Another night, another case. Tonight it was a car accident. A blue minivan was swerving around the road and plowed into another car. The driver of the minivan was dead, as was the driver of the other car. The only survivor was the passenger of the car that the van hit. This would not normally bring in the lead CSI, but the driver of the minivan did not die from the accident. He died from a gunshot to the neck, which had come straight through the passenger side window and went out the driver side. Their job was to figure out who shot him, and why. Warrick and Nick were each walking one side of the road, looking for evidence of the shooter. Sara was talking to the lone survivor who was amazingly barely scratched despite the accident. And Grissom was examining the cars, looking for anything that might give him a clue. The shot looked clean, a straight through and through. There was nothing in either of the cars that was jumping out at him. He stood up and stretched and looked out at the rest of his team. Nick and Warrick were quite a ways down the road, apparently not having found anything yet. Sara was still with the woman that survived the accident, who was sitting in the back of an ambulance. Sara looked oddly uncomfortable. He knew she disliked dealing with people almost as much as he did. Catherine was usually the people person of the night shift, but she was home with Lindsey who had the flu. He wondered what Sara was thinking. That would be an interesting superpower, mind reading. It would make people watching even more interesting.
****
Sara walked over to the woman sitting in the back of the ambulance. She was wrapped in a blanket and crying silently. Her face was streaked with tears, but she wasn't making a sound.
"Hi, my name is Sara Sidle, and I work with the Las Vegas crime lab, could I ask you a few questions?"
The woman looked up with a vacant look in her eyes. "Yes."
"Can you tell me what you remember about the accident?"
"I can't believe he is gone."
"I know this must be hard for you, I'm sorry for your loss. I can only imagine what it must be like to lose your husband."
The woman looked slightly startled at the sound of the word 'husband.'
"He wasn't my husband, we worked together. We were good friends once, and almost something more, but we never managed to get it together in time, and now all of our chances are gone."
Sara shifted her weight to the other foot, feeling more than a little uncomfortable at the woman's description of her relationship with the driver of the car. It all sounded a little to familiar for her.
"Do you remember the accident?" she asked, changing the subject.
The woman shook her head. "Not much. I remember seeing headlights swerving, and I remember hearing myself scream, and the crunch of metal, and then nothing. The paramedics said that I was conscious the entire time, but I don't remember anything anyway."
"That's normal. Sometimes trauma makes our mind block out things that we don't want to remember. Will you call us if you are able to remember anything later?" asked Sara, handing the woman her card. The woman took the card, but continued staring at the wreck that was her car.
"I wish I could forget my mistakes. I wish I could go back in time and change things. I wish we weren't so afraid to be together. I wish we had another chance," the woman said listlessly, more to herself than to Sara.
Sara walked away from the woman and into the dark on the side of the road. This was too much. Life was too short for regrets. This woman had completely lost her chance to be with the man that she loved. Sara wondered if she too had lost her chance, or if there could still be a new beginning for them. She looked up at the stars in the sky and remembered her wish that she had made earlier in the week. She wondered if wishes on stars really did come true.
The sound of a snapping twig behind her made her turn around. It was Grissom.
"I didn't mean to scare you," he said apologetically.
"You didn't, I was just thinking."
"About what?"
"About life, regrets, second chances and new beginnings…" She looked up at Grissom who was now standing beside her, looking up to the sky himself. She wondered what he was thinking about.
"Sara," he said. But just then Nick walked up behind them.
"Grissom, I got something I want you to look at," he said.
"Ok, I'll be right there," he said to Nick. Then he turned to Sara and added quietly, "I'll talk to you later," as he put his hand on her arm and gave it a small squeeze.
As he walked away Sara looked back up at the sky and smiled. Could this be the new beginning that she had wished for?