" I don't know where to start," Greg whispered sadly as his words caught inside his throat. " I mean one second we were all laughing and doing the stuff we usually do and then Bam, everything changes."
Leaning back against the wall, Grissom let out a long shuddering breath, his aching heart wishing he could undo this nightmare and turn things back to the way they were prior to the explosion. If only it could be so simple as turning back the dials of the clock, then he would change the way he acted towards the people he cared about, and in find some way to make up for the misery he had caused so many over the last few months.
" What happened Greg?' he asked softly, the sorrow in his voice causing the young lab tech to turn his eyes towards him hesitantly.
It shook Greg suddenly to realize that the man everyone had come to know as closed off and unemotional, had feelings after all. He was obviously hurting, his blue eyes showing the torrent of raw emotion that was usually kept behind a wall of denial.
" I don't know," he whispered as he leaned his head back against the wall " it's the strangest thing you know? I can remember every detail of what happened this morning when I went home. I can remember what I ate for breakfast but I can't remember what happened back there. I've tried so hard, but I can't." Taking a deep breath, Greg sat forward to bow his head into his hands, trying desperately to hide the wall of tears that hid inside his eyes. " Nick's hurt pretty bad," he whispered ", his leg's been mangled up and he lost a lot of blood. His doctors said that he'll be ok but he won't be walking around for a while."
Grissom drew in a sharp breath as he tried to block the mental image of the hurt and broken bodies of the people he now regarded as family from his mind. " I don't know what to do," he croaked, his tear filled eyes unable to keep the emotion from pooling slowly down his face ", I should have been there."
" To do what?" Greg asked carefully. " You think Sara could cope any better than you are right now?"
" That's just it," he choked, " I'm not coping. Look at me, is this coping?" Sitting forward he swiped angrily at her face to rid the wetness that showed his weakness all to clearly to the outside world. " Sara wouldn't fall apart. She would take charge and organize the chaos."
" I think you really should pay attention Grissom," Greg told him sadly. Sitting up slowly in his seat he turned towards the older man and regarded him carefully. " She's not as strong as you think she is you know."
" I.." he started, his voice dying on his lips as he struggled to keep the soft whimper escaping from his heart. " There's so many things I should have told her, but I didn't know what to say. God…" Grissom's voice broke as a cascade of tears slipped from his eyes, bringing a wave of destruction through his body to leave him that left him broken and torn in the wake of this nightmare.
" It's not too late," Greg sniffed ", you can still tell her."
" She's in a bad way, (.)" he whispered softly, his words catching inside his throat "She's so pale."
" Sara is going to be okay," Greg told him defiantly, his eyes unleashing the emotions that refused to be silenced ", she has too many people who love her to even think about leaving us, so don't you dare give up on her."
" I haven't," Grissom told him brokenly as he turned to face the man beside him, shocked to see that the pain on his face mirrored his own ", I'm sorry Greg, I should have realized, I know how you feel about her."
" S'ok" Greg nodded sadly as he tried to sniff away the remaining remnants of emotions from his eyes, only to have them replaced by another onslaught. " Doesn't matter anyway, it's not like she'd ever be interested in me."
Grissom opened his mouth to answer, but before he could say anything someone called his name from a few feet away. He turned in his seat. His heart aching with a tiny measure of relief when he saw Catherine, Warrick and Lindsey moving towards them.
" How is she?" Catherine asked quickly, gasping back a breath as she came to sit down beside him.
" I don't know," he said softly, his emotions once again riding on a sea of sorrow that wouldn't be silenced no matter how hard he tried to calm the waves that roared up inside him. " They wouldn't let me go with her. Cath, she's so quiet, I've never seen her like that before. What if I lose her?"
" You won't," Catherine whispered as she pulled him into her arms, caressing his body with the comfort he needed to feel right now. " Shhh," she whispered soothingly, her fingers stroking his back as he shook in her arms.
Warrick held onto Lindsey as he fought against his own raging tears that tried desperately to be freed from their restraints, but he held them back for the sake of his friends. One of them had to be strong, and he had elected himself to bear the weight of their pain. There would be a time for tears and sorrow later, when he was alone and in solitude. Clasping Lindsey's hand to his chest, he smiled down towards her, his words motioning Greg to allow the two people beside him to release their emotions in private. " I think Nick could do with some friendly faces right about now. What's say we let your mom handle things here for a while?"
" But I want to see Sara," Lindsey sniffed, her eyes filling with tears as she looked over to Greg for his moral support, but when he stood up to reach a hand out to touch her hair softly she knew she had to be patient. Nodding her head slowly, she wrapped her arms around Warrick's neck, taking his warmth to lull her into some sense of security.
Catherine's eyes met Warricks briefly before he nodded silently, indicating that he would take Lindsey with him so she could turn her attention back to the broken man beside her. His pain broke her heart. She had known Gil Grissom for a very long time, and seen him lose his emotions only once or twice before, but it was nothing compared to what he was feeling now.
" She's gonna be okay," she whispered. " You think she's gonna let you off the hook that easily?" Tightening her arms around him, she held back her own emotions, knowing that if she let the tears flow now, she would never be able to stop their flow. " She adores you Gil, you really think she's gonna leave you behind?"
Her words caused his heart to reign more regrets around his aching body as he slowly started to move away from her arms "I'm scared Cath," he admitted through ragged breaths as he fought to control his raging emotions ", I don't know how I'm going to get through this if she dies…What do I do?"
" She isn't going to die," she told him forcefully, choking back a sob as she spoke. " She promised my little girl that she wouldn't leave her and when was the last time Sara went back on a promise?"
" Never," he sniffed, pulling away from her completely as he brought one of his hands up to wipe his face. " You're right, she's going to be fine. She has to be."
" You love her Gil, that's all she needs to get her through this." Reaching out a hand to his, she entwined her fingers in his to pull him back with her to rest against the wall, as they both silently watched the doors that had taken Sara away from them. Both of them waiting for any sign of movement, as they drew strength from each other.
" She'll be ok," he whispered softly, as he prayed silently to whichever higher power was listening, to spare her life and bring her back to him again. He wished someone would come outside and end the waiting, anything to let them know that their anguish would finally be over. But as every minute ticked by, he slowly started to lose himself into the deep chasm of darkness that threatened to swallow him whole.
Catherine held onto his hand, willing him to find the tiny piece of hope inside him that would end the chaos and allow Sara to return to the family that needed her. She knew deep inside that if they lost her, (then) none of them would ever be able to recover from her loss, especially the man beside her whose heart had been shattered with grief.
"Excuse me?" someone spoke beside them, his blue surgeons gown covered with large smears of blood. " You came in with Miss Sidle?"
" Yes," Grissom gasped, fighting to control his breathing as he sat straighter in his seat " How is she?"
TBC…..
