"So why is Laura in Jail?"
"She killed my brother!"
"What do you mean she killed your brother?"
"I mean my brother is dead and it is her fault!"
Sara began to cry. Grissom was torn, he didn't know if he should hold her and comfort her, or just let her cry. His feelings overcome him and he leaned in to embrace her. Sara was shocked at first, then she welcomed his embrace.
"Its ok, Sara, take all the time you need," he said stroking her back, "I am here as long as you need me!"
"Thanks Griss, I appreciate it, its just…it's just…hard. I have never told anyone about this before. I have so many demons in my closet, I am not sure if I will ever be able to completely conquer them!"
"Sara, what happened?"
She quickly sobbed, wiped her tears, and then began to talk, "I had a rough childhood Griss. MY father died when I was young, not quite five years old. He was a wonderful man from what I can remember," She sobbed harder, "He died in a car crash and that was when Laura snapped."
"Why do you call her Laura, Sara?"
"Griss, I call her Laura because I call someone else Mom. She doesn't deserve to be called a mother, let alone mine!"
"So she snapped? What do you mean by that?"
"She started drinking, she started hitting me and my brother, Andy tried to protect me, but he couldn't be there all the time. I could handle most of it, that was until HE came into the picture!"
"Sara, who is he?"
"He…HE …" she was sobbing hard, "He was an asshole! He was my mother's new husband, he is the reason I am the way I am and the reason Laura is the way she was!"
"His name was Harold Blair, he was her John, or that's how it started out, then he married her and then he became her pimp. Once I was ten, they decided that I could be useful. She used to sit and watch as he raped me…he used to rape me Griss!" She was crying. "I was ten years old, barely old enough to even know what was going on and he used to rape me. I can remember taking myself to any place but there, I would pretend that I was running in a garden, it was my only was to survive."
"Why didn't you tell anyone Sara?"
"Who was gonna listen to a ten year old girl form the wrong side of the tracks. I didn't have any friends or anything, so I had no one to tell."
"That's awful Sara! What happened?"
"One night my brother came home, he was drinking, he was seventeen and hung out with the bad crowd in our neighborhood, well he came home to find her with some John and he came to find me. I was sitting in my room crying. I am not sure you should even call what I lived in a room. I lived in a closet on a blanket on the floor."
Sara strived to gain her composure, "My brother lived in the living room, we lived in a rat-infested dive, and literally Grissom, they were the only friends I had."
Sara stopped to cry. The memories came flooding back to her. Grissom tightened his embrace on her.
"So what happened when your brother came home?"
"He saw what was going on and he came to find me. I was huddled in my "room" curled up in a ball crying, I was badly bruised and bleeding. Andy went postal! He took off to find Harold. He vowed he would pay for what he did to me, and pay he did!"
Sara sobbed, wiped her face and began again. "Andy grabbed his baseball bat and went to find Harold. He took his bat and beat him to death. He was the only person in this world that truly loved me! Laura went ballistic! She took all her anger out on Andy and she bludgeoned him to death! I ran, eyes full of tears to the neighbor's house and begged them to call the police. Luckily, I was covered in blood and they knew something was wrong."
"So let me get this straight, your brother killed your step-father to protect you and because of that Laura killed your brother?"
"Yes, that is it!"
"So what happened to you?"
"I was taken into the foster system, that was awful! It wasn't the greatest experience. I had a few foster homes that treated me no differently than I was treated at home. I was anti-social and all I did was study, it was my escape. I figured a scholarship was the only way I was going to college. Some of the foster families didn't like that; I came home from school and lived in my room. I bounced from home to home until I found Sandra and Jim!"
"Sandra and Jim?"
"Yes, they were the last foster home I was in, it was in Tamales Bay at the B & B. They were amazing people. That was where I learned to cook. I helped them out with the B & B, they were very supportive. It is too bad I met them when I was sixteen. They were wonderful people. They had no kids of their own and they took in strays a lot of the time. They tried to get me into therapy, but I didn't want to, so they didn't push me. Every once in a while I go to Tamales Bay to visit them, they are my mom and dad, or the best ones I had in my life. I get a Christmas card every year from them."
"So what happened with Laura?"
"Well, they couldn't charge Andy with murder, he was already dead, but they charged Laura with manslaughter for killing my brother, they tried to rule her unfit to stand trial, or so the computer said. She ultimate drove Andy to do what he did, I think she should have got a murder charge, but she did twenty years and her parole hearing is coming up. I want to be there. I want her to pay for what she did to us when we were kids."