A/N: This takes place late in the fourth season or early in the fifth…the team has not been broken up, Sara and Grissom are not together, but Grissom's ears work fine, lol. I wrote this story as a birthday gift for a dear friend, and it's due to her that you are reading it now. Love ya, N!
A/N 2: Oh, and this is NOT a WIP. All chapters are done and will be uploaded, one per day.
Chapter 1
Grissom grinned wildly as the ride ended with a jolt and the screech of air brakes being applied. As the automatic seat restraints lifted, he hoisted himself out of the padded seat and sighed in contentment. Speed, The Ride was his current favorite of Vegas's many roller coaster attractions, in spite of its NASCAR theme. It was unique. Like rocks out of a slingshot, riders were catapulted from the launch area at 35 mph around the first curve and plummeted through a mist-filled tunnel 25-feet below ground. Riders then hurtled to the surface and through a 72-foot loop, accelerated to 70 mph, and sped through the Sahara's marquee to the top of a 224-foot tower. Then, they did it all again - backwards.
It was the reverse course that really made the ride unique…half of the thrill of a roller coaster, after all, is the fear of flying off of the track at 70 miles per hour. That fear is heightened when you can't even see where the coaster is going.
He was coming off of a double in which he had worked himself to near-exhaustion trying to determine if the suspicious drowning death of a toddler was accidental or homicide. The first officer on the scene had called in CSI because, when he arrived, the pool area of the victim's home was locked up securely, and the drowned toddler was laid out by the side of the pool. There was no apparent way for a 2-year-old to enter. After 15 hours of processing and interviewing witnesses, he had determined that an older sibling had carelessly left the gate open. On discovering the body of his baby brother floating in the pool, and trying fruitlessly to resuscitate him, the teen had panicked and locked the pool gate, fearing the consequences should his carelessness be known. It was negligence, not homicide. That didn't stop Grissom from agonizing over his own impotence, however. The coaster ride was necessary to clear his mind and free his soul.
As he straightened and moved into a full body stretch, his stomach brought itself to his attention: It was clinging to his backbone and complaining bitterly. Though he was mind-numb with exhaustion, he didn't feel up to shopping and cooking this morning, and his larder was pretty bare at the moment, the victim of weeks of overtime. Fortunately, the Sahara featured the House of Lords, a historic Vegas steakhouse, which he patronized on occasion, so he drew together the dregs of his energy and shuffled off to find dinner.
Too drained to wait for a full dinner service, Grissom ordered the calamari appetizer and a house beer, promising his stomach something healthier and more substantial later. As he settled into the plush, intimate booth, he surveyed his surroundings. The subtle music of the many fountains scattered through the restaurant soothed him, as did the soft crooning of Frank Sinatra emanating from hidden speakers. One of the many things he enjoyed about this restaurant was the illusion of total privacy: the high, padded booths sheltered him from other eyes. He always requested a corner booth: there, he could observe others enjoying their meals while being nearly invisible himself, screened by the falling water of a fountain on one side, the luxurious leaves of a faux palm on the other, and the high back of the booth to his rear.
Today, relaxing in his favorite booth, he let his mind wander. Eventually, he settled into his habitual occupation when out alone: people watching. Two booths over sat an elderly man and a teenage boy: grandfather and grandson, perhaps? The boy was speaking animatedly while the man watched indulgently. It struck Grissom suddenly, with a pang of sadness, that, if he were to father a child at this moment in his life, he would look like a grandfather to his own child. Children were something he'd always vaguely hoped for someday. Now, it seemed, all his chances had slipped away.
As many paths of thought often did, thoughts of having a child of his own led inevitably to thoughts of Sara: the only woman he'd thought of in the light of a potential mate in years. She'd been happier, lately, he'd noticed. He was pleased to see her smile more, but he was afraid to speculate at the cause of her contentment. If he were a truly unselfish man, he knew he'd wish for her to have found someone to care for, but…he could never be completely selfless when it came to Sara. He wanted her, and in his most honest moments, he might even admit that he loved her, but he was trapped in a stasis of his own making. Whether the cause was the age difference between them, his position as her superior, or simply his own fear, he'd pushed his feelings away for so long that he no longer had any idea of how to act upon them.
Discontented with the path his thoughts were taking him on, he wrenched his gaze away from the old man and his possible young relative, and scanned the other nearby tables for something to distract him from his unproductive line of thought. Sometimes, when eating solitary meals out, he liked to entertain himself á la Sherlock Holmes; he'd scrutinize some random person and challenge himself to learn as much about that person as possible simply from his clothing, general appearance and mannerisms. He decided that his occasional game was just the diversion he needed. Considering and rejecting several restaurant patrons as not enough of a challenge, he settled on a young man two rows over who reminded him of Nick.
Sporting a very short, masculine haircut, it was the young man's brown hair that made him think of Nick. Forcing himself to be meticulous, he started with the young man's shoes. They were leather, and somewhat dressy, but not, in Grissom's opinion, expensive. He came to the same conclusion about the young man's black slacks and olive green shirt, which was striped in some faint pattern of criss-crossing lines. So, the quality of his clothing showed him to be of moderate means, while the crisply ironed lines of pants and shirt suggested either a fastidious nature or perhaps a romantic partner who cared about how his clothes looked on him. The hand Grissom could see was sun-browned, as was the right ear (the only part of the man's face visible at the moment). This told Grissom that his subject either worked, or played in the sun, and the muscles outlined beneath his shirt and the calluses on his hand suggested that he either participated in athletic activities or had a hands-on job. Or both.
Unless the young man turned his head, Grissom had reached the end of what he could tell from the man's overall appearance. Now, he decided to let the man's choice of companions tell him more. Across the table from his subject, he could see an older man and woman. Their clothing and bearing suggested a slightly higher income level then the young man in the green shirt. They were relaxed and appeared happy, so probably were not work colleagues or casual acquaintances. At one point while he idly observed, the woman reached out and covered the young man's hand with her own, an affectionate smile crossing her lips. The two older folks were obviously together, as evidenced by the way the woman snuggled into the older man's shoulder. This information, coupled with the woman's age and the similarity of her coloring to that of his subject, led Grissom to believe that she was an older relative, perhaps a mother or aunt.
Now, he turned his attention to the young woman seated with his subject. Like his Nick look-alike, this young woman immediately brought someone to mind: Sara. Her loose brown curls and long, pale, graceful hand evoked Sara's image in his mind immediately. He frowned. This was unfortunate, since he was using this exercise to banish her from his thoughts in the first place. Still, he shrugged mentally, he'd already devoted several minutes to this study; he might as well be thorough. Unlike her male companion, she was seated to the interior of the booth, so his only view of her was of her shoulders, the back of her head and her hand, when she used it to gesture as she spoke. Devoting his considerable powers of observation to this new challenge, he decided first that, given the level of her head when compared with her companion, she would be tall for a woman. She was slim, and fine-boned. Her posture was relaxed, so she was comfortable with her companions, and the gentle shaking of her shoulders from time to time, when she laughed, indicated that she was having a good time.
Grissom had learned all he could from the appearance and companions of his young subject, so he relaxed and resigned himself to watching more idly in case the actions of the people he had scrutinized told him anything new. The waiter had deposited his beer and calamari in front of him unobtrusively while he was otherwise occupied, so he sipped his drink and nibbled at his snack while he observed. His first new piece of intelligence came when the young man threw his head back in laughter, and then wrapped an affectionate arm around the shoulders of the young woman. His teeth were strong, straight and white, and the angularity of his jaw and shape of his eyes, briefly visible in his laughter made Grissom sit up in wonder…the young man wasn't just a Nick look-alike, he was a Nick clone! Another hearty laugh from his subject confirmed his suspicions and Grissom relaxed, laughing at himself. It WAS Nick. Of all the people to observe, he'd unwittingly chosen his own young friend and protégée!
Shaking his head and reflecting on the oddness of this coincidence, Grissom decided to discontinue his study. It felt wrong to examine someone he knew…voyeurism instead of casual observation. Still, his eyes were drawn, time and again, to the young women enclosed in Nick's arm. If the young man was Nick, it was conceivable that the young woman actually was Sara; he hadn't known that Nick and Sara hung out together outside of work, but the thought was unsurprising; the two younger CSIs had a lot in common, and worked together harmoniously when paired. It made sense that they were friends as well as co-workers. Grissom's lips turned up in an unhappy smirk as he contemplated the fact that he had conceded any right to know who Sara socialized with when he had stopped acting like her friend.
He sighed, more despondent now than he had been before. He generally avoided confronting his feelings for Sara, and hardly ever revisited the mistakes he'd made in his dealings with her. Today, though, his earlier anguish over his case had predisposed him to melancholy. That, coupled with this unlooked for encounter pushed him over the edge into outright dejection. Like a tongue continually probing a sore tooth, he forced himself to continue watching Nick's table. Seeing Nick's arm around Sara wasn't particularly bothersome, since he knew his young friend was outgoing and affectionate with all of his friends. So, when Nick drew the young woman close and planted a serious kiss on her laughing mouth, he froze in bewilderment. His brain rejected what he'd seen: Sara and Nick, involved? In a relationship? It couldn't be! Desperately seeking any other explanation, he managed to convince himself that the girl two rows over was NOT in fact Sara, but a girl bearing a slight resemblance. Still, doubt gnawed at him with painfully sharp teeth.
Once he'd signed the credit slip delivered to him by the nearly-silent waiter, he resolved to prove to himself that Sara, his Sara, was not seated in that booth cuddling with his young employee. Stealthily, he traversed the restaurant until he could observe Nick's booth from the opposite vantage point. Now, the older couple was only visible from behind, and Nick (because it was definitely Nick, seen from this angle) was wrapped around…Sara Sidle. Even as he looked on in stunned disbelief, Nick leaned over and whispered something in Sara's ear, following his aside with a kiss to the soft skin next to her ear. Sara only smiled in response, though the color in her cheeks rose becomingly.
Thankful that he'd kept another booth between himself and the Stokes table, and therefore kept himself from being observed, Grissom hurried from the restaurant as fast as his bow-legged gait could take him. His brain was spinning from what he'd just learned and he could feel the start of a familiar throbbing in his temples.