Still Waters 4/4
Nick sat staring at the photos from Chrissy Handlebrook’s apartment. It was just too...pat. “Grissom! Grissom! I figured it out!” Nick grabbed the photos off the table and jogged quickly Down the hall toward Grissom’s office. Grissom was just coming out and Nick skidded to a stop in front of him.
“I figured it out! Remember how we couldn’t find any foot prints?” Grissom nodded, “and we couldn’t figure out why? It was a professional hit. Too clean, no footprints, no fingerprints, no nothing but a body and a looted apartment. They even took the shell casing! That just isn’t panicked burglar to me. We’ve been thinking it’s all just bad timing and a horrible mistake, but I think that it was on purpose. The question is now, why would someone want a nurse dead?”
“Who, Nicky, that’s the real question.”
77777777777777777
“So it turns out that Chrissy had found out about the charge nurse’s smuggling operation and with all the money that the charge nurse was making she took out a contract on Chrissy’s life before Chrissy turned her in.” Greg looked surprised.
“Wow, I don’t think I would have ever seen that.” Nick shook his head.
“Greg-o, ya just need to train your brain to think a certain way. Some people think that way naturally, like Grissom, then there are some of us that just work really hard at thinking like he does.” The days pasted rather quickly for Gil and Nick and before either knew it Gil’s audiologist appointment had arrived.
777777777777
Nick and Gil sat next to each other in the waiting room flipping through month old magazines. Every few minutes one or the other would remark on the article he was reading and show it to the other. So when Gil’s name was called they both jumped startled and stood up. Nick hugged Gil and signed good luck before sitting back down on an uncomfortable plastic chair. He had just finished looking through Good Southern Housekeeping when Gil came back out, his face gave away nothing. The drive back to the house was silent with staring out the window ignoring Nick and Nick glancing every so often over at Gil, worried.
When they had gotten inside Nick signed, ‘what did the doctor say?’
“Dammit Nick! Can’t we talk like normal people for just a little while!”
Nick recoiled in shock. Gil almost never yelled. Signing and speaking Nick asked, “Is it me your mad at or the results of the tests?
Nick’s calm manner deflated Gil’s anger, leaving him feeling desolate and empty. Defeated, Gil signed, ‘35 percent hearing loss. I’m progressing very fast for otosclerosis. In a year I’ll probably be completely deaf. I tried to listen Bach the other day and I couldn’t hear half of the music’s subtleties. I feel like I’m losing myself. I mean learning how to dance, really dance, was something I always meant to learn but never got around to and now I never will.’
Nick looked at Gil with such tenderness in his eyes it made Gil want to cry. Nick’s eyes lit up and Gil just knew that he had thought of something. He jumped up off the couch and ordered Gil to sit there and not move. Then he started to clear the floor. He had pulled up the carpeting in the livingroom and had beautiful hardwood floors now. He turned the speakers from the sound system down onto the floor and cranked the dials way up. He ran out of the room and when he came back Gil could see he had ear plugs in. ~What is he planning?~ Nick selected a cd and came over to Gil and kneeled in front of him. He gently removed Gil’s shoes and socks and then his own. He pulled Gil out into the center of the room and then turned on the music. Music blasted into the floor. Gil stood in shock. ‘You’re going to teach me how to dance?’
‘Yeah now lets get the groove on.’ Nick held onto Gil’s hips and slowly guided him through a series of dance steps. Gil could not only hear the music but feel it too. Feel it thrumming in his feet and up through his chest, hearing the vibrations was a decidedly odd, but not unpleasant sensation. He turned to look at Nick’s smiling face and it hit him, he just knew that everything would work out. Sure there would be fights, troubles and unexpected obstacles, but if he and Nick stuck together then there wasn’t anything they couldn’t figure a way around.
Butterfly in Koasati
(AL, LA, TX -