Title: Time Tells
Author: Lucy (somethingsdont)
Pairing: Eric/Calleigh
Rating: PG-13
Timeline: Post-season 5
Summary: Lost love: never lost, always love.
Notes: Every chapter posted here is PG-13; NC-17 versions are linked. I started writing this after season 5 ended so none of this takes into account how season 6 and beyond may or may not render the progress or outcome of this story obsolete.

Chapter 1: Eric

Calleigh had once called you a 'quiet lover.' She had said this while the two of you were leaning against the railing at the pier, watching the beautiful Miami sunset. You loved bringing her here. The ocean was your second home, after all, and it seemed so easy to share a piece of your ease with her. Her words were softer here, her form less stoic. It was at the pier where she shared the most precious of her childhood memories with you. It was here that she allowed you to steal spontaneous kisses without tensing up. This was your pier.

That day, windy late-August, she had let your name slip from her lips.

"Eric?"

You smile. "Calleigh?" You mimic her tone.

She says nothing for so long that if you hadn't known this was the pace at which you communicated at the pier, you would've been worried she was angry at you. But you know, so you wait patiently. Sometimes, the pauses between traces of dialogue are so lengthy that a simple conversation about where to have dinner would stretch out over three hours.

When she finally speaks, she rests her head on your upper arm. She can't quite reach your shoulder, and you consider how perfect that is. "You," she says, reaching for your hand. "You are my quiet lover."

The silence does not last long this time. You frown, unsure of what she had meant. "Quiet lover?" you ask, furrowing your brows.

She smiles then, and her cheeks flush uncharacteristically. "In bed," she whispers softly, eliciting an embarrassed chuckle from you. "You're always so quiet."

"I—"

But she hadn't wanted or needed an explanation, so she interrupts your awkward start and goes on to elaborate. "I thought—" She pauses, trying to hide the grin that threatens to burst across her face. "I always thought you'd be rougher." Her voice is still low, dangerously so.

"Yeah?" Your own voice is raspy and raw, your vocal chords vibrating unevenly.

You feel her nod against your arm. She is silent for a moment, letting your mind process her words. Her head lifts off your arm and she turns to study your face. "Do you know how I know you're close?"

A flush creeps up your body and you feel your pulse quicken. You take your eyes off the sunset and turn to see a mischievous smile playing on her face. You decide to play along. You place a gentle kiss on the corner of her mouth. "How?"

Calleigh turns back to the sunset, now almost completely submerged under the Miami tides. "If I tell you, you might get self-conscious and try to hide the signs."

She wears such a straight face that you're almost not sure whether she's joking or not. But then you remember where you are and run your thumb over her fingers. "I won't."

You can tell that you haven't convinced her. You wait a few moments to lull her into a false sense of security, before flipping her over so that her back is to the railing and pinning her against it. You enjoy the comfort of this new position only for a second, however, as you notice her hand is resting on her gun, halfway drawn out of its holster.

You raise your hands in forfeit, but keep your hips pressed against hers. She smiles, because she has confirmed that her gun still scares you. She pushes her gun back into place and pulls her jacket over it again.

Now that your life is no longer in immediate danger, you lean down to capture her lips with your own. You run your tongue along her upper lip, requesting access. When her lips part and she offers, however, you pull away gently.

She gives you a look that tells you that you are insane, and you have to agree with her. Then, you remember why you had risked death and flipped her over in the first place. "Tell me?" you ask, in your most innocent voice.

She stares at you incredulously, a confused look on her face.

You laugh softly and rest your forehead on hers, bracing yourself for her response. "How do you know when I'm close?"

You can hear her weighing the pros and cons in her head. The pros and cons of putting a bullet through your forehead. Instead, she smiles, which scares you more than if she had pistol-whipped you across the face. Slowly, she slips her hands into your unzipped jacket and drags her nails down the side of your body, your shirt offering little separation from her fingers. When she reaches your pants, she dips the tips of her fingers below your waistline. You close your eyes in anticipation, but she stops.

She stands on her tiptoes to reach your ear. "It's a secret."

Later that night, she had confessed that she could tell by the way the muscles in your upper thighs clenched, by your erratic breathing, and by the urgency in your eyes.

In hindsight, you realize that Calleigh had been a 'messy lover.' She had the louder moan and deployed profanity to display frustration. You laugh at the irony. She was always the calm, rational one on the field and in the lab. She was guarded and difficult to read. You had thought she would be quiet or cautious during sex, but she was a complete fiend.

Suddenly, you wonder how the conversation would have played out if you were the one to tell her that she was your 'messy lover.' Your heart constricts in its cavity when you realize that you would never know, because you would never ask her. You curse yourself, because it's been four years. Four years and seven girlfriends later, your name still belongs to her lips only.

"Eric."

Calleigh's voice is nothing like it was five minutes ago, when she was calling out your name in the throes of passion. It betrays her fear and hints at uncertainty. Your name suddenly sound so unfamiliar to your ears. You push yourself up and rest your weight on your forearms. You watch her lie underneath you until your arms feel like they are ready to fall off. Her eyes are closed, and you begin to doubt whether you had really heard her voice or not. She is so silent and so still for so long that you think she has fallen asleep. Careful not to disturb her, you roll off her and sit up beside her naked body. She looks so beautiful lying there, her blonde hair splayed across the pillow, her lips slightly swollen. You reach for the discarded covers and pull them over her body, covering her curves and claiming them for yourself. You find your boxers on the floor and slip them on, contemplating a visit to the bathroom.

"Eric."

You know you didn't imagine it this time, and you turn to see Calleigh staring back at you. Her eyes are red, and the corners of her eyes moist. Your heart clenches when you realize that you can't immediately take her away from whatever was hurting her. You lean toward her, but she shakes her head vehemently and pulls away.

"Eric—"

Her latest attempt is equally useless; her voice hitches in her throat, and her face turns into a sharp shade of pink from holding in her tears. You want desperately to hold her, but you are scared she will fight you away if you try. You grasp for words instead. "Calleigh, you don't have to be brave." And even though you have no idea what this is about, you can sense the necessity, and your generic words are safe and apply to all situations. "I'll be brave for you. Just this once."

She takes a few deep breaths and stares at the ceiling. You are freezing; the window is open and you are shirtless, but you sense that she needs your stillness, so you stay put, listening to your heartbeats in the air.

For the first time in ten months, or maybe in six years, they are out of sync.

Calleigh's voice cuts through the inconsistent silence and turns your world upside down with a handful of quiet words. "I'm transferring to Boston."

You feel like a 300-pound linebacker has fallen from five stories up and has landed on your chest. You are unable to process the words she has spoken. You are sure your mouth is hanging open unattractively, but you neither care to nor are able to close it. You feel blindsided by this information. She is still watching the ceiling, her face unchanged. When you finally recover a fragment of your voice, only one word escapes from your dry lips.

"When?"

"I leave today."

Suddenly, you find it increasingly difficult to breathe. You feel the bile rising in your throat and your stomach convulses. But you haven't had anything to eat yet, so you vomit nothing but stomach acid. The awful taste in your mouth is nothing compared to the awful feeling at the pit of your stomach, or the awful feeling tugging at your heartstrings.

Your 'why' is barely audible, but you know she hears you, because she flinches.

"I have seniority. Horatio would've had to fire you, and I know how much this job means to you." For once, you wish her voice would betray emotion, her words be anything other than the stiff, practiced lines she was feeding you.

You stand up and begin to pace the room, running your hand through your hair repeatedly. "Not as much as you mean to me," you say bitterly. "Don't do this to me, Cal." But you know she has made up her mind, and there is little you can do to persuade her otherwise. You slam your fist against the wall. "Damn it, Calleigh!"

You storm out of the bedroom and make your way to the kitchen, the room farthest from where she lay. You lean against the counter and press your forehead against the cabinet, your feet bare against the cool linoleum floor. Your head is still spinning. You had known when you got involved that she was fully capable of destroying you like this, but you had taken the risk. Now, standing alone, you fail to understand her reasoning, her logic behind this transfer. She had never been an easy girl to read, but you had thought you knew her better than this.

She doesn't even say goodbye when she leaves. Your only indication of her departure is the sound of the door; it clicks with a peculiar finality.

You had spent the next four years washing yourself of her memory. At first, you had tried to hate her. After all, she had known it was your last meeting, and she hadn't told you. She had given herself a chance to prepare, at the very least. But you, you were hit from behind by a bullet the size of a small boulder. It was selfish, you decide, because she hadn't given you a chance for a last kiss, a last touch that you could commit to memory. If you had known earlier, you would have kissed her with a desperation so great, it would have convinced her to stay.

But you realize then that that was precisely the reason she hadn't let you comfort her, before she broke the news. The reassurance that maybe you weren't the only one drowning had been a welcome feeling, but merely a blip on your emotional radar.

You had taken a few days off work, but Horatio had tried to keep you busy. You had wanted to ask him for her number, but you felt pathetic for even thinking it. He probably wouldn't have coughed it up, anyway. He never mentioned the incident, and you had no desire to strike up a conversation with him about it, so the words were left unsaid and eventually faded. Besides, you had access to the internet, to phone directories around the world. You could have found her if you had really wanted to. But what would you say to her? You had figured she would either hang up on you immediately or listen to you beg and plead for a minute, then hang up. You wouldn't have been able to take it, and so you live in the vague understanding that you'd never know for sure.

The new ballistics expert was nowhere near as smart or pretty as Calleigh, but he did his job. If you had met him outside this lab, you could even see the two of you becoming friends. But it was too difficult to be nice to him when he stood in Calleigh's lab, sat in Calleigh's chair. Despite the initial resistance, you had eventually accepted Ryan because he slowed down the bleeding from Speed's death. You needed Ryan to be a friend, and he had, more or less, given you that. Gregory Johnson could never give you what Calleigh had given you.

Slowly, you begin to heal. You focus on the little steps you take. You lean on Ryan, on Valera, on Cooper, even on Natalia. If the rest of the team had been gossiping, you never heard a word of it.

There were still moments of weakness. The heart never fully heals from loss. You had known this all along, because some nights you still cried for Speed and Marisol. The recovery from Calleigh is slow, and old memories are blurry around the edges in your head, but still all too clear.

Tonight, you find yourself at the pier. You haven't been here in so long, not since the day she slipped out of your apartment for the last time. Something draws you here tonight, however; you realize it has been exactly ten years since you met Calleigh for the first time at the Miami-Dade crime lab. You stumble to the place that the two of you had made your own. The sun has long set tonight, but you appreciate the darkness. You close your eyes and picture her there next to you, her head leaning against your arm, her fingers threading through your own.

You wonder if she remembers that it has been ten years today. You wonder if she still remembers you. You sigh, and you wonder when you will stop torturing yourself like this.

The dull ring of your cell phone jars you from your reverie. You silently curse whoever is interrupting your moment. As unreasonable as it sounds, you feel like they are trespassing on you and Calleigh's territory. It's a number – 617 area code – that you don't recognize. You almost ignore the call, but you remember your first job as a telemarketer, so you answer out of pity.

"Delko." There is an edge to your voice. Nobody responds, but you can hear heavy but random and rapid breathing on the other end. Something at the pit of your stomach tells you not to hang up.

Patience is something Calleigh taught you, so many years ago. So you wait, and two minutes pass before the voice at the other end speaks, but it is barely audible. "I'm sorry I—"

You close your eyes and begin to shake violently, despite the warm weather. Your hand shakes so much that you nearly drop your cell phone into the ocean. The fingers of your free hand grip the railing in front of you until your cuticles turn white. Your legs have trouble holding your weight up, so you gracelessly find your way into a sitting position.

"Cal—" Her name through your lips suddenly makes this all too real. As much as you hate crying, especially in front of other people, it's too much too abruptly, and your tears fog your vision, rolling slowly to the wooden planks of the pier.

You can hear her silently crying at the other end. "I miss you," she offers finally, her voice wavering.

Without missing a beat, you reply, "I need you."

She lets out a bitter, tearful laugh. "Don't say that," she pleads quietly.

"I need you," you repeat, a little softer.

You listen to each other cry for a few minutes, needing the release more than either would have admitted. When sobs are replaced by hiccups, which eventually subside, you spontaneously begin to speak.

"You," you begin, testing the words in your throat. "You are my messy lover."

She makes the connection immediately. "You're at the pier," she assesses, her voice laced with caution.

You nod. You know she can't see you, but the emotion washes over you again, your voice lost momentarily.

She swallows and takes a breath. "How have you been?" But her own question makes her start crying again. Between her sniffs, she laughs angrily. "I'm sorry, I didn't call to cry on you. I didn't even know I still—"

"I know." Because you do. You had learned to deal with visual cues: the ballistics lab, the pieces of clothing she'd left behind in her haste, your own goddamn bed. But nothing, nothing had prepared you for her voice in your ear. Too painfully intimate. Her voice made everything else – everything you tried so hard to compartmentalize – flood back.

You have so many unanswered questions, but you're terrified of scaring her away, so they stay paralyzed on your tongue. The silence beyond the heavy breathing is stifling, and you fumble for something to say, if only to hear her voice in response.

"Come home." You sound guarded, because you know all too well the possibility of her slamming down the phone and breaking you the same way she had broken you four years ago.

"Okay," she replies instantly. "I'm going to buy a plane ticket tomorrow."

"One-way." You're not sure why you're giving her conditions, because you know you do not give a damn if it is eight-way, as long as you get to hold her again.

"One-way," she repeats. You can hear her rustling papers at the other end. "Listen, I need to go," she says dejectedly. She pauses, as if wondering if she should say more. "I'll call you later?"

"Yes." You wish she could stay with you longer, but you know you have plenty to think about when you hang up. "I—I'll talk to you later, then."

"Yeah. Oh, and Eric?" You marvel at the way your name still falls from her lips best. "I wasn't messy."