Chapter Text
Decaying Fantasies
by Nicole
Staying awake to chase a dream
Tasting the air you're breathing in
I know I won't forget a thing.
Promise to hold you close and pray
Watching the fantasies decay
Nothing will ever be the same.
- Muse, Falling Away From You
When Nick came home early from work to check on Greg - - who had been home sick while Nick pulled a double - - he found Greg sitting at the kitchen table drinking a steaming hot cup of Chai tea. But Greg never drank tea unless something was wrong.
Then Nick saw the huge bruise on Greg's bare torso from when he tried flipping over the back of their couch the other day. It was uglier than when he last saw it - - blacker and bluer, covering Greg's entire right side of his body.
But when Nick saw a pile of pamphlets laid out at his spot on the table, Nick knew Greg's doctor didn't give Greg any good news. Because the two had looked up all the worse possibilities on the web based off of Greg's symptoms and they just hoped that they had been wrong when they made the appointment with doctor at the hospital.
Greg was crying before Nick could scoop his lover up into a hug. Greg buried his face into the space between Nick's neck and shoulder like he always did and after a few seconds, Nick could feel his shirt getting wet. Nick rubbed Greg's back as he sobbed and fingered Greg's scars from the explosion ever so lightly.
"We'll get through this together," Nick whispered and could feel tears of his own sliding down his cheeks. He ran a hand through Greg's spiked mess of hair. "It'll be okay Greg. I promise."
- - -
Greg couldn't keep his composure long enough to tell nightshift that he was going in for chemotherapy treatment. Nick had to explain to nightshift that for the next six weeks, Greg would be into work sporadically and when he could - - it was really going to depend on how much of an affect the treatment took on his body.
Grissom asked the detailed and more personal questions in his office later, while he filled out a Leave of Absence form for Greg and Nick. Nick had told Grissom that I would be taking care of Greg.
"It's acute lymphocytic leukemia." And Nick had to answer all of the questions because Greg couldn't get his mouth to work.
Grissom studied their intertwined hands but only asked about the cancer. "Where are the tumors?"
"Same place as last time - - along his spine."
Greg had had the same cancer when he was fourteen and had received a very rare, new, experimental treatment and surgery and when he was in remission just weeks later, the doctors thought it had done the trick. But fifteen years later, Greg was a plethora of symptoms and both men knew that maybe the surgery had only bought Greg time and not a permanent solution.
And when Nick and Grissom were working on a case together early on in Nick's CSI career - - and just a couple of days after Greg had been hired - - and the victim had cancer, Greg had told the two about his own close encounter with the deadly disease.
Gil knew enough about Greg's first case that he didn't ask any more questions.
Nick stayed with Greg in his lab all day since it was his last day, instead of going out in the field to work a case with Warrick. And Nick didn't care anymore if people saw his and Greg's public displays of affection so thanks to Catherine who caught the tail end of a particularly romantic kiss - - which had involved a war for each other's tonsils - - and Hodges who spied on the couple all of shift, the entire lab knew by the end of shift that good ol' Texas boy scout Nicky Stokes and the crazed lab tech Greg Sanders were indeed a couple.
If you were watching close enough, you would have seen Warrick paying both Catherine and Sara ten dollars each for losing the bet.
- - -
Nick took Greg to the hospital and Greg began to cry when they handed him the hospital gown. The nurse didn't stop Nick when he followed Greg into his room for the next couple of days while he received the treatment.
Greg turned and hugged Nick once he shut the door and cried into Nick's shoulder. "Let me help you change," Nick whispered in Greg's ear and began to unzip Greg's jacket.
He took a step back and let Nick strip him of his jacket and shirt. "My hair is going to fall out."
And Nick stared at Greg and cried. "We'll take pictures and put together a scrap book, following the journey of Greg and his hair."
Greg started laughing but he slowly started to cry again. "I just want to be better."
"Me too," Nick whispered, reaching for the buckle on Greg's belt so he could finish undressing Greg. He patiently waited as Greg eased his way out of his pants - - one of the symptoms being joint pain - - and sat down on the edge of the bed so Nick could remove his shoes.
Greg reached forward and grabbed the sides of Nick's face, pulling his lover level with him. Their noses were almost touching and Greg could smell the mint in Nick's breath. "I love you," Greg said quietly, slowly pulling Nick's soft lips onto his own.
Nick pulled away to breathe, and with a slight pant in his breath he whispered in return. "I love you too."
And even in the disgusting hospital gown, Nick thought Greg looked beautiful.
TBC..