Chapter Text
Brian Zeller didn’t know what to do with himself. The BAU lab was too empty and quiet. He found his mind wandering to everything but the body on his table. The autopsy was fairly routine work: white male, in his late 20s, gunshot wound to the head, no defensive wounds. Zeller had carefully printed the man and photographed him. He had been easily identified with dental records. His stomach contents were some coffee and a small bit of undigested egg. The man had been shot at breakfast by his girlfriend. Zeller only had to get all the reports filed before the trial in a few days. The girlfriend had all but confessed to the crime, claiming she had just been tired of the man’s cheating. He went through the motions and sewed the body up by habit.
Zeller noticed the partial print on the man’s cheek as he was finishing the last stitches on the chest cavity. Price would have just loved that were he at work that day. Zeller wondered what cocky quip his colleague would have had about the print and he knew the quiet of the lab was getting to him. Suddenly he wished he wasn’t alone, that anyone was there. He knew he was lonely when he even wished Crawford was there brooding over him about picking up the pace or about how their work wasn’t a laughing matter. Crawford had always taken some offense with the gallows humor around the BAU, until recently he had always turned a bit of a blind eye to it. The events surrounded Will Graham seemed to cause Crawford to have no room for humor in his presence. Jack was busy in court, leaving Zeller free to joke, but with no one around to share his jokes they just seemed pointless. He busied himself with lifting the partial from the victim’s cheek. They had enough evidence without it, but with it the girlfriend may not get off on a technicality. Plus he was sure Price would want to see the print when he returned from his time off. Zeller’s every motion echoed through the otherwise empty lab.
Beverly was home with a nasty flu. Of course she had presented herself at the lab this morning as usual but Zeller could instantly see she was in no condition to work through the day. She looked pale and sweaty and when he touched his fingers to her forehead she was burning hot. He had kept silent about it and Beverly went about her work, pulling hair from the victim’s clothing. She was preparing the samples while Zeller worked on his autopsy. He heard her breath hitch and turned to look at her. Her coloring was green and she looked like holding her breath was all she could do not to vomit.
“Beverly, it’s hard enough to focus on this without worrying when you are going to vomit all over evidence. Go home! Get some rest! Come back when you feel better!” he insisted. Despite her protests that with Price on vacation he would need her to stay and assist, he eventually forced her home to rest. He insisted that he could handle anything that came through the lab, but that hadn’t stopped her from texting him throughout the day. After the fifth set of texts, He ordered her to rest and silenced his phone, leaving the lab unearthly quiet.
Zeller focused on the sound of his breathing as he finished running Beverly’s tissue samples and the partial fingerprint through the system. The work was tedious and his mind wandered to his last conversation with Price before the older man left for his vacation in the Greek Isles.
“I need a break from this whole thing, Z. Part of me always wondered when Graham would break but I never imagined we would be processing evidence while he is locked in the Baltimore Hospital for the Criminally Insane. I guess that’s what makes someone like him different from people like me. I see all this death and crime but I still mostly see good in people. He doesn’t anymore, does he?”
“I really can’t say. I guess those answers will come in his trial.”
“All I know is the beautiful views of the Greek Isles can’t come soon enough. T-minus 12 hours until my plane takes off,” Price smiled.
“Keep rubbing it in why don’t you,” Zeller snipes pretending to be more annoyed then he is.
“Oh I’ll keep rubbing it. I’ll rub my toes in the sand just for you, Z. I’ll walk barefoot in the cool waters. Think you’ll feel it here in the lab?”
“Fuck you, Price.”
“As if I’d be jealous of you,” Zeller chuckles.
“I meant jealous that it’s not you I’m calling beautiful and spending two weeks with. Gonna miss me, Z?”
“Now why would I ever miss your smart mouth, Jimmy?”
Zeller came out of his memories realizing that now only a few days later, he did in fact miss the grumpy older man. He wished Price’s tenor voice was echoing through the lab right now, wished he heard that quick intake of breath followed by the “Ha!” that meant Price had found something no one else had, something to break this case. Mostly he wished the older man was here to tease.
He cursed himself for the feeling that was developing in the pit of his stomach; he didn’t really miss people often. He never let himself get close enough to anyone to feel that strongly. He hadn’t had a serious relationship since his high school girlfriend. They had dated for five years starting freshman year of high school. Yet when he left for college he quickly realized he didn’t miss her or need her as much as she did him. Somehow, no matter how hard he tried to hide his lack of feeling, she sensed the change. They only lasted through his freshman year of college. When he came home in the summer, she ended the relationship after a nice dinner date. They had sex one last time and Zeller felt nothing. When it was over, she cried.
Since then he’d had a list of short term relationships that never seemed to last more than a handful of months. Of course there were also a fair few flings and one night stands which never left him feeling anything, not even sexually fulfilled. Thinking of his last fling left a sour taste in his mouth. Used for information by that viper Freddie Lounds, he couldn’t believe he let sex turn him into a leak, betraying the FBI. Sure maybe he had been right about Will Graham in the end but that still didn’t make his actions right. It was the most shameful action in his professional career and he has been living like a saint since. He was burying himself in work in penance for his actions with Freddie. The arrangement worked out well for him considering he’s a workaholic and only ever felt a longing pull toward work. Yet here he was at work feeling a longing pull toward his absent coworker, a longing he thought he wouldn’t feel. On top of that, this was a longing he really shouldn’t feel. Not only was Jimmy Price his colleague, he was 18 years his senior, and he was a man.
Zeller tried to shake his thoughts clear, tried to busy himself with results and lab reports but his mind kept wondering what snarky thing Price would say about this or that piece of evidence. The more Zeller thought of the older man’s tenor voice, the more he pictured Price’s soft lips, tongue sliding out to lick between never spoken words, the more he felt the pulling of longing in his gut travelling lower into his groin. Soon he felt like an awkward school boy hiding his erection with a textbook, until he remembered there was no one to hide it from. Zeller was sweaty and the room was too stuffy. He had to escape. He had to run.
___________
Pounding, Pounding, the sound of his running shoes on the pavement was the only sound he could hear. A light breeze stirred the leaves but Zeller couldn’t hear the rustling over the pounding in his head. The breeze left its coolness on his damp, hot flesh. He’d long since lost track of the time, choosing to ignore the position of the sun, losing himself in the run. He found himself now in a familiar rhythm, pounding feet echoing in his head unable to block out his fantasies, instead mirroring them. He wonders how in the course of hours he has gone from remembering playful banter to having vivid fantasies about Jimmy Price. He had hoped running would help, but the rhythm only functioned to remind him of the rhythm of passionate, hard, fast sex, sex he wanted to have with Price. There was nothing to be done about the thoughts in his head. He ended his run and headed to the Bureau’s locker room to shower. He decided along the way to take the coldest shower his body could stand.
Freezing water trailed over his naked flesh leaving lines in the sweat left from his run. He closed his eyes letting the water wash through his hair and over his firm body. The cold contrasted the heat of his flesh and settled him in a more relaxed state. As the calm settled into his sore muscles, which had carried him too far too fast in his haste to forget his longing, Zeller found his mind exploring possibilities. He couldn’t deny that the banter between Price and him often went beyond professional respect. Zeller had never known Price to mention a wife or any women friends. Zeller wondered if he took a leap if Jimmy would be the one to catch him.
Sinking deeper into the cold flow, Zeller pushed those thoughts deep into untouched shadowy parts of his mind. This was his colleague and they were FBI. He couldn’t just give in to this longing and expect it to end well.
However in his longing, Zeller found even in the cold of the shower his body still had a pressing need. Zeller, knowing he couldn’t give into his desires in any other way, elected to take this matter into his own hands. After checking that the locker room showers were otherwise empty, he grasped his erection along the shaft and began to stroke. His eyes slipped closed and he imagined Jimmy in the shower with him, Jimmy touching him everywhere, trailing fingertips over his wet flesh, drinking all of Zeller in with his vibrant blue eyes. Imaginary Jimmy brushed his light caresses over the head of Zeller’s cock and his release came all over his hand and washed away down the drain. He was finally calm and relaxed.
The calm brought a sense of understanding and Zeller knew he had to talk his feelings for Price out with someone. And it couldn’t just be anyone. It had to be someone who knew them both personally, someone who could tell him he was crazy. It had to be Beverly. As he turned off the water and toweled his oversensitive flesh dry, he hoped that Beverly had ignored his orders to rest. She had been right yet again. He needed her.