an Asian woman on the couch.
"Greg," she said slowly. She pointed at the woman next to her. "This is Misty."
"Hey." Misty waved. Her voice was low and her smile was broad.
Camellia pointed at a pale guy with black hair and frosted tips sitting by the coffee table rolling a new joint. "That's Toxic."
He didn't even look up from his task when he said, "S'up."
Camellia nodded at a girl sitting at the opposite end of the coffee table, watching Toxic with fascination. She had purple hair and pasty skin, along with a nose ring in her right nostril and black lipstick. "That over there is Gemini."
Gemini said nothing, in fact she didn't even move.
Camellia laughed. "She's seein' stars." She gestured to the other armchair, where a fourth person was, with tan skin and a black tattoo on the back of his left hand that read 666. "And that is Frank."
"What, no clever nickname for you?" Greg asked, playfully.
"If you knew my real name, chico, you'd know that Frank is a clever nickname," he replied with a thick Spanish accent.
Greg smiled. "I wanna nickname!" he whined playfully to Camellia.
She returned the grin with affection. "Of course, cariño. What would you like us to call you?"
"Don't care," said Greg, because it was true. Things were beginning to slow down again, and the tingling sensation had reached his brain. "You pick."
She tossed back her head in a barking laugh and her hair floated in space for a moment before falling lightly on her shoulders, like ebony clouds. "Ah, I know. We shall call you Conejo, on account of how fast you are going, mi hijito."
"What does..." His lips moved so slowly. "... 'Conejo' mean?"
"It means Rabbit, amigo," came Frank's voice from the chair.
A dopey smile claimed Greg's features as he closed his eyes and leisurely raised his eyebrows in amusement. "Sounds good to me." He felt as if someone had taken the sound on a record and slowed it down. Everything was in slow motion. He saw the freshly rolled joint move from Toxic's fingers to Camellia on the couch and she inhaled deeply before passing it on. It seemed to take forever for the joint to reach Greg, handed to him across the way by Misty.
He held it and was about to pass it back to Toxic, when he was chastised by Lyle. "Nah, man, you have to take a hit," he said. "It's like... an unwritten law or something."
Greg stopped and looked back at the joint in his hand, wondering why he had decided to pass on the grass this time. It was more out of habit than anything else. No actual thought had crossed his mind about whether or not he would partake in smoking marijuana. It seemed to him like a no-brainer. He hadn't gotten high on pot since college, and that was a long time ago. He knew better now, or so he liked to think.
But as the Valium flooded his blood stream and loosened up his tense muscles, his brain slowly came to the apathetic conclusion that there was no harm in taking a hit. Without thinking, he put the thing to his lips and inhaled deeply, feeling the smoke invade his lungs and held it there until his head began to spin and then he puffed it back out into the air before letting out a low chuckle, which he found he couldn't contain.
He passed the joint back to Toxic as he continued to laugh, his hand sliding across his stomach, hyperaware of the feel of the fibers of his shirt against the ridges of his palm and fingertips, and found this all the more amusing. Valium never induced euphoria in him, only a warm sense of contentedness. But with the addition of the marijuana, bliss slowly began in his chest and spread its warm tendrils out into the rest of his body.
His head felt empty, and yet his thoughts were fairly clear. He felt like a helium balloon that could just float up to the ceiling, and he only seemed to think further into the very cushy armchair.
"There we go," said Toxic approvingly as he took another hit before passing it to Gemini, who took it and stared at it a moment before laughing and falling backwards, handing it to Frank without trying it.
Greg coughed to stir up the phlegm in his lungs. It had been a while since he'd smoked anything, so neither his lungs nor his mind were used to it, but the valium kept him steady and calm. He knew he should probably be worried, but he just couldn't find the effort anymore, and so he allowed himself to be lost in the moment.
"How come she doesn't have to take a hit?" Greg asked, gesturing lazily at Gemini.
"She's already gone, Rabbit," said Misty with a grin. "Far away from here. You, on the other hand, badly needed to loosen up."
"Well, I'm loose now," Greg sighed, leaning back in the chair and closing his eyes. "So loose."
"Good!" Camellia exclaimed. "You deserve it, cariño. You're always so tense."
"S'my job..." Greg mumbled, colors dancing behind his closed lids. "Makes me... the opposite of how I feel right now."
"Well, maybe you should get a new job," Frank suggested, twirling the joint between his fingers. He handed the joint back to Greg, who inhaled deeply before sighing it all out again.
"S'more to it than that... can't explain... I don't wanna talk anymore," he moaned. He was aware enough to recognize that his words were slurred, but too far gone to care.
He felt as if a second stretched on into eternity, although moments later, he felt something warm slithering up and down the top of his thighs. He opened his eyes to see Camellia on her knees between his spread legs, her hands crawling up and down his jeans as she smirked at him.
"You still with us, Conejo?" she whispered.
Grinning dopily, he nodded. "Yeah... I just don't want to move or... do anything..."
"We ordered munchies," said Toxic, and Greg looked up to see him carrying a box of pizza into the room. Greg didn't remember him ever leaving. "You want?"
"Hell yeah..." Greg tried to be enthusiastic but found it to be too much effort. He was starving though. "I want some food."
The pizza was warm against his tongue, the movement of others blurs before his vision. He swallowed and felt the food fall into his stomach, filling it up, and was grateful for it. Laughter filled the room and Gemini was rolling on the floor, her smile still in place. Camellia was no longer between his legs, but had somehow found her way behind the armchair and her hands dug deeply into Greg's shoulders as she kneaded at them. At one point he saw Misty lean over and whisper something into Lyle's ear that made him laugh, but he didn't know what she said.
Fingers were stroking his hair, and waves of delighted shivers bounced between Greg's head and his toes. He concentrated on his breathing, staring at Gemini dancing on the floor, ate whatever pizza was handed to him, smoked whatever was passed to him, and swallowed whatever pills were given to him.
And then, after what seemed like hour-long minutes, a vibrating sensation erupted in his jeans, and he laughed, wondering if it was his cat. A friendly and familiar song floated into his ears.
And then, Lyle yelled, "Dude! Answer that, it's killing my buzz!"
Greg slid his hand into his pocket and pulled out his phone with great effort. Eyes closed, he held it to his ear.
"Mm?" he intoned, unable to form any actual word.
Grissom's voice broke into his thoughts. "Greg? Where are you?"
Greg tried to think. "Em... what?"
"Are you OK? You're an hour late."
A fleeting tinge of panic flickered over the surface of Greg's consciousness, but it was gone rather quickly. Still, time was slowly speeding up again. He opened his eyes and they flickered over to a clock on Camellia's mantle. "Oh..." he muttered. "Didn't realize it was so... late."
"Well, where are you?" Grissom asked, his anxious tone beginning to irk the previously placated Greg.
"What's the big deal?" Greg groaned with a yawn and a stretch. "I'll be there, um... soon."
"You don't sound like yourself. Are you hurt? Are you sick?"
"Li'l sick, but it'll pass," Greg assured Grissom. "Was... sleeping, is all."
"I see..." Grissom whispered. "If you're ill, maybe you should keep sleeping."
"Nah, I'll be there," Greg insisted, already feeling the weight slowly returning to his mind. "I'll..."
A hand slinked down his arm and closed around the phone in his hands, taking it from his grip. He tiled his head back to see Camellia, who closed the phone with a smirk and tossed it back into his lap.
"You can't go anywhere in your condition, you're way too stoned," she said.
He rubbed his eyes. "I'm fine," he groaned. "I feel tense now, all over again, which means the valium is gone, doesn't it? As for the pot, it's giving me a headache. I'm coming down."
"That's good, Conejo," said Camellia. "But you're still pretty high up there." She looked up and across the room. "Lyle! You're sober, right? Take him home."
Lyle saluted as Misty climbed off of his lap. What she was initially doing on his lap, Greg wasn't sure. "Yes ma'am!" he said, rising to his feet.
"OK then..." Greg muttered, sitting up in his chair. His body moved, but it felt stiff. He wondered if he had moved from it at all in the last four hours. He reached into his pocket to make sure his pill bottle was still there. "I'ma just gonna... take my pills and go then. See you when I see you."
He wavered on his feet, the room still rocking back and forth, but he was becoming more aware of himself now, and time was picking up again. He felt Lyle's arm around his shoulders as he guided Greg to the door.
"Come on now, G-man, time to go home."
"Actually..." said Greg slowly. "Can you give me a ride to the crime lab?"
"Is that where you work?" Frank asked, leaning against the wall by the couch. "Damn, that's depressing."
"You weren't kidding when you said you were a morbid guy," said Camellia with a wry smile.
"'K, I can drop you off there," said Lyle.
"What about my car?" Greg asked, looking over his shoulder at Camellia.
"It'll still be here when you get done with work, cariño!" Camilla called back. "You need to put in those hours so you can pay me, you silly Rabbit!"
And his last sight of her as Lyle ushered him out of the door, was her tossing her head full of dark hair back in laughter.