A/N: A long chapter-a lot of time, but we decided it needed to be one very long chapter. Thanks for reading!
Shopping for Sara
Chapter 13
Blackness to brightness
The longer she was in Vegas the more the black hole opened up, ripping itself with such fury she knew she was losing her balance—the abyss that had almost closed when she got the phone call about Warrick was pulling her inward. The death was waiting to hit her; she could feel it like a dark shadow drifting around her, past the corners of her eyes. Her ghosts were no longer the dead, but the projections of the living, drifts of guilt, fear, failure and mortality too great to be contained in the mind.
Every hour was painful; watching Grissom as he attempted to regain his own equilibrium brought an excruciating bone deep fear. Sara watched him, uncharacteristically quiet, day after day, as everyone looked to him for guidance, comfort, for what came next.
Then Pam Adler died—killed by lack of oxygen when her husband stopped its flow. The air exhaled from Sara's body as Grissom spoke nearly stopped her own life.
Hollowness was not precisely an emotion; it was a lack of one, a confusion of nothing because, other than an elusive, vague anger, Sara felt nothing. A little insanity episode, a believable lie, a—a whatever it was at Grissom's desk, and the love she had known was there for nearly a decade was gone. Sadness, sorrow, grief did not describe what she was feeling as she packed the few remaining items in her bag.
She flew back to San Francisco and made the decision it was time to move forward with life. Stasis, he had said. She had tried to talk Grissom into a trip—a vacation, time to grieve for Warrick away from other deaths. He had spoken his thoughts about their relationship—she had thought they could withstand anything. Stasis—a state of no change. The pit opened inside her and altered her life.
Sara returned to San Francisco, to Doctor V and her mother. Both were surprised but gratified to hear of her plans to take a trip.
"You need this," the psychologist said. He was polite enough not to ask or he assumed Grissom was going with her.
Laura Sidle was more curious. "Will Gil go with you?" Her mother asked. When Sara shook her head, her mother said, "Then he'll join you later—that's good. He needs to get away too."
Sara looked around her mother's small room—a world easily understood with her simple belongings. She knew she had waded back into her mother's life, into this room, swimming in the contradictions of love and loathing. The room had not changed since Sara had arrived weeks ago and would not change in the future. Her mother kept an orderly room: her red-beaded rosary and clock were on the bedside table in the same place. Her mother sat near the window in an old upholstery chair, knitting needles and yarn in her lap, while Sara sat on the bed.
It was easier to let the subject drop.
Sara smiled. "I'll send a postcard from wherever I go, Mom."
…Inside the house it was dark. Grissom turned on a light to a strangely quiet house. He called, "Sara!"
Everything in the kitchen was in its place and moving toward the bedroom, he saw the small folded note with his name on it beside the dog's treats.
Gil, she wrote. I've left Hank with the sitter. I'm flying back to San Francisco for a while and then I'm going somewhere—not sure where, but I think I'll go where the sun shines every day. Take care. Know I love you. Sara.
Somehow he managed to sit. Sara was gone—she was ready to leave, he knew that. But then Pam Adler had died—Pam's husband had lied. He read the note again, fumbled for his cell phone and pressed a number. He heard her phone ringing in the bedroom.
"Oh, shit," he mumbled. "What have I done?"
He cursed himself. Leaving the chair, he hurried into the bedroom. Bed neatly made, he passed it, checked the bathroom, and then his office. Nothing. He moved to the chest and opened the top drawer. Inside, neatly arranged were the small boxes of jewelry—nothing was missing. He did not have to look knowing what he would find, but he checked the bedside table and found the blue box with the two wedding bands.
Without mindful directions from his brain, he lay on the bed, his arms stretched out on either side. After a long while, he realized his body was aching from immobility. He felt he was at the bottom of the world looking up.
…Sara's last night in her hotel room, she woke and realized she had dreamed of Grissom. She remained in bed while the room filled with light and let the dream come back to her, how they were floating side by side on an inflatable raft. The water moved under them with a lulling rhythm and large birds were diving and scooping up fish. He said something in her ear and she turned, but in the way of dreams, she was alone with a sense of losing all track of time.
Since coming to San Francisco, talking with Doctor V, she had rarely remembered dreams but this one was vivid. She could see the pearls of water beading on her skin, the burning blue look in his eyes, his fingers touching her. She wondered what the good psychologist would say about this dream.
Finally, she crawled from the bed, packed everything she had in two small bags, and took a cab to the terminal. In her pocket she carried a small blue marble etched to resemble the planet, a memento of a life she had once shared.
Her car had been left in the small garage where her mother lived, keys left with the psychologist. "I'll return," she said. "Drive it while I'm gone. You'll be surprised at how much you'll enjoy driving a hybrid."
The terminal was organized chaos as boarding a ship had a screening process similar to boarding an airplane and everything she carried was checked, scanned, or patted down. And the ship she was sailing on carried fifty-five passengers and crew, not the thousands that were waiting in line for one of the huge cruise ships.
…Grissom tried to sleep, willing himself to stay in bed. Exhaustion, a wounded spirit, an aching head kept him from what he needed. An area around his right temple throbbed insistently. Days became nights and he worked, mechanically, monotonously, and incessantly.
A month after she left, on a rainy night, confused by Sara's video message and exhausted from insomnia, he knocked on the door of an old friend and for the first time in weeks, he slept. Alone in bed, with Heather sitting in the room reading from a book he had given her years before, he slept for hours where there were no memories of Sara.
A few days later, he tried watching a baseball game—or it was on the television—while one thought chased another after another. At one time, he could sit in front of a game with absolute absorption, but no longer. His eyes focused on the television screen. Everyone was singing. He thought he could blot everything out, calm the anxiety that had begun when Sara had left his office that day. He still felt the hopelessness that had come over him that night.
Desperate to alleviate his anguish, he made the decision to locate Sara. He called her mother who was as unaware of Sara's travel plans as he was, but she read to him from a postcard she had just received. He talked to the psychologist who was surprised to learn he and Sara were not together, but the man provided a telephone number for emergencies. With the number and, taking time to fabricate a story, he found the small ship that had left San Francisco heading to the Galapagos Islands with thirty paying passengers and a crew that included biologists, chemists, and geologists. From those islands, the group would go to Quito, Ecuador, before traveling to research center in Costa Rica.
Finally, he knew where she was—or would be within days. He tried to compose an email but deleted it; after several attempts, he gave up. He had no idea what to say.
Grissom found no respite in anything—hours at work passed in a blur of man's wickedness, wanton deaths, and dissolute depravity. At home Hank thought his owner was a phantom, arriving at odd hours, and leaving a few hours later. Finally, Grissom took the dog to his mother who fretted over the dog and her son. Betty Grissom would not ask, but she recognized the worried lines around her son's eyes. She knew Sara had been absent too long.
"Go to Sara, Gil," she signed.
He shook his head unable to answer or explain. He could not tell his mother he was the cause of Sara's disappearance.
What eventually saved him was a vision. One night he saw the result of a love that disappeared. He heard a woman trying to explain how she had denied her lover, how the lover was living in the past—an abandoned place where he had been loved, where he had retreated. He watched lonely old men playing cards in a private club and when Catherine talked to him about "family" he knew where his family—his heart—was. Not in Las Vegas.
…Sara sat up in bed. Something was different. It was, she realized, the stillness of her bed. She got up and flipped on a lamp and looked at the two postcards she had purchased. She had seen the wonders of an open ocean, water as far as one could see. She had watched the largest whales and the smallest dolphins of the Pacific from the deck of the ship. Three hundred hammerhead sharks had gathered in the whirling current of an extinct volcano as she stared, open-mouthed, unable to utter a word. She had seen the wonders of Galapagos, literally walked in the footsteps of Darwin, as she strolled along the white sand beach of Tortuga Bay. She had seen tortoises and iguanas and blue-footed Boobies up close as they crossed the path in front of her, unafraid of human visitors. And she shared her experiences with no one. She was the loner, the odd one who took photographs of others but asked for none of herself.
A dozen times during her travels, a moonless night on the ship, while walking the paths of the islands, when she arrived in Quito and found a school bearing Manuela Saenz' name, she had cried for Grissom—so desperately wanting him to share it with her. But gradually, she was changing—the abyss she had been running from was gone. There was sorrow, regret for things done and undone that brought painful thoughts, but the hopelessness had been banished.
She flew to Costa Rica from Ecuador with a few of her fellow passengers from the ship. As a group, they would help several researchers in the rainforest for a month. She was the youngest member of the group by a decade and the only single female which meant she lived in one of the floored tents by herself. Everyone treated her kindly, offering transitory friendship as they settled into temporary living quarters, sharing their stories with her while she offered nothing.
For all anyone knew, she came from no where; her life was here. She called no one, wrote no letters, did not check email. It was clear she did not wish to be asked about her life, but occasionally, someone, without meaning to, would cause a look to pass over her face. At times, she would volunteer a fragment of information but never enough to complete the puzzle of her past.
Until the day a stranger arrived at the research station, no one knew anything about Sara Sidle except she was an extremely diligent worker and she was a vegetarian.
At mid-day while attempting to photograph a monkey who had successfully grabbed fruit from the table, her mind played a trick on her. The little monkey had scampered around the tree as she took photographs of him. And without warning, the monkey grew still, watching something behind her. Slowly, she turned. She saw someone completely out of context, someone who wasn't supposed to be there, which caused a mild disorientation in her brain. Blinking in disbelief, she watched as a sweaty Gil Grissom dropped a backpack from his shoulders and smiled. It was not a disorientation; he was walking toward her with a soft, familiar grin on his face.
She tried to smile, to look normal, as his arms stretched out to her.
Within an hour, everyone working at the sight knew Sara's boyfriend—fiancé—had arrived from Las Vegas, wedding rings in his pocket, with every intention of marrying her as soon as she agreed. And she agreed within minutes of his announcement.
As with the rest of their life, from its beginning when they met until the moment in which they were standing, theirs was an unconventional relationship, engagement and marriage by anyone's standards. Costa Rican laws required certain documents to be filed before a marriage took place, so thirty days passed before the actual ceremony occurred, and an atmosphere of an untraditional honeymoon developed between them and the people around them.
By nightfall of the first day, the entire group of volunteers, researchers, and native Costa Ricans recognized two people who were in love and had been for a long time. They touched each other without comment and without progression. A hand on a hand, a shoulder touching as she showed him something of interest, a lift of an eyebrow, a nod of the head—all done in silence and side by side.
An older man said: "They've worked together for a long time."
His wife scoffed, "And look who can see the past! You know nothing old man!"
"You'll see," he said with a laugh. "Those two managed to hide their romance while in plain sight."
When it came time to sleep, everyone seemed to melt into tents, even leaving the unisex bathroom strangely vacant. One of the researchers played a recording of animal sounds every night—he said it helped keep unwanted wildlife from entering work areas—and on the first night of Grissom's arrival, he turned the sound up a notch.
Sara had smiled so much her face ached in a good way. Again and again, she said "You came."
Grissom would respond each time with "Yes, I did." A similar grin plastered on his face.
Their eyes adjusted to the night, recognizing shadows as objects and seeing each other by reflections of dark and light.
Inside her tent, as the night sounds settled around them, silence in the seclusion of the tent's netting welled around them. Sara thought they had passed through the eye of a tiny needle into a place that was separated from all previous time. For a few minutes she could not speak, afraid she would embarrass herself by crying.
In the distance, Sara heard the swish of rain moving through the rainforest.
"Rain," she said. "It'll be cooler."
She could see Grissom was standing three feet away, his white shirt and pants gave him a mystical appearance. His fingers were pressed together revealing his nervousness. They stared at each for one whole minute, eyes fastened in an unspoken intention. Sara was aware she was breathing faster than usual. She stepped toward him, close enough to smell the cleanliness from his shower. He reached out and pulled her to him, wrapping arms around her.
"Sara," he whispered, pushing a hand into her hair and pulling her face to his.
She closed her eyes and let him unfasten each button on her shirt and then lift the tee-shirt over her head. He unsnapped her pants and pushed them into a puddle around her ankles, leaving her standing in pale blue panties and a white sports bra. His hands moved back to her shoulders.
"I hate these bras," he whispered, a hint of laughter in his voice, as he slid a thumb under each strap.
Quickly, her fingertips were under the edge of the fabric and the bra was off. He laughed, stooped over and removed his shoes and had his shirt off before he straightened.
"Come here," he said and she leaned against his chest. "I'm so sorry, Sara."
The sound of a warm shush met his ear. Her head moved from side-to-side. "Not now, not ever." Her lips touched the side of his face. "We've passed through that black hole."
He lowered her to the bed—not quite a cot, larger than that, but smaller than a full-sized bed—covered with a lumpy mattress, a white sheet and a cotton blanket. In an instant the weeks of separation vanished as they twined together and made love, minute by minute remembering each other's bodies, the softness, the desire, the heat made more vivid and radiant by the wildness of where they were.
Some time later, as they lay together, still nude, warmed by each other's body, Grissom fumbled with his bag. Sara knew he had only basic clothing with him, leaving a suitcase stored at some vague place in the offices of the research facility.
"I have something for you," he said as he brought a small box out of his pack and placed it on her chest. "You left everything—I wanted something special to mark the day we marry."
Sara lifted the box, shaking it lightly. In the dark, hearing the rattle of a chain, she knew the gift was a necklace—her primary choice for jewelry. She reached for her flashlight; they kept artificial light to a minimum inside the tents and the one she had was no larger than a penlight. Grissom took the light and held it while she opened the box.
"Oh," was her first word as she pulled the long gold chain from the box. "Oh, Gil. Oh." At the end of the chain was a large teardrop of gold amber. Tiny beads of red amber were spaced along delicate links of gold. "Oh," she said again. The flashlight made the gold amber sparkle and flash. Sara's thumb caressed the stone; she brought it closer to her eyes.
"Oh, Gil, this is yours!"
"It is—was. Now it's yours."
Tears filled her eyes and ran silently down her face. The amber had been given to him by his grandfather—a perfect fossilized bee not much larger than the end of a fingernail had been caught inside the hard resin. With the amber, his grandfather had given him a magnifying glass. It was the first time he had ever used a magnifying glass; the amber was one of the few childhood treasures he had kept as he grew older.
"I have nothing for you," she said between sniffles.
Grissom turned off the flashlight and brought the sheet around both of them. "I have you, Sara. You are my heart, my breath, my soul."
During the following days, the prior careers of Sara and Grissom gradually became known to field researchers. They had seldom met, or worked with, two people who could set up parameters, grid a work space, write readable notes, and remove all evidence of the human presence. Then they learned Grissom knew about bugs—not just the identity of the usual, but classification and characteristics, order, families, genus, and scientific name. And when the conversation turned to Lepidoptera—butterflies and moths—his knowledge was encyclopedic.
"You want to work—for pay—on a grant?" One of the French researchers asked.
Grissom pointed his thumb toward Sara. "My future wife will make those decisions."
The day came when Grissom and Sara had scheduled an appointment with a local magistrate—a notary by any description—who had the governmental authority to perform civil ceremonies for couples wanting to marry. Needing two witnesses, and not wanting to hurt anyone's feelings, they tore paper into bits, marked two with "X" and everyone willing to be a witness, drew out a slip of paper.
The Costa Rican cook got the first marked paper and the French researcher got the second one. Both men clapped hands and did a little dance at what they considered their special selection. The women did not give up easily, insisting everyone should go, if not as witnesses, as guests to the first wedding anyone could remember occurring among the volunteers, researchers or staff.
When the words were said, their signatures on the official document, the two looked at each other and grinned from ear to ear. The guests applauded, whistled, and created a celebratory chaos in the normally quiet café where they gathered around a common table to commemorate the event. Grissom wore a clean white shirt and khaki pants and could not keep his hands from touching his wife.
Sara, who had never planned on having a wedding, purchased a new white shirt in the local market. White threads had been stitched around the neckline creating a design of white-on-white. She balked at wearing a skirt until Grissom said: "I love your legs in a dress." So she found a skirt in the same market—a red skirt.
"It matches my necklace," she explained to the other women as she showed her wedding gift to them.
It was her wedding night, she thought as she propped her elbows on the bed, resting her chin in the palm of her hand. With the other hand, she played and twirled the gold necklace that had been around her neck all day. The day had been hectic with all the excitement that pervaded such events and she should be exhausted but she felt intensely alive. At the sight of Grissom coming from the bathroom, she smiled.
"Comfortable bed?" He asked as he walked toward her.
She rolled to her back and welcomed him into the big bed. At the feel of his strong, solid body, a warm longing flowered in Sara. He settled her against the pillows and leaned over her, his hands braced on very expensive sheets. His sparkling eyes reminded her of the ocean on the day she had seen so many sharks.
"Hammerheads," she whispered.
"Sharks?" Confused clouded his face.
"I saw hundreds of them one day—they were stirring the ocean—and your eyes are the color of the ocean that day."
A bubbling, throaty laugh developed deep in his chest and burst from his mouth. "I love you, Sara." He kissed her. "I believe I've married the right woman."
A/N: Almost finished - there are two more shopping for Sara events. This was a long chapter and we have a very busy week coming up, so the next two chapters will come-eventually-stay with us! Writing about Paris takes time...thanks for reading, we appreciate all of your comments!