Grissom, the Many-Colored
Spoilers: Fallen Idols
Disclaimer: I don't own anything or anyone in regards to CSI; the show and its characters belong to a bunch of people who aren't me. I am merely borrowing the characters for my own amusement. Dance puppets, dance.
Author's Note: I know, I know. I should be working on chapters to my other stories, but I wanted to contribute to the shaving fun :) Fear not; I am still working on the other fics. They will not be abandoned ;)
EllipsesBandit deserves the sacrilicious waffles for her beta skills on this one. She went to a lot of trouble to find a quote and she came up with the end. I bow down to her awesome greatness.
"Are you sure you know what you're doing?"
"You just said you trusted me. Intimately, I might add."
"I know." He cracked open his eyes, smirking. "You just seem a little nervous."
Sara pulled the razor away from Grissom's cheek. "I am putting a sharp object against my boy--" she stopped. "I am putting a sharp object against your face. I'm just…cautious."
"If you say so."
She rinsed off the blade. "This wouldn't be so difficult if you let me use your Gillette razor." Before putting his razor back to his cheek, she asked, "Why do you use a straight-edged blade?"
"I get a closer shave."
"Where did you get this?" She didn't give him a chance to answer as she smiled sweetly. "Let me guess; you have your sources."
His eyes sparkled when he pursed his lips, causing her to laugh.
Once she settled down, Sara concentrated at the task at hand. With each swipe of the razor she revealed his smooth face. She happily discovered the wrinkles that had been etched in his skin months ago had disappeared.
When she finished, Grissom opened his eyes and smiled. Those lines, however, had become more pronounced.
"Thank you," he said quietly.
"You're welcome," she murmured. Reaching up, she brushed her hand across his cheek a few times. "Cream," she told him. "From shaving."
He laughed, and her ears welcomed the delightful sound. Pulling her toward him, Grissom started nuzzling her neck.
"Gil," she giggled. He started adding little kisses. "What are you doing?"
He mumbled as he continued his ministrations, "Quality assurance. The product should be thoroughly tested."
Rolling her eyes, she said, "I'll bet."
"I like this." His lips found their way under her ear. "My face doesn't feel like it's surrounded by a furnace."
Sara pulled back. "Why did grow it back, then?"
"Because it was cold in Massachusetts," he answered plainly.
There was that word: Massachusetts. The four syllable, thirteen letter word that would always represent a month of doubt, worry, and loneliness for her.
Realizing she'd frowned, he grabbed her arm. "It was never about you." His voice was genuine and honest.
"I know." And she did. The fact he had told her about the sabbatical two days before he left and the one phone call she received certainly made that point clear.
"I just…I needed a break from the lab." He entwined their fingers. "Not you."
Sara drew in a deep breath. "Whatever the…reason, it was good for you." They stared at each other for a moment. "What did you find out there?"
Grissom's expression relaxed as he spoke, "During my second week, I ran into Dr. Homer Montgomery, one my classmates from UCLA. He's the head of the physics department at Williams. He invited me to sit in on one of his lectures. The day I went in, he was talking about prisms and white light. To demonstrate the principle, he set up a beam of light going through a prism."
Peacefulness and wonder swirled in his eyes. "Colors appeared on the table. Red, orange, green, blue. Even a little bit of violet. They were…beautiful." He smiled.
Her forehead wrinkled. He went to Massachusetts to observe the properties of white light?
"'White serves as a beginning. White cloth can be dyed, white paper can be overwritten, and white light can be broken,'" he quoted. "Saruman. Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring."
"Wasn't Saruman the villain?"
"Yes," he admitted. "But the idea still applies." Grissom drew his eyebrows together, and looked at his feet. He faced her again with his mouth wanting to form words, but not succeeding. Whatever he wanted to explain, he was having a difficult time doing so. After a minute of silence, he began, "The last several months, everything at the lab was so…bleary. The cases, the administrative paperwork…" He sighed. "I just-I needed to step back. When I did step back, I found the colors." He shook his head. "I thought I lost them." His thumb brushed against her palm. "Does that make any sense?"
Sara gave him a small nod. "A little, yeah." While she appreciated the properties of a prism, she still found it odd Grissom had to look for colors in white light. Colors surrounded them all the time: flower gardens, the mountains, insect houses. Heck, even the Strip was covered in every color known to man.
Grissom must have noticed her quizzical expression because he said, "It doesn't make sense."
"I know what you mean." When she put her hands on his clean jaw line, her voice turned slightly sugary. "You found the rainbow."
He didn't say anything, merely quirking an eyebrow. Sara continued to let her fingers play over his skin. She couldn't help but trace the smoothness over and over.
"Most people look for treasure at the end of the rainbow." She shrugged. "But you wanted the colors."
"The end of a rainbow doesn't exist," he replied seriously. Then his lips turned into a half smile. "And now you're just making fun of me."
"No I'm not," she protested. "The colors are very important to you." Leaning forward, she placed her arms on his shoulders, and pressed her nose to the right side of his face. She inhaled the delicious combination of shaving cream and Grissom's unique scent. Her lips touched the skin, and she spoke between small kisses. "Red…orange…yellow…"
"There's more to it than that."
"Absolutely." She reached his chin. "There's green and violet and blue." Sara traced the dimple there a few times; the feel of it under her lips never ceased to delight her.
"Blue's my favorite color, you know," she murmured against the corner of his mouth.
They spent a few minutes reveling in soft kisses. When Sara tried to move to his left cheek, Grissom tilted his head enough to block her efforts, keeping their mouths in contact
She chuckled. "I still have to check the other side."
He grunted in response. "'S fine," he mumbled before kissing her again. His hands slid down her sides to her waist. Just as his fingers gently swirled the skin under her shirt, a cell phone started ringing from the bedroom.
Both slowed their actions to a stop, and Sara leaned her forehead against his. "You better answer that," she sighed.
"Yeah," he replied before his arms went around her back, hugging her closer. "I am not going back in."
"Unless the caller has telepathy, they're not going to know that." She eased out of his arms. "Go. Answer the phone."
He grunted once more, and walked to bedroom, while Sara headed downstairs. She turned the deadbolt to the front door, and went to the kitchen to load the last of the breakfast dishes in the dishwasher.
As she finished, she looked at the window sill over the sink and just…stared.
Next to the small cactus was a prism with a plastic bee inside. Grissom had brought it back from an entomology convention. A beam from the morning sun hit the object scattering into a small rainbow. The colors were faint, but still visible.
She had never noticed the small array of colors in the house before. Sure she studied prisms and light in college, but it had been a while since she'd seen the effects. And here this small gift had been in her home the whole time.
"It was just Archie!" Sara heard Grissom yell from upstairs. "He just had a question on a case!"
Her wide grin made the muscles in her jaw hurt. She walked to the bedroom, and leaned in the doorway, observing Grissom going through the closet. The blue t-shirt he wore showed off his mid-section; he had already gained back some of the weight lost due to stress.
But it wasn't just his physical characteristics that changed; emotionally, he seemed healthier. He no longer grumbled and groaned when it was time to go to work. At home, he communicated about his feelings, whether he felt frustrated over a case or if he simply wanted a cheese sandwich. And no day had passed since his return where he hadn't surprised her at some point during the day with a kiss and an "I love you."
Somewhere in the six color spectrum, Grissom had found himself.
Funny his epiphany came from physics, not entomology.
When Grissom sighed and stopped his search, Sara walked behind him, and snuggled into his back. Just as she was about to speak, he asked, "Have you seen my blue pants, honey?"
"Which ones?"
"My dark blue striped pants. You know, the drawstring set?"
She knew the pants: they might have been dark blue at one time, but not any more; ratty holes scattered in the material of the legs.
"Why are you looking for them in the closet?"
"Because I didn't see them in my dresser. Are they downstairs in the wash?"
If it was up to her, they'd be in the trash.
She shook her head. "No. They should be in your drawer."
Turning around, Grissom told her, "I looked; I didn't see them in there."
Sara refrained from letting out a frustrated breath. Had the man actually looked, he would have found the pants in the drawer with his other lounge pants and sweat pants.
"Are you sure you looked?" She crossed her arms over her chest. "Because they were in the last load of laundry I did."
He shrugged.
Wordlessly, she walked to his dresser. After a few seconds of searching, she reached to the bottom of a stack, pulled out the blue pants, and tossed them to him.
She raised an eyebrow, and shot a challenging look.
"Oh," he said with surprise. "Thanks."
Rolling her eyes, she nodded. Now that his crisis was solved, Sara wanted to share what she saw, but was met with, "Do you know where my Beast t-shirt from King's Island is?"
This wasn't the first time she wondered how Gil Grissom functioned for thirty some years on his own. She was just going to have to find another time to talk.
A few days later
As soon as he arrived home from work, Grissom headed upstairs, brief case in hand. He planned on answering a few emails, and filling out some grant paperwork before having breakfast with Sara.
While he unpacked a few files, he thought back to their previous conversation about the prism. Sara had given him the same confused look Catherine often had when he would rattle off an unknown fact. And Sara hadn't brought up the subject later that night or anytime after.
Of course she understood the physics, but apparently she didn't get the prism went beyond the science. Grissom wanted her to know, but it was so difficult to put into words. Perhaps he could show her that bee prism…if he could remember where he put it.
He turned on the computer, and then adjusted the blinds to let in the morning sun. When he turned around, he blinked in surprise at the upper tier of his desk.
A small prism sitting there had caught a light ray and shone a faint rainbow on a framed picture of him and Sara.
He smiled as he examined the prism. It was obvious she had put some work into the set up because the light hit the triangular object at the right height so the display of colors hit their photographed faces.
Ignoring the papers on the desk, Grissom went downstairs. He found Sara in the living room folding a pile of clothes and placing them in a basket.
She looked up. "Before you ask, your green and grey polo shirts are washed, the blue plaid shirt is in the closet, your jeans are downstairs, and, no I haven't gotten to your Cubs jersey yet."
Gently prying the shirt from her hands, he tossed the clothing down. He leaned in, and gave her a kiss.
"Thank you," he said.
"That's the thanks I get for doing the laundry," she jokingly asked.
"No," he chuckled, kissing her again. "For understanding."
For a moment, she remained silent, then her eyes lit with recognition. "You're welcome."
When Grissom didn't leave, Sara smirked and went back to her chore. He took a breath. "That spectrum…what I saw…" Grissom felt he had to put it into words, but he couldn't find the right ones. "I guess you can call it…" Perspective? No. Comprehension? Not quite. "Clarity," he finally stated.
"I knew you found something more than just junior high school physics," she teased.
That was true. After the physics lecture, Grissom had rushed back to his temporary office to pen Sara a letter. He'd written what he felt without her beside him; the great meaning she gave to his life; and an apology for leaving without adequate notice.
But when he'd addressed the envelope he thought it would be better to give her the letter in person; to explain it with his voice. But now he realized he didn't have to give her the letter; he could explain it right now.
Grissom softly quoted Blaise Pascal. "'Clarity of mind means clarity of passion too; this is why a great and clear mind loves ardently and sees distinctly what he loves.'"
It didn't take long for Sara to put down the clothing, wrap her arms around her neck, and kiss him.
She tasted like warm apple coupled with the slightest hint of vanilla and something he could never quite identify. Brown sugar maybe? He supposed more experimentation was needed.
Nuzzling into his neck, she hummed contently. "I'm happy you're seeing things more clearly now."
"Almost," he answered. "I still don't know where my tan slacks are. Did you hang them in the closet?"
She slowly pulled back and stared at him with her mouth half open. It was all he could to keep from laughing out loud. He struggled to keep his expression impassive. A moment later, her mouth curved into a devious grin. "It sounds like you need something different to clear your head. I have just the thing for you."
Grissom caught the laundry basket with an, "oof" as Sara shoved it at him.
The End