Title: The Life & Times of Sara Sidle

Rating: T

Summary: (You all know by now)

Disclaimer: I own nothing but my original characters!

A/N: Hey everyone, thanks for the encouraging reviews, I love you guys! Anyways, I've decided to go through all of Sara's life. I hope you guys enjoy!

December 25, 1984- Residence of Ted and Nancy Wilcoff

Sara had woken up Christmas morning excitedly. She couldn't remember the last time she had woken up on a holiday actually excited. As soon as she had gotten up from her bed, she ran into the living room. Ted had come in banging a wooden spoon on pots and pans, scaring Sara half-to-death thus waking her up, and he forbid her from making up her bed before opening presents.

Sara walked into the living room and sat down in front of the tree. It was a nice tree- there weren't many pine needles on the floor and the ones still on the tree were a nice deep green color. The tree was covered with Christmas ornaments, including Ted's signature Top Gun ornament he won off eBay.

Sara watched Ted and Nancy who were sitting on the couch. Nancy was sipping a hot cup of coffee and Ted was fidgeting in his seat. Sara couldn't tell who was more excited- her or Ted.

"Sara, you can go ahead and hand out the presents," Nancy said taking a sip of her coffee. Sara nodded and looked around the tree. She was hesitant, but she grabbed a present and tossed it to Ted.

"There you go, it's from me to you," Sara said with a grin.

Ted raised a brow and looked at the wrapped gift. "You didn't have to-"

"Just open it," Sara said smiling. Ted shrugged and ripped the paper off of the gift. As he looked at Sara's gift, his eyes filled with tears. He stuttered as he spoke and his hands were shaking.

"You...y-y-y-..." he stuttered as a single tear ran down his face. "THANK YOU!" He held in his hands a special copy of Top Gun. He didn't have his own copy of the movie, he had recorded it on TV and watched it over and over and over again.

"You're welcome, Ted," Sara said with a smile and tossed another gift to Nancy. "Go ahead and open it," she said with a grin.

Nancy ripped the paper off of the gift. She laughed when she saw what Sara had gotten her.

"Thought you'd need those," Sara laughed pointing at the ear plugs Nancy held in her hands.

"Yes, thank you," Nancy said smiling. "Go ahead and open your presents."

Sara blinked. "Um...okay." She looked around the tree and found a gift to her. She swallowed and studied the green envelope, her fingers running over the smoothly-folded edges and the clear pieces of tape...

"Open it!" Ted said jumping up and down. Sara giggled and nodded. She slowly ripped the paper, irritatiing Ted. She smiled and when she opened it up, she put a hand over her mouth gasping.

"Oh my god..." she said reading over the envelope. It couldn't have been right...so many zeroes...

"Yup," Nancy said proudly.

"You guys...you guys are giving me $2000?" she asked, a single tear running down her cheek.

Nancy and Ted smiled. "We assumed it was the proper amount. You'll use it wisely, we know that."

Sara jumped up and almost tackled them both in a tight hug. She cried tears of joy and Ted and Nancy just tried to calm her down as they told her that they wanted to give her the money and that she deserved it.

After getting everything cleaned up, the doorbell rang. Sara jumped up and ran to the door. She opened it up and found Josh standing outside her door with a steaming thermos in his hand.

"Merry Christmas, Sar," he said with a smile.

"Same to you. Would you like to come in?"

Josh nodded and stepped through the door. "I brought some hot chocolate...Frankie's special recipe."

Sara smiled. "Alright, that sounds good to me. I'll show you to the kitchen." Sara walked through the entryway and into the kitchen where she took out two mugs and handed one to Josh. Josh unscrewed the lid of the steaming thermos and poured himself a cup of the steaming liquid and a cup for Sara.

"Cheers," Josh said as she sipped his drink.

"Wow," Sara said after taking a sip. "This is great."

Josh grinned. "Yeah...Frankie claims she has a gift..." Josh looked around and leaned closer to her. "She just puts some cinnamon in it and a little extra milk," he said in a whisper.

Sara giggled as she took another sip of the steaming liquid. They were about to continue their conversation when a scream came from down the hall.

"What's wrong?" Sara asked running into the room the scream came from.

Nancy was making a scene, running back-and-forth. "Someone stole the last cookie from my secret stash!"

Sara raised a brow- secret? Sara knew where it was, it wasn't hard to find, she had found it cleaning the house one day. "Um...okay."

"Not okay!" Nancy said. "I wanted that cookie! I was saving it!"

A grin was tugging at the corners of Sara's mouth as Josh spoke. "Well, you do have a forensic scientist in the house."

Sara tilted her head. "I'm not-"

"Great!" Nancy said. "Get to work, young lady!" Nancy said walking out of the room.

Sara smiled and looked at Josh. "Well...shall we go to my lab?"

Inside Sara's room, she was busy slipping on a pair of latex gloves. "I can't believe I'm doing this."

Josh smirked. "Come on, it'll be fun."

Sara sent him a look before sighing. "I guess so..." she said and walked into the bedroom. Josh turned on the light.

"Turn it off," Sara said. "I want to see what the scene looked like originally."

Josh rolled his eyes. "Scientists..." he muttered and turned off the lights.

Sara smiled. "Thank you." She flicked on her maglite and began combing the ground. "Well..." she said picking a fiber up with her tweezers. "Looks like Ted's been here," she said putting the fiber in a bindle.

"It is his bedroom too," Josh pointed out.

"Yeah, but this fiber is denim, it wouldn't have just fallen off a pair of jeans or a shirt easily. It looks like it was torn. There's a sharp wire sticking out of this chair, and Nancy hid her cookie stash behind the chair. Makes me think it was ripped by the wire."

Josh nodded. "Sounds believeable, but how do you know it's from a pair of Ted's jeans?"

Sara held it up to his nose. "Smell."

Ted took a whiff of it. "What's that smell?"

"Ice cream- cookie dough to be exact. Ted gets his ice cream everywhere."

Josh grinned as Sara continued to scope the area. "Alright...hand me my print powder, please?"

"You don't have a fingerprint lab."

"Just gimme."

He smiled and handed her the plastic container holding the black powder and her brush. "Alright, I'm going to print the cookie jar," she said running the brush over the jar. "And that should give us some prints."

After printing it, she lifted three prints. She grabbed a magnifying glass and looked over each one. "Alright...do me a favor and go get Nancy's fingerprints," Sara said handing him the ink pad and a piece of paper. Josh nodded and walked off. He came back and handed her the paper. "Okay, now for the comparison." She looked at the center swirls of the prints. Two of the prints on the car seemed to be Nancy's, but there was one print that was unknown. Sara stood up smiling. "I know who did this." She walked out of the room and found Ted sitting in the living room watching Top Gun with his ice cream. "Ted, I need to talk to you."

Ted blinked. "What is it?" he asked.

"You stole the last cookie from Nancy's stash."

He blinked again. "That's ridiculous!"

"Really?" she asked with a grin. "Give me your fingerprints and we'll see."

He blinked and looked at the ink pad in front of Sara. "All RIGHT! I ATE THE LAST COOKIE!"

Nancy heard this and stormed into the room. "What? Why?"

He lowered his head. "I was hungry," he shrugged.

Nancy turned to Sara and thanked her before chewing out Ted. Sara walked back into her room and put everything up.

"So, case closed," Sara said pulling off her latex glove.