Work Text:
Geek Love
by Ragna
(writinggoddess@aol.com)
Fred was a physicist. But after spending enough time with Angel, and desperately trying to get away from both Gunn and Wesley, she moved to Las Vegas and went from physicist to crime lab technician.
She liked it here. Catherine, Warrick, Nick and Sara...in ways, each reminded her of friends in Los Angeles. Grissom even reminded her of a slightly broodier Angel in some ways.
The only one she had yet to really figure out, aside from Ecklie, was Greg.
Today he was hovering in her little lab abode, watching her work. She knew chemicals well, and so she worked on determining chemical patterns and dealing with chemicals. Greg had brought her a strange substance found at a murder scene involving showgirls, and Fred analyzed it.
"Hair gel," she said in the end, over the music playing. Letting Greg change the CD from her Dixie Chicks to his Interpol hadn't been so bad; she really enjoyed the song "Slow Hands" and it was rather amusing watching Greg pantomime along.
"It didn't smell like it," he said, pulling up a stool.
"It's special hair gel. Meant for more holding power without the smell."
"So I look for someone with gelled hair who's hair doesn't stink, I take it."
Fred giggled. "Once it hits the hair, it actually breaks down and leaves the hair looking normal but it still hold it in place."
Greg banged his head on the table. "So nothing I can take to Grissom that may, I don't know, get me some respect?"
"Why do you need respect from him?"
"He's the boss."
Fred nodded. "I understand the feeling, then." She gestured to the microscope. "There is something that can help, though. Take a look."
Greg moved over to her microscope, and he was so close she could reach out maybe an inch and brush his arm. She realized, almost suddenly, that that was exactly what she wanted to do.
"Um, Greg?"
"Yeah?"
"When do you get off work?"
"Soon, why?"
"Want to get some breakfast or something?"
Greg's head popped up so fast he looked like a mole coming out of the hole. "Are you asking me out?"
"Oh, is that not allowed? I'm sorry, really, I just thought breakfast would be nice, and I feel really stupid and damn, I'm rambling. Silly, stupid me, what am I doing..."
"Sure. Let me just tell Griss and Sara I won't be eating with them."
Fred stopped in mid-sentence. "Oh. Okay." She flashed a smile. "I still have no clue where there's a great place to eat..."
"If you don't mind sitting a few booths away from the boss, I know a great place."
"Okay, then. It's a date?"
Greg picked up the results Fred had printed out before she had figured out what they had on the slide and smiled back. He was surprised to see her blush.
"It's a date. I'll come back in a half-hour, okay?"
"Okay." Fred watched Greg walk out of the office, and suddenly she got the urge to call Los Angeles and let Angel know she was really, truly okay again.
END