"That was two years ago on a closed case," I argued. I instinctively drew my hand to my head; my head pounded. I was fine prior to walking into Grissom's office; I was fine until I asked him what the hell was going on. I was never one to mince words.

"What if the conviction is appealed?" Grissom fired back at me. His face was red; the bags under his eyes were much more pronounced. I wondered when the last time he slept was; he spent all his time here.

"It's over, Grissom. Why Sara? Why not Ecklie or Sophia?" I asked pointedly.

"Sara's work has been sloppy at best. If she wasn't a drunk . . ." Grissom started.

"Grissom, your whole team comes in with hangovers. I'm not stupid . . . I see what you've done to them. This isn't about Sara's work ethic. This isn't about sloppy handwriting. This has been about you . . . now, what the hell is your problem?" I yelled at him. He stopped; he was barely breathing. He looked me in dead in the eyes with an anger that I never expected from this gentle man.

"Get out," Grissom calmly ordered as he pointed towards his office door.

"No, not until you tell me what's changed," I demanded. My palms were sweating; I could feel my left eye begin to twitch. My eye only twitched when I was extremely angry or stressed out. Normally, only Lindsey was able to get this response out of me.

I had been worried about Sara and Greg. I may have not been their friend or anything more than a coworker, but I was worried about how they operated like robots. They never turned their cases over to the morning shift; they normally were still in the lab when swing shift came on. When asked to hand their case off, they always said Grissom wouldn't like it if they did. Suspensions had become commonplace on night shift as did reprimands that could be heard from all corners of the lab. If they did go home after their shift, they came back hung over. Sara and Greg seemed to pop aspirin like it was going out of style. Sophia had recently taken up the practice with them. They looked like they were drowning; Grissom didn't look like he was ready to pull them ashore . . . he was watching them drown. I protected Warrick and Nick from Grissom; I didn't want them to see their mentor fall.

"Catherine, this is none of your business. You have your shift. Go ask them questions," Grissom fired back.

"As your friend, I'm worried about you . . . I'm worried about Sara and Greg. We may not work together anymore, but you can still talk to me," I replied. I tried so hard to suppress my urge to yell at him; I wanted to beat him over the head for being so stupid. I didn't want to be on the receiving end of his wrath.

"Catherine, everything has changed," Grissom said as he lowered his head.

"No one ever said change came easy," I replied.

"What?" Grissom asked as he snapped his head upward. He didn't hear me. He had been watching my lips. I remembered this same scene from only a year ago.

"Your hearing?" I asked. I held my breath as I waited for him to answer.

"Acoustic neuroma," Grissom replied. His blue eyes look more gray than blue today.

"Gil, how bad?" I asked with a sigh.

"Pre-malignant. It has a high rate of transforming into a malignant tumor," he replied.

"What's next?" I asked.

"They cut it out. Catherine, please be discreet," Grissom pleaded. It would be easy to be discreet; I never talked to the night shift workers. It would be hard to overlook their party the first night Grissom would be on leave. It would be hard to overlook it because I was his friend, but I understood Sara, Greg, and Sophia's motives. Hell, I would do the same thing.

"You let me know if you need me," I replied. Last time, he didn't tell his mother. She was in bad health at best; I had met her twice. She always looked like she had one foot in the grave. Last time, he said he would not burden his mother, so he faced surgery alone. This time, he would be even more alone than last time. He didn't have his night shift; he didn't have his friends. He didn't have the support of the people he loved the most; although he wouldn't admit it, he loved us as much as Grissom could love.

"Thank you, Catherine," Grissom replied.

I left his office. The answers weren't comforting. The answers did explain his change in behavior; he was isolating himself to protect himself from anymore hurt or disappointment. He should have been promoted to director of the lab; we all knew how much Ecklie's promotion hurt Grissom. There were no words that could comfort Grissom. Bad always seemed to lapse into worse; an acoustic neuroma was the worst. He would be rendered deaf after the surgery. I remembered Grissom once saying that a CSI needed to use all his senses to solve crimes. Being a CSI was his life, I don't think he even knew what he'd do if he lost his sense of hearing. Ecklie would never let him continue to be a CSI.

Changes never seemed to come easy.