Give me the moonlight

It's two am. A time that would find most people safely tucked up under their sheets, sleeping soundly, maybe even dreaming a little. The bedroom is bathed in light only from a distant moon shining brightly in a cloudless sky. The air is still, broken only by the sound far off of a ticking clock. Two walls are taken up by large bookcases, sagging under the weight of the many books, journals collected over the years. The only other real piece of furniture is the large bed, currently unattended, the sheets pulled tight, comforter neatly folded at the foot, like it hadn't even been used that night. Sara is aware of the time. Aware that she should be in bed, getting some sleep. She has a busy day ahead of her. Meetings to attend, a date with the library. But even if rationally she was aware of the need for sleep, she also knew she wouldn't get any. Not yet, anyway. Too many years of graveyard shift, too much sleeping during the day, working the night, to break the habit now.

She is sitting on the window chair, staring out with unseeing eyes at a world that has long since given up on the day, fallen into a silent, still wait for the new day to bloom.

She knew it was a show. That out in the city, life carried on independently of what time it was. Here in the country, life stopped, only to start again with the rising of the new sun.

Her thoughts have been drifting for most of the evening. A discarded paperback her failed attempt to stop the thoughts. It wasn't a good book. Or at least, the first chapter had failed to capture her attention.

During the day it was easier. During the day she had plans, and deadlines, and work, and meetings. It was at night that her good intentions came crashing down. In the stillness of the empty house, her thoughts would turn to the forbidden, to him. And once latched there, it was harder to rescue a bone from a dog than to stop the thoughts going round her head.

It had been six months. A long six months, but then when Sara looked back, she couldn't believe that it had been six months. Six months since she'd left the original Sin City to escape here.

She missed a lot of things about her life there. Being surrounded by light, and energy, and noise. The friends she had made, the life she had carved out for herself. Working all hours and coming home to collapse in bed.

There she hadn't sat and wallowed for hours. Even in the first few months when she felt so alone in a city where she knew just one person. She'd survived, she'd adapted. Mainly by throwing herself into work. Never being at home, never having to deal with being alone. Gradually over time there had been friends, acquaintances. There had even been a boyfriend that she wouldn't refer to as a boyfriend.

Times were different now. She didn't have that kind of work to throw herself into now for one thing. Not the all consuming, day in day out way she had as a CSI.

She was still a CSI, just not in the same way, not working the same way. She couldn't. She had burned out, that much was obvious. One victim too far, one life crushed too many. She couldn't do the job anymore, and that had been obvious for a while.

She was happier in some ways here. She wasn't constantly living on edge, constantly looking over her shoulder in a paranoid state, constantly living in a state of exhaustion. She was eating properly, sometimes even sleeping properly. Her health, which she had neglected for so long was so much better for the change. If only the same could be said of her heart. She enjoyed the current work she was doing, but it wasn't the same, she didn't think she'd ever find something that fit her so right as being an active CSI had done.

It had been a choice. At the time, it had seemed the only solution. One victim too many let down by an inadequate justice system that she was supposed to work within, to enforce, and yet it had betrayed them. Betrayed the victim. Betrayed her. It had burned her to the core. Sara didn't think it was particularly the victim, although getting too close hadn't helped. It was the wrong time, wrong place, wrong judge. It had been leave or go slowly mad in a system that she no longer seemed to be able to influence. An easy decision at the time. Straight after the guilty party had walked free on a technicality. Hindsight had restored some control, some impartiality, but by that time her notice was neatly signed, even approved by a reluctant Grissom.

She was already to move on, move out, when that night had occurred. For less than a seven hour time period, it had certainly left it's mark. Like a ferocious fire, destroying all in it's path as it burned it's way to oblivion, that night had changed her in a way that she still couldn't get to now. The scars of that night still ravished her insides now. It had started out as a friendly gesture. Talking about a system they had gone from respecting to ridiculing. Warrick had been there, been so easy to talk to at a time that her thoughts barely made sense to herself.

She hadn't meant to let things go that far. But somehow talking wasn't enough anymore. She wanted more, wanted to feel more, wanted to feel soothed and loved and not so alone. She'd initiated the kiss, probably expecting him to pull back. Not expecting him to deepen the kiss, for his hands to roam freely over her body. For his hands to work under her clothes.

She could imagine it now, six months on, as if he was here, sitting behind her, touching her all over again. The pain deadened against nerves that came alive under his knowing fingers. Even now, even though she knew the ending of that particular song, it could still leave her warm and tender inside.

If she could go back she would change only one thing. A single thing. It wouldn't be the evening, the talking, certainly not the kissing. She definitely wouldn't change the bit that followed the kissing, the night she thought she must have died and gone to heaven because there was certainly no earthly feeling this good. No she would change just one thing following that. She wouldn't go to sleep. She would lay there, in his arms, waiting for him to wake up. And when he did wake up, when he rolled over and sat up, she would reach over to him, pull him back down. She would stop him leaving as he had, without a word, without a reason.

With difficulty, she pulled herself back into the present. She couldn't change it. She couldn't stop him leaving. She could have gone to see him, tried to talk to him, but she hadn't, and that made her current heartache as much her fault as it did his. She could have found the courage instead of taking the easy option out, as she always did.

She could go back now. Grissom had said there would always be a job for her there. She knew the city, she knew the people, and she loved the job. She could go back and try to salvage something from that night, try to salvage some of that feeling, something to form a relationship with.

What was keeping her here, then? The nightlife? It could have been the quiet, the simplicity of her life here. It could have been the work, the research project that would last another few months yet.

But really there was only reason that was keeping her locked up in this house, working on a research project for a boss she hadn't even met. One thing that went beyond rationality, or her heart's desire.

Fear. Fear of going back to Vegas, of not fitting back into the job she loved, or not settling back in with her friends. Fear of seeing him, working with him, and not having anything with him. They had been great friends, and now…now everything was in limbo. She was in another state, he hadn't bothered to call, to try and build a connection. Not even an email. Her greatest fear was of going back and having nothing of that night to salvage.

She turned in the seat, planting her feet firmly on the floor, walking slowly, hesitantly over to her bed. Laying back in her bed she almost fearfully closed her eyes. Because whilst in the awake hours she could have some control over her thoughts, in sleep she lost all control. In sleep her deepest desire left over from that night resounded loud and clear, and every morning she would wake up to the hurt, to the pain, and most of all to the unrequited desire for him. And a deep despair that she didn't know how to vanquish.

She needed him to make the first move. He'd probably forgotten all about it, he certainly hadn't made any moves to talk to her after the evening. He had left.

As she lay there, between cold sheets, she remembered waking up that night. In bed, alone but unaware of that fact at first. The bed still warm from his body heat, his scent still clinging to the pillowcase. She remembered those first few moments, the delicious feeling of waking up, remembering the previous night. The sweet feelings that a moment later were crushed when she opened her eyes to realise she was alone in bed.

He had left then, and he wasn't coming back now. Sara laying there in the darkness came to a sudden decision. Enough was enough, it had been so long. She knew what she had to do. It wasn't to go back, to beg someone who obviously wanted nothing of her. She had to move on, get past him and that night.

Remember the night for what it was. A single night of passion. No lasting relationship, no never-ending feelings. It was one night, and that was all it ever would be. Now was the time to get on with her life. Starting with finding another permanent job. She had a couple of months left of the research project, in which to decide, to mull over her change of career.

For the first time in a long time, Sara's thoughts were solely on the future as she slowly drifted off to sleep. She didn't know where she wanted to work if it wasn't in Las Vegas, but there was something out there for her. There had to be. Because she couldn't live in the past anymore.