FANFIC: Yesterday's Notions

Posted with permission from the author. See notes in sidebar.
Title: Yesterday's Notions by Caroline Crane
Rating: NC17 (See happy reading in sidebar!)
Fandom: CSI
Pairing: Nick/Greg
Summary:There's no better time to grow up. You can consider this post-All the Way to Paris fic, if you want. Written for rabidfan.
Warnings: This is sort of baby fic, if you are adverse to that sort of thing. Not really, but sort of.

Follows All The Way To Paris:part 01 part 02 part 03 part 04


Nick checked his watch for the third time in less than a minute. He reached up to adjust his tie, then he stood up, peered down the hall, and sat back down again. When he let out a heavy sigh and rubbed his palms on his thighs, Greg couldn’t resist reaching out to close a hand on his knee.

"Relax."

"I’m fine," Nick said, but he glanced at his watch again anyway. "What’s taking so long?"

"You know how bureaucrats are," Greg answered. "Always running late."

"You don’t think it’s a bad sign, do you? I mean, what if they’re in there talking about what bad parents we’d be?"

"They’re not," Greg said, and the thing was, he was pretty sure he was right. Everything so far had gone right on plan – the home visits, the interviews, even the psych evals – and there was no reason for Nick to be working himself up at this point. Greg was positive they were going to go in there and sign the final papers any minute now, and that was the part that had been keeping him up nights.

Because in a few minutes they’d be signing on the dotted line and promising to be responsible for another life for…well, forever. They’d be picking up their kid – their kid – for the last time, and that would be it. They’d be a family, and Greg would never get a decent night’s sleep again.

"Hey, you okay?" Nick asked, his hand covering Greg’s and he realized he was gripping Nick’s knee hard.

"Yeah," Greg answered, willing his fingers to relax until they slid between Nick’s. And he was okay; he was more than okay. He had a great job, a great husband, a great life. His life was better than he’d ever let himself hope for, and now he was going to be a dad too. But there was no guarantee he could be a great parent, no matter what the social workers said.

Sure, they’d had some practice. Benji had been their foster kid for awhile now, but somehow this made it all seem so much more…permanent. And they’d both messed up before, but it had never really mattered until now.

He hadn’t said anything to Nick. They’d both been on edge lately, but for different reasons. Nick was still half-convinced that somehow the state of California was going to change their mind about gay rights just because they’d applied to adopt a kid nobody else wanted. He didn’t seem all that worried about what happened if the adoption actually went through; what happened when Benji got sick and they didn’t know what to do about it, or if he got in a fight or failed English or something. Nick seemed to think they could handle all that stuff, but Greg wasn’t so sure.

Most of the time he still felt like a kid himself, and hanging out with Benji was more like fun than responsibility. But that was all about to change, and what if Greg wasn’t any good at being somebody’s dad?

As soon as he thought it a door down the hall opened, and a second later Nick’s hand tightened around his. And now he knew that he definitely wasn’t ready, because his heart was pounding so hard he could barely hear their case worker when she stepped into the hall and announced that it was time. He let Nick pull him to his feet and took a deep breath, willing his heart to slow down.

"You ready for this?" Nick asked, and for the first time since they’d arrived at the courthouse, he was smiling.

"No."

Nick stopped just outside the courtroom door and reached out, resting a hand on the back of Greg’s neck in that way he used to do back when he was first trying to convince Greg they could make a relationship work long distance. And in the end Greg had been right about the long distance part, but it didn’t make the weight on his skin any less comforting. "G, we can do this."

"You sure about that?"

"Positive," Nick answered, and there went that grin again. "Trust me, you’re going to make a great dad."

And Greg wasn’t nearly as confident about that, but he knew Nick would make a great father, and he figured one out of two was better than nothing.