Title: Wonderful Journey
Author: Jeanine (jeanine@iol.ie)
Rating: PG
Pairing: Sara/Grissom
Spoilers: Based on the spoilers for 4X12 Butterflied - and majorly so. Everything else up to that.
Feedback: Makes my day
Disclaimer: If it was in the show, it's not mine.
Archive: At my site Checkmate () , Fanfiction.net; anywhere else, please ask.
Summary: Sometimes, the longest journey is a circle.
Notes: I'm not a G/S shipper, I'm really not. So if this has been done before and done better, I'll say sorry now. But on reading the spoilers for Butterflied at Under the Bridge (waves at the people who are way tolerant of a W/S shipper lurking there) this just came out. It should probably be deleted forthwith, but oh well. Think of this as me arguing the G/S ship to myself. Title comes from the Richard Marx and Donna Lewis song At the Beginning, which is, frankly, wicked appropriate for the two of them.
***
When she was growing up, Sara's parents never understood her.
She smiles every time that thought comes to her, because after all, every teenager who's ever lived has wailed that particular sentence at varying levels of volume at least once in their life. She's not different in that respect, but she is in the respect that her parents never did understand her.
Her parents, the ex-hippies who ran a B&B in Tomales Bay, a business that, despite being filled to capacity most nights of the year, barely broke even because of her parents' absolute refusal to charge anything other than the bare minimum, because to do anything else would be, in her father's words, "a capitulation to capitalist ethics."
Her parents, who didn't know what to do with their straight-as-an-arrow daughter, the one who got good grades and studied hard and read everything she could get her hands on. The daughter who was more like a parent to them than they were to her, and it wasn't lost on Sara that while it was her brother who was the more troublesome - the problem child who cut school, smoked pot, was abhorred by every father of every teenage girl in town - they found it far easier to deal with him.
Her parents who wanted the best for her, who did love her, just like she loved them. It was just that the three of them never had much common ground to work on.
Despite that, she remembers her childhood as being fairly happy; no major traumas, no disasters touched her. Still, she was happy to leave that place behind, that small town, those people who never understood her, when she was eighteen, happy to go to Harvard, to meet people who thought like her.
That's what she expected, and when she got there, to an extent, that's what she found. People who were interested in science, like she was. People who knew what she was talking about, who cared about classes and discovery and learning. She thrived in that new arena, and not only that, she flourished, because she learned a thing or two herself. She learned that being smart didn't necessarily preclude you from having a social life, she learned to go out, to party, to have a good time. She learned to play the guitar and was known to partake in sing-songs at the end of the night, when she would think of her parents and wonder if the apple really didn't fall far from the tree after all. She went on road trips with gangs of other students, went to Florida for Spring Break and joined the Mile High Club with her Organic Chemistry TA and when she looks back on her college years now, she knows that she had the time of her life.
Just like she knows that while she had friends, that she had boyfriends, there was still no-one in her life that really understood her.
She pushed the thought aside, refused to let it upset her, because, after all, she was happy. She had friends that she could talk to, and plenty of work to do for college, and later for grad school. She had a fulfilled life, she wasn't unhappy. And if the price of fulfilment was misunderstanding, then it was a price she was willing to pay.
Not that she thought it expensive at the time; after all, she didn't miss understand, because she'd never had it.
She didn't miss it until she found it.
She found it by accident, through near-tragedy. Not hers, but that of her friend, her room-mate since freshman year at Harvard, the lively, irrepressible Thea, who for the first semester doggedly dragged Sara out at night, brought her shopping at weekends and helped her re-jig her wardrobe. Thea was her first real friend, probably the best friend she'd ever had, and they'd quickly become inseparable, getting their own off-campus apartment for junior year. That had been the year that Thea had become involved with Gareth, who had pretty soon become their unofficial third room-mate, and if Sara noticed that they rowed frequently and loudly, then she never said anything. Nor had she said anything when she noticed that Thea was becoming withdrawn, that there were times when she seemed almost afraid of Gareth. Sometimes, Sara had been on the point of asking Thea about it, but perhaps seeing something in her eyes, Thea had changed the subject.
She'd gone on changing the subject until the day that Sara walked into their apartment, found the place thrashed and Thea lying beaten on her bed. She'd taken her to the hospital, where the whole story had come out, and she'd stayed there that night, had slept on the chair beside Thea's bed. Thea had told her that she didn't have to, and Sara had lied to her, had told her that she wanted to stay with her. She didn't tell her it was because their apartment was sealed off with crime scene tape, and besides, she didn't want to leave her until she knew that Gareth had been arrested.
She'd spent most of the next few days putting the place back together, cursing the inventor of fingerprint powder loudly as she tried to clean off the fine black dust. It had taken longer to put Thea back together, had taken longer to shake her lingering sense of guilt for not having talked to her, not having been a better friend. Maybe it was that that had her joining Thea when she began to volunteer at a women's helpline, had made her keep going on with the work, even when Thea had stopped.
That had been her first exposure to a crime scene, to any kind of crime, and each case had had something different to intrigue her, something that made her curious. So, with the same dogged persistence that she applied to her studies, she set about learning everything she could, even signing up for extra classes in forensics and criminology, going to seminars on her own time.
It had been at such a seminar that her life changed forever.
It was late summer 1994, a couple of months after the entire country had been transfixed by a white Bronco speeding down an LA freeway, but still a little while before words like DNA and blood spatter and evidence planting had made their way into the American lexicon. She was in grad school, studying theoretical physics, in the middle of a mild crisis of confidence, wondering if lab work was really what she wanted to do for the rest of her life. There was a weekend long criminology seminar in the college, experts coming in from all over the country, and she'd signed herself up for a number of talks and workshops, was really looking forward to it. She'd been disappointed that she couldn't get a place in the talk on DNA analysis, had had to settle for the one on forensic entomology that was on at the same time. She'd barely had a clue what it was going to be about, and when she'd heard that it was about bugs, she'd nearly walked out then and there.
And then Doctor Gil Grissom started speaking.
She took notes in her own particular brand of shorthand, notes she still has, but she's the first to admit that when she looked them over later on, even she couldn't make head nor tail of them. Something to do with the fact that her writing slopes alarmingly all over the page, that there are times when she rather suspects she ended up writing on the desk. She didn't need notes though, could remember every word as if someone had set a tape recorder up in her head.
What she remembers more though, were his eyes, the way they shone as he talked about what was clearly his favourite subject in the world, his intense blue gaze like beacons in the night.
What she remembers most of all though, is knowing, deep down in her heart and soul, knowing without thinking about it, without knowing why, that he would understand her. That finally, she had found a kindred spirit.
Her mother had called her father that, and Sara had always scoffed, rolled her eyes. But it was her mother's belief in that concept, her voice ringing in Sara's ears, that had made her wait outside the lecture hall for him, had made her approach him with her heart in her hands.
"Hi," she'd said simply, and he'd stopped in his tracks, blinking owlishly.
"Hello."
He didn't seem to know what to say, so she got right to the point. "I enjoyed your speech in there."
He smiled, somewhat embarrassed, reached up to adjust his glasses. "I um… may have got carried away."
She smiled too, crossed her arms across her body. "I have some… questions about it. Maybe we could… go for coffee?"
He blinked again, as if seeing her for the first time, and the question seemed to hang in the air between them. Finally, he nodded. "Coffee… sounds good."
One coffee turned to two, which turned to dinner, which lasted until they were the last two in the restaurant and the waiters were turning venomous stares on them, all but ordering them to leave. Grissom had been surprised when Sara pointed that out to him, had been surprised herself, because she hadn't noticed the time passing. There had scarcely been a lapse in conversation, and while it had started out based solely on his talk, it had quickly broadened to encompass all manner of things.
She'd been right about him, and she'd never felt so exhilarated.
She'd met up with him again the next day, had seen him around the conference, and they'd gone out for dinner again that night, the exact same scenario playing out again in a different restaurant. He'd told her that he was going back to Vegas the next day, and they'd exchanged phone numbers and email addresses, and they'd kept in touch ever since.
Mostly, it was via email, maybe a once a week phone call, more if one or other of them had a particularly interesting or perplexing case. He was supportive when she told him that she'd decided on a change of career, that she was applying for a job in the San Francisco crime lab, was fulsome in his praise when she told him that she'd got it. She made it a point of going to his seminars when she could manage it, where he would joke about her being his star pupil, and every once in a while, they ended up at the same conferences. At times like that, it was like they were never apart, like they'd only seen one another days before instead of months. They would go out for dinner, and they would talk and they would close the restaurants down.
Never once did she tell him that she thought she might be falling in love with him.
Never once did she let herself believe that he might feel the same way about her, although there were times when she caught him looking at her and she thought that maybe he did. Then his gaze would drop and when he looked back at her, he would be pure Grissom again.
And she told herself that that would be enough.
She kept on telling herself that, until her phone rang in the wee small hours of the morning. For once, she was asleep, sound asleep, and she didn't relish being woken, not even when she heard Grissom's voice on the other end. She quickly worked out that he wasn't calling for a chat though, because she'd never heard him sound quite so broken, quite so old. He'd told her what had happened, about his rookie CSI and a suspect who returned to the scene, and the CSI who was supposed to be there but who had disappeared to parts unknown. She'd wondered what it was to do with her, if he was just calling her for a shoulder to cry on, but he'd swiftly disabused her of that notion with three simple little words.
"I need you."
When she'd hung up the phone, she'd picked it right back up again, dialling the airlines and booking a flight to Vegas.
She'd arrived at the crime lab on North Trop Boulevard, as per his directions, only to be told that he wasn't there, that he was out at a crime scene. When the receptionist had heard her name, had heard that Grissom was expecting her, she'd told her where to find him, and Sara had only had to follow the crowd, rolling her eyes at the sight of simulation dummies being tossed off a roof. She'd called to him, teased him a little, and for a few brief moments, it was like old times.
Then he'd sighed, told her he had so many unanswered whys, and it was straight back to business.
She did as she was asked, investigated Warrick, clashed with Catherine before making some sort of rapprochement over soda, a beeper and a bling-bling, whatever that was. They'd apprehended the suspect, and with the rest of the team, she'd watched him being taken away in handcuffs. They'd stood in silence, everyone lost in their thoughts, and it had taken Grissom to break them out of it, with the words, "Let's go home."
She hadn't gone home though; home for her was a plane ride away. She'd gone over to him, pointed it out to him, and he'd blinked, looking at his watch. "You've come all this way," he'd told her. "The least I can do is buy you dinner."
That had been the first time that they hadn't closed down the restaurant, but only because it opened twenty four hours a day. It had been different too, because he hadn't been as playful as he normally was, recent events understandably taking their toll. They had talked for hours though, and near the end, he'd made her an offer.
Or almost made her an offer.
His voice had been light, as if it was of no consequence to him whether she said yes or no, at complete odds with the intense look in his eyes. He'd pointed out to her that they were a CSI down, that they were always looking for good people in what was the second best crime lab in the country, that he was supervisor for the time being, and his recommendation would carry weight. He'd talked in circles for a good five minutes before Sara had interrupted him, resting her arms on the table and leaning towards him slightly. "Grissom," she'd said firmly, and he'd blinked, just as he had that first day. "Are you offering me a job?"
He smiled, somewhat embarrassed, reached up to adjust his glasses. "Yes," he'd said simply. "Are you interested?"
She hadn't hesitated. "Yes."
She'd gone back to San Francisco the next day, had spent a week there, handing in her notice, tying up loose ends, spending a day driving up to Tomales Bay to clue her parents in on her new plans. Then she'd flown back to Vegas, started work right off the plane.
It was October 2000, and everything was about to change for her.
And nothing was about to change for her.
In October 2000, she made a joke about trying to be his star pupil, had been smacked down with the comment, "That was a seminar. This is real." She'd tried not to let it show that his words had knocked her on her heels a little, was even more confused later on when he taped her wrists to prove a point, and there had been that look in his eyes, the look she thought that she'd only imagined on so many nights in so many restaurants.
In December 2000, they'd investigated a case that pushed all her buttons, and he'd made a comment about empathy being normal. She'd asked him if he wanted to sleep with her and his shocked, "Did you just say what I think you said?" had almost made her smile.
Almost.
That was just before they sat out all night beside a decomposing pig, the longest uninterrupted quiet time they'd had together in a long time, and just like before, she hadn't noticed the time passing. When the experiment was over, Grissom had learned one important piece of information; that Scott Shelton could indeed have killed his wife.
But Sara had beaten him, two to one.
First, she'd learned that she was now a confirmed vegetarian.
Second, she'd learned that she was definitely in love with Grissom.
She just didn't know how he felt about her, and she decided that she could live with not knowing, that his friendship would be enough for her, until the day that she did know for sure. So she played the consummate professional, even though it was hard when he came to her so concerned about her, trying to get her to see that she needed a life outside the crime lab, hard still when she was talking to him about the justice system failing a victim who was too tough to die. Harder still when she saw him with Doctor Gilbert, saw some connection between them, something that seemed to go deeper than just shared knowledge of sign language.
In May 2001, she offered to act as bait for the Strip Strangler, watched as Grissom railed to Culpepper against the idea. He'd been as passionate about it as she'd ever seen him, ad just for a moment, she'd fancied that it was because he cared about her. Then he'd said that they weren't going to risk his CSI. Not Sara, his CSI, as if theirs was just a work relationship, as if they hadn't known one another for years. She'd wondered then if she'd been wrong about him all that time, if he'd ever understood her, or she him, but that understanding had come later, when the operation failed and he hadn't once said "I told you so."
In October 2001, she celebrated her first year as a CSI in Las Vegas by brushing chalk from his cheek. That's what she told him she was doing, and to be fair, there was chalk there. But something had passed between them, an almost electric charge travelling from his skin to hers, and she'd felt it all the way down to her toes. She'd been the one who left first, afraid he'd see her feelings in her eyes, and if he had, he'd never talked to her about it.
She'd told herself that she'd imagined it, that she'd seen what she'd wanted to see, and a couple of months later, in December, when he gave Warrick shift instead of her, when she'd clashed with him, with Nick and ended up feeling like a fool, she'd wondered what the hell she was doing in this town, in this job. She'd felt the same way a week later, when two women who were guilty of murder got away with it, because either one could raise the other as a viable suspect. Grissom had followed her, talked to her, if throwing out one of life's riddles could be construed as talking.
At that point, she'd been ready to write December off, but the month from hell only got worse while investigating the murder of Donna Marks. If she'd felt empathy for Kaye Shelton, she had no words for what she felt for Donna Marks, because it was like looking into her own life, a woman who lived for her work, who rarely went out, ate takeout food, ordered from catalogues, had no friends. It didn't help when Nick told her that she needed to get out more, but what hurt most was when she sat at Donna Marks's computer, Grissom at her side, and she read that woman's emails. All she could think of was the hours that she'd sat emailing Grissom, how she'd look forward to receiving a reply from him, the smile that she would see reflecting back at her from her computer monitor. "It's easy to wear your heart on your sleeve when you're not looking in his eyes," she'd told him, but it wasn't Donna and her cyber-boyfriend that she was talking about.
That case had been a wake-up call for her, and she'd tried to make a change. She'd gone out with Hank, though they'd just been friends, and the date had come to a fairly abrupt halt. Still though, it was a start, and in the first month of 2002, she thought that maybe things were looking up.
Then in February, Grissom had ordered her to clean up some meat.
It was a small thing, but the small things, in her experience, usually were more explosive than the big ones, and this certainly fit the profile. Because it told her that, despite the sheer number of times they'd eaten together, he'd never noticed her eating habits. He'd never noticed her, never respected her.
She'd turned in a leave of absence form, had demanded that he sign it. She'd seen the surprise in his eyes, knew he had no idea what to say, was prepared to cut him some slack. Until, that is, his words showed the very lack of respect that she'd been railing against. She'd turned to walk out, had been stopped by his voice, by his quiet words, "The lab needs you."
But less than eighteen months ago, he'd been the one who needed her, and if proximity had brought about that change in their relationship, if familiarity didn't breed contempt, but rather apathy, then she didn't want any part of it.
That's when he sent her a plant.
He sent her a plant with a simple card reading, "From Grissom" and nothing else. She took back her request quietly, without fuss, hoping that he'd talk to her about it, but just as when the memory of the touch of his skin was still sending shivers up her spine, he said nothing to her about it.
It didn't surprise her though; at this stage, she'd come to expect it.
She hadn't expected him, when they were sitting side by side in a hockey rink, to start talking about baseball and beauty; or when she asked him since when was he interested in beauty, to reply, "Since I met you," then go back to work as if nothing had happened.
Or, a couple of months later, when she sprayed a car with luminol, to tell her "You do know how to light up a room."
Just like she didn't expect to be ambushed about her feelings for Grissom on the witness stand, to be made feel like some kind of whore who would do anything to please her boss. That had been the same time that people had noticed that she and Hank were spending so much time together, had been convinced that they were seeing one another, despite her denials. She grew accustomed to the knowing smiles, the rolled eyes every time she denied it, but she was telling the truth. She and Hank were, for a long time, just friends, though she knew he wanted more than that. And she did like him, liked him a lot, thought maybe dating him wouldn't be so bad. He was sweet, and kind, and handsome… he just wasn't Grissom.
Though, there were times, like when he called her in on her day off, then got pissed because she couldn't be there at a moment's notice, that she wasn't so sure if that wasn't a good thing. She couldn't figure out what was going through his head, was wondering if she'd ever be able to understand him like she once thought she would. She'd tried to explain that, telling him, "It's just, um ... you tell me to get a life and then I get one, and then you expect me to be there at a moment's notice. It's ... um ... confusing." He'd looked down then, and she'd taken the chance to slip away quietly, afraid that he was going to tell her once again that she deserved to have a life.
She was pretty sure that if he did, she'd tell him that she wanted a life with him, and then where would they be?
So she'd left, and at the start of the next shift, true to form, Grissom hadn't said a thing to her about their last conversation. Nor had he ever mentioned Hank to her again, or said anything to her about getting a life. In fact, their conversations had stayed in the realm of the strictly personal, which rankled somewhat. In all the years they'd known one another, Grissom had never put that much distance between them before. In an effort not to let it get to her, she threw herself into her work, trying not to put too much stock into it when she was able to ream off a list of statistics from a new paper out of Australia, and his response to her offer to get a copy for him had been, "I don't need one. I have you." It was hard though, especially when he'd called her away from a seminar for that case, when he'd greeted her with the same words he'd used to get her to Vegas in the first place. "I need you."
Not the lab. Him.
She'd shaken her head, told herself to forget about it, that it didn't mean anything, and she'd made a conscious effort to get out of the lab more, had thrown herself into her friendship with Hank, a friendship that, over the holiday season, finally moved from friendship to something more, just like Hank had been waiting for.
2003 had started on a good note, waking up for the first time in Hank's arms, and things had stayed good personally, if not professionally, right up to the March day that she was called to a scene and found Hank there, obviously in shock, with a broken wrist, and she'd realised how close she'd come to losing him. She'd realised with a start just how much he'd come to mean to her, which had only made it hurt more when, in the course of the investigation, she'd come to suspect that Elaine Alcott was more than just a friend to Hank, had her suspicions confirmed by Elaine herself.
She'd broken things off straight away, no excuses, no second chances, and when Catherine had offered to take her for a beer, she'd let her. One beer had turned to two, had turned to three or four, and when Sara finally made it to bed, head spinning, trusty glass of water on the bedside locker, sleep had been banished by one of those realisations that only comes to mind when one is happily blitzed.
Hank, skank as he was, had waited patiently for her to decide when to take the relationship further, admiring her from afar as he masqueraded as her friend.
She'd done the same thing with Grissom.
Then she'd started dating Hank, only to find out he had a girlfriend.
Was this, she wondered, how Grissom had felt when he'd found out that she was dating Hank? Would that account for his odd behaviour over the past few months?
And if it did, what did that mean about his feelings for her?
She considered calling him, a momentary flash of sobriety telling her that that would be a bad idea. She rolled over instead, closed her eyes and fell into a restless sleep, resolving to talk to Grissom about it when she got the chance.
She didn't though. She put it off and put it off, until one day, she was sitting, eating her lunch and she saw him walking through the halls. She would never be able to explain her next action, but she distinctly remembers feeling something snap inside her, hearing a little voice inside her head saying firmly, "If you don't do it now, you never will." She stood, followed him, intending to catch him on his own, to talk to him, but there was always someone trying to catch his attention, so she gave it up as a bad job, made to return to her sandwich.
Then the world blew up around her and she was flying through the air, and she has a hazy memory of flames and alarms screaming, and a voice screaming that sounds like her own, but the next clear memory she has is of sitting on the sidewalk with Grissom holding her hand. He dispatched her off to get treatment, and she returned to work as soon as she could, not wanting to be home alone with her thoughts. For once though, work hadn't really helped, with large amounts of the day passing as if she was walking through quicksand, and it had only been at the end of the shift, when clarity had been somewhat restored, that she remembered his words to her.
"Honey, this doesn't look good."
It hadn't been a big thing, there had been no production, no fuss. But Sara knew it was the little things that mattered more. That, and a return of the voice that she'd heard earlier on that day brought her to his office door, with her heart in her hands, made her ask him out to dinner.
He'd turned her down, but in a way that left her hopeful. "Sara… I don't know what to do about this."
She hadn't had to pause for thought. "I do. You know, by the time you figure it out, it really could be too late."
Because they'd known each other for nine years, and she'd either been nursing a crush, or been in love with him, for most of that time. Because she'd nearly died that day, and she was so damn tired of waiting for her life to begin, of wanting to be with the one person that she knew would understand her.
But he said nothing, and she walked away, just like she had a few months previous.
And, just like all the other times, he said nothing to her about it when next she saw him.
They never spoke about it, but it was there between them all the time, because now there was no excuse. Now her feelings were out there, and all he had to do was act on them, if he wanted to. But he never did, was perfectly Grissom, save for those few moments, most notably a couple of months ago when they were standing in front of a bloody sheet, his arms on her wrists, him pinning her down. He was so close that she could feel each breath he took, and the sensation of his hands on hers had the same effect as her hand on his cheek had two years earlier, multiplied by about a million times. He was looking right into her eyes, and it would have been the easiest thing in the world for either one of them to have leaned in, to close any distance between them, for them to be kissing.
Which is why she walked away when she did, not only afraid that he would see her feelings in her eyes, but because she knew that she wasn't strong enough to resist temptation a second longer.
Nor was she strong enough to see the look in his eyes if he walked away from her.
And she's not strong now, as she stands in the observation room, looks at him interrogating a suspect, listens to the words that he says.
This case that they're working on has freaked a lot of people out, which is unusual when you consider that they deal with people on the worst day of their lives every day. But this is different; this time, the victim bore a striking resemblance to someone they knew, to her in fact. Everyone knows about it, even those who aren't working the case, and everyone has noticed how Grissom is handling it, or rather, that he's not.
Sara's noticed it too, and she wondered what it meant.
She's getting her answer now.
Because he's in there, and he's talking about falling in love with a woman who's a free spirit, who excites him, who looks up to him. About a man who can't find the courage to tell her how he feels, because he's afraid that he's too old, because he's afraid that she's too young, because he's never experienced life.
Sara's on her own in the observation room, and she's very glad of that, because it's clear that Grissom's not talking about suspect and victim any more.
He's talking about the two of them, and if she'd dreamed of him confessing his feelings to her, she couldn't have dreamed a more eloquent speech than this. She's rooted to the spot, unable to move, even when all hell breaks loose there, even when Grissom stands right in front of her, looking right at her but not seeing her.
She doesn't move until he moves to exit the interrogation room, then her feet act of their own accord, stopping only when she's right in front of him.
"Hi," she says simply, and he stops in his tracks, blinking owlishly, as if she's the last person he expected to see there. Which she supposes she is.
"Hello."
He's utterly at sea, doesn't seem to know what to say, so she gets right to the point. "I enjoyed your speech in there."
He's obviously taken aback, not having known that she was there, but he seems to be suffering from the same affliction that blighted her in the interrogation room, a complete inability to move. She smiles, hoping to ease the moment, and he smiles too, somewhat embarrassed, reaching up to adjust his glasses. "I um… may have got carried away."
She tilts her head, crosses her arms across her body. "I have some… questions about it. Maybe we could… go for coffee?"
She knows that they've been here before, and she sees him blink as the realisation strikes him too. He narrows his eyes, looks her up and down as if he's seeing her for the first time, and all the while Sara holds her breath as her question hangs in the air between them. Finally, he nods, speaks slowly. "Coffee… sounds good."
Sara feels a broad smile breaking over her face, lets it through for a second, then with considerable effort pushes it back. Inclining her head towards the door in wordless invitation, she takes a step, not the least bit surprised when he falls into step beside her in perfect understanding.
It's taken almost ten years for them to come full circle, and Sara can't wait to see what happens next.