Disclaimer: I do not own CSI.
Summary: GSR ficlet
Rating: Teen
A/N: I hope you like it. I'm a little nervous about this one.
Entropy
Gil Grissom was the kind of man who owned a pair of galoshes, though he lived in the desert.
He had a spare umbrella in his car, and antacids in his desk drawer. In his breast pocket, he usually carried a small bottle of Visine for those occasions when his tired eyes needed some over-the-counter help.
Schedule permitting, he liked to have a nutritious bowl of oatmeal before work. It was proven to lower cholesterol, and because his hectic job made fast food an occupational hazard, it was nice to have that buffer going into his shift.
He did laundry every Tuesday, and paid his bills the moment he got them.
Nights off were spent either at work (when there was a pressing case at hand) or at home (when there was a good book to read).
And every time the seasons changed, Grissom treated himself to a ride on a roller coaster.
His life held no surprises, and, for the most part, he liked it that way. The cases he worked were chaotic; routine helped to combat the disorder, resulting in a balance he could live with. So long as he had that element of control in his personal life, things were fine.
How he found himself in bed with Sara Sidle on their mutual night off was beyond him.
The orderly to-do list of his life was hacked up and pasted back together to her liking. Laundry was done at her place -- and not on Tuesdays. She didn't care for oatmeal, so they ate pancakes dripping with butter and sugary syrup. Grissom's cholesterol shot up fifteen points. His spare umbrella was somewhere in the deep recesses of her locker, and she borrowed his Visine and never gave it back.
That couldn't be sanitary.
Nights off were spent either at work (when she was in the lab) or at home (when she was in his bed).
He hadn't been on a roller coaster in over two years.
That careful balance he had worked so hard to maintain was knocked askew. Control was ripped from his hands leaving him open and vulnerable to the one person he knew could do real damage to his soul. Sara possessed that power, a fact that simultaneously drew him to her and made him wary. He recognized that she was special from the very first moment they met, but didn't realize just how deep their connection was until it was too late and he was hooked. That sweet something about her that made him itch to know her better was like a drug that permeated every tissue of his body. By the second and third taste, there was nothing he could do.
He was in love.
Not that there was any reason to let that disrupt his schedule. No, Gil Grissom could be in love and carry on with his life as usual. He just tucked that love safely away in a compartment, like he did with so many other emotions, and went about his routine. The love sometimes seeped out, causing momentary bouts of discomfort, but on the whole it wasn't so bad. It took a bit of adjusting to get used to the fact that he loved her and had to see her nearly every day at the lab, but before long, Grissom could get through a shift rather painlessly. Blocking his reaction to Sara became just another part of the routine.
Obviously, he wasn't as good at it as he hoped.
Everything changed one Saturday night, well into their third shift. The CSIs were all doing a little extra to make up for the absence of Nick while he recovered from his kidnapping, which meant the graveyard's resident workaholics were expected to pick up most of the slack. Grissom and Sara worked without complaining. He was tired and his knees were sore, but he said not a word, standing occasionally to stretch and relieve the pressure from his joints. On one such occasion, he turned his head to look at Sara and saw her lift a hand to massage her neck as she leaned over a layout table. Her hair was pulled up in a messy topknot, exposing the delicate line of her throat. Grissom watched her fingers work the tendons as she rotated her head.
Love peeked its head out of its box for a look ,as well.
Her hand ran up and down her neck, sometimes reaching around a bit to the front as she tilted her head back.
Love climbed out of its box and leaned closer.
A small moan escaped Sara's throat, barely perceptible to anyone whose attention wasn't trained on her every move.
Love danced.
Perhaps it was the lack of sleep, or perhaps it was the fact that love had escaped its hiding place and was now wreaking havoc on his psyche, but Grissom found himself powerless to do otherwise than invite her over to his place for some breakfast.
Some oatmeal.
She smiled stiffly as she ate it, and it took him several minutes to realize Sara didn't care much for oatmeal.
"I can make you something else."
"It's okay," she had smiled.
He frowned. He should've taken her to a diner, some place where she could choose anything she wanted. But for some reason, he had a strange desire to take her home. He was so tired. All he had wanted to do eat some oatmeal and sleep. But he needed her there.
"I should go."
She had reached for her phone to dial the number of a cab when love interrupted her.
"No!"
Grissom closed his mouth quickly, feeling the heat rise up his neck into his cheeks. His defenses were down, the compartments were open.
Sara watched him warily from across the table. Her hand was frozen in the air, holding her phone.
"Stay with me."
It didn't take more than those three words for order to become disorder, for calm to become chaos. She was part of his life. She was his life.
And so he found himself without his umbrella. Without his Visine. There were some weeks when laundry just did not get done, and Las Vegas' roller coasters were left to the tourists.
Love reigned.
And then she left.
Love did not know what to do with itself. It paced frantically, nervously, until it was so tired it collapsed, crawling back into its box, back into its safe place.
And one day the Visine was back in his pocket, and the umbrella was waiting for him when he needed it. Laundry was done every Tuesday and the bills got paid on time.
When he found himself pondering a roller coaster ride, Gil Grissom roused Love out of its box and left his galoshes in the desert as he went in search of his heart.
THE END