While Sara was trying to tear herself away from Grissom, Catherine was dressing for thier dinner, preoccupied with what she might learn of the couple. For someone as adept in reading people as Catherine, Sara, in particular, had been by far, her biggest failure. After all, her ability to read people is what first drew her policeman friend to run his baffling cases by her, and one by one, she cut through to the heart of things, understanding human nature seemingly like no one else, even picking up on the smallest of details, until he finally succeeded in persuading her to pursue a career as a CSI. Those skills only sharpened over the years, which made her habitual misread of Sara Sidle that much more perplexing, and downright frustrating. She had a much better read on Grissom, despite his silence. She even knew he was seeing someone on the sly, but never, ever, put it together that it was Sara all that time. Ultimately, she foresaw his unfathomable departure from CSI, before anyone else in the lab, including Gil Grissom himself.
It was Sara who baffled her to no end. The most glaring 'miss' was not seeing that Sara had a front row seat to horrific domestic violence in her past. She never saw that 'victim' behavior; instead she saw an overzealous crusade Catherine mistakenly believed was out of some feminist hippie cause of hers. Frequent clashes over domestic abuse cases only pushed Catherine further down the path to the wrong conclusion. Once things came to a head with Ecklie, she noticed Grissom avoided certain assignments for Sara. Thoroughly convinced as she was that avoidance was not a prudent tact for such misguided handling of such issues; Catherine boldly confronted Gil often behind closed doors insisting that he take a more direct approach with Sara. The fact that no one could predict what might surface in certain cases, that potentially puts Sara in situations that she might not be able to handle thus creating who knows what kind of havoc; the argument had merit, on the surface, anyway. Realizing she would not let up on the issue, Grissom knew he would have to act to make Catherine realize there was whole lot more that had been done for Sara in addition to the case assignments. He reluctantly divulged just enough to lead Catherine on a search of public records to learn Sara's true motives. He managed to 'tell' the tale, without literally betraying Sara.
Catherine remembered that day, as she was picking through her earrings, determined to find a certain pair that had been missing for a few weeks. She paused to recall Grissom's very subtle hint to search Sara's parents in the system. He discreetly allowed that since he learned about her family, she had someone to confide in, as well as intermittent counseling, and was far more in control since she was not trying to handle everything by herself. He finished by sternly reminding her how private Sara was, and letting this knowledge out would be devastating to her. Catherine shook her head over her jewelry drawer recalling how with their CSI resources, it took less than half an hour to have the entire misery of Sara's childhood scroll across her computer screen. How did I miss that! Catherine mulled in frustration of both missing the signs in Sara for years,and for having to give up on the earrings. Choosing another set of earrings, she paused in her reflection in the mirror. Catherine was hardly brought up by Ozzie and Harriet, but compared to Sara's childhood; it was a Norman Rockwell painting. And that knowledge, stayed with her like white on rice; she never let on to anyone, not even Sara, that she knew anything about Sara's past.
Driving to the restaurant, her preoccupation continued. She thought on the other day, at the lab, she paused outside the break room, catching Sara in an idle moment. She observed her intently, candidly; one more shot at reading her, as if that were possible, she mulled in frustration. Sara's body language was relaxed, she had just been chatting on her cell, Grissom, perhaps, and she had a genuine grin as she closed out the conversation. As she lowered the phone, the grin remained, her eyes closed as her head tilted ever so slightly upwards. Catherine devoured the signs, they all pointed to contentment, satisfaction, and overall well being. She sighed, pulling to a stop at a red light. How can the same person run from a job and a city with such aversion that you leave behind a committed lover; and then, return to the same job, same city, once said lover, now husband, is gone, and be more at ease with everything than at any point before? Aagghh, stop thinking about it before you have a wreck, Catherine had to caution herself.
The restaurant was right up Sara's alley, but Catherine liked the choice as well, from the quiet atmosphere of the converted old house, sans any form of a neon light, to the delicious, but healthy, menu options, very much the opposite of most of Vegas. She arrived to find Sara already there, a good sign, Catherine optimistically thought to herself. An even better sign; however, upon seeing her arrival, Sara popped up and greeted Catherine with open arms. A patented 'girlfriend' hug, a rare occurrence over the years for these two. Ah, just pile on the question marks, Catherine thought to herself as she welcomed the embrace.
Settling in with some small talk, Catherine decided it was time to jump into the deep end; she was there to get a date on the calendar, but it was also important for her to convey her appreciation for what Sara had been able to do upon her return. "Sara, before we get into this, I have to tell you how incredibly valuable you have been to me these past few months." Shaking her head for emphasis, "I don't know that I could have turned it around without you."
Sara smiled, "Wow, thanks, Catherine, hearing you say that," she shrugged, "that made it all worth it."
"Seriously, Sara, even an experienced CSI would have an orientation period to adjust to our lab and personnel, but you just came in and took off immediately. You got Riley's open cases closed quicker than she ever could have." They shared a brief laugh as Catherine continued, "And, the relationships you have with everyone, the great chemistry with Dr. Ray; I mean, you really brought us together."
"Catherine, I'm so touched to hear this, I don't know what to say," she shrugged once more.
"What I don't get is how are you able to do it?" amazement in her voice, "I mean, when you left," searching for words, "I guess I could never see you coming back here, I mean, working at the lab, of course. The way you and Grissom were so in love; we couldn't understand it." Sara shifted uncomfortably after being reminded of one of the lowest points of her tumultuous life. Her smile was gone, but Catherine continued, looking down at the menu, unfortunately she was oblivious to Sara's reaction. "We always hoped against hope that you would at least move back to Vegas, even if you didn't work in the lab. I mean we missed you, but worse than that we really had our hands full putting up with Grissom those first few months you were gone." Catherine chuckled, remembering Grissom acting like a lovesick puppy; he was in a bear of a mood pretty much all of the time. It was about then that she glanced up from the menu, looking for Sara's response.
"Cat, I, aah," Sara was searching for words, seeming to want to find them somewhere on the ceiling actually, she couldn't make eye contact with Catherine, and was really not that sure what to do, "I'm not sure what to say, I mean, I intended to try to explain things as they are now. You kind of threw me for a loop with talk about the past."
Catherine was now reading Sara like never before, like an open book, a book with pictures no less; the pain was back, the pain she bore in the months, even years before she left. Catherine now recognized it. The signs were all there, not as severe, but there to be sure. That edgy look on her face, the tension in her body, the palpable battle against her emotions bubbling to the surface, Catherine had seen it all before, but not until now since Sara had returned. "Oh, my God," she put the menu down, and grabbed Sara's hand, "I can see what that did to you, please forgive me." She paused, sincerely sorry for taking Sara to this place, "No more questions, promise," She tilted her head downward to try to make eye contact with Sara who was now staring at the table, "Please, forgive me."
After a few seemingly endless moments, Sara looked up and mouthed, "Okay."
Mercifully, the waitress appeared just about then to take their order. Once that was done, they could start over, leave the opening train wreck, and try to move on. Catherine felt awful. She sincerely wanted to understand Sara, but she didn't want to see that pain on her face to do it. She kept her word, but afraid Sara wouldn't speak, she tried to reassure her, "Sara, I meant what I said, no more questions. You just tell me what you want me to know."
Sara finally cracked a smile, "I guess, you deserve to know what happened to me." With a humorless laugh, "You all do, the whole team I mean." Looking down, a bit ashamed, "I left all of you when I left; I hurt my friends, and I nearly broke Grissom's heart, but you must understand, I tried so hard to stay" she whispered emphatically, before succumbing to a few involuntary sobs.
Catherine didn't know what to say. In the time she was gone, they were out of touch with Sara, and Grissom was as tightlipped as ever where she was concerned. This little revelation that she desperately tried to stay in Vegas only muddied the water even more as far as Catherine could tell. She was pessimistic that Sara could reveal anything to her that would genuinely make sense of her actions, because at this point nothing remotelly made sense.
"I'm going to try to explain things, but I need you to keep the details to yourself. I think knowing my story, you can help the others to maybe understand things," She grinned before adding, "without hanging that dirty laundry out there for all the neighbors to see."
They shared a laugh, and like the medicine it is, the tension relaxed its hold on them, and Sara took a deep breath before speaking…..
tbc…..
a/n: Well, you can't do a GSR story without at least a little bit of angst, but please, don't blame Catherine. Her inadvertant mistake is more consistent with her cluelessness regarding Sara than any intent to hurt her. BTW, So sorry about the cliff hanger ending, NOT intentional, but a very natural break in the story. Also, on a technical note, the spellchecker toggle button is acting like a major undo switch. I may have made a few edits that did not have the luxury of a last spell check, and my dyslexic brain will never see 'em, so apologizing in advance....