So I'm the king of all these things
Of this mess I have made
Such a waste
What a shame
My whole life is a fake
Well I'm a bore and I'm sure
I'm a thorn inside of you
That has torn at you for years

She hated this time of year. It was the few days right before the new year when everything darkened. Daylight savings time already passed and she was granted that extra hour in the afternoons, an our that seemed prolonged, dreary. She felt as if she should be doing something with that extra hour, something she dreaded but couldn't figure out.

It was that month where all the greens and golds of nature finally faded out, with nothing but the dismal greys and browns that signified events to come. Since the beginning of November, everywhere she went, whether it was the grocery store, a coffee shop or even the crime lab, was covered with those tiny white blinking lights and those fake mini Christmas trees. She hated Christmas.

As she walked into the crime lab that morning, bundled in her gigantic black coat, she had the urge to throw that small tree on the receptionist's desk into the wall. Breezing past the few technicians that were roaming the basically empty halls, she hurried to the break room. She threw her lunch into the fridge, slamming the door for good measure, before collapsing onto the couch. She could already tell today was going to blow.

She stretched out on the couch and sighed at the shitty-ness of her day. It wasn't until this time that she noticed the other person in the room. Greg was perched at the table, staring at her with bewilderment present in his expression. Judging by the opened magazine and the coffee mug on the table in front of him, he had been catching up on a little reading and a coffee break before shift, only to be distracted by the spectacle that was Sara.

"So," he broke the ice with a smirk. " How did you get stuck working on Christmas eve?"

"I don't celebrate holidays that have become nothing more than a capitalistic attempt to boost our nation's economy by preying on the stupid people who buy into all of the commercial shit like trees and eggnog and those damn blinking lights."

"How can you not like eggnog?"

"It tastes like eggs. I hate eggs."

"Oh". He paused, letting the awkward silence take over for a few minutes before he continued. "So Sara," he began, nerves evident as he tapped a pen repeatedly on the table. "What do you say to breakfast after shift? I'll pay and we can pay homage to the capitalists by ripping down all of the holiday decorations we see."

She snorted, which was always a bad sign. "Alright." She didn't look at him.

His fresh sip of coffee was almost spewed all over the floor. "Really?"

Despite the small pang of guilt she felt once hearing the excitement in his voice, she grinned. "No". Although his ego was a little crushed, it didn't stop him from jokingly tossing his pen at her. Sara was interrupted from her pending protest when Grissom stuck his head into the room. Sara quickly jumped up into a sitting position.

"Sara, we've got a 419 a few miles from here. Teenager was shot in his own home." He turned to leave, but whipped his head around as a second thought hit him. "Greg, you come too."

Sara turned to face Greg. "You ready for this?" The delight that shone through his eyes left no need for an answer. The grin that spread over his face was infectious and she found herself smiling as she continued. "Well, let's go then."

They met Grissom in the parking lot and the two CSIs quickly began drilling Greg on what to do at the scene, like they did every time he went with them. They lectured him on what he should and should not do, but Greg let none of this phase him. And Sara, as she peered into the backseat at Greg, who was lounging, catlike, across the three seats, noted that he truly did seem calm. His calmness immediately vanished as Grissom yelled at him, telling Greg to buckle up because if he died on the way to the crime scene he would surely lose his job. Greg scrambled to a sitting position the second he heard him yell. It was obvious that Greg looked up to him. He was so nervous whenever he was around him that it made Sara feel a little sorry for him. He always tried so hard to impress Grissom by all that he knew, but every time he ended up letting his nerves get to him and annoyed Grissom in the process.

As Sara and Greg were busy preparing for the scene, Grissom was trying his best to see through the heavy downpour that surrounded his car, a wall separating them from the rest of the world. His feeble headlights tried their hardest to illuminate the pressing darkness, but he didn't know how long they would help. But before they ended up in a ditch or worse, they reached the crime scene.

Sara peered at the house. It was white with a red roof, identical to every other house on the block. If it wasn't for the yellow crime tape, it would have looked quaint, like every other house in suburbia. Inside, despite the fact that it was swarming with police officers, the house looked untouched. A detective led Sara and Greg into the bedroom of the boy, while Grissom stopped in the kitchen to talk to the hysterical mother. As the moldy smell of old blood reached her nose, Sara's stomach jumped and a wave of nausea overtook her. No matter how many scenes she visited, how many murder victims she saw, that smell never got any better. If she ever smelled that scent and did not react, then it was time for her to find a new career.

The boy, who had to be at least eighteen, was draped over his small mattress. From the angle Sara was looking at him from, he looked like he was asleep. But from the look on Greg's face, who was standing right beside bed with a clear view of the body, she knew the teen wasn't just sleeping. Once she was level with Greg she caught sight of the boy's face, or what was left of it. Shotgun to the mouth. Blood and brain matter were splattered on the wall parallel to his bed.

Grissom, who entered the room unnoticed by the group, turned to Greg. "What do you see?"

"Male victim in his teens. Judging by the exit wound, I'd definitely say he was shot." Sara snorted. Greg grinned in her direction and continued. "The position of the spatter suggests that the bullet entered in the back of the throat and that the victim was sitting on the edge of the bed, which explains the way he was lying when we entered the scene. The gun is right there by the bed so I'm thinking suicide."

David, who was standing over the body, whistled mockingly. "Someone's done their homework." Greg laughed sheepishly. "Time of death was anywhere from one to three hours ago."

Grissom took Greg over to the body and began lecturing him about something. Sara took this opportunity to look around the room. She couldn't even guess the color of the walls because band posters covered every free space of the walls. They were bands she never even heard of but she was pretty sure Greg owned CDs by most of them. A surfboard that looked as if it hadn't been used in awhile was hanging over the bed. The giant stereo in the corner was the only non-furniture item in the room.

Grissom, who, after fully lecturing Greg, was walking aimlessly around the room, walked over in her direction.

"The mother said that a year ago today, their family's house burned down. Our victim was badly burned in that fire."He pointed to the body. "Can you see the scars on his face? They also cover his arms and chest. She said he hasn't been the same since."

"I think I found something", Greg's voice echoed from under the bed. "A journal maybe?"

"Do me a favor and read the last entry, alright Greg?"

"Sure" came Greg's muffled reply. He continued in a much clearer voice as he crawled out from under the bed. "It's from yesterday." It was just a regular composition notebook, painted blue with a permanent marker with the words "Hold onto the memories, they're all you've got" scrawled in the only white space on the cover.

Greg cleared his throat and began to read.

"Mom,

I wanted to explain to you why I'm doing this. It's not anything you did, so don't you dare blame yourself. But since that day last year, I've changed. Not just my appearance but everything about me. No one, including you, has treated me the same since that day. You say you were accustomed to waking up in the morning and seeing what was left of me, that you had accepted it and eventually forgot about it. But I saw the looks. The small flicker of horror in you eyes was the first thing that greeted me every morning."

Greg paused and cleared his throat again. He was having a hard time reading this and Sara completely understood - reading the dying words of anyone, even a complete stranger, was tough.

" I can't even hang out with my friends like before. Even the few friends I have left wouldn't be able to take the stares. You've seen the stares I get just going to the grocery store. You've heard the clerks ask me what the hell happened to my face. These scars have isolated me from the rest of the world. I'm alone and I hate it. Do you have any idea what it's like to know that people get disgusted just bylooking at you? It's unbearable. But the loneliness isn't what drove me to this. It's not the looks of horror. It's not the fact that my friends deserted me. It's not that I'm unable to enjoy the things I used to love. It's the scars. They'll be there forever,constantly reminding me of what I've become - - a circus freak from a fucking sideshow act. I just don't want to look in the mirror and have those scars be the first thing I see. Just once I wish I had the opportunity to be normal again."

Greg looked up, meeting Grissom and Sara's stares. "Definitely a suicide then, huh?"

"Suicide?" a voice whimpered. The victim's mother was standing by the door. Sara turned to Grissom, wondering how he would handle the situation.

"Mrs. Smith?" It wasn't Grissom's voice that broke the awkward silence, it was Greg's. He slowly walked over to the door and stood directly in front of the mother, making sure to meet her eye the entire time he talked.

"Mrs. Smith, how long have you been standing there?"

The woman, who was growing progressively older by the second, shivered as she tore her eyes away from her son's body and focused on Greg. Her face was haggard, pale and she opened her mouth as if to reply but she couldn't. She burst into tears and fell into Greg, crying on his shoulder. Through her sobs, Sara could he her muttering "How could he do this?" over and over again. Greg just stood there, trying to hold her up until an officer came to take his place.

The CSIs and Greg loaded up into the dark SUV and drove back to the crime lab soon after that. No one said much the entire way back and Sara sat in the front seat, listening to the rain fall onto the windshield to pass the time until they made it back to the lab.

Sara went about the task of logging the evidence. Many hours and countless fingerprints later, she was finally finished logging all of the evidence from the Smith case. She was walking towards Grissom's office to let him know she was finished but the low rumbling of her stomach changed her destination to the break room fridge. She pulled a cereal bar out of her lunch and bit into it hungrily. She tossed the wrapper in the garbage can only to have her trash spill out onto the blue carpet. The trashcan was overflowing with garbage.

"It figures," she spoke aloud to the empty breakroom. "Even the janitortakes Christmas off." Sara then tied up the bag and carried it out to the dumpster, which was outside the very back of the building. She opened the door and immediately felt the chilling breeze. It was only about 50 degrees but hey, in Vegas it was COLD. The singular black dumpster was propped up against the chipped brick wall as if that solid wall was the only thing that kept it standing. At that very second, the wind blew the lid shut spraying Sara with remnants of trash. She finally lost the last of her sanity and screamed out loud in frustration, kicking the dumpster for good measure. She went to the other side of the dumpster to try and open the lid, only to see Greg leaning against the sturdy brick wall. He was sitting with his knees folded up to his chest and clinging tightly to his thin coat with one arm. In his other hand he held a lit cigarette which he took a slow, deep drag off of before looking up at her. Sara noted that his hand shook around that cigarette.

She walked over and stood next to him, leaving the bag of trash alone by the dumpster.

"Since when do you smoke?"

"Oh," he began with an almost invisible grin, "since I was about fifteen."

"Those things can kill you, you know."

"I'm well aware of that." he said with a laugh

"Why have I never seen you smoke before?" she questioned as she sat down beside him.

"I guess I'm what you would call a closet smoker. I think you're the only person who's ever seen me smoke." He took another drag and exhaled. The two watched the smoke dissipate into the air, mesmerized. His hands still shook and Sara was starting to realize why. She had a feeling that the case got to him more than he let on. Sara looked down at her watch. Their shift ended ten minutes ago.

"Hey Greg, I think breakfast would be a good idea, don't you?"

I can't get out of this dead skin
Not sure where to begin
I can't get under my dead skin
I can't shed my skin
Can I sleep till then

AN: there is a second part to this story that I hope to have up sometime soon, but it definitely won't be before Christmas so you'll just have to pretend, ok? The song in here is Dead Skin by Crossfade.

Please review!