Disclaimer: Characters contained within do not belong to me.

Author's Notes: Just one last little post-LD fic before they all become AU;) Here's to making it through the summer. Cheers, my friends.

Knowing You

by Kristen Elizabeth

There is a great difference between knowing and understanding: you can know a lot about something and not really understand it. –Charles Kettering

"I think she got my butt wrong." Sara shook her head. "It's not nearly this flat…is it?"

Grissom stepped out of the layout room doorway where he'd been watching his girlfriend for several silent minutes. It had been foolish to think that she didn't sense him standing there. She had a sixth sense when it came to him.

"What are you doing, honey?" he asked as calmly as possible.

"What does it look like I'm doing?"

He stopped at the opposite side of the lighted table. "I thought we agreed you weren't going to look at that."

"You agreed." She glanced up from the miniature replication of her own body. "I told you what you wanted to hear."

"Well. At least you're telling me the truth now."

Sara put down the doll and picked up the broken model car. "It's a lot lighter than the original," she noted.

Grissom gripped the edge of the table so hard his knuckles turned the same color as its surface. "What are you hoping to find here?"

"Why does this have to be about finding something?"

"Are you trying to give yourself more nightmares?" He was aware that his voice was dangerous, but he couldn't keep the anger out. His whole body was taut with the raging disbelief that she was actually doing this to herself.

After setting the car down, Sara ran her fingers over the small, sandy slopes. "It feels the same, you know?" She bent at the waist and touched the tip of her tongue to the model. "Tastes the same, too."

"For Christ's sake!" Grissom grabbed the miniature scene and unceremoniously dropped it back into the evidence box she'd taken it from. "I'm not going to stand here and watch you…" He trailed off, unable to coherently finish the thought.

"Grissom." From that one word and the inflection she put into it, he knew he'd crossed the line. "You cannot…you can absolutely not tell me how to deal with this any longer." She spoke between her teeth, like they were keeping back the worst of what she had to say. "I have to do this. And you can either shut up and let me, or keep fighting and go to bed alone tonight."

"Would it really be any different, Sara?"

He hated himself the moment he heard the words coming off his lips. She drew in a ragged breath, like he'd stabbed her in the stomach. The hurt in her eyes was so palpable that there didn't seem to be any point in trying to apologize. The damage had been done, and if he was honest, the wounds weren't fresh. He'd been hurting her for awhile.

"You told me you were okay with not…" Sara pulled her injured arm closer to her chest, holding onto the cast on her forearm. "Until I'm healed…you said it was all right that we weren't…"

"I told you what you wanted to hear."

She shook her head for a long time, biting her lip to hold back the tears he could see resting at the brink of her eyelashes. "This is why I have to do this," she eventually said. "I have to understand how this all happened. How we got to this point."

Grissom shoved his hands into his pockets. "I heard you went to see Natalie."

"I did," she admitted. A tear escaped her control and ran down her cheek. She brushed it away with the back of her hand. "I wanted to tell you, but I knew how you'd react."

"Did you get anything out of her?"

"Bits and pieces." Sara paused. "She recognized me. Called me her little bisque doll. Asked me if I played chess."

"She's insane," he said hoarsely. "But she can't hurt you anymore."

Sara relaxed her grip on her arm. "That's where you're wrong. She's still hurting me." At his confused look, she went on, "She got inside you…and she changed you."

"I haven't changed, Sara. I'm the same…"

"Stop." The look she gave him was so sad his heart twitched. "It's not what I want to hear, so you don't have to lie."

Grissom withdrew his hands from his pockets and crossed his arms. "She affected us both."

"Yes," Sara agreed. "But the difference is…I'm not willing to let her have power over me anymore."

"And you think I am?" he snapped back.

"I think the thing you hate most in the world is someone knowing you too well." Her smile was rueful. "That's at least partly why you stayed away from me for so long, isn't it?" Before he could answer, she started walking around the table towards him. "It's one thing for me to know you. But Natalie…a complete stranger? A crazy, obsessed killer?"

"She doesn't know me," he whispered.

"She knew you so well that she knew just who she needed to hurt in order to make you beg."

Now standing only inches apart, Grissom was able to reach out and grab her good arm. "I begged for you, Sara. And I'd do it again if I had to."

"But you hated it." She bobbed her head slightly. "I know, baby. It's why you can't let go of all this." Their eyes met. "It's why you can't forgive me."

He released her and took a step back. She really did know him.

"But you will," Sara continued with shaky certainty. "And I'll heal all the way. And we'll probably end up in bed before we're ready for it." This time, her smile was genuine. "It'll be amazing. I'll cry and you'll fall asleep first and when we wake up, Bruno will be curled up at our feet, and..." She pressed two fingers to her mouth to stop herself.

Grissom swallowed several times, but couldn't seem to dislodge the lump in his throat. "What do we do until then, honey?"

"I go to counseling three times a week," she told him after she'd collected herself again. "You work. Because that's your best therapy." She shrugged. "It might not be a bad idea to keep some distance between us, anyway, considering that we're the talk of the lab."

"That's my fault," he apologized. "I'm sorry I let it slip. It should have been something we decided together."

Sara chuckled so faintly that he almost missed it. "If you think I'm upset that everyone knows about us…you don't know me half as well as I know you."

Grissom watched as she tucked the evidence box under her arm and started for the door. "Sara." She glanced back at him patiently. "I miss you already."

A second slipped by. "Don't clear my drawer out," she told him.

He nodded. "Don't throw away my razor." With a small dip of her chin, Sara left the room.

Grissom stared at the bright surface of the table for a long time before he noticed the smattering of sand left behind from the model. He pressed his finger against the grains and brought them up to his tongue.

Fin