Sara grinned as Grissom fumbled with his tie as he finished getting ready for his first day teaching. She was sitting crossed legged on the bed with Romeo in her lap as her husband wrestled with the thin slip of fabric, a frown etched on his features. Exasperated, he turned to her with a slightly pleading expression on his face as the knot fell apart in his fingers.
"How is it that someone with such an impressive resume and such an extraordinary mind can struggle with something as simple as a Windsor knot?" she asked, just barely keeping a giggle out of her voice as he stood in front of her and she began to deftly secure the offending accessory. He sighed and shrugged slightly. "What did you do before?" she asked, straightening the tie and pulling the end out of Romeo's grip.
"Glue, clip on tie or I loosened the knot enough to get it over my head. I can tie them fine, as long as it's not around my neck." Sara smiled and kissed him gently.
"Have a good day," she said.
"You too, I'll see you later." He gave her another kiss, gathered his coat and briefcase, and left. Sara lay back on the bed and tickled Romeo.
"What am I going to do today, hmmm?" she asked the kitten, stoking him softly. Juliet pounced on her chest, demanding attention. "Any ideas Juliet?" she asked, trying to stop Romeo from chewing a strand of shower-damp hair. Juliet meowed, and launched herself at her brother. They wrestled and then tumbled off the bed before chasing each other down the hall in what was now a customary morning game.
...
An hour or so later Sara wandered through a beautiful park full of evergreen trees and shrubbery. As heavily wrapped up as she was, she still shivered slightly and so turned and started walking in the general direction of where she had left her car. Passing a clump of bushes she heard a low whimper and paused, listening intently. Hearing the sound again she worked her way into the greenery, searching for the source. Pressed against the trunk of an old oak tree a young greyhound puppy was shivering in the cold. Kneeling down beside it Sara noted the its right foreleg had a nasty looking compound fracture and that there were cuts on the dog's back and other legs. Talking in a low, soothing voice she pulled an old bandana out of her coat pocket and folded it into one long strip of fabric about an inch wide. Carefully she tied it as a makeshift muzzle, knowing the dog wasn't going to be happy about being moved. Not having anything to brace the leg with, she carefully and slowly eased the dog into her arms, talking softly all the while, and set off for her car. There was a blanket in the trunk which she wrapped her passenger in before getting behind the wheel. She had passed an animal shelter on the way to the park.
...
Sara pulled into the large, gravel drive way of Animal Ark Rescue Center and parked carefully. She checked her passenger, then hurried inside the single story, somewhat utilitarian building that appeared to front a complex of other structures. The reception area was in chaos. The phone was ringing shrilly, two employees behind the counter where frantically gesticulating over a piece of paper, and a third was trying to calm a mother trailing three youngsters in outfits emblazoned with a soccer motif, and yelling at another, this one a young teenager with green hair, half a dozen facial piercings, artfully torn clothing and a plastic bag in one hand. The employee made calming motions with her hands, but the mother continued to roar at the teen, who bellowed back with equal force. The mother seized the bag and thrust it at the girl behind the counter, who backed away, looking terrified.
"I'm sorry mam," she insisted, "but we don't take fish here. Are you sure the pet shop won't take it back?" The irate woman heaved in a deep breath of air, brandishing the fish at the girl. Before she could speak again, Sara lunged forward and scooped the bag out of her hand, shooting a panicked glance inside. The fish was swimming in tight circles, but otherwise appeared to be unharmed.
"I'll happily take the fish," she said calmly. "I'll take good care of it." The woman gaped for a moment, taken aback. Then she nodded curtly and grabbed the teen by the sleeve, hauling him out of the door, the other three trailing behind them like ducklings.
"His name's Anthrax," shouted the teen as he vanished outside. Sara looked at the girl, who glanced at the clock, gasped, and bolted through the back door. The other two employees were still debating over the piece of paper and the phone continued to ring, the sound so grating that Sara snatched it up off the cradle.
"Animal Ark Rescue Center, how may I help?" she asked.
"What time are you open tomorrow?" asked a burly voice. She had seen a sign on the door coming in. With a sigh of relief Sara replied,
"Nine-thirty to four."
"Thanks," said the voice, before the line went dead. Sara replaced the receiver, muttering
"You're welcome." She looked at the other two; they were by the back wall, their heads bent as they tried to calculate something. "Excuse me," she tried. They didn't hear.
"No, no," said the more senior of the pair, who seemed to be leading the discussion, "It's this one, $17.93 and we need sixty-three of them."
"Where's a damn calculator when you need one?" groaned the other.
"$1129.59," said Sara loudly, trying to get their attention. They both turned to stare.
"Minus twenty percent discount," said the older woman.
"$903.67."
"Plus California eight point two-five percent sales tax."
"$978.22."
"Plus nine point four percent delivery fee."
"$1,070.17."
"Are you a math genius?" asked the younger girl.
"No," replied Sara, "I'm someone looking for a vet to help an injured dog I found at the park." The older woman put two fingers to her lips and blew an ear-piercing whistle. A forth woman appeared through the back door, wearing surgical scrubs and a large amount of black animal fur.
"This human calculator has an injured dog," said the boss lady, jerking a thumb at Sara before picking up the phone and rapidly punching in numbers, the paper clenched in her hand. The vet came around the counter and smiled at Sara.
"I'm Mariah, let's see the patient shall we? You can leave the fish on the counter so he doesn't freeze to death out there." Her head reeling from the last few minutes Sara led Mariah to her car, explaining how she'd found the puppy. She helped the vet move the dog into the center and then relinquished it into Mariah's care with a sad sigh. Returning for her fish, she found the boss lady putting the phone down.
"Sorry about that," she apologised, shaking hands with Sara. "That order literally had to be in less than a minute ago and I can't wait another month to order them." She looked around at the piles of notes, receipts, files and general office chaos. "I had a secretary, but she up a quit on me two weeks ago, and Mikah, the young lass the fish lady was threatening? She's doing what she can, but she's no hand at organization." She yanked a stack of files out from under the telephone and stuck her paper to a notice board. Sara winced internally at the mess, and reached for her fish.
"Are you as good with computers as you are with numbers?"
"It depends, but for the most part I get by, why?"
"Do you want the job?"
"What?" spluttered Sara, caught off guard.
"Nine to four, Monday to Friday. Office work, fixing this mess and computerising all our files. You look like the sort of girl that likes solving puzzles." Sara stared at her.
"Look, you obviously love animals, you've already rescued two this morning, and you've demonstrated that you can answer a telephone, and mediate tense situations. What else do I need to know?"
"Ok," said Sara slowly, her mind reeling, as she struggled to come up with an answer. "Give me a couple of hours to take care of my fish and I'll come back."
"No problem. My name's Mary and I'll be here when you return."
"I'm Sara, and do you know where the nearest pet store is?" Mary grabbed a sheet of printer paper and scribbled a map.
"See you later Sara," she smiled, and then vanished through the back door.
...
An hour and a half later Sara sat at the kitchen table eating a sandwich and watching her fish swim around his new home. The guy at the pet store had been very helpful; it transpired that her new friend was a young male Betta. For twenty dollars Sara had purchased a kit containing a one gallon triangular tank with a small pump, some green gravel for the bottom of the tank and a somewhat realistic plant. Also included was food and liquid drops for conditioning the water. She watched as the fish explored the castle ornament she had placed in the bottom of the tank. His body was bright turquoise and his fins a deep purple; moving through the water he looked like rippling silk. Sara stared, entranced as he fluttered slowly around the castle and then through the leaves of the plastic plant. It wasn't until Hank barked from the back yard that she realized she needed to get moving. Driving back to the sanctuary she wondered if she was doing the right thing. Mary seemed more than a little crazy, and her track record with crazy wasn't exactly reassuring. What the heck, she thought as she walked inside, I'll see what it's all about.
"How's your fish?" asked Mary with a smile as they sat in her tiny office, that was, if at all possible, even more cluttered than the reception area.
"He's ok," smiled Sara, "the man I spoke to at the pet store was very helpful. He's swimming around on my kitchen table until I find a better place to put him."
"You got a name for him yet?"
"Shakespeare," admitted Sara.
"Ah, an educated woman," said Mary, yanking out a blank file. Sara raised an eyebrow and Mary shrugged. "I studied sociology before I found my calling." Sara laughed. Mary handed her a sheaf of papers which Sara glanced through quickly before realizing something.
"I just moved here and I don't actually know my address yet," she said, indicating the form.
"Bring it tomorrow," shrugged Mary. "Any criminal history I should know about?"
"No."
"Drivers license?" Sara handed it over. "Social Security?" She passed that card over too.
"Any allergies?"
"Shell fish."
"Medical conditions?"
"I need to avoid toxoplasmosis." Mary looked up from her form.
"How far along are you?"
"Seventeen weeks."
"Congratulations."
"Thanks."
"Your first?"
"Um, yeah," she replied, uncomfortably. Mary looked at her, blue eyes sharp and appraising.
"I won't tell anyone," she promised, scribbling away on the form before presenting it to Sara to sign. She handed back Sara's drivers license and social security card. "You don't sound like you're originally from Vegas."
"Tamales Bay, California," acknowledged Sara.
"Boston, Massachusetts."
"I like Boston," said Sara.
"Me too; work history, last job?"
"Las Vegas Crime Lab, Criminalistics." Mary stopped writing and looked up at her again.
"What are you doing here?"
"My husband is guest lecturing at the university for a year. I'm supposed to be taking it easy, but I can't sit around and twiddle my thumbs." Mary snorted, nodding.
"I've got four rugrats and every time I was pregnant my man wanted me home doing the accounting. I started ignoring his calls eventually, when he tried checking on me every half hour." She surveyed the papers Sara handed to her. "That'll do for now. Let's take a tour. We have all manner of mammals, small and large and some birds, but nothing aquatic, and nothing exotic either. No lions and tigers. There are two vets and about a dozen staff. You met Mariah, the other vet is Joe, he likes animals a whole lot more than he like humans. Candy works in the office after school, she'll be in later." Sara followed Mary through kennels, two catteries, storage areas, a stable, a long building housing various small animals and finally the surgery. Mariah looked up from cleaning an exam table.
"You here to see the puppy?" she asked, leaning Sara over to a row of cages built into the wall.
"How's she doing?" asked Sara.
"She'll live," smiled Mariah sadly, "she'll have a bit of a limp once that leg heals, and some of the cuts will probably scar, but she'll be ok."
"This was deliberate wasn't it?" asked Sara, stoking the dog's nose when she pushed it through the bars.
"Yes, the third case we've had in the last two months."
"People are sick," said Sara bitterly as the dog snuffled her fingers and licked her.
"You want to give her a name?" asked Mariah. Sara thought for a moment, then nodded.
"How about Lucy?"
"I like it," said Mariah, taking a sharpie out of her pocket and scrawling the name on the card above the cage.
"What's going to happen to her?" asked Sara, still running her fingers over the dog's nose.
"We wait and see if someone claims her and if they don't we try and re-home her."
...
The office was even more of a disaster than Sara had noted from the other side of the counter. Mary gave her a brief rundown of the way things were supposed to work, then left to attend to a disaster of some sort. Standing in the middle of the room, alone, Sara tried to decide where to start, wondering if she was maybe a little out of her mind. What the hell, she thought, might as well dive right in. Two hours later she had sorted all the loose paperwork into rough piles by category, and tidied up the desk space. One of the filing cabinets had a box of antibacterial wipes on it, so she wiped down the counters and the computer, which was sporting a healthy coat of dust. She was familiarizing herself with the log books when a teenage girl in jeans and several layered t-shirts dropped into the other office chair. A mass of short, pink and blond hair framed her face in choppy layers. Her sharp eyes were dark blue and presently irritated. She dumped her backpack unceremoniously on the floor and shoved it under the counter with her foot.
"You're new," she stated, leaning back in her chair.
"I am," replied Sara, curious.
"Candy Peters," she offered a hand. Sara took it.
"Sara Grissom," she replied. Sidle-Grissom was too long to use every day, but it worked nicely for academic differentiation. "Tough day?" she asked, indicating the backpack. Candy rolled her eyes.
"Senior year is supposed to be easy," she grumbled. "But don't bother telling that to my calculus teacher." She shrugged, and looked around. "What kind of system have you got going on here, it sure looks better than it was."
"Thanks," said Sara, showing her what she'd been doing. "Can you explain these invoice logs to me?" she asked. Candy nodded.
"Sure thing. I don't suppose you explain calculus to me?" she replied, somewhat offhand as she opened the nearest log.
"If you like," answered Sara, startling a look out of the girl.
"Really?"
"Really!" Candy grinned openly at her.
"I think we're going to get along just fine," she laughed.
...
Sara was making stir-fry when Grissom got home a little after five.
"Hey," he said, walking up behind her and kissing her cheek.
"How was your first day?"
"Good, it's nice to back in a classroom. I think I'm going to enjoy this. How was your day dear?"
"Oh, well, I rescued a puppy, adopted a fish and got a job I didn't even apply for," she replied, chopping onions.
"You kept busy then?" he teased, an eyebrow raised. Sara laughed at how crazy the few hours since their last conversation had been. She put down her knife and turned to kiss him properly.
"How about you tell me all about your day, and I'll tell you all about mine?" she suggested. He grinned, and kissed her again.
...
...
Please R&R, your comments inspire me :)