Title: Color Theory
Author: LiLAqUaMaRiE
Fandom: CSI: Miami
Pairings/Characters: Natalia Boa Vista
Rating: PG/K+
Genre: Drama, angst
Spoilers: Mentions of the whole "mole incident" but nothing really spoilerish.
Word Count: 1,409
Challenge Fic: #1
Challenge Word: #1 – Colorless
Summary: Everyone has a color, everyone but her.
Disclaimer: I don't own "CSI: Miami" or anything related to it. So don't sue me please!!!! I'm already poor as it is. Don't need a lawsuit to put me out on the street.
Note: This is a fic for the MiamiFicTalk Community prompt challenge.

COLOR THEORY

Colors.

Since childhood, Natalia Boa Vista had always loved colors. They were intriguing, beautiful and symbolic. From the moment she could open her eyes and the moment she could read, she adored watching or reading anything that was related to colors.

When she was seven years old, her grandmother – Mima Maria – had given her a book on colors for her birthday. It was a book which attracted her eyes from the start; it was bound together by a spindle of colors – a rainbow.

Natalia can remember never going anywhere without it; at that time the book itself resembled her bible, her love, and her peace. Just watching the colors within it seemed to soothe her when she was sad or in a funk. Through it she learned that colors had the power to influence actions, emotions and how people responded to other people, things and ideas. In short, colors were important.

That same book attracted her attention once more.

Natalia sighed as she leaned back against the driver seat of her car with the said book in her hands. She had been on her way to work that morning, as she usually did at that time of day, when she had the sudden urge to be anywhere but where she was heading. It was a feeling that she was familiar with; she had it plenty of times in the past when she was in a relationship with her ex-husband and now once again because of the whole "mole" incident she was involved in.

She felt as if she had to get away from everyone and everything, so the first thing that came to her mind was just to drive and drive to wherever fate led her. She had no destination in mind, she just drove until she felt empty inside. Once she reached that point within herself, she parked her car somewhere and just sat there staring at nothingness. Staring until her eyes fell upon something else.

Natalia sighed once more before turning to glance at the passenger seat beside her, on it laid the book that her grandmother had given her when she was young. She glanced at the title of the book as she picked it up – Color Theory.

Gently Natalia lifted her hand to trace the letters of the title, before opening the book. As she opened it she skimmed through the first page until a certain part caught her eye:

Colors are universal and have been associated with different meanings. But we must understand that the colors we chose are not arbitrary but on the other hand they hold personal meaning to us. While there are certain colors that "attract us" and other colors that at times we can not even stand to have around us, there are those colors we carefully select and want near us – those colors have personal meanings to us as an expression of "who we are."

Natalia blinked. Since she was young she couldn't help but try to associate the people that were in her life with a color, as if she was trying to label them to understand them or get a personal insight about what was going on with their innermost feelings and emotions. Flipping through the pages she found herself in the section of the color yellow.

Yellow. Thinking of that color reminded her of Calleigh Duquesne.

Yellow represented happiness, energy and intellect. It was sunshine; it was a warm color that created a warming effect and aroused cheerfulness - it was a color which was filled with creative and intellectual energy.

To Natalia, Calleigh was clearly that, she was like the color yellow. Like the energy of a bright sunny day, Calleigh brought to herself and the people around her clarity and awareness. By looking at her you wanted to smile, feel happy. Furthermore, just as bright and sunny yellow is the easiest color to see, Calleigh was a very noticeable person.

Turning a few pages she found the section for the color blue.

Blue represented understanding, comfort and loyalty. It was the color of the sky and the sea. In short blue was calming. The color clearly reminded her of Horatio Caine.

Horatio was the one that just by standing next to you made you feel comforted, at ease and above all safe. At times he doesn't even need to say comforting words, his presence alone makes you feel that you had a shoulder to cry on, someone to fall back on, and someone to give you a hand – someone who'll never leave you. That and by staring at him, staring at him in the eyes, it was as if staring at the sky or the sea - it was refreshing.

Natalia smiled softly as the emptiness she had been feeling slowly started to ease away; in silence she bit her bottom lip in thought. Curiously, she wondered what colors Eric and Ryan could resemble – so she decided to search through the pages in hopes of finding her answer. For a few moments, the only sound that could be heard was that of pages being flipped but then the sound stopped. Natalia found the color that definitely reminded her of Eric – the color red. As she read, she immediately agreed - Eric Delko was indeed red.

Red represented the color of fire and blood; it was associated with strength, raw energy, danger and power but also passion, desire and love. In short, red was a very emotionally intense color. The color itself seemed to scream Eric's name in every sense. Eric was a very passionate man; when he was angered he was like a bull that saw red, if someone he cared about was in need he was like a burning flame that guided you or warmed you, it was said that the color red was the warmest of all colors and that attribute shined within Eric. But when Eric Delko loved, he loved with every ounce he had to offer. Clearly, he truly resembled the color red.

Turning the pages to the section after red, Natalia found herself reading on the color of orange. It said orange combined with the energy of red and the happiness of yellow gave off the representation of friendliness, courage and warmth. It was a color that gave of the sensation of heat and it was a color that can catch someone's eye. The more she read on the color, the more Natalia recognized she was reading about Ryan Wolfe. That man showed courage within his work and it was easy to notice that he took the idea of friendship very seriously.

Natalia smiled. Orange seemed to fit nicely with the color red and yellow reminding her how well Ryan fitted with Eric and Calleigh. It was as if, just like the colors, they were a team in their own.

Slowly, Natalia flipped to the last section of the book – the last color: white. Correction, white was not a color but the opposite, the absence of color. White had no attachments to any color or their shades like pink to red, or orange to red and yellow. It was on its own, separate from the rest.

When you look at white you see nothing; Natalia closed her eyes. She hated white – it reminded her of how she felt in the past with her ex and how she felt ever since the "mole" incident. Natalia couldn't help but feel separated from life, from the people she had grown to care about like white was separated from the rest of the colors.

While the others may say that the incident was all in the past, she still can notice moments where they tense up when she walks into a room they're in, how sometimes they stare at her with disappointment on their faces when they think she doesn't notice or when they try to not be with her much more than necessary.

Silently, she closed the book and placed it back on the passenger seat next to her. Leaning back against the driver seat once more, she closed her eyes as silent tears fell from them.

Colors were important in life, colors were everywhere, and colors were in people. But the way fate seemed to have treated her left her resembling an empty shell of who she once was in her younger years. She was a sad sight to look upon, as if she was a broken doll.

She was colorless.

FIN.