Disclaimer: I donot own CSI or any of its characters. I am making no money from this fic. Please don't sue.
A/N: This was written for the Brasslove Summer 07 ficathon over on LiveJournal...if you love the Bras man you should check it out. Thanks so much, as always, to my amazing beta, talented and generous friend, dreamsofhim, for the banner, the beta and the gift of her friendship.
"I'm going to Lake Mead first. Spend the day; I got a buddy who's a ranger up there. We'll ride the bikes around for a day; then I'm headed to Grand Canyon National Park the next day. I'll spend a couple of days there and then move on down to Sonora Desert, then the next day head out to the Mojave National Preserve."
"All of those places? By yourself? Just you and your motorcycle?" Sara frowned slightly at her breakfast companion. "Is that safe?"
Brass took a sip of coffee and winked at her over the rim of his cup, his eyes mischievously sparkling. "Some of us manage to keep ourselves on top of vehicles out in the desert instead of the other way around."
Sara grimaced then choked out a small laugh. "Hey, it wasn't my idea."
Carefully, he placed his mug on the table. "Have you heard any more about Natalie?"
She pushed her toast around on the heavy plate. "The DA says she'll probably never make it to court." She raised her eyebrows. "There seems to be some doubt if she's competent to stand trial."
Brass snorted. "Yeah, the only way her name and stable are ever going to be used in the same sentence is if the Rubber Ramada keeps horses."
Sara laughed and he smiled. It had been far too long since he'd heard the sound. He decided to press his luck. "How are you doing? Healing up all right?"
She gave a one shouldered shrug. "Feels like it. All the stitches have been removed. It doesn't hurt to breathe any more, all the ribs have healed, I get this off next week." She held up her left hand, indicating the cast around her wrist. "I still get really tired, but other than that if I can just get Grissom to allow me five minutes alone, life would be perfect."
The look Brass speared her with was both solemn and sincere. "He was..." he shook his head, searching for exactly the right words, "lost. Completely beside himself...it was sort of scary to see."
Sara waved, airily. "But, I'm fine now. Everything turned out all right."
"Sara, he had the worst day of his life...Hell would have been a pleasure cruise compared to what he went through that day. You need to understand, he has scars that are every bit as painful as yours."
"I know that, I do..."
"Cap'n Jim!" A very excited, small voice piped into their conversation.
Brass turned immediately to a dark haired, dark eyed little girl bouncing on her toes beside him. "Gina!" He pulled her into his side with a sweep of his arm.
"Cap'n Jim!" the little girl squealed delightedly, smacking a loud, wet kiss on Brass's cheek.
"Hey, kiddo. Oh my goodness, just look at you! You've grown so much since I saw you last! What are you about sixteen? Or are you twenty?" Sara hid a grin behind her coffee mug as the child shook her head emphatically at the detective.
"No, I'm gonna be seven next week and we were gonna go to Disneyland for my birthday, but Uncle John can't go now and help with the driving so Mommy says we can't go because she can't handle all three of us on her own." All of this spilled out in an earnest and energetic tumble of high pitched words as she looked straight into Brass's eyes. Then she turned to Sara and confided in an overly loud whisper, "She says we're a handful."
"That you are, young lady," a soft voice said from behind Sara. Brass stood immediately and Sara turned to see a slender woman with dark blonde hair, a toddler on her hip and a wide eyed young boy holding her hand. "Jim," she inclined her head slightly and gave him a tentative half smile.
"Tracy...hi." He paused briefly, then leaned forward hesitantly and brushed his lips softly against her cheek. "It's good to see you. How have you been?" Then he looked down at the boy clutching her hand and ruffled his hair. "What's the matter, Jake? Did you forget me?" A huge grin split the youngsters face, revealing a large gap where his two front teeth should be. Brass barked out a laugh. "Did your sister finally make good on her promise to pop you one?" The youngster vigorously shook his head as he continued to grin up at Brass.
"The monkey bars at the park had more to do with it than Gina." The woman looked at her son with affectionate exasperation. She hitched the tiny girl higher on her hip. "Come on, kids, we should let Captain Brass get back to his breakfast with his friend." She spoke quietly, nodding towards her daughter.
Sara spoke quickly. "Oh, please, stay; he'd probably appreciate the break from babysitting me."
Gina giggled. "You're a growed up. Growed ups don't need babysitters."
Sara snorted, derisively. "Tell that to my boyfriend."
Jake was staring, wide-eyed, at Sara's cast. "You have a boo-boo?"
The CSI nodded. "Yes, I have a boo-boo and my boyfriend gets worried about me. That's why he asked Captain Brass to watch me." She held out her injured wrist for the boy's inspection and smiled brightly at his mother. "Hi, I'm Sara Sidle."
Brass, who had been trying to coax a smile from the toddler in her mother's arms, started slightly. "I'm sorry. Sara this is Tracy and Danielle," he placed a large hand delicately on the toddlers golden curls, then nodded to the two older children, "Jake and Gina Bell."
"Hi." The smile Tracy directed at Sara was bright and warm; she seemed to have relaxed slightly since joining them.
There was a brief, too loud silence and then Brass grinned at her, "So, Disneyland, huh?"
She laughed. "Well, no, not anymore. Maybe later in the year. John was going to help out but he had to go out of town."
"Cap'n Jim could go with us! He could help." The soon-to-be birthday girl shrieked.
"Yeah!" Her brother's agreement was every bit as enthusiastic.
"Gina! Jake! Inside voices, please."
In the same exaggerated whisper she had used before, Gina rattled words out without pausing to take a breath. "Sorry, Mommy. But he could, Cap'n Jim could go with us since Uncle John can't. He's funner than Uncle John, anyway. And he knows how to drive us in the van and we haven't got to see him in forever. Please, Mommy, please?"
She shot Brass an apologetic look and then addressed her child. "No, Captain Brass has to work. We'll go later in the year."
"But my birthday is next week..." The rapid fire earnestness had been converted into an unapologetic whine.
Her mother sighed. "I'm sorry, Jim." She turned to Sara, "It was very nice to meet you, but we need to go before this turns into a full fledged meltdown." She released Jake's hand and nodded to her daughter. "Say goodbye to Captain Brass."
While Brass's attention was on the two children and several hugs were exchanged and a whispered promise of a birthday present was given, Tracy Bell smiled openly, tenderly and just a bit wistfully at the detective with her children.
Sara watched as the adults said an awkward goodbye that appeared to virtually hum with the energy of unspoken things. Then she watched Brass watch the family walk away and leave the diner.
"That was...?"
Brass nodded. "Yeah." He resumed his seat in the booth.
"Wow." Sara studied him for a moment. His expression, usually so open with her, was shuttered. "So, you, uh, know the family pretty well?"
"I used to go by...help out when I could...do stuff with the kids." He shrugged, not meeting her gaze. "You know."
"I see." She continued watching him, waiting for him to say something, but he just stared into his empty coffee cup. After awhile, she prodded. "And you don't go over any more?"
Chewing on his lip, he grunted, "No."
"And that would be...why?"
Brass shrugged again.
Sara heaved a huge sigh. "Am I going to have to get my crowbar and pry this out of you?" She waggled the fingers on her uninjured hand at him in 'come on' gesture, "Give."
He looked contemplative for a moment, then sighed and sat back against the vinyl of the booth. "She was pregnant with Danielle when...it happened. I figured she wouldn't be able to stand the sight of me, but, you know, she was...Hell, Sara, her husband just died...I shot him--"
"That was an accident," Sara interrupted heatedly.
He waved a dismissive hand. "Accident or not, I was still the shooter...and she was comforting me. She was the only one that didn't seem to blame me." He tapped his spoon against the edge of the table absently. "If it had been me? I wouldn't have been able to look at my sorry ass, but she, well, she was just amazing. And we, you know, sort of struck a deal." He half smiled. "Now that I think about it, I'm pretty sure she conned me. I think she knew I needed to do something to feel better, so she let me come over and you know, mow the yard, fix the faucet, change the air filters, rearrange furniture, hang a ceiling fan...stuff like that." He shook his head thoughtfully. "Knowing her how I do now, probably most of the stuff didn't even need to be done...she just wanted me to feel better about the whole thing."
Sara noted the faraway look in his eye. "And?"
He shrugged. "Danielle was born and I started spending more time there helping her out as much as I could. Hanging out with Gina and Jake; get them out of the house some or make dinner or something." He resumed tapping with the spoon. "I guess maybe we all got pretty attached to each other."
"From the way those kids reacted to you, I'd definitely say so." She tilted her head. "So, what happened?"
"I got shot." His voice was flat.
She blinked at him several times in quick succession, waiting for him to elaborate. When the silence stretched to breaking she was tempted to push, but the look of loss and sadness resting on his features made her wait. So, she waited.
Patience was not her strong suit...despite ten years spent stalking an eminent entomologist. But she could wait when waiting yielded results...and she had learned a painful lesson that sometimes pushing caused pain. So, she waited.
He chewed the inside of his cheek. He tapped the spoon some more. He shifted. He stared at the table, into his coffee cup, anywhere but into her eyes. And still, she waited.
And waited.
Finally, slowly, he spoke. "That family...you know...it had to be hard, losing him that way. I can't think of anything more painful. And here I was, another cop, and I..." he finally raised his eyes and met her gaze, straight on, nothing barred, "I almost died, Sara."
She reached her hand across the table between her water glass and the bottle of ketchup and squeezed his hand. "I know."
He swallowed heavily and broke eye contact. "So, you know, it wouldn't do for them...the kids, to get attached to somebody else who just, you know, up and dies on them."
Biting her lip, she found herself blinking back tears at the heaviness of his tone. "So, she asked you to distance yourself?"
"Tracy? No," he shook his head. "Tracy was great. Tracy is always great." Something in the way he said that tickled at Sara's brain but she didn't interrupt. "She visited me in the hospital. Brought the kids by to see me once I was out."
"It doesn't sound like she was afraid of her kids getting too attached." She watched doubt skitter across his features and disappear.
"Tracy isn't afraid of death. And she's not afraid to live, either. It's part of what makes her so incredible." He leaned forward, studying the remnants of his Denver omelet and the melon rind resting like a disembodied smile on his plate.
It clicked into place. "You made the decision," her tone an indignant accusation. "You got some kind of paternalistic, bullshit notion about what was best for her and her family, you made a decision, you backed away and I bet she doesn't even know why." Sara snorted, derisively. "No wonder you and Grissom are such good friends."
His jaw clenched. "There's nothing paternal about the way I feel about her," he snapped. "I hate the idea of her losing someone else, OK? God, I can't bear the thought of her being in that much pain again."
Mouth agape, she looked at him, wondering if he realized what he had just revealed. "It's not about the kids at all." She contemplated his suddenly embarrassed and uncomfortable expression. "Does she know? That you...care about her?"
He pushed his plate to the side and rested his folded arms on the table. "Does it matter?"
"What is this? Junior high?" She exhaled loudly. "Of course it matters, Brass. You can't be in a relationship by yourself."
"We're not in a relationship," his tone was unemotional, but emphatic.
"Does she know how you feel about her? Does she have any idea?" Her dark gaze was unrelenting.
He sighed. "I don't...I'm not sure." He faltered for a moment, obviously self-conscious. "I, uh, kissed her. One night, I kissed her. I didn't plan it, it just sort of happened."
She couldn't help it. She smiled at his blushing awkwardness. "Brass? Did she kiss you back?"
He looked up briefly then averted his eyes. "Yeah, maybe."
"So, what's your problem?"
He tossed his crumpled napkin on the table. "I told you, Sara, I could die."
"Brass, I have something to tell you." She leaned over the table and mock whispered. "You're going to die someday."
He frowned at her. "Funny, Sidle."
"Seriously, Brass, what's up with this?" She pushed her coffee mug away and pulled the beaded glass of water towards her.
"Other than the fact I'm the same age as her mother? How about the little detail that I shot her first husband?"
"If you want somebody to tell you an age difference is a reason not to have a relationship? I'm the wrong person to talk to." She picked up the glass and drank.
He inclined his head in her direction, acknowledging her point, but countered, "Yeah, but she's a few years younger than you and I'm a few years older than Gil..."
She thumped her glass back on the table and snapped her fingers in front of his face, too irritated to be amused by his startled expression. "Look, I had this argument with your best friend more times than I can count. Don't make me have it with you. If age doesn't matter to her, it shouldn't matter to you."
"What about the other thing?" The normally cool Detective appeared to be just shy of squirming with discomfort.
She saw then how real this was to him. How much he cared and how afraid he was. She released a breath and her aggravation with it.
Idly, Sara ran a finger through the ring of condensation left on the table, making a miniature river bisect the circle. "It might be uncomfortable sometimes; it's certainly ironic." She pursed her lips for a moment, her face and then her voice becoming contemplative. "I'm not a religious person...but I do believe in...fate, I guess? Out there," she nodded her head towards the window and the desert beyond, "I had a lot of time to think and I've been doing a lot of thinking since."
She ran her hand through the circle spreading the moisture with her palm, making the ringed river into an ocean. "Things have happened in my life and sometimes, I have wanted to say they were bad things. But the fact of the matter is, everything that has happened to me has led me here." She turned her casted wrist, "Maybe a little worse for the wear in some ways, but," she wiggled her ring finger, causing the light to catch on the diamond resting there, a brief burst of refracted light skated across the surfaces of the booth and the window, "infinitely better in others. And not just because of what has happened in my life as a result," she nodded toward the ring, "but because of the person all of those things have helped me become."
"You made a mistake," she nodded at the protesting sound he made. "It was a bad one, I'm not denying that. It hurt a lot of people, including you." She touched his hand again, lightly. "But you are without a doubt, one of the best people I have ever known. Like…top two." She smirked at him and he smirked back. "A terrible thing happened. But it led you to where you are. There's nothing bad in my life that didn't have some good come out of it."
She looked into his face, made eye contact and smiled. "I can't tell you everything will always be smooth, that there won't be questions about how you got where you are. But I can absolutely tell you that sometimes the only way home is by a winding path. And love is always worth the detour."
Slowly, he smiled back at her and suddenly, his face looked lighter and younger. "Do you think..."
"Hi," Grissom slid into the booth beside Sara, wrapping an arm around her, pulling her close for a brief hug. He lightly kissed her temple and then let her go.
"How'd it go?" she asked quietly.
His shrug was non-committal. "The DA wants to offer a plea despite the evidence. Mr. Oakley's very expensive lawyer appears to be earning his money."
Sara nodded, bringing her glass of water to her lips. "That will be easier on Lady Heather, at least."
Brass quirked an eyebrow. "Ah, our favorite dominatrix. She certainly puts the 'pill' in pilloried, doesn't she?"
In an amazing display antithetical to cool, Sara spewed half of her water across the table and choked on the other half. Brass merely grinned at the glower Grissom aimed his way. Brass mopped up the table and Grissom mopped up his fiancée.
After a few minutes and several napkins, Grissom's expression eased and he turned to Brass, intent on changing the subject. "So, how are your vacation plans coming along?"
"Well, you know how they say a good way to make God laugh is to announce your plans?"
Grissom nodded. "Yeah."
"Sometimes it can make you laugh, too." Brass winked at Sara.
The scientist looked slightly confused. "So, does that mean your plans have changed?"
"Yes, my friend, it seems my he-man solo trip through the deserts of the Southwest has turned into a drive three kids in a mini-van to Disneyland."