Chapter 43

Stoic

Gil found himself buried in work for the next two days, and as he was so completely consumed in it, he found very little time to see Sara at all, and he was glad of it. Seeing her less had helped to slightly ease the sting of the words she'd used in the break room three days before.

But although the sting was eased, it didn't completely heal away. Every time he did see her, he was reminded of it. There was a general unease between the both of them whenever they were in the same room, and when Sara took her breaks with the rest of the team, Gil avoided going into the break room at all, he'd take his break when everyone else had gone back to work, he'd sit quietly doing his crossword, or sipping his coffee enjoying a moments silence from the chaos of work.

With all the hard work the team had been putting in, the workload began to slowly decrease and the pace gained some normality.

As he'd been sitting in his office, he realised he had still not found time to speak to Greg about his gossiping at work. Now that he'd cleared up a good deal of his work, and could afford to leave his desk for the time being, this would be an excellent opportunity to speak with him and try and clear a few things up.

He left his office, and traveled the hall until he came across the lab. He gazed through the windows first, as was habit when approaching. Greg and Sara were standing at one of the counters discussing something.

Gil felt his curiosity pique, and he couldn't help but go in to the lab to find out what they were talking about.

"Come on, what's the big deal. Are you ashamed of this guy or something?" Greg was saying to Sara. Both had their backs turned and had not noticed Gil enter at all.

"No, it's not that," Sara said.

"Then why can't we meet him?" Greg asked, "I mean, we're all friends here. We're all curious to see who this guy is…"

Sara folded her arms, "yeah, so you can stand and pick out his flaws."

"So…is it just he's ashamed to go out in public with you, or you're ashamed to go out in public with him?" Greg asked.

"Neither."

"Then how come none of us have met this guy?" Greg asked. "You won't even tell us his name, you won't let us meet him…if you weren't such an honest person I'd swear you were making all this up," Greg teased.

Gil cleared his throat as he approached to gain their attention, "Actually. I've met him."

Sara and Greg both turned, surprised to find him there.

"You have?" Greg asked, "Sara kept that quiet."

Sara looked away, pursing her lips together tightly.

Gil gave a nonchalant shrug, "DNA results for that sample I sent in three hours ago?" he asked. He decided to abandon his plan of reprimanding Greg for the time being – at least while Sara was around.

"Right here," Greg picked up a folder from the counter, "so when did you meet him?"

Gil opened the folder to survey the results, "Hmm?"

"Sara's boyfriend? When did you meet him?"

Gil glanced to Sara before looking back to Greg, "A while ago…I ran into him and Sara when they were out on a date," he shrugged, he tried to appear casual. "He's a an okay guy," he shrugged.

Greg looked at Gil as if he completely didn't believe this at all, "so what's he look like?" he asked.

"Uh…average looking…brown eyes…" Gil quickly said off the top of his head. He deliberately did not use his own eye colour to try and throw Greg off the scent.

"I heard they were blue," Greg turned quickly to Sara looking at her suspiciously.

Gil winced, and it only came to him then that Greg was right, Sara had told everyone she had a boyfriend with blue eyes.

"They are blue, Grissom isn't as observant as he used to be," Sara shook her head in disgrace.

"It was dark," Gil shrugged, "They could have been any colour."

"Is he tall?" Greg asked curiously, his eyes slightly squinted as he stared at Gil.

"Average for a guy," Gil shrugged. "Can you get back to work, please?"

Greg ignored the comment, "I'm guessing near enough six feet, maybe an inch or two below, probably older than Sara too, real smart…the person anyone would least expect," he rambled.

This guy knows too much and I gotta get out of here, Gil thought."Uh…" he looked at his watch "I have some work to be getting back to. And so do you two," he pointed to Sara and Greg.

Greg shrugged and went back to work immediately. Sara followed Gil out into the hall, she was carrying a sheet of paper she'd received from the DNA lab.

"Hey, I haven't seen you much lately," Sara said.

"Life is hectic, work has been hectic," Gil reminded.

Sara stopped him, "hey...are you still mad at me?"

"Why would I be mad?" Gil played dumb rather well.

"Hey…you wanna catch breakfast after the shift?" she asked hopefully.

"I can't. I need to catch up with paperwork. I'll talk to you later."

"I think we should talk about this—" Sara began.

"We have rules," he interrupted, "work is for work," he reminded, he looked around cautiously, they were in the hall, and anyone passing by would hear if they weren't careful.

"You weren't paying much attention to that in the lab just now," Sara remarked coldly, her expression was dark.

Gil felt his temper begin to flare with her. She was asking too many questions out in the open. He took her by the arm and guided her into the nearest room – the Trace lab, which currently was unoccupied. He closed the door quickly, and turned to her.

"Look, I'm not getting into an argument about this here," he said trying to maintain a calm attitude.

"Why is it you can make rules and break them so easily, and yet…when I stick to them, it's still not good enough for you?" she demanded.

Gil sighed "what are you talking about?"

"You ask me to keep this a secret – when Warrick brought up the kiss on the head, I acted just as you had wanted me to act. I made it seem like nothing was going on – and you get mad at that."

"I never said I was mad, I said I was hurt," Gil corrected.

"And then you come into the lab announcing to Greg you've 'seen' my boyfriend! And by the way, you've made him even more suspicious than you did before thanks to your messing up on that eye colour question!" Sara admonished.

Gil remained silent, he could see she had more to say and with that dangerous look on her face, he wasn't about to interrupt her.

"You haven't said two words to me in the last two days! When I ask if we're going to see each other after work, you brush me off!" her voice was beginning to grow louder, "I don't get you! One minute we're pretty hot and heavy and the next I can't even tell if I'm in a relationship with you or not!" she was practically yelling now, he was tempted to put his hand over her mouth.

"Work isn't the place to discuss this," Gil remarked, trying to remain unruffled by her statement. He glanced to his left to see beyond the glass, Nick and Warrick had been walking by the Trace lab, and they had now stopped to stare, they could clearly see an argument was going on.

"If I don't discuss it here, it'll never get brought up, because you're the master of avoidance, Grissom," Sara clenched her fists.

Gil lowered his voice, he was shaking with fury, "what do you want me to do?" he asked in little more than a growl.

"I want you to stop this! We're nearly two months down the line and you're still doing it!" She cried at him.

"Doing what?" he asked, feeling somewhat blank.

"Playing games!" Sara hissed, "you get me close to thinking that I'd be better off leaving this relationship, and then you do something that makes me stay…"

"That's not true," Gil responded, although he was beginning to see how it could seem that way.

Sara sucked in a sharp breath, she was visibly shaking, "you're so completely frustrating! How can you stand there and be so completely stoic!"

"Because we're at work, and we agreed work was work, and that we'd maintain a perfect working relationship, that was the deal, remember?"

"Jesus Christ, the only relationship I can seem to have with you is at work!" Sara outburst, her face was filled with emotion. "Being with you in Edinburgh – it was still work…if it wasn't for work, we'd never be together, Gil."

Gil would never forgive himself for saying what he said next, "fine, if that's what you think then maybe we shouldn't be together."

Sara seemed completely taken by surprise. She virtually stepped back, her expression full of confusion. She hadn't expected his response at all. She tried to speak but the words seemed to fail her and all she could let out was one single breath.

She turned towards the door and left without another word, leaving him standing alone there, he glanced through the glass to see Nick and Warrick still standing gaping, they watched Sara pass by them. Nick reached out to Sara to touch her shoulder but she shrugged away from him, and marched stubbornly down the hall.

Warrick moved to the door and opened it, "Everything okay?" he asked of Gil.

Gil remained quiet for a moment, trying to figure out what to say, "just…just a work related brawl…that's all…we don't…uh…we don't always have the same opinion…" Gil passed by Warrick on his way out. One look from Warrick's face seemed to suggest that he and Nick had heard everything that had been said from behind that glass. "Excuse me…I have to get back to work."

Anxious stuff, huh?

I'll be adding the reviewers names in the next chapter as per usual :)

Thanks to Solaris-Snape for the awesome "prize" ;)

(chapter editted becuase I had Gil's name beside something Greg should have said).