Some of the characters and situations in this story belong to Alliance Atlantis, CBS, Anthony Zuicker and other entities, and I do not have permission to borrow them. Others strongly resemble characters that sort of belong to ABC, though I seriously doubt anyone cares at this point. The rest belong to me, and if you want to play with them, you have to ask me first. No infringement is intended in any way, and this story is not for profit. Any errors are mine, all mine, no you can't have any.
Spoilers: general fifth season through "Unbearable"
Note: this is a sequel to "Rollercoaster", which really should be read first. It is an AU futurefic that includes a number of original characters.
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Dawn teased her awake. Sara blinked at the early light coming in the unshaded window, and stretched carefully, aware of Grissom asleep next to her.
She shivered pleasurably under the warmth of the blankets; she didn't usually sleep nude, but drowsiness had overtaken them both after their overdue reunion, and she had been too tired--and too unwilling to leave the absolute comfort of Grissom--to dig through her suitcase or his closet for something to wear.
Sara rolled over to look at him. Grissom tended to either wrap himself around her or sleep sprawled, which she thought was an interesting contrast for someone so self-contained when awake. This morning he was spread out over more than half the bed, one arm up over his head and the other where her head had been. Stubble was coming in on his cheeks above his beard, and he was snoring very quietly.
Her heart swelled, and she almost kissed him awake, morning breath not withstanding. But he still had shadows under his eyes, and she herself was hungry and dying for a shower.
So Sara slipped out of the big bed, stretching again and appreciating the mattress more and more--her back didn't ache. The carpet underfoot was a light grey-blue, and wonderfully thick; she dug her toes into it appreciatively and looked around, prodding her memory awake.
Grissom's robe was right where she remembered seeing it, hung on the inside of the bathroom door. She wrapped it around her, enjoying the smell of him rising from the terrycloth, and belted it tightly to keep its folds under control before venturing out of the bedroom.
Despite Grissom's tour the night before, Sara still felt like a guest as she walked into the big main room, but she figured it was only natural. It was Grissom's space, after all, and it would take time and patience on both their parts to make it their space.
But, as she stood and looked around, the realization that not only was she welcome in Grissom's home, but she actually lived there now, made her shiver again, with a sort of half-frightened delight.
Gil's house. Our house. Our...home.
His coffee machine was top-of-the-line; it took Sara a few minutes to figure out how to circumvent its programing and start a pot. It was apparently set to brew in the late afternoon, which made sense given Grissom's schedule; the only reason Sara figured he was still asleep, after sleeping through half of his regular shift, was that he was still tired from getting Rosalie settled. His face had been more drawn than she liked when she'd first seen him the night before, but Sara hadn't said anything; there were more important things to discuss at the time.
Now she pressed the button to start the machine and went to fetch her suitcase, feeling determined. It's about time for him to take better care of himself. He needs someone to keep an eye on him.
It wasn't until she was halfway down the hall, arms full of clothes and toiletries, that she realized fully that it would be she who would watch over him. Shaking her head in bemused delight, Sara went to clean up.
Grissom's bath was quite big enough for two, which Sara approved of, but she just took a quick shower, finding fresh towels in the linen closet and room to put her shampoo bottle next to his. The room was spacious, its fan quiet; there was an empty towel rack next to a full one, and Sara hung the towel she'd used on that, then took a closer look. What she saw made her bite her lip in a sudden, absurd surge of pleasure.
Unlike the full one next to it, the empty rack was newly installed, a tiny smear of plaster dust showing that the screws had been put in only recently. He set this up for me.
The sun had more than cleared the horizon by the time Sara returned to the kitchen, barefoot but clothed. She'd combed out her hair but hadn't dried it, not wanting to wake Grissom with the whir of a hair dryer, and the townhouse was just warm enough that she wasn't getting chilly.
The coffee was ready; Sara took a mug from the dish drainer poured herself a cup, and found not only cream in the refrigerator but a variety of other things that showed that Grissom had been preparing for her there too. Either that, or he's discovered a sudden passion for bean sprouts.
I don't think so.
Sara doctored her coffee and put the cream away, unable to suppress a wondering smile. Everywhere she turned, it seemed, there was more evidence that Grissom wanted her in his space. And while she didn't doubt that he did want her, it was tremendously reassuring to see that he'd thought about it.
The big sliding door to the backyard drew Sara's eye as she sipped her drink; Grissom had omitted it the night before, when it was just a square of blackened glass, but now Sara walked over to look out at the dawn-lit world. Grissom's back yard was small and fenced, no doubt the same measly allotment that the other townhouses in his complex had, but it was as neat as his pocket-sized front lawn and much more suited to the climate. There was some grass, but most of it was xeriscaped, with what looked like a simple rock garden, and there was a large shed against the back right corner. On impulse, she flipped the latch on the door and slid it open.
An ear-splitting siren assaulted her ears. Startled, Sara nearly dropped her coffee, and yanked the door closed, but the noise didn't let up. Damn! I didn't know he had the place alarmed--
She looked frantically around for a keypad, finding it at last half-hidden by the drawn curtain, but the display demanded a code. Sara swore under her breath. I have no idea--
Before she could panic further, an arm reached past her and punched five numbers into the keypad. The noise shut off abruptly, and thick silence rushed in to fill the space.
Sara stared down at her mug, feeling her cheeks hot with embarrassment. Waking Grissom out of a sound sleep because she'd been too careless to check for an alarm system was hardly an auspicious beginning to their life together.
"Sara--" Grissom started behind her, his voice rough with sleep, and she lifted her chin and turned.
"I'm sorry," she said, overriding whatever he'd been about to say. "That was stupid of me. I should have known you would have an alarm system."
Grissom was rumpled and adorable, wearing nothing but yesterday's pair of slacks, his eyes still narrow with sleep. He ran a hand over his beard, blinking. "Sara, I didn't even mention it, how were you supposed to know?"
She opened her mouth, and then realized that she didn't have a good answer. If there were a keypad next to his front door, Grissom hadn't touched it when he'd let them in last night.
"I'm the one who should be apologizing," he went on, his expression rueful. "I should have told you about it as soon as we got home. But using the remote on my keychain is so automatic I don't even think about it any more."
Sara shook her head, pursing her lips in a small smile. "Well. Want to start over?"
Grissom looked confused. "Sorry?"
Sara set her mug down on the counter nearby, then put her hands on his bare shoulders and pulled him into a warm kiss. A second of resistance on his part melted, and she felt his own hands land on her hips, then slide around to the small of her back. "Good morning," she murmured when their lips parted.
Grissom expression was a little dazed...but very pleased. "A very good morning to you, Ms. Sidle." He raised a brow. "I see you found the coffee."
Sara wasn't sure if sight was quite the sense involved, but she didn't argue. "It wasn't hard." She stepped out of Grissom's arms and picked up her mug again, offering it to him, and he took a swallow before handing it back. "I was just going to look around outside."
Grissom pulled the door open, letting in the cool sweet air of early morning. "The code is 28635," he said, stepping out onto the small patio and holding out a hand to Sara. "I'll order you a remote today."
Sara stepped down to join him. The cement was chilly and slightly rough beneath her feet, and she breathed deeply of the Nevada air, enjoying the familiarity of it. Grissom's patio held one rather battered, sturdy lawn chair and a small table; Sara realized that he probably had an excellent view of sunsets from that angle.
"The shed is mostly for insects," Grissom added, stuffing his hands in his pockets. "I've started a new set of racing roaches."
Sara took a closer look at the small building and realized that it had an air-conditioning unit on one side. "You don't keep them in the house?"
Grissom shrugged. "The tarantulas, yes, when I have them, but not crickets or cockroaches. The latter smell, and the former tend to...escape." One corner of his mouth turned up. "Out here, the native wildlife finishes them off in short order. If they escape in the house, I have to listen to them singing between the walls for a month."
Sara snickered at the image, and took another sip of coffee. "You should go back to sleep," she told him. "I know you're still tired, and you have to work tonight."
Grissom shook his head. "I have tonight off," he countered, and took one hand out of his pocket to stroke a tendril of damp hair away from her forehead. The tender, familiar touch made her breath catch. "I just want to spend the day with you."
x
Grissom found himself smiling at odd moments throughout the day, without conscious thought behind the expressions. It was a wonderful feeling to see his fantasy unfolding before his eyes.
He'd had the pleasure of making Sara breakfast, something he'd often envisioned without hope of actually seeing it come true, and then they had begun bringing in boxes from the garage and unpacking them. Her clothes were swiftly dealt with, now all hanging neatly in the closet or folded into the drawers of the small antique dresser she'd picked up in San Francisco. It didn't match Grissom's own larger, blockier dresser, but somehow it managed to harmonize with the room nonetheless.
Her little writing desk and the boxes of books went into the empty room for the moment; the carved wooden screen fit naturally into one corner of the living room; and at Grissom's urging Sara consented to hang a couple of her framed photographs, though she said firmly that the rest could wait until she was more settled in.
"What happened to your round lamp?" he asked as they stacked more boxes in the empty room's closet. "I didn't see it."
Sara's mouth twisted. "Joey," she said without rancor. "He was four years old and wanted to see how it was put together."
He grimaced in amused sympathy. "Ouch."
She shrugged, and bent to shove a box into place. "It was starting to fall apart anyway; those wicker things were nice, but they didn't last that long." She straightened and redid her ponytail, a move that made her shirt ride up, and Grissom found his attention momentarily riveted on her bellybutton. "I picked up the whole set at a yard sale during college, they were a pretty good bargain."
She snickered and stepped out of the closet. "I was lucky my roommate didn't make off with them, but then she had this huge monstrosity of a lamp made out of wrought iron and stained glass…"
Grissom set down his box and tried to picture Sara in college--a Sara younger, more carefree, haphazardly furnishing a dorm room with a friend with different tastes. "Do you have any photos?" he asked suddenly.
Sara looked at him quizzically, but to his fascination a faint pink appeared on her cheeks. "You want to see my college pictures?"
He gave her his best grin. "I'd love to see any photos of you at all, but yes."
She pursed her lips, obviously thinking, then shrugged again. "Why not?"
Sara led him back to the garage; most of the remaining boxes, she had declared, could go in his storage unit, as they contained nothing she needed to have immediately on hand. But she sliced open the tape on one and fished in it for a moment, finally coming up with a rather battered shoebox that she handed over her shoulder to Grissom. "There you go."
He lifted the lid; it contained a jumble of photographs in no discernible order, some with pinholes in the corners. "We need better light," he said.
Sara rolled her eyes. "Don't tell me--you want commentary."
Grissom simply looked at her, letting his amusement show, and after a moment she gave in. "Okay, okay."
They ended up on the couch, Sara lifting the photos out one by one and sometimes flipping them over to see if they had anything written on the back. "Kaye and Rica and Eileen," she explained, handing Grissom one of herself and three other young women, arms around each other and laughing at the camera. "We were so much trouble, freshman year."
Looking at the intelligence sparkling in the mischievous faces, Grissom could well believe it.
Sara went through the whole box, skipping doubles and the occasional mistake shot, and Grissom got his glimpse of Sara almost twenty years in the past--a curly-headed girl-woman even thinner than she was in the present, with a smile that was sometimes nervous, and often with a book in her hand. He got the feeling that while she had enjoyed college, and had found a congenial group of friends, she had still spent a large part of that time alone--only partly by choice.
When she was finished, the box was empty and the coffee table in front of the couch was covered with neat piles, pictures sorted by subject or event. Sara lifted one to put it away, but Grissom laid a hand on her wrist. "I think I have an empty album somewhere."
"Gil--" she protested, but he cocked his head.
"Don't you think Kimmy and Joseph would like to see them?"
She huffed, but set the photos back down. "Maybe. After a little judicious editing."
"Oh, come on," he teased. "Don't you think they should see the one of you asleep at your desk?"
"And drooling? They'd never let me live that one down." Sara snickered, and tossed a blurred photo into the box.
"I didn't see any boyfriends in there," Grissom commented, trying to keep it casual. It wasn't that he was jealous--this was far in Sara's past, after all--but he couldn't help remembering the TA she'd mentioned years before.
"That's because I tore up those afterwards," Sara replied tartly. "I never was any good at relationships, and it showed."
"Sara--" he started, reacting to the hint of old pain even though he had no idea what he was going to say, but she shook her head, and took his hands in hers, looking down at his fingers and lightly rubbing her thumbs over them.
"Gil, either I screwed up my relationships or they screwed me over. It hurt every time. But at this point I still wouldn't go back and change any of them, because their failures got me here."
Sara's tone was matter-of-fact, but her hands were trembling very slightly, and Grissom swallowed hard. After all I've put her through, all the years of denial--
She squeezed his fingers gently. "Sometimes the last really is the best."
"And when you've found what you want, you stop looking." His voice was hoarse, but Grissom didn't care. He curled his fingers around Sara's and lifted them to his face, kissing the fingertips with reverence. "I love you."
She made a sound that was partway between a laugh and a sob, and leaned forward until their mouths met.
x
His heartbeat under her ear was deeply comforting. Sara lay in Grissom's arms, reflecting that it was a good thing that he had replaced the loveseat with something larger and softer; it had just enough room. She shivered slightly, ebbing pleasure still tingling along her nerves, and Grissom stirred.
"Are you cold?" he asked, his voice drowsy; Sara shook her head, and his hand ghosted over her hair before resuming his hug.
The photos had brought back memories. Old friends, teachers, events passed by Sara's inner eye, their accompanying emotions mostly faded to an overall sense of nostalgia. The people she'd studied with, the professors she'd admired, the boyfriend who'd used her and the one who had eventually bored her…they belonged to another time.
That's how the mind works, thank God. More recent years were sharper, with some memories carefully preserved--her first day on the job in San Francisco, verbally defeating a particularly annoying defense attorney in court, Ed's wedding, the wry smile on Grissom's face when she'd found him dropping dummies off a roof…
Sara blinked, feeling Grissom's chest rise and fall under her own. Their relationship stretched back over more than a decade, and so much of it had been painful in one way or another. But the last eight months had worked an alchemy, transmuting the hurt into something gentler; the long ache had eased, leaving her able to forgive him and accept the belated gift of his heart.
I hope I'm up to this. I don't want to screw this one up.
But the worry was weaker than it had been. Grissom was committed--the very fact that she was lying in his arms, in his house, was proof enough. And I'm not the person I was even five years ago.
Her thoughts were diverted as Grissom's stomach rumbled. She couldn't help grinning, and he chuckled, shifting under her. "Sorry."
Sara sat up, snagging her shirt from the back of the couch and pulling it on. "I guess it's lunchtime."
Grissom made them grilled cheese sandwiches, and they finished sorting through Sara's stuff, deciding the last of what would stay and what would go into storage. They were loading boxes into the Mercedes' trunk when a familiar amusement-laced voice made them both look up.
"Hey, I may have been off last night, but does that mean I don't rate a phone call?"
Sara blinked at the man standing on the edge of Grissom's tiny front lawn, and let her grin take over before she ran five steps to hug him soundly. Brass, unusually casual in jeans and a polo shirt, returned the hug, almost lifting her off her feet and laughing in her ear. "Hey, hey, take it easy--I'm an old man here!"
Sara scoffed as she let him go. It had been Brass who had dropped her off at the airport when she'd left Las Vegas, his silent understanding far more bearable than her other friends' regret, and she was delighted to see him again. "Oh please. I was going to call you, I just figured you were still asleep."
He snorted, and looped his arm through hers, walking the few steps to where Grissom leaned against the car. "Are you kidding? The minute I set foot in the lab this morning, Sanders was breathing down my neck to tell me you're back. What did you do, force-feed him sugar on the way in from the airport?"
Sara snickered at the thought. Brass was smiling at his old friend, looking knowing; Grissom merely gave him a tolerant look in return. "Greg's enthusiasm doesn't require a chemical boost." He glanced over at Sara and lifted his brows. The old synchronicity was firmly in place; she knew exactly what he was asking, and nodded.
Grissom looked back to Brass. "We're about to drop some stuff off at the storage unit, Jim, but would you like to join us for dinner afterwards?"
The police captain grinned back. "Don't have to ask me twice."
He followed them to the self-storage unit in his own car and helped them move the boxes inside before taking control of the evening and insisting on a quiet Italian restaurant some distance from the strip. "Now," he ordered, when they had decided on their choices and had drinks in their hands. "Details."
Sara traded an amused glance with Grissom, and complied.
They were halfway through dinner by the time they had finished filling Brass in. He was silent a moment, apparently savoring a sip of the wine they'd ordered, then set down his glass. "You, my friend--" he pointed at Grissom. "--Are luckier than any SOB deserves."
"I know," Grissom answered simply. Sara slid her hand over his where it rested on the table, and he turned it so that their fingers could mesh. Brass smiled at the sight.
"Good. You've been taking good care of him, Sara." He leaned back in his chair. "But does this mean no more Thursday morning poker at your place, Gil?"
Sara burst out laughing at his smirk, and Grissom rolled his eyes.
The talk turned to recent cases and the difficulty of dealing with neophytes in both branches of law enforcement, and they chatted easily through dessert and coffee. Grissom won the fight over the check, and finally Brass glanced at his watch. "I hate to break up the party, but I need to go home and change clothes before work. You'll be in tomorrow night, Gil?"
"Unless something unusual comes up before then, yes."
Brass grunted as he stood up. "Let's hope there's no collection of left feet in tackle boxes tonight, then." Sara shot him a disbelieving look, and he smirked. "Oh yeah. Get him to tell you about that one, doll. I'm still wondering what the guy did with the rights."
He leaned over and brushed a kiss on her forehead. "Glad you're back, Sara. You've got more guts than anyone I know." And he was gone.
Sara shook her head. "He doesn't change," she commented softly, and Grissom nodded.
"He's a remarkable man." He squeezed her hand lightly. "Want to go for a walk?"
They wandered for a while through the quiet streets near the restaurant, hand in hand, just enjoying the cooling air and the time spent together. Sara reflected with some amusement that normally spending an entire day with someone else would leave her yearning for a little solitude, but being with Grissom seemed to circumvent that urge. I'm sure we'll want some time alone eventually. But for now--
"Are you glad to be back?" she asked him at last.
Grissom tilted his head. "I am," he said thoughtfully. "I've always enjoyed my work here. It's a fascinating city." He pulled her arm through his. "What about you?"
"Ask me in a week," she teased him, and he laughed.
Eventually they wove their way back to his car, and Grissom opened the passenger door for her, leaning down as she settled into the seat.
"Ready to go home?" he asked softly.
Sara smiled, and lifted a hand to his cheek. "Oh yeah."
See Chapter 30
