After You Were Mine part 2 – Pause – by Sara's Girl

- Remind me, over and again, what I had -

It's funny how I think I can predict people's behaviour, that I know what they are going to do next, because more often than not they wind up doing something that really surprises me. I stopped trying to predict what you would do next a long time ago, but I think I have a pretty good handle on most of the people in my life. Warrick surprises me, this time. We stand side by side behind the two-way glass watching Brass in the interrogation room. I know that this is one of the missing links that hurt you, and I insist I be allowed to observe his interview. Warrick takes one look at my face and follows me in. That's not what surprises me though. It's what he says next. His tone is cold and quiet.

"What are you doing here?"

I turn to look at him with surprise and have not yet formulated a response when he continues.

"He's lying in a hospital bed, alone, confused, and you turn up to tell him – by the way, you guys split up a year ago – and then you leave?"

Warrick's face is an incongruous mixture of fury and pity. I open and close my mouth like a fish. I don't understand, because only hours ago, he told me to be careful because you were going to try and mess me up. Now, inexplicably, he is in your corner and I am the bad guy. Sometimes Warrick makes no sense to me, and I tell him so. He gives me a look that could curdle buttermilk at fifty paces and I fall silent. Of course I feel bad about what I did to you this morning. Bad doesn't cover it, there should be a word for what I feel for hurting you, because it's like actual physical pain. I can still hear that horrible, drawn out sound that came from somewhere deep inside you, somewhere primal, and it makes me feel sick.

But I had no choice. It would have been disastrous for both of us had I allowed you to go on believing that we were still together. I know how easily I'd slip back into our life. The thought of you in my arms at night, your back pushed tightly against my chest and your legs tangled up with mine like we used to, makes me breathless and warm inside. You and I just fit together. The first time I woke up without you there I felt like a piece of me had been removed, yanked away in the night by unseen hands.

I'm honest with myself, at least. Having you home is the only thing I want in the world, and the part of me that knows that would take you back in an instant, however you offered it. The other part though, knows that you only seem like you want me again because you have forgotten why you stopped wanting me. It's as though someone has reached into your soul and purified it of all the parts that made you leave me. The only trouble is, I know it wouldn't be real, and when your memory comes back, so will all of the reasons why you broke my heart. I'm not sure I could survive that a second time. You never actually said as much, but your voice and your words and your touch earlier today tell me that – for the moment at least – I am what you want again. That hurts, because I want you too.

When I tell Warrick this, he snorts and shakes his head. I wish he would tell me what he's thinking because I feel like I need something solid to hold onto before I get washed away in all of this. I tell him I'm sorry because it feels as though an apology is expected of me, and God knows I feel weighed down by guilt as it is.

XXXXX

I get through the next week because I have no choice, and because I'm stubborn, and because the job demands it. It seems as though all of the things that lurk in the nightmarish side of Las Vegas have come out to play, and every case I work reveals some new sickening twist. Then of course there are the everyday run-of-the-mill nightmares too. Rape, murder, assault, abuse, neglect – I see them all. See, document, collect, process, analyse. I absorb myself in my work because I don't want to think about you, and though I still see you everywhere I look, it's the best distraction I have. I know I need to get good at distractions, fast, because on Friday evening Sara corners me in the locker room and tells me that you are coming back to work on Monday. I cannot decide if she looks angry with me, or frustrated, or anxious. In fact, she looks a lot like Warrick did just before he yelled at me. I decide not to push it. I just want to go home and sleep and forget, just for a few hours, the whirl in my head and the pain in my chest and the unsettling feeling that the world is shifting under my feet whether I like it or not.

Which is why, probably, you do not get the best reception when you turn up at my door five minutes after I get home. You are wearing a plain t-shirt and jeans that look too big for you, hanging off your hips. In fact, you look thinner, and you weren't big to start with. Your hair is disheveled but not in the artful way I grew to love, which - I learned the hard way – takes a long time to create, but just messy, like you don't care. At least the dried blood and bandages have gone, but of course they have. That was a week ago, and I feel a twinge of remorse that I did not go back to see you, but I know it would not have helped either of us. I can only wonder why you are standing here now, staring at me in what can only be described as a defiant manner. You almost look cute and I suppress an inappropriate urge to smile at you and push your hair out of your eyes.

"Hey," you say eventually, an edge to your voice. Your hands are in your pockets and you stand like you are trying to front me out.

"Hello, Greg." There I go again. Now I have started this whole forced formality thing it's like I can't stop. I remind myself that it's you. The man I used to be married to. It hurts my head. "What do you want?"

"The doctors checked me out, you know, and they said there doesn't look to be any permanent damage. They said my memory loss might even be stress-related, because…because most things have started to come back. Except you."

Great. I have a horrible, twisting, sinking feeling that I know what's coming next. I'm still standing in the doorway and I'm not sure I have any intention of letting you in. You haven't been in this apartment since the day you left for good. Not once. I feel almost as though letting you past me into the hallway might bring some carefully erected barrier crashing down, and me with it.

"I want to talk about what happened." You look sad, but resolute, and this is what I had been afraid of.

"Can't you talk about this with Sara?"

"Sara wouldn't tell me. She said I had to come and speak to you."

Well, thanks a fucking bunch, Sara. For a fraction of a second I want to slam the door in your face, as if by not seeing you I can pretend you aren't there. I don't know who I'm kidding, because everything in this damn place reminds me of you. Your eyes are impassive and I listen to the sound of your breathing.

"I really don't remember it," you whisper, leaning on the doorframe, and I know there's another question because your eyes are burning with it. I wish you'd just ask it, so we can get this over with. "Why did you leave me?"

I take an involuntary step back at the quiver in your voice and the knowledge that you truly believe that I was the one to end our relationship. Not you. I wish I could forget that day as easily as you have...no...I take that back, hurriedly, and thank God I didn't say it out loud. It must be horrific for you, and I'm sorry for even thinking that thought. You sigh and I wonder if it's because we are still standing here, me in the doorway, not allowing you into the apartment that as far as you are concerned, you should still live in.

I let you in, make coffee. We sit, gravitating towards the positions we always occupied in the lounge, or at least the ones we chose when we were absorbed in separate tasks, or had company. A lot of the time we would just lie tangled, full length on the couch, because you liked to feel as much contact between my body and yours as was possible, and I was happy to oblige.

The thought of touching you heats me and hurts me simultaneously. You are sitting in the big red armchair, and I watch as you kick off your shoes and curl your legs around you, settling, looking at me expectantly with huge eyes. Your bruises have all but faded but you look different to all the versions of you I have known over the years. You look worn, and for the first time, you look every one of your thirty-one years. I'm not sure why but this makes something in me contract with sadness, and I push it down. I shift on the worn leather sofa and sigh.

"Sara really didn't tell you anything, did she?" You shake your head but say nothing. "I didn't leave you. You left me."

I let this hang in the air for a while and though I try not to look at you, my eyes are drawn. I hear myself wince because the colour has drained from your face and a wet sound is dragged from your chest. I know now for sure that this is brand new information to you. I muse on the fact that acting only on the information that were are no longer together, you have automatically assumed that it was me who broke things off. I don't get to think on this much longer because you are speaking to me, urgently now, demanding to know what happened. Your arms are hugged tightly around your chest and you draw your knees up as if protecting yourself. I wonder if you think you need to protect yourself from me. I hope not, because I would never hurt you on purpose.

I start talking. It's the one of the hardest things I have ever done, harder than the hospital, harder than being in that box, harder even than standing in the kitchen the day you left holding your ring in my fist and wondering how it came to be the only part of you that still belonged to me. This is harder, because I am reliving every moment of it all at once. And I'm doing it for you, because you have a right to know what happened to us. Because although it was you that left, I know it takes two to destroy a relationship and I had my part too. Because you are sitting there, looking like you have stopped breathing, listening to me with pure incomprehension and hurt glittering in your eyes.

I tell you about our arguments; the ones about work, the ones about what we did at the weekend, the ones about your family but especially about mine, the ones where we always came back to the same things, when you would call me predictable and I would call you irresponsible. You once told me I was boring, and you knew it hurt me, so I said you were ridiculous and that you should grow up. I'll never forget your face when I said that. I didn't mean it, I had said it because I knew it was the one thing that would really cut you, and in that moment I had wanted to cut you, but only because I was angry. Words, though, once exchanged, were impossible to take back.

At the same time, I want, desperately, to tell you that I still loved you through all of it, and that I would have done anything to make you stay. But I don't. I keep the words in my mouth, bite down hard on them, because I know that they won't help. All they will do now is confuse you.

I tell you that we stopped apologising after we fought, but just carried on as if nothing had happened, but it didn't work like that. We were drifting, and you jumped.

"Why would I do that? Why didn't we try?" you ask in a small voice.

You look genuinely baffled and I try not to hear your question because it is one I have asked myself so many times.

I have to tell you that I don't know, because, honestly, I don't. Only you know what went through your head that day. Or rather, you did know, but now I suppose no one does. All that's left is us, looking at each other from two sides of a chasm.

We talk for a long time, trying in some way to reach across the space, but it feels impossible. I know, despite what I might have said to Warrick, that you cannot want what I want, or you would never have left in the first place. I'm still talking when I realize you haven't said anything in a while, and when I look over at you, you are asleep, curled into the back of your favourite chair. I've lost count of how many times you have fallen asleep in that chair and I've had to pull you, protesting sleepily, to your feet so you can come to bed with me. I would make sure you didn't mind too much, one way or another.

I stand and stare at you, unsure suddenly of what to do. Seeing you asleep in that chair seems like the most natural thing in the world and the most utterly wrong at once. Eventually, I cover you over with a blanket and leave you there, crawling into bed, exhausted. I never imagined that if and when you slept in this house ever again, that you would be out there and I would be in here, and that I would feel so completely empty. I want to walk out there and rouse you from your sleep, pull you gently into bed with me and know that the comfort I would feel, even if just for a little while, would take all of this away. I settle for curling myself around a cold pillow and pretending that I'm not crying. It doesn't count if you don't make a sound, you told me that once, do you remember?

XXXXX

When I leave for work you are still sleeping, and after a moment's indecision, I just leave you where you are. I don't have time to think about what that might mean.

When I unlock my door after shift, I can't help but wonder if you are still there, and I honestly don't know if I want you to be or not, but I hesitate all the same, my hand resting on the door handle for a few seconds longer than usual.

The apartment is empty, and there is no sign you were ever there apart from a neatly folded navy blue blanket sitting on the kitchen counter top. I stare at it and feel a little strange. I remember that you were always much neater than me, even though it seemed to surprise people how tidy you were. We used to have silly arguments all the time because I left my clothes on the floor and you hated it. I would tell you it was a horizontal filing system, and you would just shake your head and tell me I was a slob. You never stayed mad though, I suppose you just accepted it as part of me, like so many other things you endured for me, like football, and Johnny Cash, and talking in my sleep. I wonder, not for the first time, what it was about me that you finally could not endure.

I lean on the counter top heavily and push out the breath I am holding, slowly and deliberately. I know I'm being ridiculous, getting misty eyed over a blanket, and I grab it up and shove it back into my closet. I can't miss you, because that makes no sense. I don't miss you.

XXXXX

I don't see you at all during your first shift back, I'm out at a messy scene with multiple victims and by the time I get back to the lab, shift is almost over. I know you are around somewhere, I can feel it. I hear snatches of conversation from the lab techs as I pass, most of them are commenting on how well you look and that you seem quite happy. I want to stop them and shake them. Tell them of course you aren't happy, don't they know how well you can pretend? But I don't. I keep my mouth shut, which I know is the safest course of action when in doubt, and go to store my evidence away before I leave.

I am only mildly surprised to see you leaning against my car with your eyes closed and your headphones on. I'm tired, physically and emotionally, and I don't feel like a confrontation. You pull out your headphones and straighten up. You want to come over. You don't say why, but I know that it's not a good idea.

"Please." Your voice is louder than usual and it echoes harshly across the parking lot. "I don't want to be alone." You fiddle with your cuffs. They're too long, and hang down over your fingers.

I shake my head and get into the car, not looking at you. Certainly, I'm not thinking about when you used to wait for me just like this, when we first started out, when we were a secret and could not leave work together. Most nights I would walk out of the lab to find you leaning against my car, just like you are now. Flashing me that secret smile that promised so much. Sometimes you would be hiding behind my car, crouched down next to the front wheel and grinning, having ducked down to avoid being seen by Grissom or Warrick or anyone else who might put two and two together with any success.

I used to laugh at you when you jumped into the passenger seat and crouched below window-level, even when there was no one left to hide from, just because you knew it made me smile. I'm starting to hate the fact that everything you are doing recently is reminding me of something you used to do when we loved each other. Maybe you haven't changed as much as I think you have.

Sometimes I think you can read my mind, and I wish you couldn't, because for some reason you have a small smile on your lips and then you're slipping around the side of the car, ducking into the passenger seat and bending at the waist, clutching your bag on your knees. I stare at you for a moment, because you're laughing. I can't remember the last time I saw you laugh, and it pokes at a sore spot inside me. You look up at me from between your fingers, your dark eyes dancing and there's that smile that I pretend I don't think about when I'm alone. I'm breathless, suddenly, because the years fall away from you in that moment, and you're Greg Sanders – DNA Tech, Greg Sanders – crazy lab rat that I can't keep my eyes from. You're the Greg Sanders that was mine. I feel inexplicably exhilarated. I forget, momentarily, that I'm supposed to be keeping you at arm's length, because I'm grinning at you in a way that the pull on the tight skin around my mouth tells me I have neglected for a long time.

You straighten up slowly, clicking your seatbelt into place, and I don't stop you.

"Do you think anyone saw us?" you stage-whisper with faked anxiety, unable to stop one small corner of your mouth lifting slightly.

"No, G, I think we're good."

I register the use of the name at the same time as you do. You lift one eyebrow briefly and my heart speeds up a little. Am I flirting with you? Are you flirting with me? In that one moment, I appreciate the irony of covertly flirting with my own ex-husband in my car outside the place where we both work. I start the car just for something to do with my hands while I think. You aren't looking at me any more. Your eyes are shut and your head is tilted back onto the headrest. I watch the way your eyelashes rest against your pale skin, the darkness of one throwing the lightness of the other into sharp relief. I tear my eyes back to the road. I don't mind admitting when I'm utterly confused. You're sad, scared, flirtatious, vulnerable and excitable, and you have been all of these within the last five minutes. I'm not sure if I'm petrified, angry or turned on. Just drive. I take deep breaths and wonder if you are actually sleeping or just none-too-subtly avoiding conversation.

When I park up, you open your eyes and follow me languidly inside. You assume your position in the red armchair and your eyes light up when you see that I'm already passing you the phone. I look down at it, startled, as you take it out of my hand gently and punch in a familiar number. I do that without thinking, and it scares me a little, because I slip into this role, whatever it is, so easily, and you...you just fit right there, sitting in the chair. One leg curled around you and one tucked up to your chest, chatting away to some restaurant employee like they are an old friend. Knowing your eating habits, they probably are.

So many nights, we did this. We gave up trying to cook quite early on, and you always did the ordering because we both knew I would eat anything. I'm not sure what we're doing here, but it feels nice, and scary, and I don't know if you're here because you want me, or because you're lonely, or because you don't know what else to do.

We don't talk about that though, and we don't talk about last night. You sit in your chair – it is your chair, whatever I tell myself, because I never sit in it – and I sprawl out on the couch, and we talk about nothing and everything, until I'm just mumbling, and I let my eyes close.

When I open them, it's light outside and there are empty chinese cartons everywhere. You are curled into a ball and snoring gently. I'm confused for a moment because I smile and get up, crouching down in front of you to brush lips against your skin, sleepily amazed at how content I feel. When I'm half an inch from your face, close enough to smell you, I remember with a sickening jolt that this is not the scene of cosy domesticity my sleep-addled brain is trying to tell me it is. I freeze. I'm here, and you're here, but you aren't mine. I can't kiss you. Nor do I have any business being anywhere near this close to you. I draw away, catching my breath, and retreat to my bedroom as quickly as I can on unsteady feet. I flop down on my back and cover my face with my hands.

What the hell am I doing? What are you doing to me, Greg? Do you know?

XXXXX

The second morning you are there again when I walk out to my car. You say nothing this time, just pin me to the spot with your eyes. I suddenly get the impression that this is not a negotiation, at least not one that I'm going to win. Though I love all your expressions, there is a certain glance that you have that you know leaves me breathless and submissive to pretty much anything you want. You didn't use it often when we were together, perhaps not wanting to dilute the effect, and maybe also not wanting to make me feel powerless too often, because you knew that being in control made me feel safe. It always felt a little dangerous that I was in your thrall so completely, but I also knew you would never use the power I gave to you against me. You shared it with me, and to my surprise I learned that there were things I could do that reduced you to nothing but liquid eyes and breathless pleading, and it thrilled me.

I am intoxicated by your stare now and I force myself to look away. I wonder if you look at anyone else like that. We drive in silence and I can't help wondering why you don't want to go home, and where you are getting your clean clothes from when I know you have been nowhere but work and my place for a couple of days now. I don't realize I have given voice to my question until you answer me.

"I have spare clothes in my locker," you murmur, looking ahead. "I can't sleep at my place."

We don't talk like we did last night. Instead, you order Thai food and curl into the armchair, eating it slowly and watching CNN. I have no idea why you want to watch an unbroken procession of death, violence and destruction when that is what you see all day every day, but I say nothing because it seems to be soothing you somehow. In the end I put my glasses on and pick up the book I have been meaning to finish for months now. A couple of times, I catch you looking at me, feel you looking at me, but when I meet your eyes, you look away.

The silence between us hangs heavily but it is not uncomfortable, even though my heart is hammering in my chest. Everything would be right if you were sitting next to me, curled into my side, pressing kisses against my shoulder like you always would without really thinking about it. I loved those moments because I knew you were not really conscious of what you were doing, you just did it because it came naturally. You were mine, and it was written through every cell in your body. You are looking at me again, and I glance up from my book, catching my breath.

Your mouth is slightly open and your eyes are darkened, almost predatory. You haven't moved, but your expression transforms you. I find my body responding to you in a familiar, uncontrollable way and the urge to touch you is incredible. I look down for a beat, taking a deep breath, and when I meet your eyes again that look has vanished from your face, and you are sitting there regarding me with interest. Your mouth is closed and your eyes are soft and a little confused.

God.

I get up then and walk away from you. Grab the blanket from my bedroom closet and almost throw it at you. You don't know what you're doing. What you're doing to me. You're confused. Vulnerable. Sexy as hell. No!

I sit down heavily on the edge of my bed, wincing as the door slams shut behind me. What are you doing in my house, G? I can't do this, I just can't. I don't know what you want – I don't think you know what you want – but I know I can't give it to you. I block out the thought of you sitting there alone in the lounge, probably with a slightly stunned expression on your face, wondering what you did to offend me. Unless you know, and you want to do it to me. I suppress the overwhelming urge to take my frustration out on the wall, because I do not want to be that person any more.

This ends now. I'm breathing rapidly and I can feel the remnants of your gaze prickling all over my skin. I'm not thinking when my hand drifts down and I wrap shaking fingers around myself. God, I'm hard. It's almost painful. Anger, confusion, desire mixing and spiking with a frightening intensity as I move my hand faster and faster, never releasing my grip until I come hard all over my stomach. I'm not thinking of you when I feel my bittersweet release and bite down into my own forearm to muffle the sound. I'm not thinking of you at all, just in the next room. This ends now.

Tomorrow.

XXXXX

There is only one hour left on the clock when I find you alone at last. You look calm and focused, staring at the monitor in front of you, softly glowing in the relative darkness of the AV lab. You look up at me and your eyes soften. I love your eyes. I used to think I could fall into them and everything would be ok. I close mine, briefly, cutting off the connection. You know what I mean when I say:

"Please…don't."

You know, because you look confused and hurt and I want to take it back, but you nod quickly and turn back to the monitor without a word. I watch you for a moment and then slip away.

When I walk out of the building at 9am, there is no one in the parking lot but me.