Chapter Three.

I stepped out into the dim sunlight of the November afternoon. Straightening my tie nervously for the infinite time that day, I looked up into a sea of faces that I didn't know. They all seemed to be standing in lines, like soldiers preparing for a ten-gun salute or a crossing of swords. At the end of the line silhouetted by a low orange sun I saw the reason I was here.

The black car stood motionless by the road, flanked by two tall men in black suits. I was here to bid my final farewell to a wooden box surrounded by masses of flowers. Their bright happy colours taunting me, laughing at my sorrow.

My feet suddenly felt cemented to the ground. I couldn't face taking another step, moving this event forward. Another step forwards meant another slice of confirmation that I had to leave her behind and my life had to go on.

I felt a hand on my arm.

'Come on Greg, it's time to go.' A voice said softly in my ear.

'I can't do this,' I said back, my voice thick, tears resting in my eyes, threatening to spill.

'You have to, I'll be right here with you.'

I turned around and took a step towards returning to the building; She placed her free hand against my chest preventing me from going any further.

'If you back out of this, you will never forgive yourself,' she said with a gentle purposefulness.

'I feel like I shouldn't even be here, I don't know any of these people,' A tear slid down my face.

She gently wiped it away and smiled softly at me. 'You know me.'

My face crumpled as a torrent of tears began to fall. She wrapped her arms around me and held me tightly as I sobbed on her shoulder. It would have felt awkward if I wasn't so overcome with grief. I swallowed back the tears and forced myself to calm down.

'Thank you for being here Sara, I don't think I could do this without you.'

My reaction to Alanis' casual attitude was postponed by the arrival of Grissom, instructing me to go and assist Nick at a scene. I hadn't had time to process whether I was amused or enraged by her understatement of the century. Another thing that was grating my cheese was that I had found it so easy to tell her about the court summons yet I hadn't been able to tell Sara, one of my closest friends.

That was another thing that was playing on my mind as I absently dusted for prints on a twirling baton. I needed to talk to Sara. It would never sit right with me if I were unable to clear the air with her. I knew I was in the wrong. I was also in the doghouse it seemed as Nick enlightened me with his experience of Sara.

'Hey Greggo, what'd you do to Sara to piss her off so much?' he called over as he flicked through the victim's diary.

'She's pissed off?' I asked, looking up, my hand frozen mid-dust.

'Well, she didn't say as much but I could tell she wasn't happy,' he looked at me disapprovingly. 'Man, what are you dusting?'

'Blunt force trauma, she was a cheerleader; I figured it could be a viable murder weapon. How can you tell?' I replied, holding up the baton so he could see it

'Spray it with Luminol?' he suggested.

'I meant how can you tell Sara's pissed off with me?'

'Ohh Right, she does this thing where she pretends like she's just focused on her work when really she's just trying to make excuses for the fact that she's regressed to talking in grunts to whoever crosses her path.' Nick explained his somewhat irregular theory.

'Why can't she just scream and shout at me instead? At least then I would know she's mad at me,' I muttered, picking my bottle of Luminol up out of my kit and spraying the baton.

'Beats me, chick thing I guess.' Nick shrugged.

'Hey,' I said triumphantly, holding up the baton that now displayed an array of pink splodges. 'I was right.'

'That's a chick thing too,' Nick said, pointedly.

'What?' I frowned, not catching his drift.

'Always being right.'

Not particularly impressed with Nick's insinuation that I was a woman, as much as it was a joke, I had proceeded to bag and tag the murder weapon in silence still musing over what I should do to repair the situation with Sara.

Arriving back at the lab, I was still in Greg Sanders land as I wandered down the corridor towards DNA, suspected murder weapon in hand. So far I hadn't come up with any worthwhile gesture of apology that I could give to Sara for being incredibly dense and ungrateful after all she had done for me. Somehow a bunch of flowers and a box of chocolates didn't seem to make up for the fact I had spoken to the one person I had relied on in my time of personal crisis as if she were a piece of scat on my shoe.

'Walk much?' a disgruntled voice snapped angrily as I felt my shoulder connect with something hard.

I looked in front of me to see Sara rubbing her forehead.

'I'm sorry, are you all right?' I asked bending down to help her collect up all the papers I had caused her to drop.

'I'm fine,' she said with the same lack of tone as she had had in the break room earlier that shift. Clearly, a little bump in the corridor was not going to make her forget my shortcoming in a hurry.

She looked up at me briefly before continuing to gather the rest of her papers together. In incredibly clichéd timing, my hand touched hers as we both reached for the same sheet of paper displaying some DNA results. To my surprise, her cheeks reddened slightly and she pulled her hand sharply away from mine like I had given her an electric shock and she returned to a standing position.

'Seriously Sara, I'm sorry for what I said in the break room. I didn't mean it. I appreciate you trying to help me I really do,' I said in one last desperate attempt to clear the air before she walked away again.

'I'm not bothered Greg, words are just words,' she said casually as though her rapid exit had been perfectly normal and non-resultant of my verbal attack.

'Oh,' was all I could think of to say in return.

'So what's with the twirling baton, you taking up a new hobby?' she asked with her familiar playful smile.

I laughed. 'Nah, cheerleader got murdered, found blood on it. Think it might be the murder weapon.' I explained.

'Well that's original,' she said sarcastically.

I smiled and nodded, watching her as she set off on her way down the corridor, relieved that we seemed to have returned to normal speaking terms and that there was no sight of hostility threatening to rear its ugly head.

A/N – this chapter doesn't need much discussion. I was mainly using it to explore the friendships Greg has with his fellow CSI's although the little funeral flashback at the beginning was to show that although it was some months ago, Greg's mind still wanders back.

I hope you all liked the little Greg/Nick at the crime scene part. I thought I would try and throw in a tiny bit of comedy again as this story is intended to be lighter and I could see that playing out in my head. Then again I do have a particularly unique sense of humour that not everyone understands! Please R&R, as you deem necessary.