Early Fall 1998. San Francisco and the coast, California.
Grissom was going to be in San Francisco for ten nights. He couldn't remember having ever left the lab for that long before, but his boss, Jim Brass, was very supportive. Heck, Jim Brass was practically shoving him out the door. Grissom was arriving on a Friday night and would be staying until the Monday following his week of lectures. This gave him time to get settled before the week, and afterward he and Sara were going down the coast for the weekend. Sara had said he should see some of the coast south of San Francisco. He'd known this was a truly terrible idea, and of course he had again promptly agreed.
As his shuttle drove him in from the airport, Grissom began to think about how he hadn't even spoken to this woman in over six months, and he began wondering if things would be awkward between them in person; this might have been even worse an idea than he'd thought.
For only the third time ever, Sara had taken a week off work—to act as Grissom's official tour guide and San Francisco crime lab liaison, she told him. She was waiting for him at her apartment. Once he arrived, she reacquainted him with the apartment (not that there was much reacquainting needed for the small space) and showed him where to put his belongings. Then she put her hand on his neck (always, she put her hand on his neck) and kissed him.
Grissom had known this was coming. He could hardly have arranged to stay at Sara's apartment and to go away with her for the weekend without knowing it was coming. He wouldn't quite admit to himself that he wanted it, but of course he did. Still, before they proceeded, he needed to make sure they were on the same page.
He pulled away. "Sara…" he said. At least he didn't say it with regret this time. "Sara, I'm still too old for you, I still live too far away, and I'm still… I'm still not looking for a relationship." Again, from someone else this might have sounded like an excuse. But Grissom cared about Sara, and this was obvious to both.
"I know that, Gil. It's not a relationship. We're just going to have a nice week." She smiled at him as she said this. Then she kissed him again, and this time he didn't pull away.
They didn't go out that evening. They had pizza delivered, which they ate in bed, and had a marvelous night.
Their ten days together continued much in the same way—well, not in exactly the same way, because they did eventually leave Sara's apartment—and they were very comfortable together. When Grissom wasn't lecturing or preparing for his lectures, Sara took him all over the city, this time to both tourist spots and the less touristy places she liked to frequent on her own. She'd ask him about the lectures he was giving and the students, and he assured her none were as impressive as his star pupil, which made her smile. Even though they hadn't spoken in at least six months, after emailing regularly they knew each other better and were even more in sync than they had been during the week of the AAFS conference. And every night they had a rather marvelous time.
On the first Saturday of Grissom's visit… well, on the Saturday, they still hadn't left the apartment. But Sara's colleague had given her two tickets for the last Athletics game of the season, against the Anaheim Angels, so on the first Sunday of Grissom's visit she took him by BART to Oakland. The A's had a new general manager that year, Billy Beane, and a losing record, but Sara didn't know that; she had no real interest in baseball and spent most of the game preoccupied with Grissom's presence and trying not to make it too obvious. Grissom, meanwhile, spent his time very interested but trying not to look it, as he wasn't sure he wanted the lovely Sara to know what a geek he was for the sport. Luckily, they were each so caught up in their own deceptions that they didn't notice the other's.
During the week, Sara took Grissom to her favorite out-of-the-way brunch spot and her go-to greasy spoon diner. They went to the Mission District for tortas and appreciated the area's many murals; perused the selection at Dog Eared Books; and sat in the grass eating ice cream and enjoying the view of the city from Mission Dolores Park. They went to Haight-Ashbury, and Sara tried not to think about her hippie parents, while Grissom blithely hummed "San Francisco (Be Sure to Wear Flowers in Your Hair)." One day she met him over in Berkeley, where they wandered the campus and surrounding area, and he took her to eat at the famed Chez Panisse, restaurant of Alice Waters. Remembering his fondness for boats and being on the water, Sara also took Grissom to Sausalito by ferry. When these two intensely private people again managed to break away from their ocean-watching for several minutes to make out, Sara once more thought it a very delightful outing.
After Grissom's lecture finished on the Friday, Sara drove them down to Carmel for the weekend. On Saturday afternoon, they drove back up to Santa Cruz for the afternoon to ride the Giant Dipper; it had been closed when they drove through the previous day. Sara would not have driven so far just to ride a roller coaster, but she was beyond amused to discover her very eminent entomologist had a definitive thing for the rides. He was downright boyish, and she thought she'd never seen anything so darn cute. Her desire to kiss him was overwhelming. So kiss him she did.
A couple years later, when she was working for him in Las Vegas, he would tell her he sometimes road roller coasters as a diversion—as if she hadn't ridden that roller coaster on the California coast with him several times that afternoon, as if she didn't still want him as her own diversion—and she found him considerably less charming, although she still wanted to kiss him. Sara would tell him the victim of her then current case was special to her; Sara would wonder whether she herself was still special to Grissom. But now we're getting ahead of ourselves again….
On that Sunday in the early fall of 1998, Sara and Grissom went to the beach. Sara rented a surfboard. She had not learned to surf as a child, but she had taken lessons as part of a weekend bonding exercise, in which she had reluctantly participated, with some of her younger colleagues. Although she had felt reluctant about the group bonding (group bonding still not being Sara's thing), she found she quite liked being out on the water on her own. Of course, since all Sara did was work, she'd only rarely picked up a board since. Still, she went out on some quiet waves, while Grissom sat on the beach in Sara's SFPD baseball cap, reading and watching her out on the water.
When Sara came in from the surf, she stood over Grissom dripping water on him, which he would have found annoying if she hadn't been so darn cute.
She kissed him, and he tasted of sunscreen and salt (okay, maybe that was her) and promises—promises that maybe her life could be just a bit more magical than she'd ever expected. She knew this wasn't a relationship, not in the way people usually meant it, and he knew this wasn't a relationship, not in the way people usually meant it; it was some sort of a relationship, but it wasn't an ongoing thing. Still, for that day on the beach, they both felt something close to happiness, and the potential for something more—much more. And the rest of their weekend was, truly, marvelous.
UP NEXT: NEXT CHAPTER: WINTER 1999 AND ONWARD. SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA AND LAS VEGAS, NEVADA.
SOUNDTRACK LISTING
Scott McKenzie. "San Francisco (Be Sure to Wear Flowers in Your Hair)."
A/N:
Thank you again for reading, and thank you so much for the kind reviews/favs/follows! Honestly, it quite literally makes my day to know anyone is reading and enjoying this. (I know I'm again repeating myself, but I very much mean it.) 💛
This story has about 3,500 words left, split over three chapters (two of which should be posted next week because the penultimate chapter is very short). Then at the end I plan to post a preview of the next story, once it's up, since FFN does not have a series function.
