Title: Synecdoche
Author: discoxwithxme
Pairing: Nick/Greg
Fandom: CSI
Rating: G
Disclaimer: Own nothing but the plot.
A/N: I am dutifully avoiding my informative paper. This hit me today randomly, and I ran with it. I hope it came out acceptably, Lol, because it’s pretty late and I’m exhausted but I still have a paper to write. Blah.
Summary: “Would you… would you still love me if I looked like Grissom?” Total fluff.

***


“Nick?” It was that soft, wheedling tone that Greg always adorned whenever he wanted something, but knew Nick would object to it, or whenever Greg was hesitant about asking Nick something because he didn’t want to appear silly or foolish. He also used it whenever he wanted Nick to do something for him, and more often than not, Nick relented. Because how could you say no to that cute, timid little voice and the glimmer of hope in Greg’s eyes, and the pout of his lips—yeah, Nick had no chance in Hell to resist him.

Nick looked up slowly from his sprawled out position on their bed, eyes flickering from the book he was reading to Greg, and then back to the book. After a brief moment to mull over his options at the impending situation Greg was going to ask him into, Nick let out a heavy breath. “Yeah?”

Greg didn’t respond right away, so Nick set his book down on his lap and slid the bookmark in place, flipping the book closed. Greg refused to look at Nick, eyes trained pointedly on his lap as his fingers twitched and fiddled with each other restlessly. He was sitting in a chair beside their bed – specifically, Nick’s side of their bed, though really the idea of them having sides was pointless because they always ended up snuggled together anyway – in one of Nick’s old, faded t-shirts, which was without a doubt four sizes too big for the kid. But the dark, warm glow of royal blue against Greg’s pale skin was luminous to Nick, and he felt a smile tugging at his lips at the beautiful sight his boyfriend made. Husband, he should say. Even if they weren’t legally married, they both wore identical rings on their ring fingers. As far as Nick was concerned, you didn’t need papers and acknowledgement from the government to prove your love was real, or even to accept it. He couldn’t care less if the government thought they were fit to be a legally married couple or not. He loved Greg with everything he had and more, and as the years had come and gone he’d found it harder and harder to describe this, this…radiant, fulfilling, child-on-Christmas-Eve feeling he had 24/7 for one Greg Sanders. Greg never failed to make Nick’s heart skip a beat or two; never failed to make him squirm in his seat with a seductive look thrown across the lab; never failed to make him lose his breath from just walking into the room. He never failed to amaze Nick at how he always smelled like coffee, sunshine, cold rain and certain warmth that Nick couldn’t quite put his finger on.

“G?” Nick whispered, setting his book on his nightstand and propping himself up into a sitting position. “What’s up, baby?”

Greg’s nimble fingers pulled at the frayed ends of Nick’s t-shirt, his toes scuffing across the carpet sullenly. The orange glow from the table lamp shot a surreal light across the left side of Greg’s face, and his browning hair turned a beautiful shade of something akin to brilliance. Nick could just make out the shape of Greg’s face, hidden in the otherwise pitch black room, and it worried him to no end that Greg was sitting all by himself in a chair, away from Nick and the cozy comfort of their bed. Reflexively, Nick reached his arms out toward his lover, beckoning him into his embrace. Greg slowly uncurled from the chair, tentatively taking a few steps over to the bed and relenting into Nick’s waiting arms. The Texan immediately wrapped his arms around his boyfriend and hauled him into his lap, burying his face into Greg’s slightly damp hair, the silky strands pushing against his face and pressing his glasses against his cheekbones and the bridge of his nose.

“You gonna tell me what’s on your mind?” Nick murmured, fingers absentmindedly stroking up and down Greg’s back languidly. The younger man remained quiet for a couple more minutes before finally speaking.

“Would you… would you still love me if I looked like Grissom?”

“I… What?” Nick pulled his face away from Greg’s hair, tilting the Californian’s face up to be level with his own. “What are you on about? And where did that come from?”

Greg’s eyes shimmered silently, unwavering as he stared into Nick’s eyes. “When I get old…you know, like Gris and all… Will you still love me? Will you still love me if I’m all old and wrinkly, and have an ugly, salt-and-pepper beard and Harry Potter-style glasses, and I was pudgy and introverted and philosophical…?”

Nick laughed, shaking his head at his husband. It rumbled in his chest and sent tingles down Greg’s spine from the contact. “What’s going on, Greg? And why would you ever think I wouldn’t love you when you got older? In case you’ve forgotten, Einstein, when you get older, that’ll mean I’m older too. Are you still gonna love me when I’ve got horrible crows feet and wrinkles in my forehead, and my skin is all saggy and full of ripples and bony veins?”

“Of course I will,” answered Greg solemnly. His answer was so serious that the smile dropped from Nick’s face. “I’ll always love you, Nick. Your looks don’t matter to me. Even though they are definitely a plus,” there Greg dipped a hand between them and raked fingertips across Nick’s taut abdominal muscles, delighting in the tiny shiver that reverberated up Nick’s back, “but it’s not what I’m interested in. I’d love you if you were four-hundred pounds overweight, with dandruff all over your clothes and dirty fingernails and lisp. I’m not sure I could deal with bad teeth, though. But I might be able to manage.”

Nick smiled at Greg, leaning forward and giving him an Eskimo kiss, which he eagerly accepted and reciprocated. “Well aren’t you sweet and unselfish?”

“Yes, I am, thank you. But that’s not the point. The point is, Nick, I don’t love you for your looks. It’s all about the man under the clothes for me. It’s all about the person that I wake up to in the morning, and the person I go to bed with at night. The person I slave over when they’re sick and whiny and needy; and the person I cook for when I know he’s had a bad day, even if my cooking is atrocious and I always make a bigger mess than I start out with, and I usually manage to spill everything and anything in sight so that we have to spend the rest of the night cleaning up what I made, or lack thereof.

“Because I love you, Nick. I love you and your birds and your toy making and your Texan drawl and your overbearing parents who scare the crap out of me,” he took a deep breath, arms wrapping around Nick’s neck out of habit, “and I love your horrible taste in mustaches and your need to romance me even though you know I’m finicky about it, and I love the way that your face softens at night when you sleep and…”

He stopped when Nick covered his lips with his own, smooth lips moving gracefully over each other. He felt Nick’s hands resting on his biceps, holding him there, holding him close, as if Greg would run away or something. But Greg understood that need to remind oneself that the other was there, that need to establish contact. The kiss was tender, gentle and lazy, yet somehow one of the most passionate ones Greg felt they’d ever had. When it broke, Greg’s cheeks were pink and his eyes were swimming, and Nick was in a much similar state.

Nick knew he still had yet to reply to Greg, and it cut him deeply that he couldn’t. He really, truly couldn’t respond to that. Greg had always been better with the whole feelings deal, and it’s not that Nick doesn’t feel the same way about him; it’s just that Nick has a harder time expressing his feelings. It’s not always that he’s embarrassed about it or he just can’t bring himself to do it, either; sometimes, like now, it’s just that he doesn’t know what to say. He can’t vocalize or even gather up his feelings for this wonderful man in his lap, staring at him intensely, terrified and trembling. He’s trembling. Because Nick still hadn’t said anything, and Greg’s thinking he’s taken this too far. But he hadn’t. They hadn’t taken it far enough yet.

“Greg, you know I can’t… I’m just not good with…” Greg’s jaw clenched tightly and he nodded, looking away from Nick. Nick felt a searing pain shoot through his chest and he winced, raising a hand to turn Greg’s face back to him. “You know I love you, right?” he whispered, brushing the backs of his fingers over Greg’s cheek. “You know I’d do anything for you.”

“I know, Nick, I know. I just… I don’t know what I want. I guess I just wanted you to tell me how you felt for once. A guy can’t live on faith alone, you know?” He added a half-hearted chuckle at the end, at least trying to give some effort, but it only furthered to make Nick feel worse.

Nick swallowed, raking his eyes over Greg’s face before he let out a long, heavy breath. “I do know. I’m sorry I’ve never really told you how I feel, G. I wish I could verbalize just what it is that throbs and aches in my chest at even the thought of you, what makes my heart beat faster at every thought of your smile or your eyes or your voice; but I can’t put that into words. It’s too… too much for words. Just…just know that I love you, more than anything. If could marry you, I would, right here and right now. I’d propose anywhere, anytime, any place so long as I get to make you mine forever.”

Greg fought hard to repress his blush and lost miserably. “There you go, being Casanova again.”

“Your Casanova,” Nick mumbled, pressing a kiss to the tip of Greg’s nose. “I can’t help but be all mushy and romantic around you. You just bring it out in me.”

“Well I want to put it back in,” grumbled Greg, fingers twitching against the tank top Nick was wearing. “I’d rather have a male Jane Austen over Pepe le Pew.” He tugged at the material of Nick’s tank, growling and tugging harder. “Why are you wearing this, anyway? Shirtless is a good look on you. Besides naked, of course.”

Nick chuckled and leaned Greg back far enough so that he could take off his tank top. As soon as the offending garment was tossed to the other side of the room, Greg was curled up in Nick’s lap; head burrowed into Nick’s neck, arms wrapped tightly around Nick’s midriff and legs folded up in-between Nick’s crossed ones.

“You never answered my question,” he whispered, fingers convulsively twitching against Nick’s bare back. Nick let out another deep breath.

“I wouldn’t care if you looked like Grissom, Greg. I wouldn’t care if you looked like Steve Martin or Hugh Heffner or John McCain. You’ll always be my Greggo, and that’s all that matters.” Nick worried the bottom of his lip, hoping that would be good enough for his husband. He had no idea what to say, how to answer, but he was praying that would suffice.

“Even if I was fat?” came the meek voice from his neck.

“More to love.”

“Condiment-coloured hair?”

“It would make you look rugged and sexy.”

“Beard?”

“Fuzzy.”

“…Glasses?”

Nick smiled, nuzzling into Greg’s now dry mop of hair. “You’d look smart and totally nerdy, and it’d be hot.”

“So you’d still love me, even if I turned out like Grissom?” Greg asked meagerly.

Nick said the first thing that came to mind. “Grissom’s got Sara.”

Greg was quiet for a few minutes before he appeared to be satisfied with that answer and placed his head in the crook of Nick’s neck again. “So you’d be… the Sara to my Grissom?”

Nick nodded his head. “I’ll be your Sara, Greg. I’ll be your everything, forever, like I promised you I would. Did you not believe me?”

“I believed you, and I still do,” Greg said quietly, shuffling around in Nick’s lap. “So you’ll take care of me when I get old and decrepit? You’ll fix me food and do whatever I need because I’ll be a flimsy old man who can’t fend for himself?”

“I think I’ll be old before you will, Greggo, but yes, I will.” Nick pushed his fingers up the back of the shirt Greg was wearing, feeling the heated skin there. He needed the pulse of warmth underneath his fingertips right now.

He heard the unmistakable swoosh of Greg swinging the platinum ring around on his ring finger. And sure enough, a second later, Greg spoke again. “Forever…,” he placed a feathery kiss to the sensitive skin of Nick’s neck. “Only me from now on, huh?”

Nick reached around behind him and gripped Greg’s hand, lacing their fingers together and bringing them around front so he could kiss Greg’s knuckles. “Only you, Greg,” he murmured, placing an especially delicate kiss to the underside of Greg’s wrist, where there was a small scar from when one of the females had kicked him in his beating. “Only you.”

And when Nick reached out and clicked off the lamp, setting his glasses on the table; settling back into the bed with Greg, pulling the covers over the both of them, Greg knew he had poured his heart out over two simple words. And it fit perfectly, because Greg didn’t need a bunch of phrases or declarations of love from Nick to make him believe how he felt.

He figured that having wheelchair races with Nick in the hallways of their nursing home later on down the road was enough.

***