I know it's been so damn long, but I just couldn't seem to want to write anymore of this and didn't want to write for the sake of it. I wanted to be in the right frame of mood so I apologise for the wait but I'm sure you've coped!!! Oh and AAAAA is my nice way of putting gaps between my scenes seeing as it doesn't like "star star star star star"!!!

Barb8: Thank you. I hope you like this as well.

Leddy: I hope this adds to your feelings for Gil and Jade. Plenty of good angst here.

Chapter Thirteen – Moments in a Lapse of Reason.

The next night Cath had arranged to pick Gil up from his place at around 7.30. At the same time Warrick pulled up to see Jade who'd spent the afternoon with Gil. Jade waved Gil and Cath off, then turned and smiled at Warrick.

"What you doing here? I thought you were busy tonight? And what's with the clothes – you look all dressed up?"

She asked as he pulled her in for a kiss before pulling her into the house.

"Well, seeing as they've gone out for a meal I thought we could do the same."

She gave him a beaming smile.

"Aww, that's sweet. Okay, give me 15 minutes and I'll go throw something more suitable on."

She said, turning and walking down the corridor to her room. He watched her leave, wearing slightly tight sweats and thought to himself that she'd still look the most beautiful person in the restaurant wearing what she was wearing anyway.

AAAAA

Three hours later and they'd eaten and paid the bill and decided to go for a slow walk. They take an old route past the Bellagio, gently holding hands and taking in the sights.

"I've missed doing this."

Jade said after a long calm silence.

"Me too."

Warrick agreed.

"It's been so long, I can't even remember the last time."

Warrick nodded, agreeing, then stopped and did a half turn to face her, taking her other hand.

"Then let's do it every night."

Jade laughed.

"You'd get bored."

"With you, never."

Jade didn't know what to say to that so she merely stared at him, staring back at her. He was silent for a moment, then,

"Marry me."

She stared at him more seriously, then did a little half laugh.

"You don't need to marry me to do this every night."

His expression stayed serious.

"I'm being serious." She believed him straight away and stared open-mouthed at him. "I don't just want to share walks with you every night. I want you to be a part of my life every second of every minute of every day. I love you. I want you to marry me."

Kneeling down, he produced a small black velvet box as if out of no-where and opened it to show a sparkling diamond shining back. Jade's eyes widened and she put her hands over her mouth in shock and amazement. Neither of them noticed that a small crowd of people had stopped and were watching them in anticipation of her reply. Finally able to make some sound, Jade whispered as she reached down to the small yet most important box she had ever seen in her life.

"Oh Warrick..."

"Well...?"

He asked looking up into her eyes with the most hope and fear he had ever carried in his life. She turned her gaze from the ring to looking deep into his eyes, the diamond was shining in them and a smile spread slowly across her features.

"Of course I will, you fool."

At that Warrick stood quickly and swept her up into his arms, laughing. She joined in, feeling overwhelming joy and happiness – something she hadn't felt in a long long time as the crowd around them cheered. She looked around at all the strangers faces clapping and laughed even more. Finally he put her down and took the box from her hand, taking out the precious jewel. He held his hand out for hers and she gave it to him, smiling as he slipped the ring onto her finger. She looked at it for a moment, sitting perfectly on her finger, then looked back up at him as the crowd around them dispersed.

"I love you."

She said and leaned in to kiss him. Putting his arms around her he kissed her as passionately as the day he'd confessed he'd loved her.

AAAAA

Reaching home, Jade didn't know what to do. She felt on a high and wanted to scream out to the whole world that she was in love and getting married. She looked over to Warrick who was standing in the hallway with a big smile on his face as he took off his coat. She looked down at the ring sitting perfectly on her finger and smiled again. Two hands on her shoulders brought her gaze back up to Warrick's smiling mischievous expression. She knew what that look meant.

"You know, we really should tell someone. I'm dying to let people know –"

"Shh..." He said putting a finger to her lips. "Let's keep it as our secret for the moment. Just you and me. I'm not sharing you with anyone tonight."

He said as he leaned in and kissed her. Responding, she felt his grip move down, then he twisted her slightly and picked her up without their lips losing contact, before moving into the bedroom.

Early the next morning Jade went around to Gil's to give him the good news. She left Warrick sleeping in and would be picking him up on the way to the lab to let everyone else know as they were all in working on a big case. Warrick had been quite glad he had booked the week off because it was a very slow going case, one of the ones that left you rather drained afterwards.

Jade knocked before entering just to let him know she was there and called his name.

"In the kitchen."

He called. She walked through towards the kitchen area with the smile still plastered to her face. Moment later it vanished as shock and worry set in. Gil was sitting on a stool by the breakfast bar holding a piece of gauze to his forehead.

"Gil, are you okay? What happened?"

"It's nothing. The floor was wet and I slipped."

She made him remove the gauze to look at the cut on his head. It looked superficial but there was a slight bruising around it already.

"It doesn't look too deep. Did you lose consciousness? Or have a dizzy spell? Nausea?"

He thought for a moment before shaking his head.

"Not really. I felt a little dizzy but it passed quickly."

"And you're sure you're feeling okay now?"

She asked as she wiped up some of the blood and was about to place a plaster onto it.

"Yeah, yeah I feel fine. No headache, just feeling a little sore."

"If you're sure...but if you start to feel sick or anything let me know, we'll go and see the Doc to check it out."

"Okay."

He sat quietly as she finished off, then thanked her as he stood and gestured to the living area.

"You mentioned having something to tell me over the phone. Something important."

The smile was back as she sat next to him on the bigger couch he'd bought recently, the other being too small for his liking.

"Yeah, well, last night while you were out with Cath – how did that go by the way?"

He nodded.

"It was fun. I feel like I'm really getting to know her now. Carry on."

"Well, Warrick and I also went out for a meal...and he proposed."

She said as she showed him the ring. He looked down at it in amazement, then up at her smiling face.

"Congratulations, that's great!"

He said, happy for her and pulled her into a hug.

"Thanks. I also wanted to ask you...you've been like a father to me – and I know you don't remember but I do, and it would really mean a lot if you would give me away."

She asked hopefully. He gave her a real genuine, appreciative smile.

"I'd be honoured."

He said seriously. He knew how hard the last few months had been and he knew he was a different person to the one she knew, but it felt like he really belonged in her life now and would like nothing better to be the one to give her away. It was like she was finally accepting the loss of the Grissom she knew and the gain of the Gil he now was.

"Thank you."

She replied.

AAAAA

Picking Warrick up on the way to the lab, Gil congratulated him and had a quick private conversation along the lines of 'if you ever hurt her...' etc. Warrick took it in his stride, knowing it was Gil's job as her God-father to say these things. It made him happy to think that he seemed to be getting on track with his life and taking his responsibilities back that dealt with his god-daughter, even if his career was taking a massive leap in the other direction. He knew that sometimes in life things didn't always work out how you wanted them too. He'd be only too happy to get the old Grissom back, but it was almost positively never going to happen. He was going to be completely happy with what he had, his career was going well and he was engaged to a completely fantastic woman – something he never thought would happen to him.

They reach the hospital in high spirits, just in time for the others coming off their shift. It didn't take long for them to gather their friends in the break room and give them all the good news. They were all ecstatic for the happy couple and Greg and Sara went out to get a couple bottles of wine to celebrate.

They spent an hour having a good time, interrupting the day shift, but not caring in the least. Halfway through the celebration Cath managed to pull Jade aside to have a good woman to woman chat.

Jade smiled at Cath as she pulled her into a quiet corner and sat her down. In fact she hadn't stopped smiling properly since the night before.

"I just wanted to have a chat with you, you know, about things."

"Ohhh...one of those talks."

Jade smiled. That was one of the small regrets she'd had about this perfect moment in her life. That she didn't have her mother there to give her that talk about marriage, commitment and everything.

"It's just...I never got the talk from my mother and I really wished I had, and having been married myself I thought I'd just give you some advice that I think would have helped me."

"Thanks Cath."

She nodded, then got right in with giving the advice – everything from what things you should discuss with your husband and what you should keep secret, certain tricks Cath had learnt to keep the marriage fresh, plus things she thought she had done wrong, hoping to give Jade a wider range of choices when it came to certain problems. It took nearly 20 minutes for her to relate everything she thought would be of help to Jade. When she finally looked up she noticed that the room had thinned slightly since she'd last looked up. She caught Warrick's eye and he gave her a smile and a wink before turning back to Nick and Greg's man speech, then she looked around the room searching for Gil and frowned when she couldn't see him.

"Can you see Gil?"

She asked Cath. She took a look around, then stood for a better view. Jade stood with her, taking a few steps to look down the corridor but he wasn't there either.

"I'm gonna go check about, he must be here somewhere."

Jade said. Cath nodded.

"I'll go check downstairs."

Two minutes later they were back by the break-room with no sign of Gil anywhere. Having exhausted most possibilities they headed to the main desk.

"Hey Diane, have you seen Gil Grissom come past here?"

Cath asked the receptionist. She nodded.

"Yeah, he went about 10 minutes ago, asked me where the nearest roller coaster was. Is everything okay?"

Jade frowned as Cath calmed the receptionist's worries, while feeling her own start to surface.

"He hasn't been on a roller coast since the accident."

Jade said, feeling the panic rise up in her throat. Cath put a calming hand on Jade's shoulder.

"Let's just go and find him, I'm sure he's okay so let's not panic until we have something to panic about, okay?"

Jade forced herself to take a breath, then followed Cath out at a very fast pace towards the closest park.

It only took two minutes to reach it, but then came the problem of finding him in the crowds. Jade stood for a moment, before deciding to head for the biggest coaster in the park as it seemed the best place to start. Cath followed her without question and was glad when they noticed Gil sitting in the front seat of the coaster as it was being taken up the first ramp and to the first big drop, leading to a corkscrew.

Even though they'd found him Jade was still worried and they both went and stood at the exit of the ride waiting for it to finish. It seemed to take forever to end, and even longer as they watched all the people getting off the ride with no sign of Grissom. She looked through the gab to see him still sitting in the front, staring at nothing, with the guy in charge of the ride asking him to get off the ride.

Without thinking Jade rushed onto the ride through the exit with Catherine in tow, ignoring the man trying to stop them.

"Gil? Gil."

She asked as she went and bent down next to him. She put a hand on his shoulder and shook him gently as she said his name again. She didn't get any type of response, he just stared into the space ahead of him. As she got a little more frantic – a sharper shake, a more commanding tone – Cath turned to the guy in charge, the fear barely hidden in her eyes and asked them to call an ambulance. Then she turned to Jade and put a hand on her arm, stopping her from shaking him any harder than she already was. The tears were already tipping from her eyes.

"Jade, Jade."

She put her hand on Jade's cheek and made her turn her head away from Gil.

"It's okay, it's going to be okay."

She told her calmly.

"What's wrong with him?"

Jade asked.

"I don't know, sweety, I've asked them to call an ambulance to be on the safe side. He looks like he's catatonic."

Jade's fear had taken over her sensible, thought process and the links just clicked into place.

"Oh God."

"What?"

Cath asked, hearing the dread in Jade's voice as if she'd just remembered something she shouldn't have forgotten.

"He hit his head this morning and I told him he should go and get a check up but he refused and he promised me he'd let someone know if he felt any symptoms. God, if only I'd taken him straight to the hospital this wouldn't have happened."

She looked over at where Gil was just staring, he hadn't moved at all, and she took his hand.

"Jade, this isn't your fault. You weren't to know that him banging his head would cause this. Let's just keep calm until we get him to hospital and find out what's wrong."

AAAAA

Jade had called Warrick from the ambulance to let him know what was going on. He'd missed her at the celebration and had been trying to contact her with no luck. Shocked to hear about Gil he told her he'd meet her at the hospital. Warrick still hadn't arrived when Jack came into the waiting room after checking Grissom over.

"What's wrong with him?"

Jade asked outright.

"He's catatonic. Somehow that bump to the head caused some sort of reaction in his brain – you wouldn't have known it would cause something like this. Nine out of ten times bangs to the head are completely harmless."

Jade looked distraught as she looked down at the floor – she'd been up above cloud nine since the night before and she felt that she'd been brought back to earth with such a bang she must have broken all the bones in her body.

"It's not fair..."

Cath turned to Jack.

"So what happens now?"

"There's a few choices we can take. Usually people come out of catatonic states on their own – we've found that sometimes hearing familiar voices help."

"And unusually?"

Cath asked, hearing the but in his sentence.

"Sometimes it could lead to a coma."

"No."

Jack and Cath looked over to Jade.

"No." She said again. "We've been here – we're not going back there again."

"Jade..."

Cath started.

"No!"

Jade said sternly before walking out the door. The tears glazing her eyes didn't go unnoticed by both Jack and Cath.

Out in the corridor Warrick walked around the corner to see Jade pacing towards him. She seemed to be looking through him and he grabbed her arm as she was about to pass.

"Jade, honey?"

She looked up and seemed to notice him for the first time, before she shook her head and burst into hysterical tears. He pulled her towards him quickly and held her tight, feeling his own lungs start to tighten in fear. At that moment Cath came around the corner. Warrick mouthed Gil's name in question and she mouthed back the answer, relieving his worry slightly in that Grissom was still alive at least.

AAAAA

Cath sat with Jade until her shift was about to begin. Warrick had been with her the whole day, talking to Gil with her. Just after Cath went Warrick headed to the cafeteria to get them both some coffee as they'd both been up all day.

Jade sat quietly in the chair next to his bed, staring down at her hands with no clue as to what to do or say anymore.

Out of the corner of her eye she saw a movement and looked up to see Gil's hand twitch. She was on her feet in a second, taking hold of the hand and squeezing it. When she felt a slight squeeze back all the torrid emotions that's had plagued her all day fell away. He was awake.

He blinked a couple times looking confusedly at the ceiling, obviously trying to work out where he was and how he'd gotten there.

"Gil?"

She called to him. He looked over at her, then frowned. A nervous feeling rushed into her stomach and she heard the words 'who are you?' echo in her mind. But to her relief he asked,

"Jade...? What are you doing here? What am I doing here?"

He added on as it suddenly occurred to him he was in a hospital bed.

"It's okay. You've been catatonic for a few hours from that bang to the head this morning, but you're going to be okay. I'll just call Jack to come and check you over."

Before she could move away he grabbed her arm.

"Why are you here?"

"Huh? What do you mean?"

"How did you get here so quickly from California if I've only been catatonic for a few hours? And I don't remember banging my head this morning. In fact," he said, a thought suddenly occurring to him. "this morning seemed a long time ago."

Jade didn't listen to him, she'd stopped at the point where he'd mentioned California.

"Gil, what's the last thing you remember?"

"I was called to a crime scene in a warehouse. A man was found dead. How did I end up here?"

Before he could think he found Jade launching herself at him in what could only be described as utter ecstasy as she hugged him tight.

"Hey Gris!"

Gil looked over as Warrick entered the room happily.

"Warrick? You here too?"

"Yeah man. I'll go get Jack."

He headed out as Gil gently pushed Jade away to see her face. There were tears on her face.

"Jade, what's wrong? I'm okay."

She shook her head.

"Gil...it's been a couple months since you were at that crime scene."

"Huh?"

Seeing Grissom confused and speechless with that look on his face brought a sense of joy to Jade. She hadn't seen that expression for longer than she can remember.

"But you just said I'd only been catatonic for a few hours."

She nodded but before she could launch into the story Jack entered with Warrick.

"Hey Mr. Grissom. Glad to see you're awake."

Before Jade could say anything to Jack, Gil spoke.

"I'm sorry Doctor...?"

Jack stopped moving for a moment and stared at him.

"Jack, he doesn't remember anything of the past two months."

She could see the through processes on Jack's face as he took in this piece of news. Jade smiled at Warrick who moved over and took her hand in both of his.

"What is going on here?"

Grissom asked. He hated being in the dark about things like this.

"Jade, Warrick, would you wait outside for a moment while I give Mr. Grissom a check-over?"

They both nodded and left the room.

AAAAA

It was nearly half an hour later and a few different doctors had been in and out of the room since, before Jack left and headed over to them.

"So...?"

Jade questioned as Jack sat.

"I can't explain it. There's been a few cases such as this but I've never seen it. Somehow the bang to the head this morning bumped him back to...Gil Grissom." He took a breath, trying to work out how to describe it. "It's like after the accident his mind created an alternate Grissom that didn't remember what happened in the warehouse to protect himself, and after the incident this morning his mind realised he didn't need to anymore and it's righted itself. Like he's been in an awake coma for the past months."

"So, what now?"

"We'll keep him in for observations but other than that he's fine. Physically 100% although he made need a few counselling sessions to sort his mind out. But right now he's in there waiting for you guys to fill in the gaps."

Jade took Jack's hand in hers and squeezed it.

"I can't begin to tell you how grateful I am for everything you've done these past months."

She leaned in and gave him a kiss, then took Warrick's hand and headed back into Grissom's room to find him sitting up in bed. She gave him a smile.

"Okay." He said. "I guess you've got a lot to fill me in on."

"I guess we have."

She smiled. Warrick, realising he wasn't needed at this point said he'd head to the lab to tell everyone the news in person. Then Jade launched into everything that had happened since the warehouse, everything about the case, about what he was like when he woke up.

"Your Graduation!"

He suddenly blurted out at her, making her stop mid-sentence.

"What about it?"

"How was it? How did you do?"

She smiled.

"I passed with honours. But I didn't go to the graduation."

"Why not?"

She looked away.

"I couldn't bear to go knowing you wouldn't be there."

"I'm sorry."

Her gaze shot up to him.

"What are you being sorry about? None of this is your fault." She took his hand and gave it a squeeze. "You're back now and that's the main thing."

He gave her a rare genuine smile, then noticed the glimmering ring on her finger.

"What's this?"

He asked, giving her a look as he moved her hand into a better light to see the ring. Jade suddenly smiled with a slight blush.

"Oh...Warrick proposed. I said yes."

For a moment he seemed shocked, then he smiled.

"I have missed a lot. Congratulations."

"Thanks."

"I can't believe I've missed so much. I'm really happy for you."

Her smile got bigger if that was possible.

"Thank you. It means a lot. Well, seeing as you don't remember the last time I asked, I'll ask again. Will you give me away?"

"It'll be my honour."

AAAAA

Two days and almost a dozen check-ups later, along with hundreds of visitors, Grissom was finally given a clean bill of health and was allowed to go home.

Jade hands him his key to unlock his front door and he steps in. He'd barely made it three steps when he stopped dead.

"What the – "

He started to say. Jade looked around at the room. She knew she'd forgotten to mention something.

"Oh yeah...I forgot to mention..."

"What have you been up to in here? The place is a state."

"Oh, this wasn't me. This was you –I've been spending most of my time at Warrick's."

She laughed at the shocked expression on his face as he stared around his apartment.

"This is going to take some cleaning up."

Okay, only the epilogue left now!!! It's like a miniature end of an era!!! He he!!!