Upon a wheel
by Jen

 
One summer when I was a kid we went to Colorado for our vacation.  It's a bit blurry in my mind now, though I remember driving up twisty mountain roads and the car breaking down at what felt like the top of the world. The other thing I remember was going to the bug museum just outside Colorado Springs.  I don't think Mom and Dad had planned to take us there, but the big beetle sign on the highway was irresistible to us kids and we begged until they caved in and took us.  When we actually got into the museum, it was different from what I'd expected.  All the bugs were dead.  The wood-framed glass display cases went on forever, and all of them were full - butterflies, beetles, spiders.  If it had legs it was in one of those cases. I remember being upset that they'd been killed just for display.

I guess it wasn't till I got into the forensic side of things that I understood the importance of studying them.  Back then, I just remember staring into the cases so full of things that used to be alive, using my hand to wipe away the damp mist my breath had formed on the glass so I could see them more clearly, see the delicate wings and beautiful colours.  I wondered if they'd been killed first and then had one of those long pins pushed through their bodies to fix them to the mount, or if they'd still been breathing when the hard steel pushed through their bodies, struggling against the pain, but left to die, eventually taking their place in the neatly ordered rows of dead bugs.  I remember wondering what sort of person would do that.

It must be about twenty years since I last thought about that museum.  You could say it's seeing Grissom’s collection in his office that's reminded me, but it isn't.  It's because for the first time I know what it's like to be pinned down, helpless, and studied so that every bit of me, every weakness and flaw, is catalogued.

It was on the day of Kristy's funeral.  I paid for it but I didn't go.  It seemed wrong that maybe nobody would be there but the priest, nothing to mark her life, but better that way than somebody there who was burning with anger about her lies.  Everything I'd thought we were together was a lie.

She didn't deserve to die like that - nobody does - but then she was trying to get more girls into a line of work that could be their death warrant too.  And good old Stokes had fallen for the oldest line in the book.  No wonder Grissom won’t let me work solo; it’s surprising he trusts me to tie my shoelaces.  But no matter how angry I got at her, I kept remembering how good we'd been together.  It hadn't just been lies.  It couldn't have been.

I was meant to be on call, but I had that first beer anyway.  I didn't owe work a damn thing.  Not the sheriff, not Brass, and least of all Grissom. I could have been shafted by Ecklie for all he would have noticed.  If it hadn't been for Catherine, I would have been.  And I'd already pulled a double shift - if they needed somebody, they could go elsewhere.  I was sick of being the dependable one.

I was halfway through the second beer when my pager went off: I was needed at work ASAP.  I switched it off, unplugged the phone, and went back to my beer.  It was that or another endless round of other people's tragedies, hatred and lies.
 
 

 "Nick.  Nick, you in there?"

I think it was the pounding on the door that woke me, but it was the voice that got me off the couch.  I was all over the place, so stiff I didn’t think I could even get up, let alone walk, but I made it to the door.  And kinda wished I hadn’t when I opened it to find it was daylight.

"Where were you last night, Nick?"

Grissom was pissed.  I couldn't stop the yawn that cracked my jaw, and that didn't help his mood any.

I fumbled around for something to say.  "Wasn't feeling too good."

"And you couldn't take the time to call and let us know?  Nick, you were on call!"

"Yeah, well."  It was like being a teenager again, like Dad chewing me out for doing something stupid when I should have known better.  "Sorry," I said.

He paused then, and looked at me.  "Can I come in?"

"Uh, sure."

I led the way back to the living room, and gestured at the couch, while I sat in the chair, taking in the room through his eyes.  The big screen TV dominates the room, and there was a mess of books and dvds I'd pulled off the bookcase at some point and never got round to putting back.  There were also three beer bottles on the coffee table.  Not exactly an indication of alcoholism, but not good for somebody who a minute ago had claimed they weren't well.

He sat forward on the couch, leaning towards me, body language open and encouraging.  I wondered which management seminar he'd learned that technique from.  "Want to tell me what's going on?" he asked.

I shrugged.  "Nothing much."

"Nick."  A trace of irritation crept into his carefully modulated tone. "You didn't show up for work when you were paged.  That's not like you."

"Yeah, well."  As though he really knew me anyway.

He stared at me for a moment, then sat upright.  "Deliberately ignoring a call is a disciplinary offence.  You left the team hanging, expecting you to turn up any minute.  You left us trying to cover the worst pile-up of the year, as well as following up your case from last shift.  It's not good enough, Nick."

"And if I were in jail right now you'd have had to work without me anyway, so I don't see what the problem is."  I glared at him.

"Jail?  Is this about Kristy Hopkins, Nick?  Is that what this is about?"

"No it's not about her!  It's about you not lifting a fucking finger to save my ass.  I went to you, man, went to you for help and you just brushed me off.  You didn't care that my career was all but over."  I was on my feet, and shaking with rage.  "Or maybe it was just an excuse to get rid of me the easy way, instead of having someone nursemaid me all the time.  So don't give me shit about not turning up when you don't even notice when I am there!"

I was glaring at him, ready to yell over whatever excuse he gave me. Instead he sat there, staring as though his Billy Bass fish had started spouting Shakespeare.  And it was probably about the same; he probably thought of me the way he thought of that stupid fish.  That stupid fish that we'd all bought for him last birthday on Greg's suggestion.  I'd been really pleased that he hadn't just shoved it in a cupboard but had put it up on the wall.

"Nicky."  He stood up slowly, and his fingers pinched his nose just below his glasses in that way he has when he's tired, or thinking.  "Is that what you really think?"

"Follow the evidence, Griss, isn't that what you always say?  Well, there's only one way to read this evidence trail, and pardon me for being so slow to see it."  I grinned humourlessly at him.  "Guess you were right about me not being up to the job."

"Don't say that."  He sounded pissed.  Defensive.  Maybe that's what he thought too because he stopped to take a breath and let it out slowly before speaking again.  "Nick, I have never said - never thought - you aren't up to the job.  I do think you’d do better if you would concentrate more on the job, and not what I want, but that’s all.  You know that. "

"Yeah, right."

"Nicky."  He was suddenly standing close to me, "I think you should take a couple of days, see someone about what happened with Kristy.  I'll arrange for you to have some personal days, and – “

 "I don't want any personal days!"  I yelled it in his face.  "Don't you get it - she lied to me, she was using me.  It's not about her!"

He stood there, very still.  "What is it about, Nick?"

My gaze dropped from his and I looked down at my feet.  "I don't know."  And then I closed my eyes because it was suddenly so damned clear.  I just wanted him to say I'm good at what I do.  Wanted him to trust me like he does the others.  I wanted him to tell me he had a reason for not helping me, and that it wasn’t just because he’d seen it as an easy way to get rid of me.

“Why didn’t you help me?”

“I did.”  Thank God he weighed back in sounding pissed; maybe he hadn’t noticed how pathetic I’d sounded.  “It may have escaped your notice, Nick, that I took Catherine off what she was working on and gave her priority access to whatever she needed to sort this whole mess out.”

“This whole mess that I got myself into, you mean?”

“Yes.”

“You would have let Ecklie hang me out to dry without a second thought, wouldn’t you?”

“I allowed the evidence to speak for itself.  It’s what we do, Nick.”

“Evidence.  Right.”

He must have heard the thickness in my voice, because his own was suddenly gentle.  “I’m your boss, Nick.  It’s my job to make sure you don’t mess up.  But if you do, then you have to take the consequences.”

Unless you’re Warrick.  Or Cath.  Or even Sara.

I knew then that whatever it was I wanted from Grissom, I’d never get.

He was inspecting me with the same fascination he had when he saw something under a microscope but wasn’t quite sure what it was or where it fitted in to the pattern he was constructing.  It was the same expression I imagine he’d wear when pushing a pin through a butterfly: a detached curiosity at the creature’s struggles, not understanding why it didn’t accept its fate at his hands.

I cleared my throat.  “Thanks for coming by, Griss.  I’ll take those personal days, and come back on Monday, kay?”

He agreed without any discussion, and seemed relieved when I showed him to the door.  The house felt dark and empty when I went back into the sitting room, so I opened the blinds and flicked the TV on.  There was nothing on, of course, and I thought again about getting a cable package, but thinking about it wouldn’t make it so.  Just like thinking about Grissom wouldn’t change a thing.

So instead of thinking, I stripped off, changed into my running kit, and let myself out into the early morning sunshine.  At least I knew where I stood with Grissom now.  I was simply one more empty shell to be pinned neatly in its place.  There was no point in trying to get him to see me as anything else.
 

End