A/N: OOO I did it - I've been home 4 hours and have literally done NOTHING but type this up! hope you all enjoy :-)
Love Charli xx
It was well gone 4 by the time he managed to get hold of Sara, she answered her phone with a somewhat audible frown.
"18 missed calls?!" She exclaimed "Can you say 'stalker'?"
Greg rolled his eyes and shrugged off her tease.
"I need to talk to you" He stated firmly, already swinging his jacket over his shoulders and searching for his car keys.
"Well I figured that... come round. I just got home"
Sara hung up the phone with a shake of her head turning back to the coffee machine as she filled two mugs. The smell of the rich, freshly brewed coffee filled the air and she took a deep breath letting it mingle with the air in her lungs.
"That boys got issues" She smiled as she crossed the room and placed the mugs on the table.
Robyn was staring at the stick insect tank again, still trying to locate the elusive insect.
"Who? Greg?" She nodded in agreement, finally giving up her search and approaching the sofa's."He's special alright."
"He's a good friend" Sara muttered, thinking about all the things he had done for her "I don't know what I'd do without him"
"He's a good man, they are very hard to find these days. Trust me" Robyn smirked.
"Oh believe me I know. I'm so glad I don't have to worry about that anymore..."
Grissom was meeting Nick for dinner, too often when he was in town it was only for a short time and he didn't get the chance to catch up with anyone else. He was taking full advantage of the time he had at home.
"Gil seems like a nice guy" Robyn smiled "He asks a lot of questions"
"Yeah, I'm sorry about that... I have no idea what got into him. he's not normally that interested in new people" She chuckled.
Greg pulled into the driveway. Robyn raising an eyebrow towards Sara as he made his way up the path towards the door. He didn't knock, he very rarely did when she knew he was coming over but he stopped in his tracks as his eyes landed on Robyn.
"What are you doing here?" He asked, her presence seemed to sweep the world from under his feet. He had worked out a perfect speech, planned the best way to tell Sara everything without upsetting her and now he was too stunned to even walk across the room.
"Nice to see you too!" She teased, placing her coffee mug on the table carefully and leaning back in her chair to watch him carefully.
Greg didn't really know how to proceed, Robyn being around hadn't factored in his plan and he knew he had to tell Sara in private. He knew that her reaction was likely to be an angry one at first, and the last thing he wanted was for her anger to be directed at Robyn.
Greg quickly glanced from Robyn to Sara, his eyes gleaming with a strange emotion as he figured out the right words.
"Robyn...would you mind if I talked to Sara...alone..." He found himself saying turning his attention to Sara and trying to convey the urgency he felt.
Sara frowned at Robyn wondering if she knew what was going on before shrugging towards Greg and perching on the sofa.
"It's ok. She can stay" She declared with some certainty.
Greg sighed finally finding the self-control to make his way across the room.
"No. She can't" He spoke through gritted teeth, trying hard not to see the hurt look in Robyn's eyes. eventually she would know he was doing this for his own good but for now he would have to live with being the bad guy.
"Greg... whats going on?" Robyn muttered, her brow furrowed as she approached him. Her gentle hand stroking his arm made a thousand doubts appear in his mind.
"I just...I have to speak with Sara and I need to do it in private" He spoke through gritted teeth, flinching his arm away from her touch as she frowned looking between Greg and Sara attempting unravel the silent conversation.
"Fine" she stated shortly, crossing back to the sofa to retrieve her things.
"No, you don't have to go Robyn" Sara stood as she spoke "Greg... whats this all about?"
"It's...something important...work..." He shrugged trying not to alarm either of them.
"Then talk about it now...you won't bore me..." Robyn gave a small laugh smiling at him.
"It's complicated...chemistry stuff you wouldn't want to listen...it won't make sense to you" Greg again attempted to make her leave. Sara cleared her throat, finally catching Greg's helpless eye.
"You mean I'm too stupid to understand?" She muttered, shaking her head as she slung her purse over her shoulder.
"I mean that I need you to go away Robyn..." He flustered, not really aware how vicious his words sounded until they filled the air. Robyn paused, hurt reflecting in her eyes as she looked at him and Sara took a step forward awkwardly standing beside him.
"What Greg mean's is - we've got a long shift ahead of us and I have a lot of catching up to do" She said with a soft smile attempting to rescue the situation.
"Oh I know what Greg means" Robyn hissed as she moved across the room "Thanks for the Coffee Sara"
She left without a backwards glance, the anger radiating from her body lingered in the room leaving an atmosphere thick with tension. Sara crossed to the window, watching as Robyn's car pulled away from the street and out of sight before turning to face Greg with a bewildered expression .
"What the hell was that all about?" She exclaimed "I know I'm the poster girl for self sabotage but you went out of your way to upset her!"
Greg began to pace, his mind racing with a million and one problems. Robyn was mad at him, Sara was probably going to be mad at him, as a result Grissom would be mad at him and there was really nothing he could do to make this situation any easier.
"I...I know... I had to. I need to talk to you" He finally turned to face her, deciding that the best thing to do was deal with each problem one at a time. Greg gently took her hand, guiding her onto the sofa and taking a deep breath.
"Greg... your scaring me. Whats going on?" Sara stared at him with wide eyes and he realised he had no idea what to say anymore. His carefully crafted speech had been lost in his altercation with Robyn and he'd come too far to dismiss it all as nothing.
"I...Robyn..." Greg could feel himself panicking, he took a deep breath and pressed his eyes closed finally muttering as he exhaled "She's your sister"
The air seemed to leave the room as time stood still. Sara stared at him, her eyes unseeing and unemotional. He wondered for a moment if she had heard him and considered saying it again until she slipped her hand out of his, her eyes fixed on the floor.
"She was adopted... at a few days old...They changed her name" Greg began to ramble, hoping to snap Sara out of her daze with the facts. "I uhh ... I know you asked me to stop..."
"Stop" She muttered in a daze, slowly lifting her eyes to his "I told you I didn't want to know..."
"I know... but its Robyn! I mean... that's a good thing right?" He tried to justify but Sara shook her head.
"It can't be her" She stated with some certainty, crossing into the kitchen to start the coffee machine again. Greg followed, fishing in his pocket for the document he needed.
The photograph fluttered out of its own accord, coming to rest at her feet as she turned to him with a mug in her hand. She followed his glance to the image on the floor, the unmistakable smiling child looking out at her churning her stomach. With a gasp the mug fell from her hands smashing on the floor in an explosion of ceramic and hot coffee. The photograph curling at the corners with the heat as she stared at it and tears formed in her eyes.
"I was going to keep looking just in case you changed your mind but then Grissom said..."
Sara's eyes shot to his, her lip quivering with the overload of emotion she was suffering.
"Grissom...?" The word came out in a whimper, disappearing into the air with her tears.
"He said she looked familiar... and asked me if she was adopted" He continued "..it never occurred to me that it could be her... never in a million years"
"You need to leave her" She stated.
Greg frowned, certain he had heard her wrong but the expression on her face spoke otherwise. She was absolutely unwavering in her certainty as she held his eye contact with her lips held in a firm straight line.
"You need to leave her" She repeated. "You need to break up with her"
Greg was bewildered by her demands. He realised wasn't sure how to react., he had prepared for her to lash out, to cry or to question him relentlessly. This was something he hadn't prepared for.
"What? No, I'm not leaving her...why would you even say that?" He frowned.
Sara swept the shattered mug and the photograph into the trash as though she could pretend it never happened. The lid closed over on the image and Sara wandered aimlessly around the space gently running her hands across furniture and coming to a stop outside the stick insect tank.
She crouched down to glance inside, spotting the insect on a small branch in the corner almost immediately. With a disappointed sigh she turned to look at Greg as he watched her expectantly.
She had thought about telling him the full story many times before. He had never been the kind of man to withhold a good listening ear and on many occasions she had taken him up on the offer of a shoulder to cry on or an arm to lean on. For some reason the subject of her family had always been avoided, she suspected he knew she had been a victim of abuse. either through his own research or just by the way she sometimes behaved. She was never well versed in hiding her resentment towards abusers of any kind but especially people who abused those more vulnerable than them. It was no secret in the lab that she became so emersed in such cases she forgot where the victim ended and she begun.
"Just...trust me ok? you need to leave her. She's bad news"
Greg shook his head, following her path to sit beside her on the sofa again.
"Sara, you love Robyn! Up until today you were happy for us to be together... whats changed?"
"Everything's changed" She insisted as she thought about the personality traits and illnesses that had forged the fault lines in her family. The way Michael's life had been destroyed by the memories and the guilt hadn't really been a surprise to her and even although she spent a large proportion of her childhood out with the confines of her family Sara still found herself battling her ghosts.
"I don't understand...She's the same person" He frowned.
"You don't want her in your life Greg...If she is my sister...then your better off without her" She stated sadly.
"You're obviously not thinking straight Sara... this is ridiculous" Greg moved to stand, intending to leave her alone until she had cleared her head enough to see things clearly but she reached out her hand and grasped his wrist.
"Its not ridiculous! do you know why she was adopted Greg? Why I grew up in foster care or why I never talk about my family? didn't you notice my mothers address was an institution?"
Greg sat there stunned for a few minutes words falling silent on his lips. Part of him wanted to protest, to tell Sara that she was wrong and Robyn was different but he respected Sara too much to dismiss her concerns in such a way.
"Sara...I love her. I can't leave her" Greg sighed, hoping he could make her understand.
"Does she know?" Sara asked quietly.
He could almost see her mind working. He could envision all the tiny pieces of information lining up in her brain to create a full picture.
"I haven't told her yet" He sighed, wondering just how mad she was going to be when he spoke to her next. He had a lot of making up to do.
"Don't tell her" Sara exclaimed, apparently excited at the idea "Maybe she never needs to know. Maybe we can pretend it never happened"
Greg was beginning to get irate with her attitude of avoidance.
"No we can't pretend it never happened! Sara...what are you so scared of?!"
"I'm scared that she'll turn into my mother... or that she'll turn into me or spend the rest of her life afraid that she'll turn into either of us" Sara admitted in an outburst of honesty.
Greg paused, wrapping his arms around her and letting her tears soak into his shirt.
"It wouldn't be so bad if she turned into you, you know... I happen to think you're pretty awesome" He soothed.
When he finally calmed her down enough to have coffee his thoughts turned to Robyn. She was bound to be upset with him after the way he spoke to her. When Sara excused herself to go to the bathroom he dialed her number, his heart turning somersaults in his chest with nerves.
they'd never had an argument before. He hoped his reasons would justify his actions and that she would give him a chance to explain at all.
"What do you want Greg?" She snapped when she answered.
He could hear the sound of her stereo in the background and traffic noises. It made him immediately nervous a strange feeling tying knots in his stomach.
"Are you driving?" He asked, already well aware that the answer was yes.
"I need to pick up Joel" She stated keeping the conversation very matter of fact and sharp.
"Look Robyn... we need to talk" He muttered.
"I have nothing to say" She replied, the sound of tires on tarmac making him wince on the other end of the phone.
He could picture her driving along the highway, her inability to drive slowly taking control as she weaved in and out of cars. The rain was beginning to fall, covering the streets in a sheen of water and he could imagine how poor visibility would be.
"Robyn... please, I didn't mean what I said. Will you calm down?"
"I am perfectly calm!" She screeched "But I don't want to speak to you right now. I want to collect my son and go home to watch god awful midweek TV and eat ice cream"
Greg took a deep breath rolling his eyes at her irrationality. His patience was wearing thin.
"Robyn...you need to speak to me" He insisted.
Sara padded back into the living room, sending a soft smile his way.
"No, I really don't" She declared.
Her defiance was certainly familiar to him. Sara could also keep an argument going for days if she put her mind to it, so much so that often he forgot what they were fighting about in the first place.
"Robyn... Sara's your sister" He stated, immediately regretting the irate tone he used and the circumstances under which he'd told her. For the longest time all he heard was silence as he called her name into the phone until a barely audible whisper entered the phone.
"What are you talking about?"
Greg opened his mouth to reply but a deafening crushing sound filled the phone that made his heart stop in his chest. He heard the sound of the car colliding with another, he could hear the airbag, he could hear the commotion and the scream... and then for a long time he heard nothing.