Yay for introspection! Yay for pretty Sara! Yay all around!
There was no contact between the two of them the next day, and neither had bothered to call in the morning to see how the other was doing. It would have been too awkward. She'd awoken with a sense of lost dignity and felt such despair in the pit of her stomach that she was unable to swallow anything but warm tea.
When she had been in the shower, Peter had called, her answering machine picking up, his voice lilting to her ears, mingling with the spray of the water, making her somehow even more desolate. There was no reason to be sad or upset about the date, she had reasoned. It had gone wonderfully, he'd been attentive and lovely and everything that she needed at that moment in her life. He... was perfect, considering the alternative.
It wasn't fair to categorize Peter as 'the man who wasn't Grissom' but that was what she kept doing.
Night closed in around her as she stepped out of CSI headquarters after shift and almost immediately searched for his car in the lot. It wasn't there, and she found herself gulping in the cool air to steady herself. It was like they'd had a one-night stand, or worse, even, because it was all emotions, all soul, and more was at stake. Perhaps he was out with his blonde writer, wining and dining her back into his bed.
She worked with Morgan like nothing was new... and nothing, as it seemed, really was. Everything, in reality, was new. Everything: her outlook on life, her take on love, her diet, for the love of god. But that didn't matter, it was the night, and she was... looking for something.
It felt as if she were a coward retreating as she climbed into her car. She didn't know how to fix herself, fix her soul. But as she drove home she realized that she shouldn't have to fix anything, she shouldn't have to change. She liked herself just the way she was. It was him that she thought needed the changing.
'Another thing that will never work, Sara. You can't change a man,' she thought as she sped down the strip.
He could hurt her, damn it. Yeah he could hurt her but she could hurt him too, she was sure of it.
She had plans tonight, and she needed to focus on those plans. Sara toyed with the idea of buying something, of actually going out shopping. There was a cocktail dress collecting dust at the back of her closet and she figured that it would do just fine. After all, the money she saved from buying a new dress could be put to good use purchasing angsty chick flicks and Ben and Jerry's for after her date.
'Date,' she chuckled at the thought. A real fucking date... not one she had been waiting on for five years and change...
Instead of stopping at an expensive boutique, she stopped off at Blockbuster and bought a few used titles, heart heavier as she walked back to her car. 'Diane Keaton, Keanu Reeves and Phish Food will be my goal for the night,' she swore to herself as she pulled into her parking space.
A headache bloomed between her eyes as she entered her apartment and dropped the bag of movies down on her coffee table. Preparing for a date was such a hassle; one had to dress appropriately and primp. Ugh, she hated primping. It was so tiresome, and it took planning, meticulous hands applying makeup and setting hair...
Sara sighed and made her way into her bedroom closet, searching inside for the black silk dress that hadn't be worn in, god, years.
Between smoothing her dress and tending to her hair she was afraid she would forget his face, and it made her cry, but only a bit. Could she ever forget his beautiful, flawed face, his soft, demanding voice? If she let Peter in that far, would she forget Grissom? No, there was no forgetting him; there was pretending to forget him and pretending to move on, but there was no forgetting him in her heart.
She deserved to have fun and be happy. Jazz, she decided, was a fun thing. She'd never gone to a jazz club (the closest she'd come to that was attending one of Warrick's shows) but she was looking forward to it nonetheless.
She imagined herself in Peter's arms, somehow on the dance floor, a place she would never dare to go. She saw him whispering in her ear, kissing her, attending to her desires. Desires that had long since laid dormant, called anew by her will to be normal and full.
The screech of the hair dryer screamed to her, smoothing out her consistently unruly hair. The incessant noise did nothing to quell her thoughts when she bent over to fix the underside of her hair.
In her head, she was drinking with Peter, yes, sharing drinks. She was whispering sly suggestions into his ear, making him want her, if he didn't already. Oh yes, asking, delicately if he would take her home.
And he would, he would take her home and offer her wine and then water and then a soft place to rest her head. And then, it was a test if she would choose to accept his pillow or not. If she would accept his bedroom or his sofa. Considering his bed, she saw him atop her, mumbling romantic obscenities, wanting it to mean something although it never would. God, it would feel so good, so new and fresh and alive but it would mean nothing.
She imagined the sky in December, walking with Grissom, somewhere north. She grasped his hand and it was so, so cold but she refused to let go. A lonesome reminder of what it meant to be alive.
And yet, her mind drifted to Peter over her, loving her in some way that she couldn't grasp. Peter, who wanted her as she was without altering a thing about himself or her. 'Love. Love, none of that here. Just a man...'
But the rain would fall around her and Grissom. He'd know her deepest fears and soothe them with a strange balm of his hand. They'd kiss and she'd go insane and love him more and more and more until she was gone.
Sara knew she wasn't beautiful, wasn't captivating, wasn't enthralling. But she was something; she heard it in Grissom's voice, she saw it in his eyes. She was something more than she thought she was and she was torn between wanting to find out what that was and wanting to leave it all behind.
Peter was an amazing man; he made her feel like she was important, intriguing. He made her feel mysterious, made her want to duck behind her wine glass and blush. In a few short weeks he'd managed to open her eyes to the spectacular and sensual.
Peter caressing her cheek, making her feel like a woman again, as she so deserved. Her hips, they would sway against his, and yet not press. Yes, a casual sway, something akin to friendship searching for something more. Sensuality in his grace, making her want to move with him, just move, a sort of dance that wasn't really.
She envisioned the lights being cut, something down to a low purple, a deep blue, something that would allow her to slip into the delicate realm of fantasy.
She could nearly feel it... His touch, as warm as it was in those fleeting moments, didn't feel anything like she'd anticpated. It wasn't what she was looking for, Peter's touch, but damned if she couldn't admit that it was good. It was velvet and chocolate... but somehow old and crusted. Him, him, him, who?
Even thinking about him, thinking about Grissom's feather-light touches over her body made her want to crumple...or weep...or both. A simple kiss to her cheek would do her in and it made her so very sad to know that she was so strong and yet so weak. 'No, not weak, just so very in love, that's all.'
Sara thought, 'In love, love doesn't matter. Such a colloquial term.'
He'd changed her life so slowly, so subtly. And she, well she could find solace in the memory of him smiling at her, or touching her lower back while escorting her through a doorway. 'It's not meant to be... not, even if it is meant to be, you can't change him...'
And yet, he'd touched her, listened to her, the desolation that she felt when she thought of her father, of her mother. When she thought of the family she barely had. She saw herself grasping his hand and falling into his embrace and sleeping, dreaming of the things they could be.
She doubted she'd ever just feel all right because Peter was beside her, handing her a bindle.
Even 'friends' would have suited her. Just friends with Grissom. Though she was in love with him, just friends... to hear him admit that... would have been enough. 'Such a lie, a lie baby doll. A change is coming, do you remember that?'
A lovely press into her skin, a simple burn into her arm. It slid into a fantasy of him sliding into her, welcome and warm. Pressing inside of her and she pressing back, all Sara could think was, 'Fuck you Grissom, other people are allowed to want me... right? Right?'
Mind's eye again... she was in her own world. The world was deep purple; he, Grissom, grabbed her wrists and pasted her to the wall. "I've been looking for you all night." He said it and even as he did, even as he spoke, his lips attached to Sara's neck. "Where were you? I've been here all night..." Her hips rolled to his and she had to think, really think if the roll was a rebuke or an acceptance.
And yes, she'd responded. "You never gave me a chance to forget." All in her head... she never deserved the run around...
Her cell phone trilled and she was cut from her thoughts. It was Peter, kindly asking her if she was ready, if it was inappropriate to present her with flowers since they weren't technically 'steady'. Sara laughed... she liked that. She liked that Peter made her laugh so very easily. It was simple to be just a woman with him.
There would be drinks, she was sure of that. And yes, there would be dinner. Wine would be ordered; it would be good wine, she knew it.
Sara glanced over her appearance in the mirror, simply because she thought she had to. Damn, if Grissom saw her now...
She was perfect, a flame of flamboyance. As insanely uncomfortable as she was in the slick dress, she was ready to allow her inhibitions to slip through her hands. She was willing to slake her insecurities and press forward with all that she was unsure of.
He'd pulled up across the street from her building, the anticipation nearly searing a hole through his skull. Yet, he, the one with the Ph.D... the one with the experience... he, the one who could easily quote Shakespeare and turn the words into a slippery innuendo could form nothing of a rational argument.
He was ripped from his arrogant thoughts by a wisp of silk, caught from the corner of his eye.
She was wearing some sort of modest dress, gorgeous and flowing. It was perfect for dancing, or dining or... anything. The dress was perfect. But dancing, yes it stuck with Grissom as he watched her enter the car. 'Sara, she would never dance...'
Dancing or something equally as personal, something where he could touch her and get away with it.
God, he wanted to hold her in his arms, just to feel how her body warmed the silk. That silk would look better on his floor, Grissom reasoned, and her naked body would be perfect and at home in his bed.