Title: Float like a Butterfly
Author: wobbear
Rating: General/K
Pairing: Grissom/Sara
Disclaimer: CSI and its characters aren't mine; the story is.
Author's note: I recently imposed a writing hiatus on myself, but this was already mostly written in longhand in my notebook, so I figured typing it up and tweaking didn't really count.
In my warped little world, it's still the summer of 2007 and G & S are still in Gambier, OH where Grissom is teaching a short course at Kenyon College. I wasn't writing fic when Butterflied first aired so even if you think it's been done to death, it's new for me.
Cheers to smacky30 for her speedy and very helpful beta!

Summary: There are butterflies. Grissom has a problem with them and Sara helps him work past it. Set in the same universe as Bugsville, OH and Swing Time.

Gil Grissom was hot, sweaty and hungry. And it was his own stupid fault.

He was dripping with perspiration and trying not to pant as he walked up the steep hill. Bruno had no such inhibitions and was slobbering mightily as he forged ahead of Sara, at the full extent of his leash.

Of course Bruno was fine, he thought. Lucky SOB, he'd had a drink and a swim in that pond. Grissom's own throat and mouth were parched and, yes, he was feeling jealous of the dog.

He was hot, sweaty, hungry and thirsty. And grumpy. Very grumpy.

Ahead of him Sara, in mid-thigh length shorts and a tank top, was taking the incline in easy loping strides. Normally he would have been enchanted by the view of her long lean legs and pert buttocks but right now they were slamming home how inappropriate his own attire was. He was dressed for the icy cool of the lecture hall, with thick cotton khakis flopping damply against his legs and a dress shirt clinging clammily to his torso. Not to mention that his favorite loafers were not intended for hiking, especially in hot weather. Why had he not changed first? Why had he agreed to this excursion anyway? He felt out of place and out of sorts, but in truth it had little to do with either his garb or the location.

They were climbing back toward Kenyon College and their temporary home. It was around six in the evening and in the high 80s, with humidity nearing 100 per cent. High temperatures he was used to, in fact much higher than this, but the desert heat was dry. It was like a sauna here.

Sara had suggested the pre-dinner outing to the butterfly garden because, as she said, it would be too dark afterwards to properly see the day-flying beauties. It was a good idea and he'd agreed to go but, well, it was difficult to explain ...

And now he was regretting his cavalier refusal to drive down. "I feel like a sloth," he'd said. "I've got to get some exercise."

Sara had rolled her eyes at his insistence, but was being very diplomatic and not mentioning it as he silently stomped up the hill. She paused and looked back over her shoulder. "D'you want to take Bruno? He's pulling hard—it might help."

Grissom grunted. "No, I'll make it." After a moment he mumbled, "Thanks." He wriggled his shoulders in a huffy shrug and kept plodding, head down. A trickle of sweat emerged from the short hair near his nape, and as he leaned into the slope the drip grew into a trickle which wended its way over his shoulder and finally fizzled over his sternum.

He needed to get past this, he knew. She knew it too.

But it wasn't that simple.

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Trailing Sara's steady strides he survived the hill, and followed as she diverted off their route home, ending up in the Village Inn, a little pub on the square. She directed him to an empty table outside, saying "Sit!" He almost protested, but saw the amused glint in her eye and obeyed, nearly in unison with Bruno.

Sara disappeared to order for them, quickly returning with two large tumblers of icy water and an empty ice-cream container. Grissom downed his drink in one huge gulp and a young waiter soon arrived with a tray bearing three beers and a jug of water to fill Bruno's makeshift bowl.

The boxer enthusiastically lapped up his water then flopped underneath the table.

Grissom raised his eyebrow at the extra beer, all the while moving it over to his side of the table. He knew it was for him.

Sara gestured toward the door of the Inn. "We can't take Bruno inside, where the A/C is, so ..."

"Thank you ... um, just ... thank you. Not just for the beer." He sighed. He knew he needed to talk about ... things, but he didn't have the energy right now. However, he could apologize, so he did. "Sorry I'm being such a grouch."

Sarah shrugged, giving him a gentle look. "You've had a difficult day." That wasn't strictly true; it was only the last hour or so that had been the problem. But she knew she had to tread very carefully here.

She was letting him off too easily, Grissom thought. He was now feeling ashamed at his cranky behavior. "You're so much better to me than I deserve—"

She shook her head deliberately and raised serious brown eyes to meet his. "No. NO. None of this 'I am not worthy' crap. I know you, I know who you are, what you are. You're not perfect; neither am I. We are what we are, and I love you."

He raised his hands in surrender. The fact that she was repeating, nearly word for word, what he had said to her two days earlier was not lost on him. It was a lot easier to say, and to believe that way, than it was to hear it. They were both too used to beating themselves up, being way too introspective, shouldering perceived guilt, and ... yeah.

Grissom blew out a deep breath and grinned weakly. Raising one of his drinks, he tilted it towards her. "Well ... thank you, my love.

Sara nodded in acknowledgment, smiling softly as she tipped her bottle and clinked it against his before taking a long draft. After an equally long "Ah" of satisfaction, she grinned broadly and Grissom began to let go of his tension. He slouched down in the plastic chair and stretched out his legs, toeing off his shoes. Under the table Bruno looked momentarily interested, sniffed then returned his head to his front paws.

Bowls of guacamole and tortilla chips soon arrived, making Grissom's face brighten, and they both dug in hungrily. After a while Sara rose, heading inside in search of the restroom. She bent to kiss his forehead as she moved past him, patting his shoulder. He reached up to touch her hand, but she was already gone.

As he stared out at the verdant oaks soaring over the town square—it was a rectangle really, he mused—Grissom reflected that, the butterfly business aside, this brief interlude in Ohio was proving to be a wonderful break from their busy Las Vegas lives. He was teaching morning and afternoon classes, but even allowing for question time he could generally wrap a class up inside two and a half hours, which left plenty of time for them to just be—together.

He'd known for a long time that he needed to deal with his butterfly ... issue, but his approach to personal problems had always been avoidance. Procrastination was easier than facing the facts. But the facts still remained, and they did him no credit.

Not long after Sara had started spending most of her free time at his townhouse, she had remarked that the butterflies were missing from his walls. She'd seen the framed specimens years before while he was suspended during the Strip Strangler case, and remembered them.

She had asked where they were, and the first time he'd managed to distract her into the bedroom. The second time they'd ended up on the ancient shag rug in his office. The third time ...? Ah, the kitchen island. Check one off the fantasy list there.

He'd become accustomed to deflecting her queries on the matter, and after a while she had stopped asking. But the problem still lingered, lurking like a seditious spy, ready to surprise him when his guard was down.

Like today.

It was high time he got over it. With Sara's help, maybe he could.

----------------

Grissom's attitude adjustment was remarkable. Liquid refreshment both inside and out had worked wonders. What the beers had started, the shower had completed.

Wearing loose shorts and a V-necked tee shirt, hair still damp, he was overseeing skewered vegetables on the grill while Sara tended to the black bean stew and steaming the rice. His steak would go on once the veggies were done.

The sun was dipping below the horizon as they ate on the shady screened porch at the back of the house. The steamy heat of the day had ebbed away, leaving gentle warmth in its wake.

After dinner they took Bruno for a walk in the soft evening light, wandering through that precious window of time when colors fade into shadow and whites glow so brightly.

Usually on these evening strolls through the quiet streets of Gambier Bruno was allowed off the leash, and he was chafing at being tethered—but Sara's sharp eyes had spotted a skunk with two kits. The furry creatures with their thick black and white pelts were fascinating to watch from a distance, stripes undulating as they made their way along a hedgerow. Bruno whined and tugged on his lead, wanting to investigate, but they moved on, drawing him away from temptation.

Once back at the house, Bruno slurped a noisy drink from his bowl and then settled on the rug in front of the empty fireplace. Sara and Grissom moved out to the front porch. Before joining Sara on the swing, he lit citronella flares to keep the worst of the nocturnal insects at bay.

They sat and stared into the shadows for a while, letting the last stresses of the day slip away as the seat swung slowly to and fro.

"So ... the butterfly thing ..." Sara floated the words in his direction. "I know you don't enjoy them any more."

Interlacing her fingers with Grissom's, Sara gently pulled his hand onto her thigh. She waited several minutes, then quietly asked, "Are you going to tell me why, or do I have to guess?"

More silence from Grissom. He shifted uneasily on the seat. He drew in a shaky breath and puffed it out. Then he uncrossed his legs, and stopped the swinging with a firm foot on the porch's creaky boards. Sara was opening her mouth when suddenly he spoke.

"Your twin. Uh, your pseudo-twin, murdered in her bathroom. She had butterfly jewelry from all her conquests and ... I--I ... didn't like the association. She debased them and, at the same time, she looked so much like you. It was ... distressing. Y-you—" He hesitated, then glanced almost furtively at Sara. "For so long you had seemed like a beautiful butterfly, floating beyond my reach ... It was yet another reminder of how far apart we were."

He lifted Sara's hand up to his chest; she could feel the steady thumping of his heart. The fact that it was he who had isolated himself went unsaid. They both knew it and that was enough. She squeezed his hand to encourage him to continue.

"When we couldn't prove he killed her, I felt ... helpless." He bit his lip. "Before, I had loved butterflies for their beauty, their natural grace ... then they came to symbolize death and deceit." His shoulders heaved with an enormous sighing breath. "And my own despair ... about ... you."

He stared unseeing toward the barn-shaped mail box, his eyes bleak.

"I went home and took all my dead butterflies down off the walls, packed them into boxes and the next day I shoved them in a storage unit in Boulder City. I couldn't quite bring myself to destroy them, but I shut them away from my daily life."

Sara spread her fingers wide underneath his warm palm and softly patted his chest, silently urging him to finish.

Grissom felt Sara's eyes upon him, and met her compassionate gaze with a calmer expression. Talking about it was helping. "So, I've been avoiding them for years. And even though things, uh, between us are wonderful now, the butterfly garden ..." He trailed off.

"Brought that all back." She finished for him.

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They had arrived around 5 pm, having left the College straight after Grissom's afternoon class.

"Didn't you say it was a butterfly garden? This," Grissom pointed to the sign at the end of the little footbridge, "says ' Wildflower Garden'."

He was sounding a touch petulant, but Sara knew why. She chose to ignore his tone, and just answered his question. "The website referred to a butterfly garden with carefully-planned plantings of wildflowers. Looks like the person who did the sign went for the broader view."

He roamed off to the right, muttering something about real wildflowers being planted by birds and the wind, and she left him to it. After studying the information board about the types of butterflies that frequented the garden, Sara wandered around slowly seeing what she could spot. Bruno had settled down to doze in the shade of a tree.

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"Mmm." Grissom flexed his knee and started the seat swinging again. They listened to the cicadas singing and watched fireflies sparkle and swoop in the front yard for a while, until he chuckled lightly. "I don't think those carp will ever be the same."

"Whuh?" Sara had been wondering how to help him get past the butterfly block, and Grissom's quiet laughter took her by surprise. "Gil, what d'you mean?"

"You can't have forgotten; the ones in the pond at the wildflower garden." He stressed the descriptor.

Sara giggled. "Uh, yeah, Bruno was pretty surprised too."

-------------------

The scene had unfolded as though in slow motion; they'd seen it happen, but were powerless to stop it.

Bruno had woken up from his snooze and started to explore the environs. Meanwhile Sara and Grissom had gravitated to a bench shaded by a sycamore, and were idly watching as he sniffed around. Apparently thirsty, Bruno planted his big front paws on one of the rough-hewn river rock paving stones that fringed the small pond and lowered his head to drink. Just then he caught sight of a large orange and white carp just below the surface and lurched toward it. The sudden motion upset the paving stone, which tipped into the water, taking a yelping dog along with it. He then bounced around excitedly, lunging after terrified fish, until Grissom managed to grab his collar and haul him out.

The carp all went to hide under the lily pads as Bruno shook himself then headed into the big trees at the garden's edge, pursuing some lively young squirrels. Eventually he had answered Grissom's call to come, and they had started back up the hill.

-------------------

Grissom's shirt had gotten wrinkled. Leaning forward, he tugged it down then settled back more comfortably into the swing seat. "Haven't seen that many anisoptera in a long time."

He was still thinking about the garden visit, Sara realized. She reflected for a moment. Butterflies had been only part of the thriving insect life there and luckily she recognized the term that he had used. "I guess the desert isn't prime habitat for dragonflies." He nodded, a pleased smile on his lips; she was right on both counts.

Sara decided to nudge him. "I saw a beautiful blue butterfly when you were off muttering at the other end of the garden."

There was a brief silence before he replied. "Describe it to me." It was his teacher's voice, tinged with a hint of amusement and not a little gratitude. She stifled her own smile. He knew he was being nudged, and he knew that she knew that he knew.

She began. "Mainly blue, with orange spots near the edge of the hind wings …" Sara's close reading of Grissom's Audubon Field Guide to North American Butterflies had not been in vain; she proceeded to describe the butterfly in considerable detail. Winding up, she said, "And I think the antennae were sort of stripey, uh, banded."

"Hmm." Grissom rubbed his forehead with a finger, trying to frown. "Can't be sure from that description." He pursed his lips to hide his growing grin, and turned to look at Sara. "You'll have to find it again, show it to me. We should go back to the butterfly garden, say tomorrow evening."

"Yeah?" Sara smirked at him, very satisfied.

Nodding, he paused for effect, then added, "By car."

THE END

… but given the tiniest amount of encouragement, I will try to complete the companion piece entitled—yup, you guessed it—Sting like a Bee and post it soon.

I took minor liberties with the contents of the parent website, but the Butterfly/Wildflower garden exists. The butterfly Sara saw was an Eastern Tailed Blue, of the genus Cupido. For links, see my post on geekfiction.