Author's Notes: Not mine; they belong to CBS & the rest. For the weekly fic challenge. This one is to use a X-Files title in the story. I'm not a fan of the show, so I just grabbed a title. Hope you can figure it out. Thanks to dreamsofhim for the Beta & WONDERFUL ideas on how to wrap it up.

CSIGSR

When Sara started moving things into the new house from her apartment, Gil Grissom had only had some idea of what a sports fan his love was. In boxes retrieved from her closets there were things you got for attending games like picture frames, baseballs, mugs, pucks, towels and the like. But then there was her collection. Autographed jerseys and balls, signed ticket stubs, and the photos of her with various athletes over the years lined the walls of her bedroom. The first time he had been in that room, it was a bit overwhelming.

"I'm, uh, a bit of a sports fan," she said. The blush that stained her cheeks was so adorable he was alternately amused by her and aggrieved with himself for putting her off for so long. Beautiful, smart, strong, and from the looks of it a huge sports fan. Baseball had a pretty good showing on her bureau, but on her wall she had…

"An autographed Wayne Gretzky jersey?"

"I got hooked on hockey in Boston. My roommate the last two years was this rabid hockey fan from Texas, where they didn't even have a team at the time. But she had watched them on TV, knew all the players, had a thing for hot guys, and got season tickets for the Bruins once she got to Boston. She won the jersey for me in a contest. She actually won a lot of things in contests," she finished. She had this wistful smile on her face and it occurred to him, that Sara had been many places in her life and not all of them involved travel.

"You are a woman of many mysteries still, Sara," he said as he enveloped her in his arms and dropped a kiss in her hair. "So this lucky friend of yours got you started on hockey. What about the rest? That's a 70s Giants baseball jersey, and an Astros pennant from the 80s," he said gesturing to the wall. "A New Orleans Saints helmet on your dressing table and I'm sure a former Bostonian has some Patriots memorabilia lurking somewhere."

She pulled back out of his embrace and settled on the edge of the bed. He joined her, taking her hand in his and caressing it gently. A sad, almost regretful look crossed her face before she started her tale and he almost wished he'd never asked.

"My dad watched sports all the time. He never talked much, but when I asked him about baseball one Saturday morning when I was four or five, he really opened up. I think it was the longest he had ever spoken to me. His drinking wasn't so bad then and we still had the B&B, so he kept his temper in check. As baseball turned into football and then into basketball, I would scour the newspapers the guests left for sports stats and players names and learned a way to connect with my dad. Sometimes a business traveler would leave us a couple sports tickets as a thank you and we had a few repeat visitors that would bring me banners or shirts and things from their hometown."

He wanted to keep her memories light. "Do you go to the 51's games?"

"Yeah, I get a mini-season ticket pack with Nick. We get to about half the games. Sometimes he takes Greg on my ticket; sometimes I take Greg on his. We usually all hit a few Wranglers games, that's the, uh hockey team. And Warrick knows a couple of the guys who play for the Gladiators, the arena football team, so we go pretty often during the season."

He couldn't help but smile at her. "Jim is a huge Jersey Devils fan."

"Yeah. He usually comes with me to the hockey games when one of the guys can't."

He thought about how many times they must have all been out together over the years and wondered, not for the first time, how he had become so alienated from his friends. He hoped the steps he'd been taking with Sara would put him back on the path to being a better friend.

"Being a sports fan is a complex matter, in part irrational…but not unworthy…a relief from the seriousness of the real world, with its unending pressures and often grave obligations," he quoted. He could tell the gentle quirk of her lips was hiding her mirth at his ability to pull a quote out of the air. "Richard Gilman. I'm glad you found something in your world to bring you relief."

Her watery smile and demanding kiss reaffirmed that any past mistakes he had made in regard to her had been forgiven. When she laid him out on her bed, climbed on top, and proceeded to kiss him senseless, he promised himself then and there he would do all he could to promote her relief from the seriousness of the real world. After all, baseball wasn't the only beauty in his life anymore.