A/N - hi all. sorry i've taken so long to post this up. I've been really busy working and trying to finish my degree! Anyway here's chapter five. Enjoy.

Chapter Five.

The sun shone brightly as I left for work early the next day. It was getting towards early evening but there was a lot of light left shining through the clouds in the clear dusky sky, splitting into parallel rays before joining together again illuminating the tarmac. Returning the basketball that collided with my car windshield to a group of apologetic ten year olds, I climbed into the car, flicked on the radio and began the ever so familiar drive to the Las Vegas crime lab.

I was still humming the Marilyn Manson track that I had subjected the streets of the city to full volume treatment with as I walked into the building, bag slung over my shoulder.

'Evening Grissom!' I called down the corridor as I spied my boss talking to Archie at the door of the AV lab.

'Evening Greg,' he replied, an air of caution in his voice.

'Someone's been taking their meds today,' Archie quipped.

'I heard that!' I turned and pointed accusingly at him as I passed on my way to the locker room.

Judging by the quick exchange of wary glances between Nick and Warrick followed by their sudden exit from the room, they were more than a little bemused by my jovial mood. Sara wasn't quite so quick on the uptake as her head was buried inside her locker.

'Hey Sidle, whatcha doing?' I asked, dumping my bag on the bench and opening my locker.

Judging by the raising of her left eyebrow and her lack of verbal response to my over amorous greeting, Sara was still sufficiently annoyed with me to warrant another day of not speaking to me other than to compare field notes. It seemed to be a common occurrence lately that Sara and I would exchange words and be cast into an atmosphere of curt conversations and deliberate attempts to be indifferent towards each other. Her exit from the room deflated my irregularly positive attitude that I had entered the building with that evening and set my mind turning the usual vicious circle that it did when it didn't want to face up to reality.

I unsuccessfully suppressed a yawn, receiving disapproving looks from the two solitary people who stood in the corridor as it echoed loudly. I rolled my eyes guiltily and looked to Warrick who was eyeing me suspiciously with an open case file in his hand.

'What?' I asked, straightening my tie and shifting my shoulders uncomfortably.

'Didn't get much sleep huh?' he said knowingly.

I turned away so he couldn't see my face, looking out of the window onto the parking lot of the courthouse, enjoying the fact that he couldn't see me smiling proudly to myself.

'Yeah you know it was one of those nights, I just couldn't relax.' I said, giving the most pathetic excuse known to man.

Warrick nodded acceptingly and returned to looking over his case notes. I turned to face him again when I saw her walking up towards us, a pile of papers in her arms. She spotted me and smiled coyly as another woman walked alongside her barking orders angrily into a cell phone. I sent a wink quickly in her direction as she passed, maintaining eye contact with me until she couldn't crane her neck any longer without looking suspicious.

'Hey, looks like you've got an admirer!' Warrick said with a grin having looked up from his reading a few seconds previously.

I smiled and cocked my head to one side as though I were impressed with this 'new' information.

'Yeah, well, there's no accounting for taste,' Warrick quipped and returned to the file.

Sitting down on the bench I sighed as I remembered the days where not having enough sleep was due to more enjoyable circumstances and wondered why I had managed to sleep so peacefully last night. There had been no nightmare, no waking in floods of tears or gasping for breath. There had been nothing. In an odd way I was almost disappointed, like I had become so used to it as if my emotional responses reminded me I was still a functioning human being, albeit slightly more dysfunctional than functional.

The sudden tapping of footsteps outside the room was replaced with an anticlimactic 'oh,' bringing me away from my thoughts and drawing my attention to the doorway. Alanis stood, slightly out of breath, shoulders hunched looking slightly bedraggled. Not that that was particularly different to any other day. She often had her hair hanging in rough loose curls, cascading down the latest punk t-shirt she chose to wear with her two sizes too big combat pants which I was duly convinced were the only pants she owned and far too young for a woman in her late twenties to wear.

'What's up?' I asked, zipping up my backpack and preparing to load it into my locker whilst trying to maintain a relatively cheerful tone despite the memory that was stabbing at my heart, taunting me as though it were dying for me to break.

'I heard you were in a really good mood and I figured it was a once in a lifetime occurrence so I thought I'd better come see for myself,' she said sarcastically. 'But you're clearly still insanely depressed judging by the look on your face.'

I sighed and slammed the locker door hard, resting my forehead against the cold metal, the sudden thought that it reminded me of her hands when she lay in Dr Robbins office a year and a half ago felt like a brutal punch to the stomach.

'Greg, are you all right?' Alanis' voice had that rarely heard but genuinely concerned tone to it.

I shook my head but didn't speak. I was tired, physically and mentally, of everything. It seemed like I was up and down, the latter being the more common state of my mind. Taking a deep shuddering breath in I willed myself not to do this, to remain calm and not break down. A skill I had maintained for so many months now. A skill I suddenly no longer seemed to possess.

'Hey c'mon, just let it go,' Alanis said.

I was surprised at how close her voice was to my ear. I hadn't realised in my angered stated that she had taken me in her arms and was holding me whilst I cried, my tears wetting the shoulder of her prized Green Day t-shirt which seemed a ludicrously small detail to be concerned with at that point.

'I'm sorry,' I said, pulling away as my typical smokescreen washed over and I tried to make like everything was fine.

'Don't worry about it,' Alanis smiled weakly and rubbed my arm in an affectionate manner that I wasn't used to but felt reassured by all the same.

'No really, I'm sorry. I'm making you uncomfortable,' I sat back down on the bench needing the support for my trembling legs.

'What you mean is you're the one feeling uncomfortable,' she gave a small knowing smile and sat down beside me.

I looked down at the floor feeling like a small child who had been caught out in a serious breach of the ground rules.

'I know, I'm good,' she laughed lightly. 'So, you wanna tell me what that was about, other than the obvious?'

I looked up briefly at her. She had a small compassionate smile on her face and was looking at me expectantly.

'Things are just getting to me that's all. It's like I'm trying to rebuild myself and be strong and then all of a sudden I'll remember something about Elizabeth and it's like someone yanked out a cornerstone or something.'

Her smile widened as I finished my little rendition of how intolerably difficult things had been just lately. She seemed amused but she didn't say anything.

'I know, it's a terrible analogy,' I said, feeling a little irritated that she seemed to be laughing at me after I had been so honest with her.

'No it's not,' she shook her head.

'Then why are you smiling like I just told a really funny joke?'

'You tell a joke? That'll be the day. Actually I was thinking about the conversation we had yesterday…'

'And?' I interrupted sharply not the slightest bit more understanding of the inner workings of the mind of the strange woman that sat beside me.

'It's just interesting, that's all,' she gave me a pat on the back and stood up, walking towards the door.

'What is?' I was more than a little confused now.

She turned and looked at me for a second.

'I think you just let your guard down.'

A/N – and so the healing begins. Or does it? Not a lot to say about that chapter really Think I've got bored of trying to justify my interpretations of what's happening – I'm leaving it up to you to decide what you think. We all read into things differently. As long as it leaves you with a positive feeling that's all I care about. Please read and review.