"Okay tour guide, I'm hungry. What are you going to do with that?" Sara stopped Caza at a little creek so that her horse could drink.
"I'll make a lunch for you. As I told you I've my gun with me, I'll shoot a moose and we'll have plenty of food, we can stay a week."
"First of all you've no license to shoot a moose; I hope. Second I wouldn't eat it as you know and third, there'll be something else around to eat than a poor moose. They are quite entertaining. Did you never watch 'Brother bear'? The moose are the best of the whole movie."
"I did watch it and I cried my eyes out when Kody's mother died."
"And you want to be a detective?"
"I'm a mother not a detective."
"Yeah, right." Sara grinned and got down from Caza. She could need a little break from riding.
"You didn't cry? Sara Sidle has no feelings when the mother of a poor baby bear dies?"
"There's barely a Disney movie that doesn't make me cry. I don't know why all the times somebody has to die in this movies."
"We should go to Disney Land and ask them there."
"The next time you're in Vegas. I'm sure you visit your mom a few times a year."
"She comes up here, that's easier than leaving the ranch alone and if we do, Jon or me has to stay to make sure everything is alright. If she wants to see the whole family she has to come to us."
"Fair enough. What are you doing?"
"Lunch." Sofia had build a circle out of stones, placed some wood in between and looked for more. "Wanna help?"
"What shall I do?"
"We need some more wood."
"Okay." Sara threw one look at Caza who was grazing next to Kirundi. No reason to tie her horse up she guessed. With a bunch of branches she came back to a small fire.
"Thanks." Sofia put some more wood on it, got a little pan out of her bag and placed it on the stones so that the fire was beneath it.
"What are you cooking?"
"I've two eggs and this." Sofia threw a package to Sara.
"Instant noodles?"
"Yes, all we need is to add some water and lunch is done. Very handy for a ride. Easy to cook, easy to carry."
"Jamie cooks better."
"Even he can't make a vegetarian lasagne in the forest."
"I bet he'd find a way."
"I found out you and him are close, it looks like he found his way to your heart with his food. Food of the heart."
Sara smiled a bit. It was less the food than more the shared past. They hadn't talked about what had happened to them in details, Sara had told him less than he had told her, but they knew, they shared a past and some nightmares.
"You've got great kids…well they don't have your DNA that will be the reason why…ouch." Sara held her shoulder. Sofia had thrown the second package of noodles there.
"Pat will be an aggressive, arrogant and annoying child, the poor boy has your DNA…"
"Sara Sidle, I'll kick you in the creek if don't stop now!" Sofia broke the eggs and let them slip into the pan.
"Sunny side down please."
"There's no choice, I'll turn them anyway because as soon as they're ready I'll add the water for the noodles. You'll get an all in one lunch, like it or leave it."
"I'm hungry I'll eat it."
"Good."
"Are there any dangerous animals around or can I have a little walk?"
"You shouldn't meet anything more dangerous than yourself."
"I can handle myself. When will we have lunch?"
"Any time between five and ten minutes."
"Alright." Sara got up. Time for a little walk.
"Don't get lost we don't have a dog with us to find you."
"No mom."
"Don't mom me."
"Sorry grandmother."
"Get lost!" Grandmother. And when Sara said that it sounded even older. Sofia was sure the brunette did that on purpose and if she found a way to prove that she'd give Sara some trouble. Trouble. Something had triggered something inside Sara when Sofia had mentioned trouble before. It was still in her mind, she could see the shacking woman in front of her. Sara hadn't been with her, her body was but the rest of her had been somewhere else.
Sofia hadn't mentioned it but she had seen things like that before. Jamie had the same problem sometimes. When things reminded him of his childhood and caught him in bad memories, he started shacking and sometimes crying. The only way to make him leave these memories fast was holding him in your arms and talking him out of the pictures in his mind. She had held him a few times in her arms when he had that and she knew Jon and Cat did the same.
Had the same happened to Sara? Was that the bound she and Jamie had? The special connection Jon had mentioned. Sofia would never dare to ask one of them, if they had talked about that, if they knew they shared bad memories, she hoped they talked to each other, helped each other. Jamie had started to open op, at least to his family. She had no idea what he did when he met somebody who had survived the same hell.
"You'll them burn, detective!"
"What?" Sofia shook her head. "Oh." Her eggs were done, she needed the water. "Sorry." She got some water from the creek and added the noodles.
"That's alright better well done than bloody."
"There's nothing like bloody eggs."
"You know what I mean."
"Yeah…where have you been and what do you have in your cup?"
"Dessert."
"Dessert?"
"Yes." Sara put her cup on the ground. It was filled with berries. "I thought I get us something healthy."
"And you're sure they're not poisoned?"
"Yes. I know something about berries, don't worry."
"I'm sure you do. A vegetarian should know how to get his or her food."
"I do. What lies ahead of us? Anything special coming up?"
"Well we're too far away from the attractions of the park but we'll see some snow covered mountains later. I think it will take another hour until we're on top of the highest mountain of our trip, we'll have a pretty nice view from there. The weather isn't that warm so we don't need to stop at the lake for a swim…"
"What? You told me to wear my swim suit and now you tell me won't swim?"
"Do you want to swim?"
"Sure. And I want to see the lake."
"We can make it to the lower side, the upper one is nicer but you need the overnight right for that."
"After I didn't fall down when Caza was running like the wind am I good enough for an overnight ride?"
"You want to repeat that gallop?"
"No!"
"When you want to repeat that gallop and enjoy it a few times a day you're ready for an overnight trip."
"Great, I'll never get up to the nicer side of the lake."
"You will one day. If I get Cat to do the rides next weekend I can ask Jon to make the trip with you from Friday to Saturday. I need to be in town Saturday morning, I can't join you. You can walk and trot the trip but it will take longer then."
"I should practice in Vegas and come back next summer to be intermediate and join all the great rides."
"You should come back in winter, it's lovely in the snow and the horses like running through the soft snow. You can get some ski, a horse and do skijöring."
"What?"
"You're on ski and are behind a horse. It's like water ski but in the snow and with a horse in front instead of a boat. Some real fun."
"I can't see any fun when Caza runs like before. And I can't ski."
"Something new to learn."
"I'll break my neck one day."
"But you'll die being happy."
"Great."
"You prefer to be alive and unhappy?"
"I'm dreaming of being alive and happy. One day it might happen."
"The greatest happiness on earth is sitting in the saddle of a horse."
"Walking slowly over a meadow and not running up a mountain like the devil is right behind you."
"You're faster than the devil – at least the first quarter of a mile."
"He's not a horse."
"He has a clubfoot."
"I don't believe that. I thought a few times you're the devil and your feet were way too small for a clubfoot."
"I should spill your soup in your face, Sara." Sofia eyes the brunette.
"You won't. It's your soup too."
"I can have mine in my cup."
"You still won't do it."
"Don't dare me too much."
"You won't let your CSI starve. A good detective takes care of her CSI."
"I am not a detective anymore. We had that topic already."
"You'll always be a detective, Sofia. Deep in your heart. One day, detective Curtis, you'll miss the streets, come back and qualify as a lieutenant and make it to captain."
"My mom dreams that dream I won't live it. I'll stay on my ranch and chase tourists who lost their control over their horses. That's more fun than chasing men with guns who want to see me dead. I don't need the thrill of fighting to survive every day anymore."
"I really tried to get you back to Vegas."
"Why do you do that?"
"I miss working with you." Sara said simply.
"Why? You can't be bitchy to somebody else?"
"They're all pissed off right away, that's no fun."
"What a pity."
"I tell you. So are you coming back?"
"No." Sofia laughed. "It sounds tempting to see you every day, have you bitching around but I think I prefer the peace of the ranch. I'm really sorry."
"No, you're not and I can understand you." Sara smiled. It was a nice place here she wouldn't trade it for Las Vegas. Not if she had a family like Sofia and fulfilled a dream of herself. Why leaving that? There was nothing in Las Vegas that was worth doing that.
What kept her in Las Vegas? Grissom was in France, she should be there too. She had no family in Las Vegas, her family was in Paris. Why did she choose to stay with her few friends in Vegas? Well, the only real friends were Nick and Greg, she didn't know Ray well enough and the relationship between her and Cath were too often too complicated. So why did she choose to stay with Greg and Nick instead of Grissom? It must have been the job that got her back to Vegas. The job that got her here too; in a strange way. But sometimes your life takes strange ways…