TITLE: A Conversation with Jill and Claire with a Silent Witness
PAIRING: Lindsay/Cindy
DISCLAIMER: Not mine. Never was. Never will be. No profit. Just love.

“What did you do to Cindy?” Claire asked sharply, tracking back to the mute, immobile redhead and putting her palm to Cindy’s forehead, as if she could diagnose her through osmosis.

“Nothing. She’s fine,” Lindsay replied with an awkward shrug-like gesture that did nothing to prove her innocence.

“Cindy? Cindy?” Claire called.

Cindy’s blinking may have reacted slightly, picking up from the occasional, languid closing and opening to an almost normal blink. Other than that, there was no response.

“She’s not fine! She’s catatonic!”

“No, she’s not. She’s just not moving or speaking.” Lindsay attempted to laugh it off despite the fact that her funny fuse couldn’t seem to make a real connection.

“Yeah, catatonic,” Claire repeated. “Carry her into my office.”

“What?” Lindsay sharply returned.

“You’re the strongest. Carry her into my office.”

That really didn’t seem like a good idea given the present circumstances, but that was hardly something Lindsay could say without Claire and Jill wanting further explanation. So she stepped forward as if she might follow Claire’s directive, and, as soon as she was within range, kicked Cindy in the back of the foot. The nudge was all it took to send Cindy ambling blindly forward in a robot-march.

“There you go,” Lindsay uttered.

Claire shook her head in disapproval and took off after Cindy. Lindsay felt rightfully scolded as Claire caught up to her just as Cindy was about to walk into a wall. Turning Cindy gently, Claire steered her through the door into her office.

Once they were alone, Lindsay felt the steady presence of Jill’s gaze upon her and gave in to it. As she turned Jill’s way, Jill cocked her head to the side. “How did you break Cindy?”

“I did not break Cindy,” Lindsay defended herself again.

“Well, did you happen to see what did? Because you were the only one here.”

A loud smacking sound from Claire’s office spared Lindsay from having to answer.

“Did Claire just slap her?”

“Hey, we’re concentrating on your bad deeds right now, not Claire’s,” Jill declared.

Not sure what else to do with them, Lindsay threw her hands up. “I didn’t do anything!”

“You broke the redhead!”

“I did not break her!” Why wouldn’t anyone believe that? “She’s not broken. I guess… she could be… in shock… maybe.” Truth settling over her, a concerned pout took over Lindsay’s lips. “That can’t be good, can it?”

“It depends. What did you do?”

Guilt gnawing at her insides, when Lindsay looked up at Jill, standing there in power position with her arms crossed and one leg jutted forward as if she was in a damned courtroom, the guilt shifted to blame.

“I took YOUR advice,” Lindsay pointed at Jill. “I let her know how I felt.”

“You did?” Jill almost sweetly returned. “I can see how that might have come as a surprise to her, but I don’t think it would break her.”

Too nervous to argue Cindy’s brokenness with Jill again, Lindsay shoved her hands into her back pockets to keep from fidgeting. “Well, I didn’t use words per se.”

Jill’s eyes went instantly wide. “You molested Cindy in the morgue?!?”

“I did not molest Cindy,” Lindsay hissed. “I just kissed her.”

“Aww. You kissed her?” Jill asked dreamily, a gentle smile coming to her face.

“You can’t be happy about it now after all the accusing you just did.”

Jill’s disagreement with the assertion was evident in the fact that she completely ignored it.

“So how was it?” she asked instead.

“Well, I thought it was nice,” Lindsay said, flapping her hand at Claire’s office door. “But since Cindy is in a semi-conscious coma now, maybe it wasn’t.”

“So you admit you did break her?” Jill grinned.

Lindsay almost smiled back, but it was stopped by a tempest roaring into the morgue.

“What in the hell did you do?” Claire abrasively returned to the conversation.

“Did you slap her?” Lindsay queried back with just as much fire.

“No, I didn’t slap her. I just clapped my hands in front of her.”

“Like a dog?”

“Well, it got her attention,” Claire responded.

Fight gone out of her, Lindsay glanced toward the doorway to Claire’s office. “So, she’s okay?”

“Sure, if you consider mumbling nonsensical things about rib cutters and your tongue okay.”

Fingers rising to shield her mouth, Lindsay grimaced. “Were those two separate mumblings or did they go together?”

“I don’t know, Linds,” Claire shook her head. “What did you do?”

“Lindsay kissed her,” Jill enlightened Claire.

“You kissed her?” Claire queried, looking to Lindsay for confirmation. When Lindsay’s tiny nod apparently didn’t provide enough for her, she re-voiced the same question, only louder and with a higher, more disbelieving inflection.

“Yes, Claire, I kissed her,” Lindsay verified.

“And it caused this?” Claire’s eyes turned from Lindsay to Jill. “Wow, maybe Cindy isn’t as into her as we thought.”

Blood rushing through her brain like a freight train, Lindsay registered Jill’s solemn nod of concurrence.

“What?!?” she yelped. “She’s your soul mate, Lindsay! Tell her, Lindsay! This was all your idea, people. You pushed me into this and now that I’m all… accepting of the idea… you’re telling me you were wrong?!?”

“Accepting of the idea?” Claire mumbled. “More like you registered for the association and pinned the badge to your chest.”

Disbelief melting her mouth open, Lindsay could have easily served as the model for “The Scream.” “You told me to!”

Riled by the responding burst of laughter, Lindsay snarled at Claire. When Jill joined in, Lindsay felt downright betrayed.

“Lindsay, Claire is just screwing with you,” Jill finally said. “Clearly we were right. Cindy is obviously even more into you than we’d ever imagined.”

Thrown by the sudden change in the facts of the case, Lindsay shook the chaos from her head and felt her mood soften considerably. “You really think so?”

“You kissed her into catatonia, Linds,” Claire rationalized. “I think that’s a pretty good sign.”

“Oh,” Lindsay smiled.

“So, now that we’ve established that this is, in fact, your doing,” Claire stated matter-of-factly, “go fix it.”

Lindsay whirled her head to Claire, looking for any sign of a joke, but there was no jest in Claire’s expression.

Turning to Jill for assistance, she watched her friend shrug helplessly.

“I’d love to help you, Linds, but I really don’t think I would ever kiss Cindy into catatonia. Ecstasy, yes, but not catatonia.”

Averting her gaze from Jill’s intimidating sexual self-confidence, Lindsay found herself once again looking at Claire. Claire stepped aside, making an open palmed sweeping motion over the path she’d cleared for Lindsay.

Taking a deep breath that she may as well have taken on the moon for all the good it did her, Lindsay shuffled in the direction of Claire’s office.

When she reached the doorway, she stopped hesitant. She refused to call it scared. Left to her own decision-making, Lindsay might very well have lingered there forever. But a slight push from behind compelled her into the room and before she could escape again, the door was closed behind her.