Winter 1999 and onward. San Francisco, California and Las Vegas, Nevada.

After Grissom returned to Las Vegas, Sara and Grissom's correspondence continued as it had before. At Christmastime, he even sent her a book of poetry he thought she'd enjoy, since he still felt he owed her for the copy of Howl she'd sweetly snuck in his bag. (Possibly not even Grissom can say whether he realized that, in so doing, he was starting a tradition whereby he would gift Sara Sidle a book—amongst, starting some years later, many other things—for Christmas every year for the rest of his life.) They each quite delighted in hearing from the other, though they didn't tell anyone else about this.

Then one day, not yet quite a year after they'd first met, Sara had a question for Grissom about a case, but she was too tired to compose an email about it; there were too many details. So she decided to take the easier route. She wasn't quite sure why she'd never done it before.

Over in Nevada, Grissom heard his phone ring.

"Hey, I've got a question," she said, as if she needed no introduction; she didn't need an introduction.

"Shoot," he told her. Shift had just ended, so he had time to talk.

So she proceeded with the question, which led to another question and then another, and pretty soon they realized they'd been on the phone for over an hour, which reminded them both of how they'd been practically kicked out of the Mexican restaurant that day they'd first met in San Francisco, but they didn't bring this up. When Sara realized she'd been talking a lot and apologized for taking up so much of his time, Grissom thought how bizarre it was that this beautiful young woman with whom he'd had quite a lot of really quite excellent sex on two different occasions would apologize for taking up too much of his time with her professional questions. (As for the really quite excellent sex, Grissom generally tried not to think too much about that or what it meant to him.) He told her she could feel free to call any time. And so she did.

Sara and Grissom did not stop emailing after that, but they started talking as well, at least a couple times per week. This again continued for a few months just the same, and then it changed slightly.

Sara couldn't say what exactly had come over her. Maybe she was overtired. Maybe she'd had too much coffee, or not enough coffee. Maybe she hadn't had enough sex. She hadn't had enough sex since Grissom, that was for sure. She hadn't had any sex since Grissom, to be honest. Though, while she was kissing him romantically on sandy beaches on the Pacific, she might like to imagine otherwise, Sara knew her relationship with Grissom was just a friendship—maybe friends with occasional benefits. But he still made all the other men she met seem inadequate and unappealing. So maybe it was the lack of sex. She wasn't sure.

But one day she'd called him, and he'd been sort of muffled, so she asked where he was, and he told her he was in bed. So she laughed and asked him what he was wearing, and he told her, but he clearly didn't get what she was thinking. So then she laughed again and told him where she was and what she was wearing. Then she told him she was removing what she was wearing. Then she told him what she would like him to do to her in the places from which she was removing what she was wearing. Then she told him what she would like to do to him. Through all of this, Grissom said nothing, but he also didn't try to stop her, and he didn't hang up the phone.

Sara and Grissom's relationship did not change after this. He still called and emailed her, and she still called and emailed him. But very occasionally, when she was feeling slightly not herself, Sara would repeat that conversation with him. He never said anything, but he also didn't try to stop her, and he didn't hang up the phone.

Grissom, for his part, didn't quite know what to do about Sara when she did this. His friend, this beautiful woman, this beautiful young woman, this brilliant woman, this woman he trusted implicitly, this woman who occasionally called him up and told him about what she was wearing (or, mostly, wasn't wearing) and what she'd like him to do to her…. He wondered whether she knew what it did to him, how bothered it left him, even though he never responded. He wondered whether she knew about the cold showers and the days and nights he spent thinking about her. He was glad he wasn't really a Catholic anymore. Did she know what she did to him, even from hundreds of miles away?

So Sara and Grissom both sat hundreds of miles apart, sometimes quite hot and bothered, and sometimes not knowing quite exactly what to do about each other.

Their relationship continued on like this for quite some time. Both were busy with work. No further speaking engagements brought Grissom to California. Two years had passed since his visit to her, and he and Sara had not seen each other again. And then Holly Gribbs was shot.

UP NEXT: NEXT CHAPTER: OCTOBER 2000. SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA.

NOTES

On Sara's love life: The above is not to say I think Sara didn't date or have sex with anyone else between her two encounters with Grissom and her move to Vegas; I think she did, just maybe not initially when she was still hoping something more serious might happen with Grissom sooner than it did (as it might have if Grissom hadn't been quite so… Grissom).

On why they didn't see each other for two years; or, The Grissom of it all:

To be clear, I didn't just get bored and decide to skip ahead two years. I wanted Sara and Grissom to get a little early intimacy but not a lot; I didn't want them to have (for lack of a better description) a relationship relationship; and I didn't want Sara to have moved to Vegas with the definite expectation that they would (even if she was moving for Grissom).

So why didn't they see each other for two years? Sara, as we know, was really playing the long game here; she knew better than to scare off her eminent entomologist with any fast moves. So it all came down to Grissom. But Grissom found an excuse to see Sara the second time (the Berkeley opportunity in fall 1998), despite always being busy, so why nothing more for the two years that followed?

Obviously the trip to Berkeley was just a pretext to see Sara again, but I'm not sure he realized (or realized the full extent to which) this was the case. The way I see it, on a very surface level, Grissom may have realized this girl had made him feel something unusual (for him), and he liked her, so, when he got the invitation to Berkeley, he thought it would be nice to see her again (fall 1998). I think, though, that slightly below the surface his reason for wanting to see Sara again was to disprove his feelings for her—to show himself that he had imagined things; that it was all in his head; that he liked, admired, and respected Sara and her brilliance as a scientist; but that what he felt for her wasn't really all that different from what he felt for, e.g., Catherine or Warrick. But we know that's not what he found.

My most sincere apologies, because from hereon in I am really going to mangle a physics metaphor, and I have not studied physics since high school.

On a deeply subconscious level, Grissom was, on the one hand, falling madly in love with Sara (even more so after he spent that second week with her in fall 1998) and, on the other hand, profoundly terrified by this. These are the equal and opposite forces that acted upon him for many years. Objects in motion stay in motion and objects at rest stay at rest, unless acted upon by an outside force. In this case, Grissom's two opposing sentiments cancelled each other out; the net force was zero. As the magnitude of one force—the love—increased, so did that of the other—the fear. Grissom kept moving much in the same way he always had; he maintained the status quo. Sometimes, though, something would happen to disrupt that status quo—the intervention of an outside force. In this case, it happened to be the shooting of Holly Gribbs. If Holly Gribbs hadn't come along, though, it would have been something else—a different change in his life, or even (as it would be on later occasions) an action by Sara herself.

Again, apologies: I know the metaphor was mangled, but I hope the idea came through!

SOUNDTRACK LISTING

Dido. "Thank You."

Foo Fighters. "Everlong."