"Hey, Sara! Welcome back!" Greg Sanders was the first to greet Sara as she strode down the hallway of CSI on Monday night—the first time in ten days. She gave a smile and a wave and kept walking.

"The return of Sara Sidle!" exclaimed Warrick, wrapping his massive brown arms around Sara in a friendly hug. "It's been too quiet without you here."

"Nobody here to take Grissom down a notch," agreed Nick.

"You have Catherine for that," Sara joked.

She and Nick settled in the break room, just relaxing. The air conditioning was delicious, stronger than the one at Sara's Place. Even though it had been somewhat of a vacation for Sara, she felt like relaxing was the only thing she didn't do.

"So, where did you go?" Catherine asked, coming into the room. She made a beeline for the coffee pot and poured herself a cup.

"To visit my parents," said Sara, putting a hand up to decline the coffee that Catherine held out to her.

"And," Nick said, a sly smile spreading across his mouth like jam on a hot roll, "to walk down the aisle."

Catherine nearly dropped her cup. "What?"

"NICK!" Sara exclaimed, standing up. "You promised!"

"I promised I'd keep it a secret while you were away," Nick held his hands up in defense. "You didn't say a damn thing about when you got back!"

"Walked down the aisle?" Catherine repeated. "Sara…you didn't…I mean, you didn't get married, did you?"

"No!" Sara tugged at her hair. "I…I went to my brother's wedding."

"She didn't just go," Nick chirped up. "She was a bridesmaid!" From his pocket he pulled the familiar yellow Kodak packet from a pocket inside his Swiss Army shirt. He tossed it onto the table and sat back, smiling.

Sara lunged for them and opened the flap, turning her back to hide them from Catherine. Something told her Nick had already seen them. Yup, there she was, in all her Pepto-Bismol glory, like a piece of cotton candy strangled in silk—gliding down the strip of carpet on Del Gray's arm, standing beside Lilith Rodriguez in the party as Polexia came down the aisle, posing for the formal pictures and dancing with Del, Wiley and, to her horror, Grissom.

"Where did you get these?" Sara asked, waving the pictures in front of Nick.

"I told you, I know people. People with cameras," Nick smiled slyly. "Especially one Delmore Charles Gray."

"DEL?!" Sara could hardly believe her ears. So, it all made sense now! She looked back down at the one picture of her and Del on the dance floor. It was Nick who had told Del to look out for her! "How the hell do you know Del?"

"Who's Del?" asked Catherine, who was ignored.

"I'm tellin' you, Sara, the Stokes' and the Grays' are tight. Like this!" Nick crossed his middle and forefinger to illustrate his point. "Our parents were both on the side of the law, known each other for years. I knew Del when he was in diapers."

"I can't believe it. I can't freakin' believe it."

"Call it, six degrees of separation."

"Call it, Nick Stokes you are a dead man!"

"If you kids don't stop fighting this instant, I'm turning this car around and nobody's going anywhere," Catherine had to jump in to keep Sara from pouncing on Nick, which she looked like she was about to do any second. "What's going on?"

"Absolutely nothing," Nick snatched the photos out of Sara's hand. "Here."

To Sara's dismay, Nick handed the photos to Catherine just as Warrick walked into the room.

"Pictures from vacation, Sara?" Warrick asked.

"You could say that!" Nick announced.

Sara gritted her teeth. "Nick, if you say one more word, I'll snatch your tongue out of your mouth."

Nick was unfazed. "Pretty big talker for someone who once wore a dress like that."

"Now, I have some ugly ones in my closet," Catherine said, staring at the photographs. "However, I've never been forced to wear bubblegum pink. Neon orange and olive green, sure, but I've never had the pleasure of pink. Thank God."

Sara sank into her chair again and groaned.

"You look good in pink!" Catherine said quickly, trying to rectify the situation. "It makes your cheeks—oh my God…Gil?"

"Is that Grissom in a tux?" Warrick peered over Catherine's shoulder. "And dancing with Sara? When was this taken?"

"My brother's wedding on Saturday. That's where I was this past week," Sara said, defeated. "He made me a bridesmaid. Turns out Grissom's mother and Wiley's mother are friendly."

"That rat!" Catherine exclaimed. "Why didn't he tell me he was going to a wedding?"

"He's not a wedding person," Sara replied.

"He told me he was going to a seminar. I should have known that was bullshit. There were no forensic or entomology seminars anywhere in the tri-state area. I should have known!"

"He's a good dancer," Sara said softly.

"Yeah, well, his mother taught him," Catherine replied. "She liked little Gil to be a proper gentleman."

"I can't believe Del would do this," Sara mumbled.

"I asked him to," Nick assured her.

"He was such a sweet guy."

"He called me after the wedding. The dude's crazy for you. Got himself a little Greg Sanders-esque crush on you."

"Great," she said wryly.

"It's not so bad, Sunshine," Nick beamed. He was content in his victory.

"Stokes, I will kill you."

"Did you just call her 'Sunshine'?" Warrick laughed. "Yeah, Sara Sidle, CSI's little ray of sunshine. I like that, Nicky, I like that."

Unable to stand another moment of this, Sara pushed her chair away from the table and went to go find Grissom. She had a few questions he might be able to answer for her, particularly about the night of the wedding and the Sunday morning when he had left her. When she approached his office, the door was shut and locked. Well, a whole lot of good that did. Not wanting to go back to the break room where she supposed Nick, Catherine and Warrick were still laughing at the wedding pictures, Sara decided to visit with her favorite rookie.

"Hey Greg," Sara said as she sat down in one of Greg's swivel chairs in the lab.

He peered out over the rim of his skateboarding magazine, "Hey."

"How's it been? Any interesting cases while I was gone?" she asked, eager to talk about anything but her "vacation".

Greg knitted his eyebrows. "One," he answered. "A guy said his wife tripped down the basement stairs…turns out she'd been there for four days and he had just now discovered her."

"Cock-and-bull story if I've ever heard one."

"You know it. Turns out he'd tripped her up and hid her body. The guy'd been abusing her for years and went a little too far one day."

"You got him, right?"

"You know it, Sar."

She smiled. Her little boy was growing up. "What'd he use?"

"Oh, just his hands. Left nice bruises on her back, shaped like so. Her body was a mess."

"Well, at least now everything's straightened out. Good job."

"Thanks!" Greg said eagerly and returned to his magazine. Sara listened to the quiet buzz of some of the machines in the lab. She sighed and sat back.

"So, Greg," Sara said slowly at first. "Did you know my middle name is Sunshine?"

"Really?" Greg smiled behind his magazine. "It suits you."

FIN