12
When he got out of the shower, the smell of coffee drew him out of his bedroom. He almost burst into tears when he saw her seated on his couch. She pointed to a coffee cup on the table. When he sat down, all he could manage was, "Thank you."
"For what?"
"For staying. I thought you'd be gone."
"I thought I would, too."
"Why'd you stay?"
Tears streamed down her face. She knew the answer to his question, but didn't know if he could handle it right now. But maybe it would help. Deciding that she'd better not start lying now, she said, "Because I love you."
He started crying again. "God, Sara. I'm so sorry. I don't know why I deserve you. I've hurt you so many times and you can still tell me you love me? How can you possibly love me?"
"I don't know, Grissom. I just do." She crawled across the couch to him and curled herself onto his lap. He wrapped his arms around her and cried tears into her hair. After a few minutes, Sara told him, "When you're ready to talk, I'm ready to listen."
It took him a while to gather his words, but he finally told her his story through his tears. "About six months before you moved here, I dated a woman. Her name was Sandra Spencer. I met her at a forensic seminar at UNLV. She was a grad student majoring in physics. She was around 5'10", brunette, very pretty. She was intelligent and very curious. In my mind, she was as close to you as I could get. In fact, the only time I didn't see you in her was when I looked in her eyes. No one has your eyes."
"Anyway, I lost myself in her to try and forget you. It didn't work. We had fun together, but she wasn't you. One night, after a couple too many drinks, I had sex with her." He felt her tighten in his arms, "It had nothing to do with love. It was just simple, alcohol-induced sex. She left me the next day. She wouldn't return my calls for weeks. Finally, she called me one night to ask if I could talk to her. We met in the park. She explained that she left me because I'd called her 'Sara' while we had sex. I never realized it. She said I'd called her that several times before, but just ignored it. She couldn't handle it in bed though."
"Of course, I couldn't blame her. She was good about the whole thing. She sat and listened while I told her about you. We talked for hours. At the end, she told me that I needed to get you back into my life. She said it was obvious that I loved you and I was just trying to deny it. Two weeks later, Holly Gribbs was shot and I called you. I guess you know the rest."
He waited in silence until her tears subsided. "I never knew she was pregnant, Sara. I don't know why she didn't tell me. She must have known when we had our talk."
Finally, she spoke, "You don't think there's a possibility that she's not yours?"
"Anything's possible, Sara. The timing is right. But I'll have a test done anyway."
"What are you going to do?"
"I don't know, Sara. I don't know anything about little girls or being a father. But it's my responsibility to take care of her."
"You're gonna need help."
"Yeah. But I'm not sure I know anyone who'd want to help me."
"I do."
"Yeah? Who?"
"Someone who wants to help you with every problem life hands you. Someone who sees all you beauty through all your mistakes. Someone who sees her future in your eyes. Someone who loves you despite all your flaws."
"I'm still not sure…"
"I love you, Grissom. Besides, you promised me, not too long ago, that you'd spend every moment replacing my hurt with happiness and prove to me that we could make this work."
"I love you, too, Sara."