Disclaimer: They are not ours. Austin belongs to Julia. Lucky Skunk.

Spoilers: None.

A/N: And we're back! First joint CSI NY fic. Yay. Um so this story takes places between season 3 and 4. Austin is Julia's OC, who grew up with Danny and Flack. Check her page (Piper Maru Duchovny) for other Austin stories. That said, happy reading!

Lindsay sat at her desk, her elbows propped up and her fingers working to keep her eyes open. She wasn't tired so much as burnt out, and she really just wanted some coffee and quiet. It had been a long case, frustrating, and fraught with masculinity that wasn't nearly as appealing as it could have been. She understood a man's need to get his aggression out by wrestling or boxing or playing bloody video games. What she didn't understand was the need for those things to infiltrate every day life, nor did she get why all guys seemed to think it was just the way things were.

"You have the same look on your face that I would make if I could."

Lindsay looked up and found Detective Austin Hawthorne who had been the lead on the case.

"You're still here?"

"Yeah. Adam has a problem with not getting to the point. I should have gone home an hour ago."

"That's why they like me better."

"I've heard about your stories."

"At least they have a point."

"Very true."

Austin plopped down in the chair by the door, sighing and tipping her head back.

"Danny's out at another crime scene," Lindsay said carefully. "He might not be back for a while."

"I don't wanna see that pig."

"Why not?"

"He's a man. I don't like that half of the species right now."

"Ug, me neither. At least he didn't kiss you goodbye."

Austin laughed and ran a hand through her hair.

"Sometime, I'm going to have to tell you some really embarrassing stories about Danny."

"His greatest hits?"

"Oh yeah. He was the most awkward thirteen year old I have ever known."

Lindsay laughed and shook her head. It had taken her awhile to get used to her boyfriend's best friend; it would have been easy for her to play the jealous girlfriend, but there was something so innocent and free about the two of them that she couldn't bring herself to hate. They were like a pair of old worn socks that had been sharing the same pair of shoes for twenty years, and they were both ornerier than dirt.

"Thank God, estrogen!" Stella Bonasera burst into the room and collapsed into a heap in the last vacant chair.

"The case got to you too, Bonasera?" Austin asked, hooking her thumbs through her belt loops and stretching out.

Lindsay did the same and popped her back, "You know what we need? A girls night."

"What?"

"A real, honest-to-goodness girls night. No boys, doing our nails, eating junk food, singing eighties songs into hair brushes, girls night." Lindsay explained as she stood from the chair, "Come on, it'd be fun!"

Austin's face contorted in confusion and reprehension, "Like... a sleepover."

"Have you ever even been to a sleepover, Hawthorne?" Stella asked, tossing a stray scrap of paper at the detective.

"Please," Austin tossed the paper back at her, "of course I have!"

"With someone other than Danny?" Lindsay raised a suspicious eyebrow accompanied by a small grin.

"Well... no."

"It's settled then," Lindsay stood, "Girls night."

"You guys aren't going to freeze my bra are you?" Austin asked, following them out of the office.

"Only if you fall asleep first," Stella shrugged, spinning her car keys around her finger.

"Oh, well that's reassuring."

"Don't be a party pooper," Lindsay said as she punched the button for the elevator.

"Hey, where do you think you're going?" Flack asked as he approached them.

"Nunya bidness," Lindsay replied.

"Grace?" he asked looking at Austin.

"You heard the woman, Flack. Nunya."

"Geez, alright. You must all be suffering hormonal…" he trailed off as they all looked at him. "I'm just gonna go ahead and shut up now."

"Wise decision, detective."

"Bye, Baby." Austin grinned and linked arms with Stella and Lindsay, pulling them down the hallway and towards the bay of elevators before they broke into a fit of giggles.

"Alright," Lindsay leaned against the wall, "We need Twizzlers, ice cream, Sour Punch Straws... COOKIE DOUGH!"

"I can already feel my blood sugar climbing." Stella elbowed her, "Where are we hosting this thing?"

Austin held her hands up, "I'm living with the man, so my place is off limits."

"My place," Lindsay shrugged, "it is the closest."

"Yeah, and you have the best sound system," Stella agreed. "And we can't do girls night properly without blasting "Love is a Battlefield.""

"I agree," Austin said with a nod.

"I'll stop at the store on the way there. Twizzlers, ice cream, sour punch straws, cookie dough, and what else?" Stella asked, making a mental list.

"I have peanut butter and chocolate syrup already. Maybe get some of those Arizona teas too."

"You read my mind," Austin said with a chuckle.

"You get food and we'll swing by and raid the video store."

"Plan. Meet you there in an hour?"

"Make it half. I'm hungry," Lindsay said. "We can order pizza or Chinese later."

"Refined palates they make out there in Montana."

"I am not beyond making a batch of Rocky Mountain Oysters."

"You'd be eating them all yourself, Monroe."

-------

"A Walk To Remember, Welcome To Mooseport, Matilda, Playing By Heart," Stella read off the titles, "and Con Air?"

"Have you tried getting Austin out of the video store without her getting that movie?" Lindsay shot back.

Austin glared at them both as she tore open a package of Twizzlers, "That movie is the best! A transvestite con singing 'Sweet Home Alabama' while a bunch of hicks take over a plane? And, I mean, Nicholas Cage's crappy southern accent should be reason enough to rent it."

"Ah," Lindsay rolled her eyes, "for mocking, of course."

"Oh," Stella grabbed a chunk of cookie dough, "You need to get Austin to watch that one show you made me watch when I was sick."

Lindsay dove across her floor and tore open her video cabinets, "Gilmore Girls!"

"Whoa, whoa, whoa!" Austin held her hands up, "I'm all for a girls night but I ain't watchin' no chick show."

"It's not a chick show." Stella rolled her eyes and threw a chip at Austin, who caught it in her mouth, "It's insanely amazing."

"Insanely amazing?" Austin cocked an eyebrow, "Could you be more fifteen?"

"I'm not the one with the vocabulary of a high school boy's locker room." She fired back as Austin whipped her arm with a Twizzler rope.

"Better than talkin' like a valley girl!" They both looked at Lindsay.

Lindsay's jaw dropped, "Oh shove it. I'm from Montana and ya expect me to sound like I'm from Alabama."

"I heard you use all the tenses of ya'all the other day," Austin pointed her finger at her, "You ain't foolin' no one, Monroe."

"Well yip uh-huh skip a dip," she muttered. "Just for that, we're watching Gilmore Girls and we're starting with season one."

"You think you're going to get me hooked and then I'll forget it's a chick show."

"You'll thank me tomorrow, I swear."

"You have one episode to make your case."

"That's what I said, Austin. That was two months ago, and now I have seen almost every episode. Be afraid," Stella warned.

"Don't worry, I am," Austin replied, pulling her knees up to her chest and eating another Twizzler as the episode started.

"Ooh, he's kinda cute," Austin said as a young teenage boy came on the screen.

"Ew, that's Dean! He's not cute, he's pathetic."

"He looks like Don did at that age."

"Poor Flack," Lindsay muttered, sticking a spoon into the peanut butter.

"Linds, are you eating that plain?" Stella asked in horror.

"No. I was gonna put some chocolate chips on it."

"And how do you stay a size two?"

"That's a secret I cannot share."

"You're mean."

"I just don't want the store to run out of jeans in my size, that's all."

-------------

As the credits rolled and the strumming of the guitar faded to the disc menu, Austin sat with her jaw slightly slacked and a smudge of peanut butter on her nose, "But... gah.. KISS ALREADY!"

"Told you!" Stella sing-songed.

Austin glared at her before turning to Lindsay, "I'm borrowing these."

"Figured as much." She nodded and leaned over to grab another chip before falling off the couch, "Ow."

"Way to go." Stella applauded as Lindsay tossed a chunk of cookie dough at her, "We need tunes."

"Have at it." Lindsay waved at her sound system. Stella stood up and crossed the room scanning through Lindsay's CD's.

"So spoil me, do Luke and Lorelai ever get together?"

"Yep. Takes them until season five. Then they break up. And then they get back together. And then break up again. And then right before the show ends… they get back together. It's all very screaming at the TV worthy."

"I can't wait."

"Lindsay," Stella sighed disgustedly. "We have got to get you better taste in music. All you have is country."

"Quit knocking my music taste first of all, and second, I have more than country," she said, joining Stella by the stereo. "See look. Top songs of 1998."

"Oh geez."

"Reminds me of high school."

"Is "Getting' Jiggy Wit It" on there?" Austin asked excitedly.

"First song."

"You rock."

Stella just shook her head as Lindsay popped the CD in.

"I need cookies," Stella said, moving into the kitchen.

"Yeah, we need to loosen you up with some sugar," Lindsay agreed, grabbing the half empty bag of chocolate chips off the coffee table and following her into the kitchen.

"Do you have any cookie recipes, Linds?"

"Nah, I usually just kinda throw them together."

They began to gather all the cookie making supplies and ingredients as Austin jumped up to sit on the counter.

"Did you guys ever hear about the time Danny tried to make cookies for his mom and he set the kitchen on fire?"

"No!" Lindsay shouted. "Tell me, tell me!"

"He was like twelve and it was his mom's birthday, and he decided to make her cookies. I told him he turned on the stovetop and not the oven, but he didn't believe me."

"Of course not."

"So he put the cookies on the tray and put them in the oven, and we went to watch TV. I figured if he wasn't going to believe me, well he could just wait all day for those cookies. It was like three minutes later we started smelling this horrible smell, and we went in the kitchen and brainless had thrown the potholder onto the stove."

"Smart."

"We managed to get the fire put out, but not before it spread along the grease on the counter. Luckily one of our neighbors was a pyro, so we knew how to put out a grease fire."

"I am guessing his mom never got the cookies."

"Nope. He was banned from the kitchen for life. He wasn't even allowed to make Top Ramen."

"No wonder he made peanut butter and jelly that night he said he was going to make me dinner," Lindsay said, pulling a spatula out of the drawer.

"I am so giving him crap about that," Stella agreed. "I'm not going to let him use the Bunsen burners anymore."

"That's a wise decision." Austin grinned and grabbed a couple of chocolate chips from the bowl and ate them.

"You could at least wash your hands first, Hawthorne."

"Bite me, Monroe."

"Children," Stella flung flower at them both, "behave."

"So," Lindsay slid around on the heels of her socks, "you've got to tell me more stories about problem child, Danny."

"I could write a book and still have stories to spare." Austin dumped in the chocolate chips, "However, anything I tell must remain between just us. He knows me just as well and he has no qualms with payback."

"Alright," Stella raised a brow, "now I have to know."

"Well," Austin racked her brain for a good story, "there was this one time, right after I got my license, Danny had a date with the most popular girl in school and he acted like a perv. Needless to say, she chucked his butt out and left him standing naked on the expressway and he called me to pick him up."

"Please say it was winter!" Lindsay snorted with laughter.

Austin nodded, "December."

"Score!"

"What's the worst story he's got on you?" Stella asked as she mixed the dough.

"Nice try, Bonasera, I ain't tellin'."

"It was worth a shot." Stella sighed as Lindsay pulled out the baking sheet and the cookie scoop.

"Alright, Stell," Austin dropped a cookie onto the sheet, "quid pro quo, tell us one on Mac."

"No."

"Mhmmm." Lindsay pouted, "C'mon, Stella, we all know you have plenty on him!"

"Do you know how bad he would kill me?"

"We won't say anything. Promise."

"Cross your heart, hope to die?"

"Yes, now spill."

"Okay. He doesn't know I know this story. I heard it from Claire many moons ago, and he would be so embarrassed if he knew I knew. I am waiting for just the right moment to mention it, so no one steal my thunder, got it?"

"We know! Just get on with it."

"Mac Taylor is quite possibly the cheesiest man in the world when it comes to romance. He doesn't mean to be, he just is kind of aloof about certain things. Like woman love the movie Titanic, but if a guy takes you on a boat to play king of the world you're going to laugh about it later. That kind of stuff. Apparently this only gets worse when it's a super romantic gesture, like proposing. Now Mac is also into big gestures, so when he decided to marry Claire, he had this whole ordeal planned. First he took her out to dinner at this expensive restaurant, and then they went for a walk downtown. He took her onto the roof of one of the buildings and it was all set up with candles and hot chocolate. Now Claire was not the most innocent girl in the world, but she was very proper when it came to certain things, and she couldn't even tell me this story without blushing, so you can imagine how skittish she was before they got married. So they sit down and Mac has this boombox and he turns it on, and I kid you not, it played "Kiss From a Rose" by Seal."

"No!" Lindsay shouted, her eyes wide. "He didn't!"

"He did."

"Was he wearing Hammerpants? Because if he was listening to Seal, you know he owned Hammerpants," Austin said, giggling and swiping another chocolate chip.

"I don't know about the Hammerpants, but that brings up a whole cornucopia of amusing mental images."

"This is quite possibly the funniest story. Ever."

"I'm not done yet. So they're sitting there and Claire totally knows what's coming and he knows she knows, and I guess he started getting really nervous and stumbling over his words. And he was giving her this big speech about how he wanted to grow old with her and he gets to the part where he says "I want to wake up with you every morning and sleep next to you every night," except he hadn't practiced that part enough and it came out "I want to wake you up every morning because I want to sleep with you every night." And then Claire choked on her hot chocolate."

Lindsay was doubled over with laughter tears streaming down her cheeks, while Austin was shaking, her hands covering her face.

"Poor Mac." Austin choked between the gasps for air and grabbed a bottle of water from the fridge, "Alright, I got one on Donald Duck."

"Does he know you call him that?"

"He knows that it's gonna be on his gravestone if I have my way."

"Evil woman." Lindsay laughed as she set the timer for the cookies and lead the way back to the living room.

Austin flopped down on the floor and stared up at the ceiling, "This one time we were babysitting the neighbor's baby and, Flack's got sisters, right? He's the oldest and he's got sisters. You'd think he'd be really good with children and stuff. So, we're babysitting Little Joe and I'm in the middle of making his dinner when Joey has an accident that gets all over him, all over Flack, all over everything that was in a two foot area. Flack's reacting like a girl and I'm all "I'm cooking, go clean him up and put him in a new diaper." Well, they went upstairs and I didn't hear anything for a good five or so minutes."

"Uh-oh." Stella giggled.

"I finished dinner, go upstairs and find Flack doubled over puking and a very naked Joe peeing on his baby sitter."

"Poor Duck." Lindsay fell onto her back and giggled at the ceiling.

"Poor Joe! He was covered in stinky sticky stuff and absolutely bewildered about what was going on. Not to mention poor me, because I was the one who had to clean it all up."

"You are a saint," Lindsay chuckled, shaking her head.

"Okay kiddo, your turn," Stella said. "You've got to tell a story on someone or tell a story on yourself."

"I don't like those rules. I don't have stories on anyone. Danny hasn't done anything embarrassing yet except admitted to taking bubble baths only he uses dish soap. But that's not nearly as good as…" she paused and a smile cracked across her face. "I got one. This was like a year ago, and I had mentioned to Adam that I needed to go to the Laundromat. He said he needed to go too, so we just ended up going together. So we threw our clothes in the washer and then I ran across the street to get something to drink. I come back, and he is in the Laundromat alone, he's turned the lights off, and without music he is dancing and singing "Mambo Number Five." I just stood in the doorway kind of shocked for a second and then he started doing the synthesizer noises and I couldn't hold it in anymore. I laughed and he turned around all red-faced and embarrassed and then wouldn't speak to me for half an hour. I suppose I shouldn't have kept laughing every time I looked over at him, but I couldn't help it."

"Adam's got moves, I'll give him that. But the fact he turned off the lights?"

"It was like his own personal club or something except he forgot the glo-sticks. And if that wasn't enough, when the clothes came out of the dryer he accidentally dropped his boxers on the floor. And they are silk. And they are Sonic the Hedgehog. And he has more than one pair."

"So that's why you call him Sonic?" Stella asked while Austin chuckled.

"Yep."

"So why does he call you Shortcake? Wait, you don't have Strawberry Shortcake underwear, do you?" Austin asked as Lindsay's face colored.

"I knew that story would come back to bite me. I just didn't think it would be this soon."

"Does Danny know that Adam knows what kind of underwear you wear?"

"No. And what he doesn't know can't hurt him. Got it Hawthorne?"

"Got it."

"Alright, alright," Stella interrupted, "enough dishing on the boys. This is supposed to be a girls night."

"Well, I'm not singing Motown songs into a hairbrush." Austin grabbed a pillow and plopped it behind her head.

Lindsay applauded, "She just unknowingly made a Gilmore reference."

"All Hail Austin, The Gilmore Girls savant!" Stella bowed halfheartedly and grabbed Lindsay's hair brush from where it had been kicked under the coffee table, "You never close your eyes anymore when I kiss your lips..."

"And there's no tenderness like before in your finger tips," Austin grabbed the hairbrush and belted out the classic tune, "You're trying hard not to show it,"

"BABY!" Lindsay echoed.

Together they sang the chorus, "But baby, baby, I know it, you've lost that lovin' feelin', whoa, that lovin' feeling, you've lost that lovin' feeling, and it's gone, gone, gone, whoa-oh-oh-oh."

"I've seen that episode of The Facts Of Life about fifty times." Austin giggled and tossed a pretzel at Lindsay, who caught it in her mouth.

"I always wanted to be Blair." Lindsay twirled a highlighted lock around her finger.

Austin snorted, "How fitting, I wanted to be Jo."

"And that, Ladies and Germs, is how eighties television changed our entire lives!" Stella exclaimed as the timer went off and they all raced for the kitchen, "Guys, get back. You'll burn yourself!"

"But the gooey!" Lindsay pawed at the air in front of Stella's face.

"You're seven."

Lindsay stuck out her tongue, "As that may be, THE GOOEYS!"

"I think," Austin hopped back onto the counter, "it's safe to say that Lindsay likes the gooey."

"Well, she can have the gooey once the gooey has gone down a temperature that won't remove a layer of skin."

Lindsay's lower lip jutted out, "Gooey."

"Why don't you get out the ice-cream to counteract the molten effects of the gooey?"

"Hey, don't talk down to me. Vanilla or chocolate?"

"Both. Der."

"We are going to roll into work tomorrow, like Violet from Willy Wonka," Austin said, surveying the cookies to see which one she wanted.

"That's attractive," Stella noted. "How are we going to explain our sugar hangovers?"

"Same way you'd explain a regular hangover. 'Ug, I think I'm pregnant.' Works every time."

"I usually use 'I have cramps' in a really whiny voice. That sends then running for the hills."

"Men are wimps."

"I concur."

"Okay Lindsay you can have a cookie now, but if you burn yourself don't come crying to me."

"Okay Mama Stella."

"I'm not that old!"

Austin chuckled and took a cookie of her own, dropping it into the bottom of a bowl before putting a scoop of vanilla and a scoop of chocolate ice cream on the top.

"Girl can eat," Lindsay said in approval.

"I know what I like," Austin replied. "Now, what was next on our agenda?"

"Something girly," Stella shrugged. "Makeovers?"

"Ooh, I know! Can we straighten your hair?" Lindsay asked while Austin nodded enthusiastically.

"Absolutely not."

"Please?"

"I said no."

"But… I said please."

"I'll think about it."

"Score!"

Austin and Lindsay high-fived and Stella shook her head. She'd think about it until they forgot about it and hopefully it would never come up again.

"Well while you think about that for a long time in hopes we'll forget about it," Lindsay said, taking a bite of ice cream. "I seem to recall pedicures being a part of this girls night process. Though that was back in middle school, so I'm not sure if it still applies."

"Well singing into a hairbrush worked, so we might as well try it."

"This is kind of a different process without braces and training bras."

"You actually fit in a training bra!?" Austin pouted as Lindsay pulled out her shoebox full of wildly colored nail polish, "No fair! I swear I went from nothing to a B cup. I even tried to duct tape them like Christina Ricci in Now & Then."

"That movie was my holy grail when I was a teenager!" Lindsay exclaimed and tossed a bottle of sparkly purple to Austin, "Oh! I know!"

"Oh dear." Stella raised a cautious eyebrow as she rifled through the box of polish and the sounds of 'Bitch' by Meredith Brooks filled the apartment.

"BOOM!" Austin cheered and kicked at the air like a turtle.

"Okay," Lindsay threw a pillow at her, "You and Danny have known each other too long."

"The 'boom' thing?" Austin rolled her eyes, "Honey, where do you think he learned it?"

"Oh." She grinned.

Austin smirked and tossed the pillow back, "And don't look so sly, I heard you say it the other day."

"I think everyone says it now." Stella grabbed Austin's foot and unscrewed the cap of a emerald green and painted her big toe.

Austin held her foot up to admire the color, "I feel a bit like Elphaba with it on... which is totally awesome!"

"That's why this song is totally you." Lindsay piped in as a Twizzler connected with her head, "I MEANT IT AS A GOOD THING, geesh, Hawthorne!"

"Geesh, Monroe!" Austin countered, "I mean, is it my innate bitchiness or my split personality moods?"

"I was going for feisty," Lindsay mumbled, "but now that you mention the split personality..."

"Bite me."

"I don't eat spoiled meat."

"CHILDREN!"

"Sorry, Stella." They chorused through their giggles.

"It's okay. Now gimme your foot back, I'm not done."

"Yes ma'am."

Lindsay continued to sort through her nail polish, putting the empty or dried out bottles onto the coffee table.

"What in the heck…" she mumbled, pulling out a piece of paper.

"What?"

"I have a phone number for someone named Sebastian and I have no idea where… I take that back. I lied. I do know where this came from and now I must get rid of it."

"Wait, freeze."

"What?"

"You've got another guys number. We must know about this."

"Okay, a long, long time ago, my oldest brother went on a hike really early in the morning. And he was out in the woods all alone and he watched the sunrise and as he was walking back to town, he ran into a group of people walking down the road. And they were all naked. Sebastian is the name of the leader of the group and my brother was so nice and considerate and got me his number, then surprised me with it at seven in the morning. That is the story of the number and now I am throwing it out."

"They were all naked?" Stella asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Yes, they were."

"From whence did the pen and paper come, may I ask?" Austin inquired with a giggle.

"Ew, now I am really throwing this away!"

"Yeah," Stella nodded, "You might want to boil your hand now." Lindsay resisted the urge to flip her off as she tossed the paper in the waste basket before letting out a yawn.

"Are you getting sleepy, Monroe?" Austin raised a brow.

"I'm getting old, Hawthorne."

"I'm the same age as you," Austin smirked, "Besides, Stella is older than all of us and she's still-"

"-I will kill you and get off on justifiable homicide, Austin!"

They giggled and Lindsay pulled a pillow off the couch, resting her head on it.

"I am going to have such a headache in the morning."

"Yeah. We should do this more often."

"Agreed."

"Toss me one of those pillows, Linds."

"Yeah, me too."

She handed them each a pillow and they all settled down quietly, the sounds of the city filtering in the open window. Lindsay started to giggle quietly.

"What?"

"I am picturing Mac in Hammerpants, Flack covered in pee, Adam in silky cartoon boxers, and Danny standing naked on the expressway."

Austin and Stella both snorted with laughter.

"And on that note, let us all have pleasant dreams."

They all fell into sleep, feeling very girly, very silly, and very nauseous. But more than anything they felt young again.