THE WINNER TAKES IT ALL
I used to hate Catherine (I felt there was too much of her private life in the show) and then along came Sophia…Yeah, I hate her, and for now, I hate Grissom too.
Catherine Willows closed her office. She had just pulled a double shift and she was dead tired, sleepy even. And hungry. She knew she could muster the energy to drive home, but the thought of having to get something out of the fridge to cook… it was too much. Going tothe dinner across the street seemed was a better idea. She hadn't had breakfast there since she had left the night shift and she felt a little nostalgic all of a sudden.
She was crossing the parking lot when she saw Gil Grissom walking towards his car. She wondered if this might be a good time to talk to him. She hated to think that their friendship might be cooling off.
A breakfast invitation might just do the trick.
It was then that she noticed that he was not alone; Sophia was walking beside him.And just beyond them, standing beside their cars, were Jim Brass and Greg Sanders. Sophia said something, the men nodded eagerly, and after a while, they drove away. Apparently, the four of them had the same destination in mind.
Shrugging slightly, Catherine crossed the street and entered the dinner. An old song was playing...
The winner takes it all
The loser has to fall
It's simple and it's plain
Why should I complain.
Does it feel the same
When she calls your name?
Catherine rolled her eyes when she heard the song. This was about the only thing she did not like about this place. The owner had a weakness for music from the seventies - the sappier, the better.
She picked up a menu from the counter and was making her way towards her favorite booth when she realized,to herutter disappointment, that it was already occupied, and by none other than Sara Sidle. That is, Sara and a pile of books spread on the table.
Well, shit. Catherine sighed impatiently. Sure, her anger had somehow abated since their very public fight a couple of weeks ago, but there was no way in hell she was going to share a table with Sara.
I understand
You've come to shake my hand
I apologize
If it makes you feel bad
Seeing me so tense
No self-confidence
But you see
The winner takes it all
She turned to leave-
On the other hand, why should she be he one to leave? She was hungry, she was tired- and it was her favorite booth. Let Sara leave.
Catherome turned back and for a moment she wondered how to approach Sara, who was reading a book. Or pretending to.
Catherine noticed the way Sara was holding herself up: her shoulders were straight, her chin was high in the air... but her eyes were down. It was her 'I'm not crying, I'm not crying, no, I'm not, I'm not' look.
Catherine walked deliberately towards the booth.
"Do you mind?" she asked, bracing herself for an angry retort, or by Sara simply picking up her things and storming out.
To her surprise, Sara barely glanced up before quietly pushing the books to a corner of the table to make space for Catherine, and turning her attention back to her book.
Catherine hesitated, but just for a moment. She sat down and tried to read the menu, but there was something bothering her.
She just had to ask.
"Where are the others?"
"I don't know." Sara muttered.
"Funny." Catherine said and paused until Sara looked up, "I have the feeling that you know but you don't want to know."
Sara didn't comment.
"Actually…" Catherine said, "I kinda saw them driving away. Together, I think."
"They're having breakfast at Sophia's place." Sara said after a moment.
"Oh? Even Grissom?"
"Yeah." Sara said airily, as if it didn't bother her.
Catherine knew better.
"And you didn't go?"
"Oh, no," Sara smiled bitterly, "I had other plans"
"What, drinking black coffee at a dingy place like this?"
"If it's so dingy then why are you here?" she retorted.
"I miss their Big Breakfast." Catherine shrugged, "Remember how Warrick always ordered one and we stole bites from it?"
Sara looked up, but didn't comment. She hadn't seen either Warrick or Nick lately and it was yet another thing that bothered her today. She missed them.
She turned her attention back to her book.
"So, Sara." Catherine said after a while, "Why didn't you go with them? Was it a guys-only invitation?"
"I just didn't want to go."
Catherine waited a moment before speaking again.
"She's quite a popular woman, isn't she?"
Sara's jaw stiffened a little, but she didn't answer.
"But she's not popular with you." Catherine added knowingly.
Sara wished Catherine stopped trying to draw her into a conversation. She hadn't expected Catherine to actually talk to her, and Sara admired her for having the guts to do it. But it was making Sara uncomfortable. Catherine knew her too well; and Sara had the feeling that the older woman knew just how upset she was, and was giving her a chance to talk about it.
And, oh, she wanted so much to vent her feelings –her anger, her pain- but not to someone who knew Grissom.
Sara was debating what to say, when Catherine spoke.
"I don't blame you," Catherine mused aloud, "Me, I wouldn't like to have her in my shift." She admitted candidly. "I like my guys to be focused on me."
"She's smart," Sara said simply.
"She must be. I never saw anyone get so popular in so short a time."
"She knows how to approach everybody." Sara said, "She knows how to blend." And suddenly, she couldn't stop talking, "When she talks to Brass, she acts like a gun's moll, and she acts so tough she practically out-brasses Brass. She has Hodges wrapped around her finger, and she's even been inside Greg's apartment while I don't even know his address." She hesitated before adding, "She uses quotes and erudition with Grissom.He likes to be challenged, and she does just that. He even repeats her phrases, you know? He follows her lead-"
"Wow." Catherine was stunned, "What about you? Has she tried to approach you?"
"Once." Sara admitted, "She told me something about how she didn't deserve to be mistrusted, but I didn't care much for her little 'we're women, we're sisters,' speech."
"She's a woman for all seasons." Catherine said thoughtfully, "Well, she better not come after my guys," she muttered.
"She won't," Sara said quietly, "She has her hands full now." Sara looked at Catherine. "She and Grissom-" She bit her lip to avoid saying the rest.
"She and Grissom, what?" asked Catherine.
Sara simply looked at her.
"Are you implying-" Catherine asked, "Oh, come on…You're not serious!" Catherine said, smiling incredulously." She kept her eyes on Sara, waiting for some punch line or some sign that she was joking, but Sara didn't add anything. "How can you know?" Catherine challenged.
"I've known for a while." Sara said quietly, "I think I knew even before he did."
"But Sara… you can't know for sure-"
"Oh, I know my Grissom," Sara said, smiling faintly. However, the words she used spoke of possession and she knew she didn't have any right to use them. Her lips trembled for a split second, but she took a sip from her coffee to cover up for it.
Catherine would have laughed if this wasn't Sara telling her all this. Sara wouldn't lie about it. Catherine knew what Grissom had meant to Sara, or at least she had guessed the scope of the young woman's feelings for him. If Sara said this was happening, then it had to be true.
"And the worst part," Sara said suddenly, "It's that he keeps asking me if I'm ok –'Sara, are you ok?' " she said, mimicking Grissom, " 'Sara, how are you doing?'. And what am I supposed to say? How the hell does he think I feel? I mean, I could answer with the truth and tell him that he's breaking my heart, but of course I can't say that. I've always been too honest for my own good. So I say, 'Yeah, I'm fine, don't worry, I'm doing ok', which is all he wants to hear, anyway."
Catherine didn't say anything. Right now there were no words of comfort that could help.
Sara took a deep breath to calm down.
"And yet... deep down…" she started, "I think I understand, you know?"
"You do?" Catherine asked.
"Yeah." Sara said. She closed the book she'd been reading and picked up another. "She makes him laugh." She said simply. She opened the book and examined the index before closing it. "She's…" she tried to search for the right word, "she's uncomplicated, I guess. She does all the right things." Sara smiled bitterly, "I mean, there are things that I'm sure she would never do. For instance, she would never cry her eyes out while telling him the sorry story of her life," she said slowly, "She'd never put him in a position where he has to plead for her so she keeps her job; and I'm sure she'd never put him at odds with one of his best friends," Sara finished, looking pointedly at Catherine. "Me, on the other hand-" she shook her head in disgust, "Tell me something that one isn't supposed to do at the lab, and I bet I've done it."
She took another sip of her coffee, but she winced as she did so. The coffee was getting cold.
"So, you're ok with this?" Catherine asked after a while.
"I'll be fine," Sara said, and then she closed her eyes. "But right now I feel like hell." she took a deep breath and then she looked earnestly at Catherine, "Do you think I was delusional? Was Grissom ever attracted to me?"
"Sara," she sighed, "Look, there's something you have to understand about men-"
"I'm not talking about men," Sara replied, "I'm talking about Grissom."
"Grissom's a man, Sara!" she said, rolling her eyes, "See, that's a mistake you've made all along. You see Grissom as a genius who keeps his heart behind a fence, or a lonely, tortuous soul… and sure, he's all that; but first and foremost, he's a man. And men, they like simple things. They fart, they scratch their privates, they like their TV loud, their whisky straight-"
"And their women loose." Sara finished.
"Exactly." Catherine nodded, "If you lay your life down some guy's doorstep, he's bound to freak out. And Grissom… you can put him at a crime scene armed with only a couple of q-tips and he'll find a way to get all the evidence needed to solve the case; but talk to him about feelings and he won't know what to do. I suspect this Sophia has the right idea about guys: she puts them at ease, she says all the right things, and when the time comes, she opens her legs first and her heart later. You, on the other hand… you just open your heart until it bleeds. Not very smart."
"Sorry," Sara said, a bit angry, "I never learned to play games."
"No, honey, you never did." Catherine smiled sympathetically, "You're honest, and you tell it like it is. That's scary for men. Men like Grissom… wounded men like him, they need someone to take care of them; preferably someone who'll tell them what they want to hear. They like their truths with peanut butter and jelly, while you… you like your toast plain. Slightly burned, even."
Sara couldn't help but smile at the metaphor.
"So, what you're saying is that I'm too honest. I already knew that," she said. Sara looked down at her cup of coffee. "I wish he had been honest with me. At the beginning, I would have taken it. Instead, there was this… ambivalence. I thought he only needed a little time to make up his mind. I thought in the end he'd be able to fall in love. Now it turns out he can fall in love; he just can't fall in love with me."
Catherine snorted noisily.
"You think he's in love?" she scoffed, "Oh, please. He's just in heat."
"So?" Sara retorted, "I'd take that."
Catherine laughed, and in the end Sara chuckled. But her sadness prevailed.
"I feel that I finally have no reason to hang around." She said, "I used to think that I was the only one who could love him and that if I left…" she shook her head, "God, I shouldn't be talking like this, it's pathetic." She looked accusingly at Catherine, "And you shouldn't be listening. Why are you listening, anyway? You're supposed to be angry with me."
"I am." Catherine retorted, flashing a hard look, "I don't think I'll ever forget what you said, Sara. But there's something I've understood just lately- That fight you had with Eckley… you didn't do it just for yourself, did you? You did it for him. You were standing up for Grissom."
Sara held Catherine's gaze.
"He didn't ask me to do it," she said firmly, "It was my decision." She looked away, "I don't think he's ever asked anything from me..." her voice trailed off.
They were silent for a moment.
"I'm sorry." Sara said quietly, "You know," she looked up, "for blowing up like I did."
Catherine looked at her, and then she smiled.
"Nah. You're not sorry."
Sara was going to insist but she smiled too.
"You're right. I'm not. I mean, I am, but I'm not. Does that make sense?"
"Yeah," Catherine said. "It does. You're glad you stood up for your ideas, but you're sorry that I was the one who got in your way."
The waitress approached them, but Catherine shook her head. They needed a little time alone.
"Hey, I was thinking," Catherine said, trying to lighten up the mood, "Why didn't you go along to Sophia's place? You shouldn't let her have the guys all to herself; you should give her some competition!"
"Nah." Sara said self-deprecatingly, "That's not me."
"Sara, hey," Catherine said, and she waited until Sara looked up, "You've been a good friend to all of them. Don't ever let them forget it. In fact… you're the kind of friend I would want by my side in times of trouble."
Sara smiled a little at this.
"What are you going to do if or when he comes back to his senses?" Catherine asked suddenly.
The question surprised Sara.
"I don't think he…" she started, but then she shrugged and scoffed, "Oh, after all this I don't think I could take him back."
She was bluffing; she knew it and Catherine knew it, but for a moment it made her feel as if she had absolute control of her life.
"Catherine," she said then, "Is she better than me?"
Catherine hesitated.
"She's smarter in certain situations-" she started.
"And I'm way too honest." Sara finished.
"Hey, look; if being too honest turns him off, then he deserves to be with a dishonest woman, and there's nothing you can do about it." Catherine said callously, "Don't even try to apologize for him, Sara. Ok?" she waited until Sara nodded, "Now. I'm famished and I'm sure that black coffee has opened a hole in your gut by now. Want to split a big breakfast with me?"
Sara smiled.
"Sure. Are you paying?"
"What?"
Laughter bubbled in Sara's throat.
"You have the big bucks now. Besides, I was suspended for a week, remember? That means I had a pay cut." She paused, "And it was all your fault"
"My fault? Ha!" Catherine scoffed, following Sara's lead, "It was you and your big mouth that proved to be your undoing, Ms. Sidle!" She opened her purse and took some change, "Order the big breakfast while I put some suitable music."
" 'I will survive', right?" Sara teased.
"Hey, that song got me through a nasty divorce. Believe me, Sara: listening to it saves a lot of therapy money."
And for a couple of hours, they ate and talked and forgot their troubles.
The end