"That was some serious attitude. What's her dealio?"

Greg watched the quickly departing back of Sara Sidle. Nick shrugged.

"When it comes to Sara, your guess is as good as mine."

"All I said was I wasn't doing lab work today and she freaked."

"Who knows, man? Sometimes we just forget that you're one of us now."

"Why Nick... I'm touched. You just admitted that I'm like you."

"Whoh now. I didn't say you were like me. I said you're one of us... As in a crime scene investigator. There's a mighty big distance between the two."

Greg just grinned as he continued down the hall towards the exit. Nick entered the CSI labs and Grissom looked at him with a raised eyebrow. "Nice of you to join us, Nick."

Nick thought about explaining his lateness but decided to skip it.

Whatever.

"Everyone else has their assignments. You need to catch up with Sara and check out a male DB found near a golf course."

Great.

He started off down the corridor in search of his tempermental colleague.

Normally a fairly positive person, Nick Stokes was having a particularly crappy start to his day.

He'd had problems with his SUV on the way to work, and he'd just barely made it into the LVPD parking lot before it had died on him completely. He'd run the keys over to the motor pool, hoping it was nothing major. He hated being without his own wheels.

As he'd sprinted to the criminalistics wing, he'd managed to pour most of the contents of his coffee cup down the front of his new shirt. He'd quickly changed, but hadn't quite made it to the shift assignment allocation. Grissom's comment had just been another nail in the coffin of a shitty start to the day.

And now, working with Sidle. And Sidle in a bad mood apparently. Excellent.

He wandered down the corridors, keeping his eye out for the familiar brunette.

OK, Sara. Where are you? Let's get this over with.


As shift ended, Sara looked at the ground, frowning.

"I uh... I'm sorry, Nick. I shouldn't be taking my bad mood out on you."

He blew out a lengthy sigh. "It's fine, Sara. Don't worry about it."

As much as his lack of concern troubled him, Nick was beginning to find that he just couldn't care less about Sara's problem du jour. She was always in a bad mood these days it seemed, and whenever he tried to get her to talk about it, she blew him off.

So why even bother?

He turned to go, and Sara was surprised to find herself disappointed. Of all the people she worked with, Nick was aways the most... well, concerned. Maybe it was because he came from a big family or something, but he seemed to always be the peacemaker, the one who wanted everybody to be happy. And he hadn't even bothered to ask her what was wrong.

She started to wonder if she had finally slipped so far into her neverending bad moods of late that even Nick no longer felt the need to bother with her.

She frowned as he left the locker room without so much as a backward glance.


She made her way out to her SUV lost in thought. How long had she been like this? She couldn't even recall when things had started on the downward spiral.

How did I get to this point?

She leaned against her door and frowned.

I can't even remember the last time I was genuinely happy.

But when did it all start going to shit? She ran through the list of her past few year's failings and started to mentally tick them off. First, there'd been the failed relationships: Hank had used her and Grissom had rejected her. And these letdowns had obviously contributed to her brief brush with excessive drinking and then the DUI charge that she'd narrowly escaped.

She exhaled noisily and reached into her bag, seraching for her keys. She jumped as a voice spoke up behind her.

"Sara, I.... Oh, sorry. I didn't mean to startle you."

She turned to look at Nick. "Um, that's OK. What's up?"

"I was hoping I could score a ride home? I don't think I can't sit around for two hours while the motor pool finds me a loaner until mine is fixed." He let out a loud sigh. "I just want to go home and sleep."

She looked at him sympathetically. "Sure, Nick. No problem."

They drove out of the parking lot and Sara felt uncomfortable as the silence stretched out. She cleared her throat.

"Uh, Nick?"

He didn't even turn his head. "Yeah?"

"You OK? You seem a little... Well you don't seem like yourself today."

His lip curled up in a half-smile. "It's cool. I've just been having one of those days. I think it pretty much started when I woke up, and it just went downhill from there."

She nodded, grinning."Gotcha. I'm glad it's nothing serious."

He smiled. "Yeah. I'll live."

"Um, listen, I was going to grab a bite to eat before I went home... Are you interested?" She found that she didn't want to eat alone today for some reason. It seemed like she spent a lot of her time outside work alone these days, and maybe it was time to try to change that.

Her heart sank a little when he didn't reply right away. She decided to let him off the hook.

"Nick, if you're too tired, I don't mind driving you h-"

"I think I could eat." He nodded slightly.

She laughed. "Yeah, you usually can."

He smirked at her. "What's that supposed to mean?"

She kept laughing. "I've just never been able to understand how you can stay so fit, the way you eat."

He grinned. "Just lucky, I guess."

She snorted. "Damned lucky, I'd say." She looked at him from the corner of her eye. "And possibly some time at the gym?"

He chuckled. "Yeah, maybe." He continued to grin. "Just drive, Sidle. I'm starving."

"You got it."

"And Sara?"

"Mmmm?"

"Stop flirting with me."

She laughed. Ah, there's the old Nick that I remember.

"Sorry. Won't happen again, I promise."

He grinned, although for some reason he felt vaguely disappointed at the thought that she might be serious about putting a halt to the flirting. He'd always sort of enjoyed it, but they'd seemed to have cut back on it as of late. And he was just now realizing how much he'd missed it.

He gave himself a mental shake. It's just Sara, man. Whatever.

Still, while they'd never been best buddies exactly, he'd always considered them friends at least. And Sara just hadn't been herself in a long time.Unfortunately, everytime he asked her what was wrong, she'd usually clam up. To say Sara was a private person was something of an understatement.

They pulled into the cafe parking and made their way inside. Since it was just the two of them, they grabbed a small table near the window.

Sara sipped her coffee and watched the early risers meandering by outside. Nick watched her, wondering if he should take another shot at trying to figure out the enigma that was Sara Sidle. She turned to catch him staring at her and she smiled nervously. For some reason, this made him smile back and she felt herself blushing.

"What? Why are you staring at me?"

He chewed the inside of his lip for a moment and then decided to take a shot. "I was just wondering..."

"What?"

"What's your story, Sara?"

She frowned. "What... What do you mean, exactly?" She stared back at him.

"I just... We've been working together now, what? Like, 5 years?"

"Yeah, almost."

"5 years. 5 years and I really don't know a lot about you, Sara."

She shifted uncomfortably. "Well, what do you want to know? Cuz there really isn't-"

"Sara. Come on." He raised an eyebrow. "I'm pretty sure there's a lot to know, so don't even go there. In fact..." He chewed at his lip again and she felt her back tensing up.

Why is he asking me this?

He went on. "It's just that... Well, you know how you said I wasn't myself today?"

She nodded.

"Well, I don't think you've been yourself for quite a while now. Or at least, I'm assuming that the woman I first met all those years ago was closer to the real Sara Sidle than the one I've been seeing lately."

She looked up suddenly as the waitress brought their food to the table, grateful for the interruption. She smiled her thanks and picked up her toasted tomato and cheese sandwich, biting into it quickly. Maybe if she chewed slowly, she could avoid speaking for the rest of breakfast...

Nick was watching her again, amused.

She's not going to answer me. I'm not surprised.

He sighed and took a bite of his scrambled eggs.

Oh well. Nothing ventured, nothing gained I guess.

But for some reason, he felt more than a little let down this time. He chalked it up to the shitty day he'd had and tried to concentrate on his breakfast.