A/N As always thanks to Jennifer and Michelle. Sorry this is late but at the last minute I decided to go to the YTDAW convo in Vegas which was a blast!

Chapter 3

Sara

I have been sitting in the parking lot for 15 minutes past when I was supposed to report to the Carol Mendelsohn Forensic Arts and Sciences building. My registration is folded in thirds on the grey, freshly shampooed seat of my car. I registered online three weeks ago. I did everything online at Gil's townhouse. I don't think he exactly wants me over there. But he didn't let on and I did everything in one session. I haven't been invited back since. I completed all of my school tasks online, including buying my books. Those are waiting for me in the campus bookstore, packed and ready to go, except for the two I found for a dollar on EBAY.

The only thing I can't do online is present my real self for first semester authentication. Gotta make sure that Mata Hari isn't registering at Sunny Valley Community College. They just want to know I am a real person. I have my birth certificate, my driver's license and my social security card. I also have my very own, shiny new credit card for incidentals. Actually, it's not my credit card. It's Gil's. It just has my name on it. I haven't used it yet, preferring to use the prepaid credit card he gave me. After all the documents have been verified and they take my thumb print, I will get my official student ID. I submitted a digital picture that Gil took of me.

All I have to do now is open my car door and walk less than 20 feet to the entrance of the building. I start breathing slow and even. One, two, three. My cell phone rings. A manic beetle appears across the screen: Gil. I have got to get out of the car. I silence the phone without answering it and leave the vehicle.

I worked on this outfit for a week. I bought Glamour, Vogue and Elle. What is the fashionable young coed wearing this fall? I narrowed it down to very dark but worn in jeans, salmon pink pullover that shows a hint of belly, super dark sunglasses with oversized frames. Then I topped it all off with some dewy pink gloss, tinted moisturizer, clear mascara and now I feel like a complete fraud. I just don't look like one.

I made Marge give me all the handbags, sunglasses and other accessories she hadn't worn in three months. She whined. I ignored. She grumbled about not thinking Gil would mind keeping me looking good. But she hasn't seen my book bill, or she'd know that Gucci sunglasses are way down on my list of necessities.

Walking like my mother taught me (head held high and long legs leading me instead of dragging behind like I am want to do), I land in front of the office too fast for my nerves. I forge ahead following the red "registration arrows" a few feet. A Victoria Gotti look-alike takes off a pair of owl glasses and tilts red rimmed eyes up at me. The blue color reminds me of Gil.

I take out the waterproof envelope that has my birth certificate and hand it to her. "Birth certificate." I say cheerily. "And if you will give me a second I have my driver's license here."

She takes the envelope and opens it without looking at the outside. Her eyes are still trained on me. "Are you that model?" she asks in a New York accent.

"What?…"

"You know. Well if it was you'd know." She looks around. "Unless you're pulling one over on me. Am I bein', watcha call it? Punk'd?"

I want to tell her that she is too old to be punk'd by MTV, but quickly think better of it. After all, she's the proverbial gatekeeper. Actually she's the literal gatekeeper.

"I'm Sara Sidle," I say, not knowing what else to say.

She puts the spectacles back on and looks at the documents I proffered. . "Oh yeah, Sidle. Dr. Rambo wanted to see you." She hits a button on her phone and works at diminishing the accent. "Dr. Rambo. Sidle's here."

"Did I do something wrong with my registration?" I shift my weight a bit. Then I remember not to slump.

"No dear. Yours was probably the only one. I can always tell who just left high school and who is a bit older by the registration forms. Grown ups read directions. Who knew a genius could look like you? Mostly they come in with pocket protectors and thick glasses. They… That's a laugh. There have only been four in the last decade: you, that irritating Hodges kid who couldn't get any decent references for Yale because no one liked him, Sanders who only lasted a semester before the Stanford people descended, and what's his face, that dot com guy."

I smile nervously at the friendly woman, wondering if I should take a seat.

"Don't sit hon," she says as if reading my mind. He'll be right out."

A dark haired, youngish looking man steps from some hidden room. He takes long steps towards me.

"Sidle, Sara." He says evenly.

"Yes."

"I was going to offer you the job before I got your test results, but I thought you might want to know what your IQ was and of course I don't get to meet many geniuses. Well, that's not true. I don't get to meet any geniuses that are actually my students."

"Test results?

"Yes, the test you took when you finalized your registration. I make all my majors take it. Helps justify a ridiculous budget. And if you tell anyone that I said it was ridiculous, I will plead the fifth. You aren't taping me are you, Alice?"

Alice rolls her eyes. She's heard the joke before. "No, Doc. No one is taping you."

"The 100 question thingy?" I ask

He nods seriously. "Exactly. With your scores I really had no choice."

"Job?"

"I am creating the questions, not answering them. Each department is required to staff the Learning Center with two students - one first year and one second year. Given your education history it was a push, but what with your IQ test, it became decidedly less so. Probably got bored in high school, huh? That why you dropped out?"

"Um…"

"Don't answer that, just makes those of us with regular intelligence jealous. Myself included," he deadpans and winks at Alice.

"About this job?"

"Sorry. Only two days a week. You tutor people in chemistry and physics. In return, you don't have to take Chem101 or Physics 101. It also awards you a five hundred dollar scholarship. That's for the year, not the semester. And we pay you a whopping ten dollars an hour."

"So, that's in addition to the other scholarship?"

"Yes, indeedy."

Alice interrupted. "You paid your bill already so come the second week of class, you'll get a check. And don't' forget about the book credit, Doc."

"What-oh." Dr. Rambo's thin lips take up their spitfire rhythm again. "Alice keeps me honest, so I won't try and use the credit for myself. Hehe. Yes… We give you a hundred dollar credit per year, not per semester, in the bookstore. What do you say? Will you accept?"

"I don't know." I want to call Gil. I should call him.

"Take it honey," Alice says. "You got nothing to loose, and ya don't have to take those classes."

"Okay," is all I can say.

Observation

James Lincoln Brass sidled up to his friend quietly. He placed his elbows on the counter mimicking Grissom's own posture. "So, you dumped me."

Gil didn't look up from the roll beetle he was dissecting. "What?"

"Your message. You aren't going to take me to the opera or the baseball game."

"Sorry," Gil said, distractedly. A slight smirk filled out his face. "Here's a thought. Maybe you should, I don't know… Buy yourself tickets?"

"You don't buy yourself tickets," Brass whined good-naturedly.

"True, but I was graduated from high school when I was 15 and college when I was 19. A great adulthood is the best revenge."

"I don't think it's right that you get to keep the free stuff and I don't." Brass continued to complain, and not the first time in their friendship.

"I'm not a cop. I don't work for the city... Or the state, for that matter. I am a hired gun. An ethical hired gun, but a hired gun, none the less. They show me on TV from time to time. It looks good to have me on boards and at parties. You, however, might be influenced by these little perks. And you don't look as good on CNN."

"What's her name?" Jim slipped in the question, hoping the beetle Grissom was trying to revive would distract him.

"Nice try."

"The lovely Melinda?"

"That was a fling; albeit a nice fling."

"When is it not with you?"

The beetle sprang to life. Grissom took off his glasses and rubbed the bridge of his nose. "I make no promises to anyone."

"Yeah, but you are taking them to my baseball games."

"It's like this. You can take the tickets or I can take the tickets, but no where in my life will it seem right to be rubbing against your hairy thigh during the 9th inning as opposed to one non-hairy thigh. It's just a couple of games, Jim, not forever."

Grissom took off his lab coat and looked around for his leather satchel.

"Just a couple of games? Yeah that's why you gave me like two months notice?" Brass mimicked in a high voice scrunching his nose as he did so.

"Next thing I know you'll be reading Dr. Phil books and eating tofu."

The sadness of Grissom's smile did not reach his blue eyes. "It's not like that, Jim."

Jim wondered if he believed his own lie. Who was this girl that had his friend making plans?

Gil

Sara pounces on me as soon as I walk in the door. Slim hands round my neck, she kisses me soundly.

"Guess what?" she asks.

"What if I don't care?" My hands rest on the swell of her ass.

"You care." She smiles and kisses me. For an instant I forget about the money and our first time together. .

I walk her over to the couch and she slides down my legs, pulling me down with her.

"Guess." She kisses me again.

"If you don't stop kissing me, I won't be able to guess. Well, not now, at least."

She leans back. "'Kay. Guess."

I close my eyes tightly and put three fingers to my temple. "Thinking… Thinking… Thinking…"

She giggles, hugs me close, burying her head in the crook of my neck as she does. "The Great Gissiny says. No. No, it's not clear." I sigh dramatically.

My eyes pop open and to her astonishment I say, "No, wait… You were declared a genius by the National Association for Forensics Examiners."

She scans her eyes around the room. "Okay, that was spooky, even for you and me. Did I leave something lying around?"

"Tell you what. I will let you in on the super secret genius perception."

"Your mind perceives things before your eye can even register it?" is Sara's wide eyed response.

"No. Ran into Dr. Rambo at lunch with Jim. He's going to write for some Forensics series. Wants me to consult. Sounded kind of boring. He went on and on about this new student who had registered for his program and, according to test scores, was a genius. He was excited because she turned out to be a looker, too. I don 't mean to besmirch your school, Honey, but that could only be you."

She kisses me again. "I didn't even know he was paying attention to me? He rambles." Slim arms slip through mine and she puts her head on my shoulder.

She might be playing me, but I don't really care anymore. "He's not blind, honey. Just a bit befuddled." "

"So, what is YOUR IQ?" she asks as her warm breath tickles my ear and I suddenly want to take her out somewhere special. We spend too much time cooped up in this apartment. Which is fine by me, but I am supposed to be showing her more of the world. I push the fact that she is quickly becoming my world to the back of my mind.

"No clue."

"Well, then how do you know if you're a genius?"

"Other's perceptions of me? They said it on CNN once and then it ended up on my book jacket and so on and so on."

Her eyes are bright with excitement. No crinkles appear around her eyes and I'm struck by just how young she is. She has on a white t-shirt and dark jeans. Her feet are bare and her toes are covered in shiny pink polish. With minimal effort, she looks like something out of a magazine. I turn to kiss her, hard. She giggles and breaks off.

"But you are, aren't you?"

"I must be. I've got a beautiful woman attacking me at the door."

"That settles it," she agrees happily. Her eyes find the white shopping bag that I left at the door. "What did you buy this time? You need some help; an intervention, maybe. I think you have a gadget addiction."

"I was in the mall… It's a wireless router."

"You have one of those." She fake groans and walks over to the door and peers in. "What's in the big box?"

"Well, I did buy something else." I love this part - the part where I get to see the light in her eyes.

"You don't say."

"For you."

She pulls opens the box. I wait. She stares at the laptop. The laptop she spent an hour reading about on my computer.

"The Sony Vaio? You bought me the Sony Vaio?" Her mouth opens but nothing comes out. I wonder if I did something wrong as she runs a thumb across the silver gray metal of the laptop

Sara

"Doc-Gil. You've already done so much. I-I can't take this." My face is suddenly hot and I feel a buzzing in my ears. I hate that I said it. And now, I can't take it back. His eyes go soft for a split second, and then he frowns.

"Of course you can take it," he says. I know he means it. Hell, that's not true. He could be totally playing me. He's older, seen things, done things. This is not Gil Grissom's first rodeo.

"Gil, it's too much. I know how much this thing costs and I appreciate it, but I was researching it because I have a little extra with everything that you have done. I can't. It wouldn't be right."

"Sara, it's just a laptop; trivial electronics and wires." He inches closer to me, his thigh touching mine. Warm lips grazed my ear. "Gorgeous, you have given much more than this little box cost. You let me…" Warm breath creates a trail down my check and lands on my shoulder."

"A woman. A woman as smart as you are. As attractive as you. For a woman like you to give me herself. To give me herself for the first time, for real. I'm honored. This is just a box, Sara. Please take it. Please don't deny me the pleasure that I receive when I give you these…these…gifts. Don't deny me, honey. You haven't denied me anything else."

"It's just that…I know… I know that I'm not what you expected." What the hell does that mean Sidle?

He holds my face in his hands. "You are more than I expected."

I smile at him. I do that when I can't figure out what else to do. It's pretty lame but it seems to work. The things one learns working at a strip club.

We have been doing this for six weeks and even I know when too much is too much. He says that school isn't a big problem 'cause he doesn't really pay for tuition with my scholarship and all. He says a little spending money is not a problem. He doesn't seem to think anything is a problem. But honestly, it's making me a bit nervous and I don't want to get too comfortable. My plan was to stock pile some cash and be ready to get out if need be. Then he says stuff like the little speech he just gave. I have no idea what I am supposed to do with this kind of information. "Gil, I do work. It's not like I don't. I can buy my own laptop."

"I want to talk to you about that." His expression morphs into something hard and stubborn. Not good. I have only seen that look a few times and it usually proceeds a foot being put down on my ass. "Don't get that look. I don't want you to quit. I do want you to cut back." A flicker of something causes his lips to disappear into a hard line. Before I can identify it, he's smiling again.

"Why?" I'm not going to be one of those women who's got nothing to fall back on.

"Because you work at night and although I know this is going to be a breeze for you, it's important that you focus."

"Yeah." I try to match his smile.

"Sara, I promise. You don't have to quit your job. I will never make you quit your job. But you can't work every night." He's giving me a half grin now. "Besides I think I might be a little spoiled. If you work and go to school then something will fall through the cracks. And I don't like falling into cracks."

"Yeah, I know." He's a man after all.

"Trust me?"

"I don't know." I never meant to admit that out loud. I really need to do something about my mouth.

His hand runs through his hair and I watch as his uncle's s gold signet slides through the curls.

"That's fair. Tell you what. Try it a month, my way, and if you don't like it: back to your way. How's that? And on the condition that computer doesn't replace my quality time?"

We look into one another eyes. "Don't know how I would go about doing that, Doc."