Given all that had transpired, Catherine felt like it was certainly safe to ask questions again. "So, Sara, I can't tell you how grateful I am that you explained yourself to me. I never, ever, even remotely understood you until this, but now, well," she sighed, "it all makes sense, everything, from day one. There's only one problem."

"What's that?"

"Um, well, so how does that tell me how long you plan on being here?"

They laughed again, "I'm coming to that."

Desert and coffee orders now complete, Sara sighed and continued. "Now, that you understand my CSI burnout, and you understand Grissom possibly even better than me, I think you see what he's going through."

Catherine paused to think on that. She had seen Grissom's pain, his aversion to cases towards the end, but now in light of Sara's analogy she was trying to put it all together, "I'm close, but I need you to walk me through it; I take it you're saying it started with a chink in his armor."

"Yes," she gazed downward, "The damage surely happened because of the pain I caused him." Her head in her hands, "It killed me to hurt him like that, but I couldn't help him the way I was. At any rate, eventually, he became just like me, feeling the pain of me leaving him, feeling the pain and misery of every case he worked, and then feeling trapped. He couldn't leave for his own reasons."

"I get it now," Catherine blew out, "It is the same process, it's the same burn out, and you both stayed beyond what you should have making it all the more difficult to escape."

"You do get it, Cat," she nodded, "He's now doing what I had to do. He's off finding life away from Vegas, from CSI, and he's got to do it without me putting in my two cents every time he has a choice to make."

"No wonder you are so content to be so far away."

"Turnabout is fair play, as they say. He actually did the same for me under far less clear conditions. I owe him the freedom to go off and find out that he is someone other than that CSI entomologist."

They didn't miss a beat even when dessert was delivered. "So what's he doing now?"

Sara smiled wide, "At this moment, he is at the townhouse pouring over old research he did," and a huge bite of chocolate pie went into her mouth, while Catherine's coffee spewed out all over the table.

"What!" she managed, "He's here!"

Sara laughed, "He surprised me earlier today, just showed up out of the blue to go through that old stuff."

"What? I mean, well, why didn't you say so from the start, we have to get you off tonight," she stammered while furiously wiping up the mess she made, "And why didn't you say something, you should be eating with him!"

Sara giggled some more, "Catherine, I appreciate that, but he needs some time there on his own. Believe me, it's all I can do to give it to him, but he needs it, really."

Catherine was stunned, "Can I see him," she spoke in barely a whisper.

Sara froze in her hardy attack on the dessert before her, "I, ah, maybe I said too much."

"Why? I mean after all we've been through over these years, why can't we say a simple 'hi'?"

"Because even 'hi' isn't simple when you are trying to escape!" She said in an emphatic whisper. Sara looked away; then refocused her energy, "You understand, but only to a point." She sighed, and then more calmly, "I honestly hope you never understand, Catherine. It's something I hope you never have to reconcile in your life." Catherine was quietly trying to wrap her head around the fact that Grissom was in Vegas and couldn't manage a lousy visit. "He can't make contact with his old life, with the lab; it will bring up the cases, the victims, all the misery you both witnessed. I know. I came back frequently to be with him after I left, but I couldn't come near the lab or any of the team. Even the thought of it was paralyzing." She tried to get Catherine's focus, "You'll see him when the time is right, trust me."

Catherine sat back in her chair trying to process everything. It was making sense, but it was an awful lot to digest. The knowledge that Sara visited Grissom without one word to her friends on the team was sobering. They all thought that her visit to help after Warrick's death was her first time back. Just as shocking was the news that Grissom was in Vegas, as they spoke. Sara and Catherine were locked in a reciprocal gaze. The silence seemed to take over, and neither one knew quite what should be said, or asked, next. Finally Sara spoke up, "To really answer your question about what he's doing now, I could have done a much better job. As you know, he's lecturing at the Sorbonne in Paris. It doesn't pay much, but the contacts he makes doing it are invaluable. As prominent as he was in forensic entomology, he was just as unknown outside of it. This is invigorating him beyond words; he's spending all his days and nights discovering new ways to pursue entomology."

Catherine nodded, then smiling, "So, um, once again, how long do you plan on being here?"

This time around Sara let go her patented Sara laugh, trying to reign it in, "I, um, yeah, I'm coming to that," she managed between guffaws.

Catherine was smiling in response, "Hey, at this rate, you'll get to that next month, and we need to get to the lab tonight."

Nodding, "I know, but I can tell you this, right now. I'm on borrowed time here. I accomplished what I came here to do, I helped out people I really care about, reunited with friends, raised some sorely needed cash, but mostly, I proved to myself that I really can do this job." She shrugged, "So, really, I could move on anytime."

Eyebrows up, "Really?" Catherine's head was shaking, "Then maybe I should ask why you are still here?"

"Here's the deal," she said pulling out her calendar. "There, the date circled is my last day for sure. Grissom finishes in Paris that week, I'm going there to spend it with him, and then help him pack up to come back."

"That's it then?" Catherine sounded so surprised, "Why didn't you just say so earlier?"

"It's not that simple," Sara sighed, "I'm really week to week until that date."

"Oh," Catherine replied tersely.

"As you may know, we've applied for a grant to fund a research project in Costa Rica. Well, we fully expected to have heard about it by now. In fact, that's what Gil's working on here; he's trying to attach some former references of his work to bolster our application."

"So, you're saying if that comes in, you are out?"

"That's exactly what I'm saying."

"I see," Catherine folded her arms, "Then," she sighed, "I will be happy to have you for as long as you can stay with us."

"Thank you, Catherine," Sara replied sincerely, "for everything."

They wisely switched to more light hearted banter while getting the check paid and rushing out as they were surely going to be late to the lab. Outside the restaurant, rushing off to their cars, Sara suddenly thought of something else she needed to tell Catherine, "Wait, Cat," running after her.

Catherine spun around, "What is it?" concern in her voice.

Sara then looked a little sheepish, "Well, ah, this may sound a little, well, silly, but I promise you it's important."

"What in the world are you trying to say, Sara, we're running very late."

"Um, well, here goes," inhaling deeply, "Grissom really doesn't like the 'B.O.' word," and she resorted to the air quotes for emphasis.

"Body Odor?" Catherine shrieked, exasperation in her tone.

"No," Sara rolled her eyes, "Burn Out!"

"Huh?"

"What I'm trying to say is, that whenever you do speak to Grisssom, he doesn't like to talk about 'burn out', you can call it anything else you want, but not that."

"What is that about?"

Sara inhaled deeply, "Um, I haven't really figured it out, but I think it's just not how he wants to think of his exit from CSI. Even though he doesn't deny the process I just described to you, he just really doesn't like the term 'burn out'."

"So what euphemism do we apply to it?" she asked, with dripping sarcasm.

"He went as far as he could as a CSI, so it was time for a change."

"Sounds like burn out to me," Catherine replied, and they both shared a hearty laugh.

tbc…..