Title: Mascara
By: Caroline Crane
Pairing: Nick/Greg
Rating: PG
Prompt: mascara. (I used it literally. Not sure that's what you meant, but that's what happened.)

They've been working separate cases all week, and Nick's been putting in enough long hours that by the time Friday morning rolls around, he feels like he hasn't seen Greg in ages. They go home to the same house every day, sure, crash in the same bed and exchange sleepy hellos over the coffee pot. But they're getting home at different times, and most of the time when Nick gets home, Greg's already asleep. Not that Nick blames him; there's no point in waiting around on the off chance Nick will make it home early enough for any quality time together, and if he did wait up Nick would just feel guilty. Still, he likes it a lot better when they're at least working the same long, messy cases, because at least that means they get to go home together.

On Friday Nick actually manages to finish before Greg for once, wrapping up his double murder with the arrest of a junkies. It's pretty anticlimactic, considering the amount of damage they did, and mostly he just wants to go home and spend a couple days trying to forget all the stupid things people do to each other in the name of a quick fix. But he knows Greg's on his way back to the lab, so he waits around anyway, because at the very least they can drive home together for once.

He's about to give up and head home alone when Greg finally rounds the corner, shoulders hunched and his footsteps just a little heavier than usual. Which means either they're still spinning their wheels on their case, or it hasn't ended any better than Nick's. "Hey," he says, and when Greg looks up Nick spots dark circles under his eyes. "Finished early for once, thought I'd hang around and see if you were ready to go."

"Yeah," Greg says, brightening a little when Nick smiles at him. "Just let me grab my stuff."

Nick follows him into the locker room, watching while Greg pulls his stuff out of his locker and puts it in his duffel bag. He watches while Greg pulls on that ugly jacket he hates, but he doesn't complain about it because he's not in the mood for a dumb argument about clothes. Besides, he knows exactly why Greg wears that thing to work, and it's practical, so he's learned to keep his mouth shut. When Greg's finished zipping his jacket he lets out a sigh and reaches up, absently rubbing his right eye with the back of one hand.

When he pulls his hand away his dark circles are even darker, but when Nick looks closer he realizes that it's only the right side. He frowns and steps forward, reaching up to catch Greg's chin in one hand. "Are you wearing makeup?"

"What? Oh. Yeah, I guess I am."

And he can tell how tired Greg is, so he knows he should let it go at least until they're home, but there's no way he can. "Why?"

Greg reaches up to rub absently at the smudge of black under one eye, but all he manages to do is smear it a little more. "We found some weird marks on one of our DBs, and when Wendy broke it down she figured out it was mascara. So we were trying to figure out how the marks could have been made...you know, rule out transfer from another person before we dug any deeper. And since Wendy and Mandy were already wearing mascara, that left me."

"You let Wendy put makeup on you?" Nick asks, smiling a little in spite of himself. Because he's never had a drag kink or anything, but Greg does have nice eyelashes. Even when the mascara's smeared -- maybe especially when it's smeared, not that he'd say that out loud -- it makes Greg's eyes look a little bigger somehow. Or maybe just darker. Either way, he looks...good, and suddenly Nick wishes they were having this conversation at home instead of in the locker room.

Greg shrugs, but he's smiling like he knows exactly what Nick's thinking. "She seemed more excited about it than Mandy. Why, you like it?"

"Hard to say," Nick lies, tilting Greg's chin a little as though he's considering the look from another angle. "It's pretty smudged."

"Yeah, well, if you're nice I'll redo it later so you can get the full effect." Nick laughs when Greg pulls a tube of mascara out of his pocket and holds it up. "I tried to give it to Wendy, but she says you shouldn't share makeup. I'm willing to take the risk, though, if you want to give it a try."

"In your dreams," Nick answers, but he pulls Greg forward for a soft kiss. When he lets go he reaches for Greg's bag and swings it over his shoulder, then steers Greg toward the door. "Come on, let's go home."

"That an offer?" Greg asks, glancing over his shoulder long enough to flutter his lashes at Nick, and it should be ridiculous, but somehow Greg makes it look good.

"You're exhausted," Nick reminds him, as though that's ever stopped either of them. But Greg is pretty tired, and Nick's willing to wait until they've both gotten some sleep if that's what Greg wants. After all, time is one thing they've got.