Title: Sounding Like an Indie Film
Author: amazonqueenkate
Pairing: David Hodges/Greg Sanders, mentions of Nick Stokes/Bobby Dawson
Rating: PG
Warnings: disturbing mental images; whiny!Greg; the inability to get any reading done; ridiculous fluff
Spoilers: None.
Summary: It all started with Greg's whining, which should have been David's first clue.
Disclaimer: Oh, pfft. As if.
Author's Notes: I was informed by several induviduals that I had to write "the origin of pookie," which relates to another fic of mine. This is complete fluff. I don't think it even really counts as, you know, content. And I apologize for that.

It all started, as so many things somehow tended to, with Greg's whining.

"C'mon," he pressed, and minute fifteen of the conversation (if it could even be called a conversation when party spent the whole time whining and left the other party to contemplate bodily harm) ticked away into nothingness. He wriggled on the couch like an antsy toddler, nearly turning himself upside down. "Why not?"

David, for what felt like the thousandth time in those fateful fifteen minutes, rolled his eyes and flipped a page in the book he was trying to read, the same book he'd just opened when Greg trailed him into the living room whining. "I think ‘why' is a better question," he replied dully. "Such as, ‘why can't you let me read in peace?'"

Apparently, the inability to comprehend standard English was part and parcel to falsetto-pitched non-conversations. "Everyone else does it," Greg insisted, his expression dangerously hovering in the "pout" range. "Nick calls Bobby ‘Bob,' and he calls Nick ‘Nicky.'"

Sighing, David pulled his eyes away from the book to arch an eyebrow in Greg's direction. "Catherine and Grissom call him ‘Nicky,' too, and they don't sleep with him."

Greg ventured a grin. "Doesn't mean they would have turned down the chance before Bobby came along."

By the time he'd actually considered the implications of Greg's little joke (at least, he hoped it was a joke), David had occasion to shudder dramatically. "Thank you for that. Now, if you'll excuse me, I need to go rinse my retinas with battery acid."

Who knew that mental scarring was the way to get Greg Sanders to trade his whining for a laugh? "Any time, sugar."

For a moment, David ... who had returned to his book after realizing that he'd never be able to look at Grissom the same way again ... glossed over Greg's response, figuring that it was some admittance to the conversation finally ending. But then, the niggling voice in the back of his mind that often woke him up at three a.m. to check the locks (that Greg never locked) or reset the air conditioner (that Greg always set to "igloo") piped up, and he frowned as he tore himself back away from what he was sure would be fine literature if only he could actually get started on it.

"What did you just call me?"

Greg beamed ... beamed - at him. "You heard me."

David had been afraid of that, and closed his book hard enough to placate some of his burbling frustration. "In case you haven't noticed, we're not in middle school," he informed him evenly, rising from the couch. "I am not ‘sugar'. Nor am I ‘honey', ‘sweetie', ‘snookums', ‘baby', or ‘lovebug'. So ... unless you want me to call you ‘pookie' from now until I finally snap and kill you in cold blood ... you will stop begging me to act like a thirteen-year-old girl and give you a pet name."

He was more than a bit discouraged when Greg kept on grinning. "'Pookie'?"

"Yes, ‘pookie'. And do keep in mind that I am acquainted with one Jacqueline Elise Franco, the woman for whom the phrase ‘obnoxiously persistent' was coined."

There was a pause as Greg ... still nearly upside down, and contorted into such a position that David was wondering how his face wasn't turning purple ... considered this. Sadly, his smile didn't disappear. "I kinda like it," he decided, propping himself up on an elbow. "Sugar and Pookie. Sounds like an indie film."

David scowled. "That was supposed to be discouraging."

"Whatever you say, sugar," Greg replied, all grins, and David ... an expert on plans, and the backfiring thereof ... found himself groaning as he sunk back onto the couch and returned to his book.