Chapter 25
At the same time Sara was being interrogated by Archie, Grissom was carrying on an intense conversation with Fluffy the spider. "I will never understand women, Fluffy. One minute they're smiling, the next minute they want to devour you as you mate . . . er, date." He blinked. Perhaps he needed a vacation - he was starting to confuse Sara with a tarantula. Not a good idea, he'd be digging his hole that much deeper if he ever let that slip to her!
Grissom heaved a sigh. He'd made a good show of being angry with Sara for a few minutes, but the truth was that he was afraid he had, indeed, done something wrong. Grissom knew his people skills were lacking, and even more so when it came to his skills at close relationships or, dare he think it, romance. The last time he'd tried to be romantic he'd ended up being left by the woman in the middle of a swanky restaurant. But this was different; this was Sara. Screwing up was just not allowed.
Sara, he knew, was almost as bad with people as he was. But she was also idealistic, a characteristic which he had lost – if he ever had it – sometime during his stint as a coroner. She wanted romance, he supposed. Could one take romance lessons? Probably not, unless he wanted to ask Catherine for help, which he would rather cut off an arm than do.
Maybe he should just . . . ask Sara. He could come clean to her about his lack of skill; the Sara he knew would be sympathetic and probably offer to "tutor" him. Which, come to think of it, wouldn't be an unpleasant experience.
There was a knock on the door. Oh no, not Catherine to bother him again – he'd barely managed to come up with some fake story to get her off his back a few hours ago. "Come in," he growled.
Sara's head peeped through the doorway. "Well you sound like you're feeling about as genial as I am tonight. Can I come in?" He nodded, and she stepped quietly into the room, eyes hooded. Grissom motioned her to a chair, but Sara continued across the office and leaned against the corner of his desk, less than two feet from him.
"I um . . . can I ask you something?" God, she hated when her voice sounded all tentative and shaky like this. Well, she might as well spit it out.
Before she could speak, Grissom held up his hand. "In a minute, Sara. First I have, uh, something to tell you." Any delay was welcome, Sara decided, hitching herself up to sit on the corner of the desk. She waited for him to speak.
"I just wanted to let you know that I, uh . . ." Grissom nervously began to clean his glasses. "That I'm not good at this romance stuff. I know we both said before 'I'm not good at this,' but I mean I'm really not good at this. I don't know how to be . . . romantic. Or even affectionate, really. So I, um, just wanted to apologize for what I said to you earlier, if it upset you. Please just take me with a grain of salt – I'd never say or do anything to purposely hurt you."
That had been entirely too easy. Sara wasn't sure how to respond to such an admission. "That's, um, ok, Gris. I mean, I know you're not good at this – I do happen to be skilled in the art of deduction, and you've given me enough evidence to draw that particular conclusion." Grissom's shoulders dropped in relief, but tensed again when Sara continued. "But what I wanted to ask you was what you were talking to Catherine about earlier. I mean, not that I was listening or anything," she added quickly, "but I kinda couldn't help hearing her voice – it's rather loud – asking you about us. And then it, uh . . . it sounded like you told her about what happened today."
Grissom chuckled. "Ah, my little detective, this is what comes from skulking around corners and eavesdropping. Certainly I told Catherine 'what happened between us'." Sara's jaw dropped. He really had done it! Grissom quickly cupped a hand over Sara's mouth, which was surely preparing to blast him. "But what I told her wasn't the truth. Did you really think I'd talk about my private life with anyone but you, the person involved in it?" He looked at her in surprise. "You did! Sara, we can't build a . . . um, we can't build anything unless we trust each other."
Sara peeled his hand off her mouth, then held it, rubbing the back lightly. "I do trust you, Gris. Honestly, I do. But I know how close you are with Catherine, and I just didn't – don't – know how much you feel you can share with her."
She didn't trust him. Or, at least, she wasn't sure of him. "Sara, please. Catherine is my friend, and I feel comfortable talking to her about most things. But you . . . you're Sara, and you're . . . I don't know. You're just Sara." He'd wanted to say she was a hundred times more important to him than Catherine was, but he wasn't sure how Sara would react. Or how he would react to saying those words out loud. "I want you to feel that you can always trust me, even if we're having a knock-down, drag-out fight. Fighting is just what people do, Sara, and it won't affect how I see you."
That was probably the longest speech Sara had ever heard Grissom make, other than his high-volume rant earlier in the day. She was starting to think that the intensity of his emotion was proportional to the length of his sentences. "I know that, Gil. It's just going to take time, I guess. I don't know about you, but there just aren't that many people I trust, and I get jumpy when I think I might be losing one of the few I do." She shrugged, hoping he'd understand.
"I do, Sara," Grissom whispered as he hugged her gently. "You can always trust me, I promise." He kissed the top of her bowed head.
Archie walked past Grissom's open blinds and smiled.
