Thank you, ccs, lily moonlight and Herrera, for your reviews! :)

Little warning: This one's angst-heavy.

So Close - Jon McLaughlin (OST "Enchanted")

People always showed strange behavior when it came to saying goodbye.

They wished all the best, but with a painful smile that shouted, "Stay!"

They didn't come to the airport or to wherever one was taking off from, saying that they hated goodbyes, they made them sad, when really they wanted to say, "You're selfish and I don't want to see your face when you leave me behind."

They threw parties for the one who was about to leave, saying they wanted to spend one last evening together, make some additional good memories, when what they thought was, "We will make you regret your decision and show you once more what you've decided to abandon."

Most people hated to see friends, family, loved ones, depart. Most people hated changes, and someone suddenly not being there anymore was a big change. Adjusting was hard when, overnight, someone who had always, or at least for a long time, been part of your life puzzle went missing. There was a hole, a gap, something that was by no means filled easily.

For New York's CSI team, it was like this when Stella Bonasera announced that she'd leave to take over the Crime Lab in New Orleans. They all smiled and congratulated, pretended to be happy for her that she finally got some well-deserved career chances. Maybe they even actually were a bit happy for her; but mostly, they were hurt. Stella was a part of the team, the heart of the team, and to them it felt like a betrayal that she had decided to leave. Leave the family they were.

So they threw a party, two days before her departure. On the roof terrace of their office building, on a beautifully warm and sunny day in May, all the people who meant something to Stella came together to show their appreciation for their colleague and friend.

They never intentionally planned to cause her any hurt by this party; unintentionally, however, it was exactly what a human's subconscious mind ordered the consciousness to do - of course by all the while giving much harmless reasons.

It was only a party to honor a leaving friend.

And yet everyone, including and especially Stella, felt that permanent piercing pain that never left throughout the whole evening.

It was Mac Taylor, her friend of so many years, who freed Stella from her brooding over her decision. He took her hand and led her, much to Stella's amazement, to the small area that had been declared to be the dance floor for this evening. Easily they fell into a harmonic rhythm to the soft music playing.

It seemed like the innocent dance of two friends.

But it was so much more.

You're in my arms / And all the world is calm / The music playing on for only two

It was the gentle sway of two bodies pressed against each other that didn't dare to touch in any other way. It was the desperate holding on to something that had never started, and was yet about to end. It were two people masking their pain in a longing embrace, one that, for everyone watching, looked like nothing else than a dedication to the music playing in the background. Still, as harmless and normal as it seemed - it lasted longer than it should have to be still as innocent as the dancing couple pretended it to be, was closer than it should have been under these circumstances; everyone paying attention would have noticed that.

However, no one paid that much attention. They saw the couple, but no one gave it a second thought, unconsciously allowing them their privacy.

They all knew it.

And now forever I know / All that I wanted to hold you / So close

When rain started to fall, the roof terrace quickly cleared of all people present. Only them, the friends of half a lifetime, didn't care; didn't notice their clothes soaking even more with every passing second.

They ignored the thousand reasons there were to let go; they rather held on to the one reason to never let go.

Raindrops where mingling with the tears rolling down her cheeks, and he kissed them away with wet lips, brushed watery strands from her face with wet fingers, pressed his droplet-covered forehead to hers.

Never let go.

A life goes by / Romantic dreams must die / So I bid mine goodbye and never knew

The rooftop was empty, the music had ended, even the rain had stopped, when they finally loosened their hold on one another. Her red-rimmed eyes broke his heart, and the sadness in his look broke hers. The moment of their parting was nearing with demanding inevitability, and they knew that, as much as they would try to hold on to each other, they would still lose the other.

She clung to him, her fingers buried in his soaked shirt, and he framed her face with his hands, the sight of her shaking form, cold from the rain, but more so, in pain because of the nearing farewell, almost unbearable. He couldn't stand it; couldn't stand the thought that the day after tomorrow, she would be gone, more than a thousand miles away, too far too touch, too far to feel, too far to breath in.

He felt betrayed by fate, by himself and his own fears, knowing that he would have had the chance to give her a reason to stay. Maybe, if he hadn't been so afraid to admit to his feelings, she wouldn't leave now.

He would never know.

Let's go on dreaming for we know we are / So close / And still so far

His open lips brushed her parted ones, again and again, like the water had made them too slippery to find any hold. Every touch felt like an electric shock, shaking them to their very core, and yet they melted together into a desperate, longing kiss in the end. There was nothing gentle to it, nothing like he would have imagined there first kiss. It was raw passion; it was mourning a loss that was unavoidable anymore.

When she pulled away from him, his lips couldn't stop seeking hers, missing the touch that seemed so familiar and natural already, although they'd never shared it before. But she stopped him, not trusting him, or herself, not willing to cause the both of them any more pain by letting them cross the line that would bring them even closer to each other than they were; had been for so many years.

Tears pooled in her eyes again when she kissed his cheek one last time before walking past him and to the door that led down to the lab, to the exit of this building, out of his life.

Rain started falling again as he stood on the rooftop, watching the door that had closed behind her.

FIN