AN: Next chapter for you guys, hope you like it – a bit of Catherine teasing, a bit of Grissom using his investigative skills to get to know his daughter, some conversation… slowly building up to The Big Meeting. Thanks for the feedback on the story so far, every single review makes my day!

Disclaimer: I don't own anything related to CSI

Chapter 8

Catherine waits until dinner is over, Shelby's in bed and Lindsey's shut herself in her room listening to music before breaching the topic.

"So?" is all she says, but it's all that's needed.

They're on the couch in the living room with a bowl of popcorn between them and some sort of rom com on the TV.

"So?" Sara still repeats, giving her an innocent look.

"Don't play dumb. How'd it go? I assume he at least didn't kick you out, considering how long you were gone."

"I could have been so traumatized I drove around for two hours," she points out drily.

"Funny. Come on, spill."

Sara shrugs. "It went… fine. Better than I could have hoped for, probably. He was shocked, obviously, and kind of snapped at me, but when I tried to leave, he asked me to stay, and we talked."

"Oh, you 'talked', did you?" Catherine wiggles her eyebrows.

"No, there was none of… that," Sara insists. "And there isn't going to be, OK, so you can just… cut that out."

"So, you're trying to tell me that there's nothing there anymore?" She can't, of course, and Catherine smirks. "That's what I thought."

"It doesn't matter," Sara says determinedly. "Right now, this is about Shelby. We need to figure out how to handle this in the best way possible for her, and if, after everything has settled down, something else were to… happen, we'll deal with that then."

"Fair enough. So, what's the plan?"

She sighs. "We didn't actually get that far. I told him that I need to talk to Shelby on my own first, make sure she's OK with all of this, and that I would call him tomorrow so we can discuss what we're going to do." She has to smile. "It was actually… it was kind of adorable, he said he would like to meet her if that was OK with me, like I would show up on his doorstep and tell him he had a kid and then refuse to let him see her."

Catherine huffs a brief laugh. "So, you still have it bad, huh?"

"Oh yeah." It's not like there's any point in denying it. In fact, it feels good to be able to talk to someone about it. She's kept those feelings locked up for long enough.

"You never talked to Shelby about her father at all?"

She contemplates Catherine's question for a moment. "Not really. I'd actually been thinking about it lately, how I'm lucky that she hasn't asked about it yet, but San Francisco is the LGBTQ capital of the US, after all. Most of her friends have unconventional families, so I don't think she's really gotten to the point where she thinks something's missing from ours, you know?"

"I guess that makes sense."

"I don't suppose you have any advice on how to talk to her about this?" she asks hopefully.

"Sorry," Catherine replies. "For what it's worth, she's a bright kid. If you're just honest with her, I think she'll surprise you."

Sara smiles. "She always does. I'm really more worried she'll ask why he hasn't been around before, you know?"

"Yeah, I don't think I can help you with that one. I assume you're not going to put all the blame on Gil, but you should probably talk to him about it before you tell her anything, so you're on the same page."

"You're right, we should talk about it. Maybe together we can figure out how to explain the complete lack of contact."

She grabs her phone from the table.

"I wasn't thinking right this minute," Catherine says amusedly.

"No, I'm just texting. I said I would call him tomorrow, but I forgot that he's on a different schedule." She opens her messages and scrolls, ignoring the twinge of sadness when his name is so far down the list. The last message he sent was during that weird Sherlock Holmes case, checking in on Greg. "Probably better if he calls when he's awake."

"Probably a good idea, yeah," Catherine agrees.

She sends the message off and receives a confirmation almost immediately, making her wonder if he was waiting by the phone. Or the 21st century version of that, anyway.

"Speaking of advice," she says when she's put the phone back down. "Any on how to do the switch from night to day on weekends?"

Catherine laughs. "I hate to say it, but years of practice. When I started out, I was basically useless until after noon on weekends, but luckily Eddie was around for Lindsey, and then my mom, after we split up. These days, I usually get a couple of hours of sleep when I get off shift on Saturday morning, and then I pretty much power through the Sunday shift on caffeine and adrenaline."

"I've never needed a lot of sleep," Sara muses. "But I'm not sure I'll be much use towards the end of shift if I've been up twenty-four hours, you know."

"It'll be an adjustment, no doubt about it, but you'll be fine. Did you just stay on your work schedule before, over the weekend?"

"Usually, yeah, it was just easier. And not like I had much of a social life to maintain anyway."

"We'll work something out," Catherine assures her, the pronoun making her smile. She and Catherine were never very close before, but now it feels almost like she finally has the big sister she always wanted when she was younger. "While you guys are here, we can take turns to get some rest and when you get a place of your own, I can guarantee you'll have more offers for babysitting than you'll need. And you know Gil will want to see her as much as he can."

Sara has to smile, because all her doubt on that particular subject is definitely gone.

Grissom's not expecting to get much done the rest of the weekend. His original plan had been to catch up on the latest issue of Journal of Forensic Sciences and a lecture on blow flies by an old university friend who's now teaching at Cornell, but after Sara's visit, all of that obviously went out the window.

Instead, he finds himself staring at the photo she left behind for what feels like hours, trying to memorize every little detail. He goes online and spends too much time on different websites about everything from child development and parenting to common children's diseases and tips to promote linguistic development.

When he finally can't ignore his rumbling stomach any longer, it's after midnight, and after a quick plate of leftovers from earlier in the week, he's back at the computer, trying to figure out what a three-year-old little girl who loves butterflies might like apart from that.

It's an enlightening – and, at times, slightly frightening – journey into children's TV shows and literature, toys and games, all of which have changed in ways he can't even imagine since he was a child himself, and he makes a mental note to ask Sara what Shelby actually does like, instead of just reading up on everything he can find. By this time, he already has several children's books in his shopping cart on an online bookstore, and he reluctantly removes them, except for one – Ultimate Bugopedia: The Most Complete Bug Reference Ever. He doesn't order it, but he leaves it in the shopping cart for later. Sara did say she liked bugs.

When he can't think of anything else to Google, he forces himself to sit down in front of the TV and turn on some old movie, but it can't hold his attention for more than a few minutes at a time. He finally gives up and finds a notepad where he starts writing down everything he wants to ask Sara the next time they speak, and soon, he has several pages.

The second time he dozes off in front of the TV, he decides to give sleep a try, but after an hour of tossing and turning, he gets up again. A glance at the clock tells him it's a little after six in the morning, which is earlier than he usually goes to bed after work, so it's no wonder he can't sleep.

His phone is on the coffee table, practically calling out to him, but he knows this isn't what Sara meant when she said to call when he woke up. She's not on the night shift schedule anymore, or not yet, anyway – she's asleep, Shelby's asleep, most likely Lindsey as well. He can't wake up the whole house just because he's impatient.

Las Vegas in late May is boiling most of the time, but at this hour of the morning, it's still in the low seventies, so he decides to take a walk, maybe tire himself out enough that he can sleep.

It's a strange thing, Las Vegas in the early morning when he's not at a scene. It's been just over half an hour since the sun rose, and the sky is still tinged in shades of pink and gold, the streets empty save for a man he recognizes as a neighbor a few doors down walking his dog and a couple of twenty-something girls in much too short shorts and sports bras, jogging in the direction of the park a block away while chatting animatedly. He knows if he were on the Strip, it would still be teeming with life despite the early hour, but out here, it's calm.

He takes a left, the opposite direction of the jogging girls, and tries to let his mind go blank for a while, just enjoy the fresh air and pleasant morning.

It doesn't last long, of course – there's a garden at the end of the next block, which is always full of fragrant flowers, no matter the time of year. Today, a beautiful Mourning Cloak is perched on one of the bushes, and he stops to study it more closely, imagines showing the butterfly to Shelby, tries to picture her childish excitement. A few blocks later, there's a young, tired looking woman resolutely picking up a toddler who's flat on the sidewalk, screaming and pounding the pavement with his fists and feet, and he wonders if Shelby has temper tantrums like that. He's sure she must have, all children do, he's fairly certain. Strange as it may seem, he can't wait to be on the receiving end of one. After that, he reaches the small strip mall where he sometimes picks up Chinese food on his way home from work, and to his surprise, there's a store selling children's furniture that he's never noticed before. The window display's been set up as a little girl's bedroom, with one of those beds that can be extended as the occupant grows, an adorable miniature armchair, a couple of bookshelves and a desk, and a gorgeous, Victorian style dollhouse in the corner. In his mind, he's cleaning out the office he never uses, painting the walls… a soft yellow, perhaps. He can see the furniture in there, can picture Shelby asleep in the bed, toys strewn around the floor, the tattered stuffed lion from the picture clutched in her arms.

He wants it so much he can almost taste it, but tells himself very firmly that he cannot, will not, push. In the end, Sara's the one who's calling the shots here. All he can do is show her that she can trust him.

He lingers a minute or so longer, and then turns back the way he came. When he gets home, it's just before seven, and after a quick breakfast, he's actually able to sleep.

The next time he wakes up, it's a much more respectable one thirty, but he still makes himself drink some coffee and freshen up before he finally grabs the phone.

"Good morning," she answers after the first ring, and he can almost hear the smile on her face.

"It's almost two in the afternoon," he points out amusedly.

"Yeah, well, I figured you probably just got up. Besides, I need to get myself in the right mindset soon anyway."

"I suppose that's true. Are you worried about that? Balancing the night shift with a toddler?"

"Not worried, really, but it'll be an adjustment, that's for sure. Catherine said she'll help me figure it out, so as long as we're staying here, we'll be fine but…"

She trails off but he can fill in the rest himself. "You know I'll help in any way you'll let me, right?"

"You might come to regret that."

"I doubt it. So did you have a chance to talk to Shelby about… everything?"

She sighs. "Not yet. Or I was waiting until we could talk about… I obviously have no idea how she'll react, but I figure it's not impossible that she'll want to know, well… where you've been. Why she's never seen you before. I figured we should maybe agree on something to tell her."

"Right." Somehow, in all his musings since yesterday, this exact issue never occurred to him.

"Any ideas?"

"Well, I suppose you could tell her I've been away due to work," he suggests hesitantly. "If you think she might accept that as an explanation?"

"She might. I was also thinking I could say that it's so far it was difficult to visit. She did think the flight here took 'forever'. Direct quote."

He laughs. "I suppose when you're three, everything you need to wait for takes forever."

"It does have a tendency to, yes. OK, so that's two options, I'll see which one I go with and let you know, so we're on the same page. If she asks, which, I honestly think she probably won't. I'm just…"

"Covering all your bases?"

"Pretty much, yeah." She pauses for a moment, and he thinks he hears the low creek of a door. "OK, so Shelby's napping right now, I'll talk to her when she wakes up and report back to you. When are you going into work tonight?"

"You've been off grave too long," he notes amusedly, which earns a low laugh. "Shift starts at eleven, but I'll be at the lab for the first hour or so, at least, so I'll have my phone."

"Shelby should be in bed by eight, I'll call you after she's asleep."

He tries to not be disappointed that she doesn't suggest meeting today. They need to take this at Shelby's pace, not rush. "OK, that sounds good."

"And then we can maybe get together… what's your schedule like next week?"

"Hang on." He climbs the stairs to his office and finds his planner. "Apart from work, I only have court on Thursday morning."

Sara hums over the line. "OK, so maybe tomorrow? We're starting an introduction thing at the new daycare, just two hours in the morning, but unless she's too tired after, you could maybe come here for lunch? Or is that too early?"

He wants to agree without caveats, but… "It's not too early, but are you sure that won't be too many new impressions in one day? I don't want to overwhelm her."

"I think it should be fine," she assures him, the smile obvious in her voice. "If I think it'll be too much after we get back from daycare, we can reschedule for Tuesday. But unlike me, she's usually mostly excited about meeting new people, at least kids her own age."

He has to laugh. "The innocence of youth, perhaps? She hasn't yet been disappointed by humanity."

"Maybe. I honestly have no idea where she gets her social skills – we were at the park earlier and within, like, five minutes she had three new best friends. Unless you were some sort of social butterfly as a kid and it just… wore off over the years."

Her words bring back memories of his childhood.

"Definitely not. I was mostly awkward. Pretty quiet, but that might have been more because none of the other children were very interested in talking about bugs."

She laughs softly. "That's pretty much what I pictured, yeah."

"I think this might be the old battle between nature and nurture, though," he muses, slumping down in his desk chair and staring absentmindedly out the window. "Social skills are learned, fostered, nurtured, not inherent. Neither of us had a… normal childhood, I don't think. Coming from a predominantly silent home, I had trouble connecting with hearing people. And I assume your… home situation meant you didn't feel comfortable getting too close to outsiders, even your own age."

The line is quiet long enough he has time to start worrying that he said too much.

"That's probably true…" she says eventually, sounding thoughtful rather than upset, and he lets out a relieved breath. "You know, I realize I don't know much about your family. I know your mom was deaf, but that's about it."

He's never been one to talk too much about his personal life, but he realizes that he wants to. He wants her to know him.

"She is, yes."

"Your dad?"

Another wave of memories – his first catching glove, tossing a baseball in the backyard, learning about the bugs and flowers his father loved. Shadows of a life long lost.

"I feel like the memories fade the older I get," he admits. "He died when I was nine."

"I'm sorry."

"A lifetime ago. Mom never talked much about him, it hurt too much, I think… I learned what I could from his notebooks and whatever other belongings she kept."

"When did she lose her hearing?" she asks curiously. "She did, right, the same condition you had surgery for, she wasn't born deaf?"

He's not sure why – he should know by now that Sara's brain is like a steel trap – but he's surprised that she remembers.

"No, she wasn't," he confirms. "I don't think children were tested for hearing issues like they are today back then, so it wasn't until she started school that someone realized something was wrong with her hearing. I asked her about it, back when I was having problems myself, but she can't really remember what it was like. She remembers some sounds, but not much. She was completely deaf by the time she was eight, which isn't that common, actually. Normally, the symptoms appear in your twenties to thirties."

"So, she got it earlier than normal, and you got it later?"

"I hadn't thought about it like that, but yes."

She's quiet for a moment. "Why didn't you say anything, back then? Not to me, necessarily, but I know you didn't talk to Catherine or Jim either."

"It was a way of… pretending everything was fine, I suppose," he replies. "If I didn't talk about it, if nobody knew about it, maybe it would go away. It took me some time to come to terms with what was happening, and then I was afraid it was too late, that the surgery wouldn't work. I was scared."

"I can't even imagine."

"No, I don't think you can, not without experiencing it. And I know Mom had it worse, but it wasn't easy for me either."

"I get that."

Somehow, despite their family situations being so completely different, he thinks she really does understand.

"I don't know much about your family either," he notes. "Apart from what you've told me." She sighs over the line, and he hurries to backtrack. "I'm sorry, we don't have to…"

"It's OK," she cuts him off. "It's not that I don't want to talk about it, it's just… Shelby should be waking up soon and I'm in Catherine's backyard with, like, no privacy…"

"Right." He's not sure if it's simply excuses or not.

"Another time?" she then says, her voice an offer, and he relaxes.

"Whenever you're ready."

AN: "Ultimate Bugopedia: The Most Complete Bug Reference Ever" wasn't actually published until 2013, as far as I can tell, but whatever. This is the problem with writing a story that takes place over a decade ago!