14
By Friday everything was all set for the get together with the crew. They'd decided to go with informal dress and everyone was bringing a dish to go with Grissom's lasagna. Sara was in charge of the salad. The vegetables always seemed to be her specialty. Everyone showed up around five so that the graveyard shift could still go in after. Better late than never.
After dinner, everyone moved to the Christmas tree to exchange gifts. Sara chose to give her gift first. Catherine was amazed at Sara's thoughtfulness. She went next and gave Greg his gift. She'd gone to a pawn dealer and bought him several pieces for his coin collection and a new case to put them in.
"Wow! Thanks Cath. This is great!"
"You're welcome, Greg. I put the card in the box of the place where I got all that. The guy said if you had doubles of anything, just come in and he'd exchange them for you."
"Thanks. Okay, so that makes me next. Here ya go Nick." Nick opened a gift certificate for 'Sky Dive Las Vegas'. "Since you've been getting into all these extreme sports lately, I thought you'd like that. It's for a 1 mile high jump and a picture cd."
"Thanks Greggo! This is great. I know what I'm doin' on my next day off."
Nick moved on and gave Warrick his gift.
"Thanks."
"I heard through the grapevine that you wanted tickets to this show. They were pretty cheap, so I had the ticket agent pick out a couple other sets, too."
Warrick opened an envelope with four sets of tickets to different jazz events coming up in the next couple months, including the one he'd been talking about at the Summerlin Performing Arts Center. "This is great, Nick. I don't know who told you, but I'm glad you were listening." Grissom gave Sara a smirk. "Here ya go, Gris. Guess it's your turn."
Inside an envelope, Grissom found movie tickets, symphony tickets, concert tickets, baseball tickets and a couple restaurant gift certificates. "Thanks Warrick. This is great."
"Yeah, well, I figured since you finally have someone to do things with, I'd help you enjoy it a little."
"You are exactly right. So, I guess that brings us to you, Miss Sidle."
"I guess it does. So this is why you wouldn't tell me who you picked."
"Yes, it is. So, I actually have two gifts. The first is not one I can wrap. I'm not supposed to tell anyone this until I go back to work when Ecklie can make the announcement, but I'm going to tell all of you. I would appreciate it if we could keep it between us." After nods of heads around the room, he continued, "I spoke to Ecklie last week and I told him I was stepping down as supervisor."
It was Sara who interrupted him, "Grissom!"
"Sara. Let me finish. I told him my reasons were personal. He told me if I didn't give him a good reason, he would not grant my request. Thanks to Catherine, I told him that in that case I would have to quit. After I got up to leave, he called me back to sit and told me he'd let me step down."
"Good for you Grissom. Who's taking your place?"
"Well, Catherine, that would be you."
"Me?"
"Yes. You deserve it."
"Thank you."
"Merry Christmas."
"Now, my reasoning for stepping down, as I'm sure you all have figured out, is because it is against the lab's policy to date your supervisor. Now that I am no longer her supervisor, Sara and I are free to date." He saw a tear roll down Sara's cheek, "Don't cry yet, Hon, I'm not done. The only other policy that will affect us is that a married couple can't work on the same shift. But that will be in the future and we will deal with that then. But for now," Grissom stood and reached in his pocket. He pulled out a small box, bent down on one knee in front of Sara, watched her bring her hands to her face and started the speech that he'd run through his head about a billion times. The room around them disappeared as he began, "Sara Sidle, you are, by far, my object of perfection. You are what I dream about at night, what I think about during the day, what I smile about, what I laugh about and what I cry about. You complete me in every sense of the word. I realize now that, without you, I am nothing. I know that this might be complicated, and I know that I am not the easiest person to deal with sometimes. But I am willing to devote my whole heart and soul to making this work and making you happy. I have fallen so deeply in love with you that I can't imagine spending one second of my life without you. It would be my greatest pleasure and eternal joy if you would be my wife."
Grissom opened the tiny box and inside laid the most beautiful ring she'd ever seen in her life. It was a combination of the two rings she'd tried on at the jewelers. The two bands were wrapped together like a rope and the butterfly sat on top. There were two tiny diamonds, one in each wing. There was also one larger diamond that made up the butterfly's body. The outer rims of the wings were lined with white gold. It was absolutely perfect. "Sara, will you marry me?"
Sara was crying, and all she could manage was to fall forward into his arms. When she finally pulled back, Grissom slipped the ring on her finger. Warrick whistled and they heard a few 'about times' around the room. Catherine was crying, but through her tears she managed, "Well, I think that made all the rest of our gifts look really bad."
A few giggles followed and Grissom apologized, "That was not my intention."
From Warrick, "Congrats, guys!"
And Nick, "Ditto."
"Well, Sara, since I couldn't have you, I'm glad you at least picked the next-best guy."
"Thanks, Greg. Grissom, it's perfect."
"It will match both sets of jewelry you picked out."
"I know. It's…it's just perfect." Sara showed off her ring to everyone in the room and after a few more congrats, everyone gathered their gifts, exchanged 'Merry Christmas's' and headed out.
After everyone was gone, Grissom drew Sara into his arms and said "Merry Christmas, Sara. I love you."
"I love you, too."