The Wednesday after, six p.m., McCarran Airport

"Where did you get to?" Grissom asked Sara. They had arrived at the airport one hour previous for check-in, and, to pay for their organisation skills, they were having to wait another two hours before they would be allowed to board.

"I was doing female stuff," she explained, sitting next to him on the uncomfortable airport chairs. They'd checked in their luggage, so all they had were their carry-ons. She placed her hand luggage on the floor between her legs.

"That takes half an hour?" He rolled his eyes.

"Well I know you won't be waiting fifteen minutes in a queue to get me a coffee," she retorted jokily, brandishing a take-away cardboard coffee cup. "Cream, no sugar," she told him.

"Uh, thanks," he replied, genuinely surprised. "I take it back."

"I also picked up a couple of journals for the flight," she added, handing him one of them. "It's a lesser-known one that I get on subscription, but somehow one of the stalls here stocked it. Thought you might want to look through it." She rummaged through her carry-on, and handed him a thick journal.

"I really appreciate it," he murmured sincerely. "I, uh, I wasn't anticipating you giving me anything, so I have nothing to exchange." He thought for a second. "Actually, you can swap places with me on the plane. I'm down on the ticket as having the aisle seat, but I know you cramp up easily, so you can take it."

Sara took a sip of her coffee and raised her eyebrows. "All I did was buy you a drink and a journal. I wouldn't ask you to give up an aisle seat."

Grissom shrugged.. "You didn't have to. Besides," he added, "your body's slimmer and longer than mine. You'd probably benefit more than me."

Disregarding the last bit, she referred to the preceding statement. "I did because I wanted to," she replied simply.

"Exactly. I'm offering you my seat because I want to." He looked at her profile. She had gone quiet. "You okay?"

"Yeah," she answered, briefly glancing back at him. "I'm just thinking about what I'm going to say."

"You don't about it much, then?"

"We don't talk about it all. We just think of things to say. She can't even ask me much about my job, because she knows I see things that are similar to what she went through, so we avoid it."

Grissom pressed his lips together, considering whether or not he should continue with his line of questioning. "Have you told her about any of the things you've recently experienced? Does she know about the DUI?"

Sara smiled bitterly. "You seriously think I'd tell her about that stuff? Tell her that I've jeopardised my career innumerable times? She has enough to deal with."

So she really has no-one, Grissom thought. He reached over and squeezed her wrist. "Yeah, I figured. How does she cope with things?"

Sara glanced at the hand covering her wrist. "I don't know. I know it sounds like a stupid thing to say, but I have no idea. On the surface she seems okay and fine, but I know she thinks about what she did every day."

"But what's your relationship with her like?"

"Oh, we're close. Very close. But like I said, I never really talk to her about things you'd wanna be able to talk to your friends or parents about. She doesn't need me adding to her problems."

"What does she think about me coming over?"

"I think she's just happy to see a couple of different faces around. She knows that you can be trusted, you're not like other guys. She's always known about you anyway, and that I've always considered myself to be a friend of yours. She has a picture of us when you presented me with that scholarship at Harvard. I think she's been dying to meet you, personally."

"I'm quite looking forward to meeting her," Grissom said, leaning back and crossing his legs. "I want to see what genes you've inherited from your mother."

"Oh, whether or not she's got my attitude, or whether or not she looks like me?" Sara smiled teasingly, and sipped her drink.

"I'm a biologist, so genes intrigue me," he replied plainly. "I'm sure you want to know how Warrick compares to his family, or Cath to hers …."

"Or you to your parents," Sara interjected. "I already know plenty about Warrick and his grandmother, and Cath with her family history broadcast for everyone to here. Yours, however, greatly mystifies me. All I know is that your mom's deaf and your father died when you were nine."

Grissom shrugged with his mouth. "Well look at how many years we've known each other. I only found out about you recently. I guess we've probably got a lot of catching up to do."

"Maybe we haven't. Maybe the reason we got drawn together when I was at college was because we didn't feel the need to have to explain ourselves and our lives. We have science in common, that's all we need."

"I don't think so," he countered. "I'm beginning to learn that by being ignorant of something in a person's past makes it hard to understand your friends. That way, you can't be there for them when they need you." He pushed his empty coffee cup into the bin next to his seat.

"What was school like for you? I can imagine your type, actually," she said before he could answer.

"What, did you and the cool kids terrorise 'my type?'"

"No. I was the female version of you, if I've got you pegged properly."

"Really?"

"Yeah. The quiet one who sits in the corner and reads, and sits in the front of class, always trying to answer questions. I spent my whole school life hiding from the jocks. Shit, my first boyfriend didn't crop up until I was in my second semester in Boston."

"What, you had nothing to do with the cool kids at all? No boyfriends or male interests or anything?" Sara shook her head. "I don't believe that for a second. I would have been exhilarated if I'd have had a friend like you at school."

"You were chased by the jocks too? Where did you used to hide?"

"The toilets at first," he answered with an endearing grin.

"Nuh-uh, they all used to smoke in there. I learned my first day at grade school that the only place I was safe was the library. They avoided that with a ten-yard radius," Sara said, laughing at the memories.

"I didn't get wise to that until much later," Grissom told her. "I used to get beaten up all the time."

"You the same? No friends, no romantic conquests?"

"I couldn't even look at the girls in my year, I though they might turn around and yank my eyeballs out if they thought I was looking at them."

"I would have gone out with you if I'd have been at school the same time," Sara remarked quietly.

"You're only saying that because you don't know what I was like. I spent all my time either in my room reading or down at the beach collecting and autopsying dead animals."

"Exactly. My kind of guy. I don't think I've changed much," she added, a mite sadly.

"Um, I don't know if this has any bearing on the situation, but ….". Grissom paused, aware that he was becoming more uncertain of what to say when in conversation with his protégé. "When you asked me to dinner …. did you mean that in a romantic context?"

"Why the hell do you have to go reading too much into things? The number of times we went for dinner and they meant nothing."

"They didn't?" He almost sounded a little a disappointed. "Answer the question."

"For God's sake, I'd just been caught up in an explosion, and I guess my mind got carried away when you called me 'honey.' You'd never say that to someone who's simply your friend. You're far too cautious for that."

"I was concerned," he replied. "I was worried you'd been hurt."

"It doesn't matter," she said, trying to pass it off. "And anyway, you know I choose emotionally unavailable men, so I would have thought your question was rhetorical."

Grissom looked around, watching people passing by, on their ways to parts of their different lives. Many of them were couples, and he felt a longing for companionship, a longing which he thought he had successfully repressed many years ago at Harvard. "Um, I wanna continue this conversation, 'cause there's a lot of stuff that should probably be explained and apologised for. But I'm not particularly partial to broadcasting out in public."

Sara frowned. "What are you trying to say?"

"I don't know yet. But I'd say I'm about three years late in accepting a dinner invitation, if it hasn't expired by now."

She tried not to get her hopes up. "I guess we should be able to manage something," she replied.