Just when Sara thought Grissom was closing the gap to kiss her, a dog barked nearby. A look of uncertainty flashed across his eyes and he paused. His gaze flitted uncertainly to his left then lowered, and taking a step back he dropped his hands from her face. Sara let out an inward sigh, and watched as he brought his eyes back to hers again and offered her a tentative smile. He was being cautious, and truth be told she couldn't blame him. There was so much they needed to sort through, so much they needed to talk about, she didn't want to rush into anything either.
"I―" he began, his shoulder rising self-consciously.
"You been waiting a long time?" she asked, cutting in without meaning to.
"Yeah. I have," he said, a slow smile creeping over his features as he held her gaze steadily. "A little over two years."
The breath caught in her throat. Afraid to believe what his turning up at her door truly meant, she licked her lips fearfully before looking away toward the house.
"I'm sorry," he said softly, "I shouldn't have said that."
Sara forced her lips into a smile and raising the keys in his eye line walked past him toward the house. "Let's go inside," she said in a small voice.
He gave a nod and followed her to the front door. "I got your message," he said, shouldering the backpack he'd leaned against the wall while she unlocked the door and stepped inside to disable the alarm. "So here I am."
She dumped her keys in the bowl on the hallway table, dropped her purse to the floor and took off her shoes. They both knew he had to have been at the house already when she'd called him the second time and left a message, or he wouldn't be here now. Quietly, he closed the door behind him and lowered his backpack on the tiled floor in a recess nearby.
She could feel his eyes on her as she slipped her feet into her house shoes, but when she turned around he busied himself looking around the room. She didn't think much had changed since he was last there, but he may think differently. His eyes alighted on the plant he'd gifted her, then on the photograph of the two of them taken in Costa Rica she kept next to it, the only one she still displayed. She saw him swallow then look up at her with surprise.
There you have it, she thought, the proof that I haven't moved on, that there hasn't been anyone else in my life since the breakup, that there could never be.
A small, uncomfortable smile formed on her lips before she turned away, moving into the lounge, and after toeing off his shoes he joined her there. She thought about tidying the note he'd included with the plant and the broken necklace she'd left lying on the coffee table, but decided against it. She hoped that he hadn't got on that plane because he wanted to talk, truly talk with her, and she decided there and then that she'd be honest and open with everything.
Taking off her jacket, she moved to the bedroom and quickly got changed out of her work clothes, then rummaged inside the bedroom closet before returning to the lounge with an old pair of his slippers. She hoped the message behind the gesture would be clear to him. Regardless of what happened next between them – or not as the case may be – she wanted him to feel welcome and at ease in what was once his house too, even if he hadn't lived in it all that much.
He'd made himself comfortable on the couch, her necklace in his hands as deep in concentration he tried fixing it. He didn't seem to have noticed she'd come back, and feeling sad and wistful for the loss of the easy relationship they once had she watched him for a moment before moving forward and dropping the slippers by his feet. Glancing toward them, his face lit up and he laughed.
"You kept them?" he asked with evident disbelief, looking up at her over the top of his glasses.
She shrugged. "What I didn't take to your mother's is in the garage. These just…stayed in the closet."
Grissom stared at her at length, his eyes soft and searching, before fixing her with a disarming smile that made Sara's heart flutter. "The clasp's broken," he said, needlessly, as he lifted the necklace in her eye line. "I'm afraid it's beyond what I can do. It'll need taking to a jeweller's."
She looked down at the pendant in his trembling hands. "I know, and I will." She looked back up. "I'm lucky Jim found it at all. I hadn't even realised I'd lost it until he brought it back to me."
Grissom nodded; his expression became thoughtful. "I wish I could have spent more time with him. We hardly had time to speak at all."
"Well, now you have more time. I'm sure he'd appreciate a call. I think the explosion shook him more than he'd care to admit."
Grissom nodded his head.
"You could always ask him to come over to the house," she insisted. "It's no trouble. I got shift tonight anyway, so you two can have the place to yourselves."
He stared at her in surprise. "I might just do that," he said enthusiastically, and Sara smiled.
Returning the smile, he turned his attention back to the necklace, studied it intently for a moment longer, and Sara wondered whether he too was remembering where and when he'd got it her. Without another word, he reached across and delicately placed it back down onto the coffee table next to the note before slipping his slippers on and pushing to his feet.
"Why didn't you pick up?" she asked suddenly, quietly, her tone one of curiosity rather than accusation or anger. "When I called your cell earlier."
He refocused on her with a start, locked gazes. "I figured I'd reply in person," he said, his tone light and playful. When tilting her head to the side she fixed him with a probing look, he sighed and lifted his shoulder hesitantly. "I wasn't sure whether I'd made a mistake or not, turning up here unannounced. I mean, to all intent and purposes we'd parted on good terms and I worried I'd be pushing it a bit."
"And still you came."
"I did." He tried a smile. "I—I took a chance and it paid off."
"And work?"
"They can do without me for another day or two. We're not sailing away for another two weeks, on a three-month tour."
Smiling, Sara stared back at him unwaveringly and nodded her head. He was being open and honest, and she couldn't ask more from him.
"We're documenting fishing expeditions near the island of Palau, near the Philippines," he went on enthusiastically. "More than 60% of the world's tuna is caught in the Central and Western Pacific region. Due to the lack of monitoring, control and surveillance capacity, foreign fishing vessels use the high seas to launder fish out of the region. We want this to stop."
She was smiling widely now, like she did every time he told her about one of his projects. There was no doubt he truly enjoyed what he did, and she could never ask him to give it all up, not a second time. Her stomach made a gurgling sound and they laughed. "Talking of tuna," she said, relaxing as she moved to the kitchen. "You want some breakfast? I haven't eaten anything since our meal last night."
He followed her through. "Only if you let me cook it. You look beat."
She glanced at him over her shoulder. "You're on," she said, not needing to be asked twice, and then winced as he reached for the fridge door. "I haven't got much in though."
He opened the fridge and took out the carton of eggs, found a chunk of cheese in the door shelf tray and a few shrivelling mushrooms in the vegetable compartment. "There's enough," he said, placing his load on the counter while Sara set about making them some coffee.
"I think I've an onion left," she said, motioning toward one of the pull-out kitchen cabinets.
In her excitement, she never thought to pick him up on his 'You look beat'. He seemed to remember where everything was, and glancing at him from the corner of her eyes she watched him work. They'd always worked well together and the kitchen was no exception, even if he was decidedly the better cook. But she'd learned over the years and was more than passable at it now. As they worked side by side at the counter, Grissom's hand brushed against hers, accidentally she was sure, but when he kept his hand there and her heart almost stopped she turned toward him. He was watching her tenderly, and she gave him a soft, hesitant smile, a smile he returned warmly.
She so wanted to believe a reconciliation between them was possible, but even if it was, how could they make it work now when they couldn't before?
While he busied himself at the stove, she put some bread in the toaster, placed their drinks on the table she then set for two. Few words were spoken between them, but she kind of preferred it that way. It felt less awkward. It felt like the old days and surprisingly comfortable between them. She realised then that the issues in their marriage had never been when they were together, but when they were apart, as together they could replace their lack of talking with meaningful actions and gestures, physical interactions that had always come more readily to both.
He'd always said that actions speak louder than words as far as he was concerned, but when you lived thousands of miles apart, words were sadly all you had left. And their words gradually began to lose meaning, the Love Yous spoken out of habit, a mere punctuation mark to their phone calls. After a particularly tough case all she'd wanted was to come home to his touch – a hug or a kiss or the simple caress of his fingers brushing at her tears.
"I watched the video," she blurted out suddenly as he added the beaten egg mixture to the onions and sliced mushrooms gently frying in the skillet.
Frowning, he glanced at her. "What video?" he asked, stirring the egg into the vegetables.
"The recording of the statement Heather made at PD?" she said, her eyes on him as she gauged for his reaction. "The officer must have forgotten to turn the camera off when he left and…" Grissom focused his gaze to a point in front of him, and she knew he'd realised what she was saying. "Why can't you talk to me the way you talk to her?" she went on gently. "How can you open up to her like that, and not me?"
He took in a long breath he let out slowly, but didn't answer for some time. He turned his attention back to the food cooking, gave it another little stir before adding the grated cheese and turning the heat right down. She thought he was about to prove her point when he finally spoke.
"It's because I'm not worried about hurting her feelings with my words," he said, turning toward her and raising his shoulder. "Because ultimately I know that like you she'll speak her mind, but her words, unlike yours, don't have the power to hurt me." He paused, and she could see he was debating with himself how honest to be. "Sara, Heather is my friend," he went on, earnestly, "and maybe I find it easier talking to her than I do you because, well, because," he shrugged, "at the end of the day she doesn't matter to me as much as you do."
Sara averted her eyes and swallowed, took a moment to digest his words before nodding her head and looking back up. "At least that's honest."
"What I said to her, I meant," he said. "Every word of it."
The omelette was overcooking and Grissom turned back to it with a start. They ate in companionable silence, sharing lingering looks and smiles, afraid to upset the status quo while trying to decide how best to address the elephant in the room. Thoughts raced through Sara's mind. Where should she start? What should she say?
When he'd finished eating, Grissom carefully tidied his cutlery across his plate, then pushed the plate away toward the middle of the table. He picked up his cup, only to set it down again, licked his lips and finally took a breath. He was searching for the right words to say what he'd come to say, and she found herself eagerly waiting.
"Sara, the truth is…I never got to the airport." He made himself look up then and meet her gaze, and gave her a sheepish smile. "Well, I did, but I never got out of the cab. I asked the driver to take me here instead, cost me a small fortune." He smiled again, and she found herself returning the smile. "And all the while I was waiting here for you, I—I was trying to find the nerve to call you. I thought you'd never get here, that maybe you had other..." he shrugged, "plans." He averted his gaze, then lifted it again and swallowed. "I thought maybe you had somewhere else to be. Someone else to be with."
Holding his gaze, she offered him a warm smile. "There is no one," she said in a low voice, and shrugged and sighed, hesitating before adding, "hasn't been since you." The last word died on her lips as her smile wavered. "If I took so long coming home, it's because I―" She gave a nervous laugh, shook her head in disbelief. "I went to see your mother."
He frowned. "My mother?"
She shrugged. "I―I…wanted to see you before you left and so I went to your mother's looking for you. Needless to say I was too late and you weren't there. You'd already gone. It was kind of awkward, actually. My limited signing is very rusty."
"Sara―"
"I haven't finished." She lowered her gaze to her plate before forcing it back up to his face. "Afterwards I went to the airport, Gil. I went to the airport because, you know, I figured…" she shrugged, let her sentence hang between them, "But your plane was boarding and—"
"I wasn't on it," he cut in earnestly.
Her smile returned. "I know that now. I didn't then."
"And all this time, I was here waiting for you."
The irony of his words wasn't lost on Sara. "Story of our lives, isn't it?" She paused, stared at him intently. "I couldn't let you go," she finally made herself say, just as he said, "I couldn't leave."
They laughed, but soon their expressions turned serious again. He moved his hand forward a little at first before slowly sliding it to the middle of the table, his fingers flexing and unflexing nervously as it stopped there uncertainly. Sara's eyes lowered to it before she looked up to his face and her lips pinching slid her hand to his until their fingers touched, then met and entwined. His fingers closed over hers, squeezing gently yet emotionally. She was about to speak when he raised his other hand, stopping her. It was his turn to speak now.
"Sara, I couldn't leave without telling you that…that, well, I don't want us to be friends, or rather I don't want for us to just be friends. I want more than that."
She felt tears rise, prickling the back of her eyes. "I want that too."
He smiled, then gently lifted their entwined hands and leaning forward brought them to his lips. "I made a mistake asking for a divorce, a terrible mistake I've regretted ever since, but we'd drifted so far apart I didn't know how to…how I could – how we could find each other again. I took the easy way out, the coward's way out, and I'm sorry. What I should have done is come home, but weeks—months passed before I could and…" He shook his head, let his words drift.
"It wasn't all your fault, Gil. I signed the papers too. I could have tried harder, should have tried harder, but I felt so guilty. I still do."
"You feel guilty?"
"Yeah. You left Vegas. You left everything behind and came to me. And for a while it was all so perfect. We were happy, truly happy. But then you took the job in Paris and…" He raised his hand to shush her, but she shook her head. "I need to say this, Gil. It's important I say this. You took the job in Paris and I lost my purpose in life."
"I know you did, which is why I always supported your return."
"You did, but my coming back here was our downfall. I know that. I take responsibility for that. You were away and I was here and we simply lost our way."
"We can find our way again," he said passionately. "I know we can."
How? She wanted to ask but afraid yet again of upsetting the balance didn't. She watched him uncertainly, and grasping her hand, he pushed to his feet and pulling her up to hers took her into his arms.
"I love you, Sara, I never stopped."
She lifted a hand to her face, wiping at her eyes. "And I love you."
He reached out to brush away a tendril of hair and then slowly, very slowly, closing the small gap between them touched his lips to hers. Sara closed her eyes and let out a gasp, overwhelmed by the intensity of her body's response. He kissed her once, twice, until she made another sound and her lips parted, welcoming him with a fervour, an excitement, she'd kept repressed for too long.
"Come with me," he said, breathless as he drew back. "It's a big ship, and we could always do with more volunteers."
Sara watched him with tears in her eyes. However much she wanted to, she knew she couldn't. A sad smile forming, she brushed her hand to his face, then opened her mouth only to shut it desolately and shake her head.
"I can't."