Title: No Strings Attached (4)
Author: podga
Pairing: Gil/Nick
Rating: Adult
Disclaimer: CSI and its characters do not belong to me. I write and post for fun only.

Dee, you have my sincere and deepest gratitude for your help and encouragement on this. You may write them fluffy, but you understand their (my) angst better than most!

Series: sequal to No Strings Attached by Dee, No Strings Attached: Past 1, No Strings Attached (2), No Strings Attached 3

Present:

 

“He fired a shot. At an unarmed suspect.”

“Near an unarmed suspect. And he was the one to disarm him.”

“Gil, you know we can’t look the other way on this. It has to go into his file.”

Gil shakes his head. You put this in Nick’s file and I quit, he wants to yell, except that he knows it won’t have any effect.

“Conrad. Warrick was one of his best friends. Cut him some slack.”

“Nobody can ever convince you that you might be wrong, can they, Gil? We end up having this same damn conversation over and over again. You cut everybody slack. And you know what? In the long term it doesn’t seem to help very much.”

He has to stay calm. He has to. This is for Nick.

“Conrad, please,” he says, trying to keep any trace of emotion out of his voice. “If this goes into Nick’s file, it will ruin any chance he’ll ever have at a promotion and that’s only if they don’t fire him outright. You know Nick. He’s one of the best there is. He doesn’t deserve this.”

Conrad sighs. “Gil, there were too many witnesses. Brass, the other cops, the helicopter pilot, McKeen himself. IA have already asked to see him in about an hour. I can’t make this go away, you know that. It’s not up to me.”

“What if I talk to Nick?” Gil asks, grasping at straws.

Ecklie looks at him sharply. “And tell him what?”

Gil hears the capitulation in Ecklie’s voice and stands up. “I’ll think of something,” he says and heads for the door.

“Gil. The most you can hope for is to get the reprimand dismissed due to lack of intent, maybe keep it out of his file altogether.”

Gil pauses and looks back at Ecklie. “Lack of intent.”

“Yes. Give IA reason to… investigate further. Draw a conclusion. Or not.”

He doesn’t need to ask Ecklie for further clarification. He nods once and walks out, shutting the door firmly behind him.

He finds Nick sitting in the locker room, bent forward with his elbows on his knees, staring down at his loosely clasped hands.

“Nick. I need to speak to you.”

Nick looks up, his eyes red-rimmed. “Griss–”

“I need to see you in my office. Right now,” Gil firmly interrupts him, afraid of what Nick might say in public.

Once in Gil’s office, he indicates to Nick that he should sit down, but Nick ignores the suggestion, so he remains standing as well.

 “You want me to lie?” Nick asks in disbelief after he’s explained.

“No. I want you to admit that you were under stress and that you cannot remember having had any intention of pulling the trigger, at any point.”

“Oh, come on. You really think that’ll wash?”

“Yes. Nobody saw anything. All they heard is a shot.”

“McKeen saw.”

“McKeen can’t know what was going through your head. Besides he was losing blood, delirious, and he’s hardly a reliable witness in the first place.”

“I can’t think of this right now. In fact, you know what? I don’t give a shit. A good friend of mine–” Nick’s voice breaks and he takes a deep breath. “A good friend of mine is being buried later today. The rest isn’t important.” He spins around and reaches for the door handle.

Gil grabs his arm. “Nick. Wait a minute.”

“Let go of me, Grissom,” Nick says, trying to pull away.

“Warrick was my friend, too. I knew him well, and I know he wouldn’t want this to happen to you. You have to promise me, Nick. When IA speak to you, pulling the trigger did not consciously cross you mind, not even for a split second.”

“Screw you,” Nick mutters. “I wanted to kill the son of a bitch.”

“Promise,” Gil repeats insistently and Nick suddenly goes very still. He stares at Gil, a haunted look in his dark eyes. “Say, I promise,” Gil says softly, suddenly realizing his advantage and deliberately seizing it, knowing full well that he risks having it all blow up in his face.

“I promise,” Nick whispers, then he wrenches his arm from Gil’s grasp and walks out of the office.

 

 

Past:

 

“I think you need to talk to somebody.”

Nick points the remote control at the TV and increases the volume.

“Nick!” Gil says, but Nick ignores him, staring fixedly at the screen. In frustration, Gil walks over to the TV set and switches it off. “Listen to me.”

“I have. The problem is that you’re not listening to me.”

 Nick sets the remote on the coffee table and gets up. “I’m going for a run.” He heads for the bedroom, stripping off his T-shirt as he goes along.

“I am listening,” Gil says, trailing after him. “I just don’t think you’re in a position to see very clearly right now.”

Nick turns to face him, his hands on his hips.

“How many times do we have to go over this? I don’t want to go into therapy. I don’t need to go into therapy. I’m fine!” He almost shouts the last word, then he turns away, rummaging through his drawer with tense, angry movements.

“You’re not. How could you be? Anyway, I’m not suggesting therapy. Just that you talk to someone.”

Nick yanks on a pair of shorts, picks up his running shoes and heads for the door.

“You should really wear socks,” Gil says, but all he gets in response is a muttered “Jesus H. Christ” and a slammed door.

 

 

After Nick came home from the hospital, he was always short-tempered, on edge. Whether he was working on his toys (though he did less and less of that), doing laundry or eating a sandwich, I could sense the anger simmering right under his skin, eating him up from the inside. I couldn’t understand how nobody else seemed to notice it, but at work he was impeccable, and maybe people only saw what they wanted to see.

And he changed. Dependable Nick, square, conservative Nick, started experimenting with his look, growing his hair longer and even, for a few weeks, a mustache. He’d vanish for hours on end, and come back reeking of alcohol and stale cigarette smoke.

There was no way I could get through to him. I did everything in my power to allow him time to heal, but the more I tried to talk to him, the more he avoided me. I don’t know if he had sex during those long absences, when he wouldn’t even answer his phone unless he got a call from dispatch.  I’d like to think not, but I’m pretty sure he did, because two or three times there was a different quality to him when he came home, gentler, softer, and the only reason I could see for that is that he was feeling guilty about something.

I tried to make allowances, convinced that he wasn’t responsible for his actions. I thought it was only a matter of time; that he’d finally see for himself that he couldn’t simply ignore what had happened, that in order to put it behind him, he’d have to acknowledge it.

 

 

Past:

 

“I heard an interesting rumor today.”

Nick’s voice is casual, almost pleasant, but there’s an undertone that alerts Gil that something is very wrong, and he warily looks up from his book.

“What’s that?”

“That you cashed in a quite a few chips in order to get Catherine, Warrick and me back into your team. That it wasn’t just one of Ecklie’s weird about-faces to keep us all remembering who’s boss.”

“I never said it was.”

“You never said it wasn’t. Remember? When I mentioned to you how unfair it was that Catherine was being punished, simply because I was at the wrong place at the wrong time?”

“I told you that wasn’t the reason.”

“No, but you didn’t tell me what the reason was, did you?” Nick laughs, a bitter, sardonic, ugly sound that Gil has never heard before. “My, my, my. Who would’ve thought you had that many favors to call in. Nah, there couldn’t have been that many. Maybe you had to sign a couple of IOUs, as well. We all certainly underestimated your political savvy.”

“Nick, what’s the problem?” Gil asks, deliberately tamping down his own rising irritation.

“The problem? Oh, I don’t know. Maybe the fact that Catherine didn’t deserve being demoted just for you to fulfill a whim? Or that you made yourself my boss again without asking me? Without even telling me once you’d done it?”

“Nick…” He pauses, at a loss for words. The truth is that he never thought about the possible ramifications. In the days after Nick’s rescue, the only thing he could think of is that he must protect Nick from further harm at all costs.

“I need you to understand something, Gil. I’m only going to say this one last time, so I need you to listen very, very carefully. I can decide for myself what’s best for me, and I don’t need you, or anybody else, telling me what I need to be doing or not doing. Stop treating me like a child. If my wishes don’t count, if we’re not equals in this thing, then I don’t want it.”

“We are equals,” Gil protests, “but–”

“But what?” Nick interrupts him. “There are no buts, Gil. We’ve had this conversation a thousand times already, and you just don’t want to hear what I’m saying.”

“I do. You know I do.”

“No, Gil. I don’t know that. And I don’t think that’s my problem. But whoever’s problem it is, I’m sick and tired of dealing with it.”

The very next day, Nick discovers the audio file logged as evidence in his own case. Maybe it’s really the last straw, or maybe it’s just the excuse Nick has been looking for. Gil never finds out, because when he comes home that morning, Nick is no longer there.

 

 

I tried to talk to him over the following days, left messages, even called him into my office. He threatened me that he would file a sexual harassment suit against me if I did that again, and the cold implacability in his eyes convinced me that he would follow through if necessary. 

All I was trying to do was to protect him. I didn’t know why he couldn’t see that, or why it made him so angry if he could.

Deep down I suspected it had nothing to do with me, at least not directly. Maybe the problem was that at some point, either during his time in the coffin or shortly afterwards (or maybe even before, who knows?) he figured that life is too short. Too short to be trapped with someone fifteen years older, someone who doesn’t share many of his personal interests and who will be retiring and maybe wanting to move to Florida or Southern California just as Nick will be reaching the pinnacle of his own career.

Would that make him shallow, unworthy of my loving him? I don’t think so. Why shouldn’t he consider the whole package? After all, part of why I was attracted to him was his youth and good looks.

 

 

Present:

 

“Are you ready?”

Gil nods and turns away, pretending to look for his car key and not to notice that Sara’s reaching for his hand. Even though he was initially glad to see her, he’s getting angrier and angrier at her as the hours pass. Why is she trying to impose her way of grieving on him? How can she presume to know what he needs to hear or feel or say? Why does she insist on helping him with the eulogy, when he hasn’t asked for help?

“Let’s go,” he says curtly.

They all reach the entrance of the church at almost exactly the same time, as if after so many years they share some type of internal clock. Only Nick is absent, and Gil worries that he’s still caught up with IA, but a second later he sees him trotting up to them.

“Everything OK?”

Nick grimaces. “I needed to go buy a white shirt. I thought I had a clean one.”

“With IA?”

“I don’t know. I guess so. They didn’t seem too interested, to be honest, barely asked any questions.”

“That’s understandable.”

The church is already full, but everybody has left the first pew empty for Warrick’s teammates. Gil falls slightly back, as if he can somehow delay or change the inevitable, and he watches Nick stop half-way up the aisle and bend over a young woman holding a baby. Warrick’s ex-wife. Nick is saying something and gesturing towards the front of the church, but she shakes her head vigorously several times and in the end Nick simply shrugs and moves forward to take his seat.

 

Warrick had no family, so there’s no natural place for everybody to gather after the funeral. Catherine would have offered her house, but she, like the rest of team, had been too busy with the case. So they end up at the diner, the same one where they shared breakfast only three days ago and countless times all the years before that. When the owner sees them coming, he closes for the day, only allowing in Warrick’s colleagues and friends as word begins to spread.

At some point Gil finds himself standing next to Nick, a little aside from the others.

“Did you know Warrick had his suspicions about us?” Nick asks.

Surprised, Gil turns his head to look at him.

“Not the exact nature of things. Just that we had some terrible argument, and that we wouldn’t reconcile. He wanted to fix things between us.”

“Did he? He never said anything to me.”

“I guess he thought I was to blame for whatever it was, so it was up to me.”

They stand quietly, shoulders a few inches apart.

“A lot of people,” Nick comments.  “I saw Mia, as well.”

“Mia?”

“DNA a couple of years back?” Nick says and Gil nods in recognition.

“Was I?” Nick asks.

Gil doesn’t need to ask what he’s talking about.

“No. But I don’t think I was either. Things just…” He pauses, but no sudden epiphany comes to him. “I don’t know. Anyway, water under the bridge, like you said.”

 

 

When we lose someone, especially during those first days, it somehow seems wrong that life goes on for us in all its mundane and selfish detail, and so our grief is always mixed with at least a degree of guilt. My friend, my loved one is dead, we think, so how can I be smiling at a joke, how can I be thinking about paying bills or buying toilet paper?

And how can I be so angry at the one person who’s at my side, just because she doesn’t understand that I need to be left alone to lick my wounds, just because she knows no other way than to cling more tightly and smother me when she sees me in pain? I know I should be thankful and that there are worse things in the world, and so I put up with it, hoping she’ll eventually get the message, and wondering what I’ll do if she doesn’t.

And so, finally, understanding dawns. Three years too late and with Sara lying at my side.