Title: Maybe
By: Shacky20
Pairing: Nick/Greg
Rating: R
Spoilers: Post Ep for ‘Meat Jekyll’
Summary: ‘Nick almost died today, again.’ A look inside the thought of Greg Sanders after he leaves the hospital.

Nick almost died today, again.  How many times will I say that, feel that crushing weight on my chest before I do something, say something, anything.  How many times is this now, I hate to even think.  For ten years I’ve feared this, from the first time that nut job wife pulled a gun on him at the scene and he was alone.  I hadn’t been here but a year, but I already knew I liked him.  When I heard what happened I felt like I had been kicked in the gut. 

Then Nigel Crane, that was, I can’t even put into words how that felt.  Word spread around the lab so fast after the discovery the team made with the tapes, and all I could was sit there and wait.  That was the worst night of my life, or had been at the time.  But he came back unscathed for the most part, and so did I.  Months past, the flirting continued.  We never admitted it, never talked, but the looks and touches were always there . That’s all they ever were.

He came by a lot after the explosion to check up on  me he said, but I didn’t believe that and I don’t think he did either. But we played the lie out, pretended the feelings weren’t there.  Maybe they weren’t and it was my imagination , and then  I got distracted. 

That year I was trying to get into the field while still DNA Tech was hard, harder than I’ll ever admit.  After all that work, and pushing, and training, I thought I had made a huge mistake.  But there I was, in the field full time, everything I thought I always wanted.  Damn Ecklie, he had to ruin everything.  I remember the morning in every detail.  I had been sound asleep when the knock came.   Nick stood there, and I knew something was wrong, very wrong.   When he told me I couldn’t  believe it, but it shouldn’t have surprised me.  Ecklie had always been looking for a way to get back at Grissom, and he found it.  We promised to talk still, and we knew we’d still see each other, just not as much, and the “Let’s go out sometime and see you around”, were passed between us.  That was the first time he kissed me.  Assaulted  me was probably a better word for it, but I wasn’t complaining.  He tasted just as sweet and hot as I had imagined he did.  It seemed like hours we spent kissing and fucking, it wasn’t making love.  It was hard and desperate, almost like it was our last chance and we were holding on as tight as we could.  It was wonderful and heartbreaking all wrapped up together.  He pushed me roughly against the counter, his body pressed tightly against mine.  He looked at me and held my face, eyes asking for permission he didn’t need.  I just slowly nodded my head and took what he was offering.  I knew when I woke up he was already gone, but then again he had to be at work at in the middle of the afternoon now.

The next time I saw him was after that horrible case when I found the boy, starved and forgotten, dumped like trash.  After the case, he and Warrick sat in the break room listening to my wild story, and we acted like it never happened.   It was easier that way.  Like it was all a dream, or something we just needed to get out of our systems.

Then Nick almost died, again.  If I thought Nigel Crane was bad,  what Walter Gordon did was hell.  That whole night was like a horrible nightmare.  I still cannot imagine what it must have been like for Nick, trapped inside that box, thinking there was no way out.  When I saw his face appear on that screen, it was like my body stopped functioning.  All I could think about was our one night, how I might never see him again, listen to that smooth voice, see that sparkle in his eyes, and I would have killed Gordon myself if I could have.  We found him, crying, a gun to his head, I wanted to vomit.  He was so broken, but who could blame him.  After he was released from the hospital, I wouldn’t leave his side.  I stayed at his place, helped take care of him.  He kept telling me I didn’t have to, it wasn’t my job, but I wanted to.  Honestly, I don’t think he minded.  But like all things, the time had come for me to go home.  I was slowly packing my things, making sure to leave nothing behind.  He looked so much better, seemed better emotionally, but I was so worried leaving him again.  I said my goodbyes and take cares and call me if you need anything at all, but as soon as my hand was on the door I dropped my bag and just walked over to him and kissed him.  Kissed him over and over until we were both breathless.  I leaned forward to touch my forehead to his and just touched him,  everywhere I could.  Felt his warm sweet breath again against my face.  Hot tears ran down his face and I reached up to wipe them away whispering over and over ‘I almost lost you again’, noticing my own tears for the first time since we found him. 


It was harder going back to normal that second time, especially now we were working together again.  I could still taste his tears on my tongue.  We saw each other more, flirted again, touched again, but dared not step over that line.  That invisible line we only crossed when we were so desperate we could only find solace in each other.  I remember the drive back to Las Vegas so well the day after he found Cassie.  I say he because only he believed, he didn’t give up, never let us quit looking.  He was still having a difficult time with it all.  He told me about the talk he had with Sara, how he was rescued.  She said it just wasn’t his time to die.  I told him maybe he lived so he could save Cassie.  The tight lipped smile and wet eyes were almost too much to bear.  He reached over to grab my hand as he drove, and I never let go.


Months passed, things settled down.  I could tell Nick was feeling uncomfortable in his own skin he seemed.  First he grew a moustache, which I must admit did look a little silly on him.  Then he grew his hair out, for him this was major.  But the first time I heard Warrick tease him about how we were starting to look alike after that case with the Rappers and the posters, he was back to his original haircut.  Brass was shot, that was tough.  Reminding us once again how quickly things changed.  I think we both knew what we felt, but needed to move on.  All the usual arguments how we work together, what if it ended bad, what if we ended up hating each other.  But I wondered what if we didn’t, what if it was wonderful and perfect.  Maybe things could be different this for us.

That all changed with Demitrius James.  I remember that horrible feeling.  Seeing them all surround that person on the ground screaming for help.  They all thought it was fun, I couldn’t let it happen.   I knew I was in over my head when I started down that alley, but I couldn’t just stand by and watch someone die.  It all happened so fast, I never thought I really hurt him.  Then the sounds of glass breaking, feeling hands grab me everywhere.  The blows that were coming toward me, the sounds of bones breaking and the taste of copper in my mouth, the feel of sticky blood all over my face.   One thought raced in my mind, I’ll never see Nick again, never feel him again, and I couldn’t give up, Nick didn’t.  I heard about what happened at the scene, it was all over the Lab.  Grissom knew but only gave him a slight reprimand,  he understood.  We all knew Nick took his cases personally, but this time I was the reason for that reaction, the unrestrained violence vibrating in his body.   I never mentioned it to him that I knew, that I wanted to thank him for punching that guy, we didn’t talk about things like that.  I remember falling asleep when the gang was still there visiting me.  It was still hard to open my eyes as I felt my surroundings come back to me.  I felt his hand on mine, he was holding it so tightly, but it felt so nice, comforting I just laid there and enjoyed the feeling.  He rubbed my hand with his thumb, saying a prayer of thanks that I was all right, that I was still here with him. 

The weeks and months after the attack, he was more protective of me, but I remember feeling that way about him after the box.  He kept a closer eye on me at scenes.  But what I remember most was the way he was so steadfast in his defense of me and my actions on the stand at the court hearing.  I felt everything going against me, I was even doubting myself, but Nick didn’t, not once.  He looked at that defense attorney right in the eye stating that my actions were justifiable, absolutely.  Then he looked at me, and I felt his faith in me.  I wanted to be wrapped in him again, feel safe again.  But I never took that step, I never reached out for him, and he never reached back for me.

After Sara left, it felt like we all started falling apart.  She was never really there after her abduction.  Her heart wasn’t in her work anymore, and that was hard to see, especially to sara.  That was also the time Warrick’s marriage fell apart, and then Warrick fell apart with it.  I could see how worried Nick was about his best friend.  He mentioned to me about the pills, how he wanted to help but didn’t know how.  We were down two CSI’s at that point, Sara was gone and Warrick on suspension.  Ronnie tried to fill that space but never really fit in.  We were so buried in our work their wasn’t much time for anything else. 

When hell broke loose with Warrick, Nick was still his biggest defender.  Even after the drugs and after the almost arrest for the murder of that stripper they found in his car.  I remember when I questioned him in the slightest and Nick would hear nothing of it.  Of course he was right.  Everyone though he shot Gedda, hell Brass did, I even admit part of me wondered.  But Nick and Grissom proved him innocent, I don’t know why I doubted.   That night at the restaurant, it felt right again, easy and relaxed with all of us.  I couldn’t help but notice the way that redhead waitress kept eyeing Nick, and he kept looking back.  I wish he looked at me that way, but that was over, if it ever existed.  Warrick kept teasing him, telling him to go for it.  I had a life happening, I was going to LA the next day, starting something brand new.  After I could stand no more, I gave my goodbyes and left.  I didn’t look back to see if Nick stayed or watched me go, or if he was still looking for the redhead.  I tried to sleep but couldn’t after packing so I went to the airport.  They wanted my story, the book I had been working on for over two years.  I felt so proud.  I’ll never forget that phone call.  I was still waiting by my gate and I saw Catherine’s number pop up.  What she told me, what little I could actually understand, it couldn’t be real. 

Warrick was gone, for knowing too much, being too good at his job.  When I got to the Lab and saw Grissom, then it felt real.  All that blood, this was really happening.  After all the close calls and what could have happened, it finally did, to one of our own.  I walked into the morgue, seeing Warrick’s body lying there, and Nick.  Nick standing over him, barely controlled rage rolling off of him, and I feared for the person who did this to Warrick, and I feared for what this was going to do to Nick.   Nick and I might have flirted and kissed and fucked, but Warrick was his best friend, always was.  I understood that.  He was all business, asking questions, making sure the day shift coroner knew what they were doing.  He could only stay for a few minutes before tearing our of there.  I did my job, got his clothes and took them to Hodges.  It was good to see Sara, and we did the little things.  We couldn’t have been more surprised when we found out about his son.  Everything seemed to happen so fast with the case.  Nick figured out quickly McKeen was behind it, even before Grissom suspected.  We got to the hotel room just minutes too late, but we knew. Nick paced while listening to Brass talk to McKeen.  Although I wasn’t there, I heard about what happened.  About the ‘miss’ from Nick’s gun, and way McKeen spoke about Warrick, and Nick’s anger, but he still couldn’t do it.  Death was too easy for him, and Nick knew it. 

It was after that things started getting hard.  I didn’t sit by Nick at the funeral.  Cath and Sara needed him, and he probably needed them.  Seeing Gris up there lose his composure, was too much to take.  I could see the tears run down Nick’s face, and all I wanted to do was wipe them away for him, help take away his pain, but I couldn’t .  He was surrounded after the funeral, friends, colleagues all giving the team their condolences.  I even saw him talking with Tina, and holding Warrick’s son.  He was hugging Catherine when our eyes met.  No words were spoken, none were needed.  I nodded my goodbye to him and went home.  Three days earlier I was planning to leave here and change my life, and now nothing would be the same ever again. 

I must have fallen asleep on my couch in my suit, because the next thing I know someone is knocking on my door.   I don’t even have to open it up to know who it is.  I open the door and Nick’s just standing there, looking like a lost little boy.  His deep brown eyes look up at me, tears on his face, breath hitching, and I just pull him in and put my arms around him.   He holds onto me as he cries.  I wonder if he’s cried like this since they found Warrick.  I wonder if he’s ever cried like this since he was a boy, because he’s sobbing on my shoulder.  I don’t say anything, just hold him, rub his back, kiss his head and face.  He finally quiets so I lead him to the bedroom.  After I sit him down, I slowly take his shoes off, and I know he’s lost because he jut lets me.  Next I unbutton his shirt and take it off, then follow with my own.  Again, like before, we don’t say anything.  This time I hold his face in my hands and look down at him, and he nods his head, and I lean down and taste him again for the first time in three years.   He’s just like I remember.  If before was fucking, this was making love.  Feeling everything, touching everywhere, not wanting to neglect a thing between us.  We aren’t the same people we were three years ago, I’ve grown a lot, I’m not the kid I was before.  This time I take charge, I set the pace and just let Nick feel.  Maybe it was the need to feel alive, or to know that we are still here, but it felt so much more honest, just more passionate.  The warmth, the strength is his body, the sincerity in his eyes as he looks right into me as I enter him this time and I wonder if he’s ever let anyone do this to him before.  The thought that I’m the first makes my heart clench.   We kissed and touched and pressed our bodies together for an eternity it felt like.  It was beautiful and wonderful and I hoped and prayed that he loved me just as much as I loved him. 

I must have been wrong because he was gone when I awoke the next morning.  No note or message, not that I expected one, it just would have been nice.  Sara left again, and Grissom followed.  He even realized there was more to life than this job.  Catherine was in charge after that, and we got two new team members.  Riley was pretty cool, and Ray was really good at his job, a fountain on information, but the team was again broken apart, and this time was for good.

Nick was having a rough time, between losing Warrick and Grissom, he was looking lost.  Then there was that hard case he had on his birthday.  I could hear him in the locker room talking to Ray about that poor girl, the tears in his voice, the regret.  Nick’s always wanted to be Superman, and when it doesn’t work that way, he takes it hard. 

Riley left and Sara came back, which was great, but she wasn’t the same person.  Nick got promoted, and so did I.  It’s been a pretty good year considering everything we’ve gone through the year before. 

Nick got the bad guy again.

Nick almost died tonight, again.  That thought keeps running circles in my head.  It’s different now that it actually has happened to one of us.  Nick almost died, but he didn’t.  But he got shot.  So many things could have gone wrong and it would have ended so differently. 

Maybe he has nine lives, but I don’t want to lose him, not now, not ever.  I always thought there would be time to say it, to tell him someday.  Maybe I almost lost my chance today, maybe it’s a sign.  Maybe I should stop being a coward and tell him.  Maybe I should have stayed and held his hand like he did mine when it was me lying there.  Maybe he wouldn’t be here at all if that bullet had been an inch more to the right.  Maybe he’s there in that hospital all alone right now waiting to see if I’ll come.  Maybe he loves me too.  Maybe I’ll finally be able to say the words.  Maybe I should leave well enough alone, but maybe it could be everything I’ve always wanted, we’ve always wanted.  Maybe if I leave right now, we can stop thinking maybe……