Pictures of You
Rating: PG, Angst
Pairing: Warrick/Sara
Feedback: Makes my day
Disclaimer: If it was in the show, it's not mine.
Archive: At my site Checkmate (http://helsinkibaby.ahkay.net) , Fanfiction.net; anywhere else, please ask.
Summary: Warrick owns a million pictures of Sara
Notes: For the LiveJournal CSReports "Oingo Boingo" challenge.
I own what
seems like a million pictures of you, some printed on paper, some of them
existing only in memory. Some are funny, some are happy, some are frustrating,
even now. But they’re all you.
The first
is from the day we met, you all furrowed brow and attitude, interrogating me
while wearing the ugliest green cardigan in history. It was a recipe for
fireworks, and I remember thinking that we’d never get along.
But we did,
although not for a while. The first mental snapshot of the two of us as friends
that I have is us playing chess while a pig smoulders nearby, trading jokes and
tossing a coin to see who would get to go for coffee. We could see our breath
in front of us, but you were warmer to me than you’d ever been, and later, at
home, all I could think of was your smile.
Your smile
is more frequent in the pictures that follow. Teasing you about Grissom as we
searched a car for head lice. Dipping chainsaws in paint to examine the
splatter pattern. Teasing you about your date with Hank as we walked through a
sewer. Hearing you teasing me about boxing experiments and mercury gloves. The
first time I ever played the piano for you, the first time that I kissed you.
And I don’t even have to close my eyes to picture you walking down the aisle
towards me, that beaming Sara-smile that I love so much splitting your face.
For a long
time, that was my favourite picture of you, but that changed the day I took the
photograph that’s framed on the mantel at home, the one that I carry in my
wallet. It’s one where you’re not even looking at the camera, instead smiling
down at our two-day-old daughter in your arms, and you’re the most beautiful
things I’ve ever seen.
I own a
million pictures of you, but I never wanted to see ones like the ones I’m
looking at now, the ones that were taken a month ago, the ones that were taken
after a suspect came back to a scene, the ones where your left eye is
blackened, your lip split and bleeding, an ugly bruise on your cheek where he
hit you. There are pictures of your ribs, your back and side, with what are
unmistakeably boot prints visible.
It’s been a
month, and my stomach twists as I look at them.
“Warrick.”
I turn at the sound of your voice, my stomach twisting again when I see the
look in your eyes, hurt and remembered fear. I flip the folder closed, drop it
on the table and take your hand in mine, squeezing it tightly. “Come on,” you
say. “Let’s go home.”
Arm in arm,
we make our way into the morning sunlight, and when you turn to me, raising
your lips to mine, I take a picture of you that makes the others fade away.