Thanks to cuttingrmflr for the beta and for being gorgeous. This is for Brandie who's helping rectify the problems over at YTDAW... also, she made me a cool banner. :)
She was haggard, bone weary, dirty and thirsty and about ready to admit that she was liable to collapse. Standing in front of her locker, Sara glanced in the spotted mirror hanging on the door, pressing the hair out of her face with the back of her hair. There were rings beneath her eyes so deep she could plant flowers in, dirt smeared across her chin, red-rimmed lids.
All things considered, well… no, she just looked and felt horrible. Horrible, but relieved. Nick was tucked safely in a bed at Desert Palm and Kelly Gordon was still behind bars, her father in pieces. All in all, everything was right with the world once again. (Nothing was right with the world, not at all.)
A heavy sigh did nothing to relieve the tightness in her chest and Sara let her gaze fall to ponder over the smudges on the tips of her boots. When she brought her gaze back up to the mirror she was met with Grissom's gaze, equally as fatigued. "Hey," she breathed, fiddling with the keys in her hand.
Grissom attempted a smile, but it fell flat, and Sara set her lips in a straight line in response. Shutting the door of the locker, she allowed herself to heave another sigh and turn towards the doors. "Well, I suppose…" and for some reason she couldn't manage to finish her sentence. Maybe it was because she was too tired or maybe it was she really didn't know what she was going to say.
Grissom blinked, opening his own locker, though he didn't look inside. "Are you okay to drive?" he asked, a gentle but unsure hand reaching out to rest on her shoulder. Sara couldn't even manage to flinch at the foreign weight; she did manage to glance down at his fingers, caked with dirt and grit.
Her head was bobbing in a nod before her nerves could register the movement. "Uh huh, yeah," her fingers curled around the strap of her messenger bag and she stood, a soreness seizing her muscles. "I'll be fine."
Grissom nodded in that manner that many do when they don't know what to say; she wasn't okay, that he knew, his question was a perfunctory thing, something that anyone would do, regardless if they already knew the answer or not. She was swaying on her feet, side to side, waiting for him to move out of the way. His jaw shifted and he licked his lips, knowing then what he needed to say, wanted to say, words that he'd tested upon his tongue before. "I'll take you home."
Sara opened her mouth to speak but nothing came out. After he'd shut the door and shrugged on his light coat he took a step back and gestured forth with a hand and she took a step and then two more and ended up somehow in the parking lot with him holding open the door to his car for her. She was half-awake, half-asleep, standing only because she knew it was what she had to do in order to go and lay down somewhere. Blinking at him, she forgot for a moment why she was standing with him at all.
Grissom's lips slipped into a tired smile, "Get in, Sara."
Her body protested as she bent down and clambered in, dropping her large bag on the floor. A hum and a jerk and the car was moving and Sara glanced from her traveling companion to the window, allowing her temple to rest against the lip of the door. Dawn was just beginning to crest over the hotels and condos that lined the dusty streets and Sara sat back, content to admire the titian and tangerine that bloomed against the cumulous clouds.
Body limp, eyes heavy, the rust roofs of the establishments that passed blurred into a continual red streak, pulling at her eyes until saline blurred her vision entirely, forcing her lids down. Grissom said nothing as he drove, interrupting the silence only for a brief cough or an audible lick of his lips.
Allowing her eyes to fall closed, she pondered on how integral sleep was to her life, to the lives of everyone around her. She thought about sleep and the cloudy feeling of dreams, the scent of Sleepytime and the feel of sheets, fresh from the dryer. She though of all of that and wondered why on earth Grissom was driving her home and then forgot to care.
The cool hum of the air conditioner lulled the thoughts of insecurity and uncertainty from her brain and she was left only with the lick of cold air against her cheekbone and the dull sensation that Grissom was watching her, on and off.
Her lips went numb and her neck began to hurt and her lids cracked from time to time to allow her a brief glimpse of the world passing by outside. It was interesting to her, how the one thing she chose to think about while drifting in and out of consciousness was the fact that Grissom had a manual and that his hands pulling against the gearshift was intensely interesting.
Head lolling between the glass and the plastic, Sara pretended like she wasn't dozing. She couldn't sleep much because she too busy trying to think and she couldn't think because she was too busy trying to sleep.
There was nothing but blurred forms and light humming as he drove to her building, parked and waited. He waited and waited and after a minute, reached over to tap her shoulder. "Sara?"
"Hmmm?" she asked, twisting her body to face him. He smiled at her disheveled hair, and she almost smiled back, but forgot why she wanted to smile. Seeing her home out the window, she bent to retrieve her bag from the floor.
Grissom stared at her for a moment as she gathered her bag to her body. "I'd like to come in and make sure you're alright."
Sara's lips twitched and her fingers clutched around the bulk of her bag, a security blanket in lieu of anything else. "Why?"
Immediately, "Why not?" He hadn't thought about that, the why and why not, the pros and cons, but he realized that there wasn't much weight to him caring, because the only thing he cared about was getting her inside and asleep, safely.
Her hand pulled against her forehead in an exaggerated maneuver, sweeping her hair out of her face. She tapped her foot and bit her lip and then exited the car without another word.
Both hands on the steering wheel, Grissom allowed his head to fall and his arms to spur his fingers to squeeze. When he looked up, Sara was ascending the stairs to her building shakily and he was out of the door faster than his knees really should have allowed him.
The air snatched him up as soon as he exited the vehicle; hot and dry, on the verge of being uncomfortable, but the sun hadn't yet seized the valley of the city and he paused for a second to glance up into the violet of the sky, appreciating the color like he should have before all of this had happened.
Cataloging the hue, he looked up to see the door begin to swing shut and ascended the stairs in twos, biting his bottom his lip as his patellas screamed against the exertion. Grissom placed his palm on the entry door and swung it open, catching Sara as she rounded the corner to her apartment, calling softly after her, "I can't fathom how you manage to move so fast."
Sara was at her door, fumbling with the keys as he caught up with her. There was a delirious smile on her face that caused him to smirk as well. "It's a gift," she replied softly, fumbling through her key ring slowly.
"I'm sure it is," and he extracted the bundle of metal from her hands gently, flipping through the keys until he found the number that was on the spare key Sara had relinquished to him when she'd come to Vegas.
The lock snicked and he turned the knob, pushing it open for her to enter. She paused at the threshold and glanced up at him, noting his apologetic shrug as she stepped inside and shut the two behind the two of them.
Dropping her bag beside the entrance to her small kitchen, she moved to the stove and immediately ignited the burner beneath the kettle. "Tea," she said without question and then bent before the oven and began unlacing her boots.
Grissom attempted not to look but he was who he was and glanced over the swell of her ass, enthralled with the view and only slightly guilty that he had indulged. Sara pulled her hair back into a ponytail with an elastic that was laying on the counter, shifting about to retrieve tea bags and mugs.
Leaning against the entryway to the small kitchen, Grissom watched tiredly as she shifted around, noting that her movements were more sluggish than normal. His heart clenched a little and he began to wonder why as she rationed out the boiling water to the mugs and handed him one without making eye contact.
Trudging over to the couch, she sat gingerly down on it, her body perched stiffly on the edge. Grissom remained standing over by the kitchen, cradling the cup in between his hands as he watched Sara blow streams of air over her tea.
He wasn't sure what to say-again-and so he said nothing, just watched her as she spaced out and sipped her tea quietly.
After a moment or two he walked over to the chair to her right and sat on the edge, just as she was doing. Sara looked to her and smiled taking one last sip before speaking.
"I'll be right back," she claimed sleepily, swaying a bit as she rounded the corner from her kitchen to the hallway, disappearing into the pre-dawn darkness that hugged the corners of her apartment.
Grissom sipped his tea and attempted to blink the slumber from his brain, glancing around her apartment with a tender appreciation, taking in all the eccentricities that lay about. A bottle of purple nail polish on the coffee table, an Eurythmics CD lying open on the desk by the stereo… a Red Sox sweatshirt slung over her sofa as though she'd walked in and just tossed it.
Tiny little quirks about Sara Sidle and he was learning them from a moment in her absence. A moment…
No, it hadn't been a moment, it had been more like… seven minutes. Grissom checked his watch and placed the mug down on the corner nearest him, rounding the corner as she had, pacing down the darkened corridor until he reached the bedroom.
"Sara," he called softly, and getting no answer, he stepped tentatively forward across the threshold to the bedroom. Immediately he felt as though he was overstepping his bounds but glanced around cautiously, investigator kicking in.
His eyes fell upon the bed immediately, taking in her limp form. She was flung across the bed, eyes closed, breaths even and heavy… asleep.
Grissom kept his eyes on her as he rounded the bed and lowered the blinds, pulling the heavy drapes closed.
He would just watch her for a minute, make sure she'd stumbled into bed out of fatigue and not out of something more dire. Sinking into the armchair that lingered beneath her bedroom window, he allowed his arms to slide against the textured arms of the seat. His knees spread too, his entire body slouching to contour to the cushion.
Sara was curled on her side unattractively, mouth hanging open, right foot twisted uncomfortably against her left to hang over the side of the bed. One hand clutched at the comforter that was beneath her, the other curled under her chin; he was sure that it would cramp when she awoke but couldn't bother to move to shift her.
Flicking his thumbnail against the nail of his ring finger, Grissom felt his eyes grow heavy and exuded a calming sigh; he'd sit for a minute and then formulate the words that he would leave on a note.
He thought better with his eyes closed, he remembered, and allowed darkness to overcome his vision, relaxing into the chair.
The last thought he had before sleep swallowed him was that he should probably try and peel his eyes open.
…A red number glared at him from across the room the next time he attempted to focus on anything; the glare of the '11' taunted him as he shifted in the seat (uncomfortable now) and attempted to sit up. "Griss?" the voice was soft and tainted with sleep and if it wasn't for the warm weight of a hand upon his jaw, he would have sworn he was dreaming. "Griss, get up, that'll… kill… your back..."
When he managed to drift awake for the second time, the numbers on the clock screamed a bright '4:37' at him; his body pulled him back into slumber for a minute or two until his conscious prodded him, spurring him to start awake.
He was extremely rested but hot, sweat collecting under his nose, behind his knees. Going to shift onto his back, Grissom's fingers flexed and it was then that he realized that he was holding a hip in his hand, her hip. Freezing mid-movement and eyes slammed shut, he waited for a rationalization to slam against the center of his forehead. After a moment of no realizations, one eye opened and then the other and his fingers pressed down into the warm, pliant flesh beneath.
Grissom's mouth felt dry and his bones felt heavy and light at the same time, as conflicted as his mind was. His hand had managed to drift beneath her shirt and she was curled into his chest, sweaty forehead tight against his sternum. It was oddly comforting, though his stomach did manage to twist in seventeen different ways when he thought to think about how he would extract himself.
It was then that he noticed that he didn't have to… extract himself. She wasn't holding him, her hands were tucked up beneath her chin and her legs were curled into her stomach, and the only point of contact that she had with his body was her forehead to his chest.
He was the one that was holding her.
Gulping, Grissom attempted to calm his erratic heart rate with a few breaths and a clench of his free hand. It didn't help anything, actually made things worse because she stirred and drifted away from him, shifting to her other side, reaching her arms underneath the pillow.
And his hand was still on her hip.
Before he could remember why he shouldn't be in bed with her, the events that had led them to the bed in the first place or why he felt so damn good just being there-"You're touching me."
Grissom started, wanting nothing more but to materialize into nothing, right there, "Sorry!"
A gentle tremor passed through her and he realized that she was laughing, hopefully finding the humor in the situation. "It's okay, I think that…" her voice was thick and right and deep from sleep and he remembered that he had let himself forget how nice it was to wake up with a woman who he cared for. "I think that you know that it's what I need." Her voice was a whisper, still tinged with enough of the sandman to hold that bedroom charm.
He could pretend-and he did-that he was too foggy from sleep to understand what she meant. "Excuse me?"
"I don't think you would touch me otherwise." It was a happy little squeak, the way she said it, holding no animosity for him if her statement had turned out to be true.
And just like that, his fingers tightened his hold on her, just a little bit and she shifted onto her back so that he could see the side of her face. He could see the tiny crusties nestled at the corner of her eyes, the dried string of drool against her left cheek, the hair that was clinging to the sweat at her forehead. Grissom, for all of his years on earth-years entertaining gorgeous, entrancing, exceptionally poised women-was lost for the wreck of the woman before him.
Bags under her eyes and cakey mascara and she was staring at him so openly that he was shocked, shocked that she was so accepting-already-of whatever he would have to say. If nothing else, Sara Sidle was a realist, and being in love with a man like him would require her to be prepared with whatever he could possibly do or say. "You realize that if we had gotten that call from Hodges just a minute later, Nick would be dead," she breathed, without emotion. "Anyone around him would be dead. You could have died. I could have died, Catherine or Warrick or Greg… could have died."
Grissom breathed and breathed and she spoke again, "Were you ever the sort of person that would seize the day, that would tell yourself 'why not' because you didn't know anyway? … I used to be."
And just like that, his lips were pressing to her temple and he was trying to gather her into his body. Sara shifted and struggled and managed to slip from his grip. "But I don't want it to be like this, I don't want it to be because you realize I could have died or you could have or that you've always wanted and never had."
They fell in sync, breathing and thinking and watching the sun trace patterns across the textured ceiling above them. "I remember," he said, speaking evenly, quietly. "I remember how you used to take your coffee, extra light with lots of sugar, you don't take your coffee like that anymore."
Sara's eyes were reduced to tiny slits as she tried to deduce where he was headed. "You used to wear your hair curly, used to smoke, used to do a lot of things… and I wonder what it was about you that made me fall in love and I still can't place it. I can't place what it was." He was so businesslike, so introspective that it made her want to laugh. She couldn't believe how he was treating the moment, admitting such a thing in such a casual way; it comforted her a little. There was no sudden intake of breath, no hurried affirmations, just a simple statement followed by nothing.
She blinked and he blinked and then they avoided looking at each other. Grissom moved his hands to smooth out some of the wrinkles in his pants, "I think I used to know you, and I know you now and you've changed so much and… I forgot to watch you change. I want to… see that. I think it would be… I think I need to know why you are who you are and…"
There was nothing she could do but to smile sadly and wait for him to work it all out.
"Would you like to get lunch? We can stop by the hospital beforehand."
A heavy silence filled the space between them and it was a beat or two before Sara reached out, grabbed Grissom's hand and placed it gently back on her hip. Licking her lips and grinding the remnants of sleep out of her eyes, she awoke and he watched her do it.
"Someplace with good soup," she affirmed quietly, and Vegas slipped-without a sound-back into night.