Catherine and Grissom stood on opposite sides of the morgue examination table. He watched as she pulled shards of glass from the victim's skin and placed each in a metal bowl with a sharp clank. She looked up at him to realize he hadn't heard a word she'd just said.

"You getting any sleep?"

He caught her eye, but didn't speak.

"Me either." She shrugged. She took in his appearance again, the bags under his eyes cut deeper and darker then she'd ever seen on him before. "What do you hear from Sara?"

"I don't know where she is." His voice was resigned and sad.

Her head snapped up in his direction in surprise but he quickly diverted his eyes to avoid her gaze.

"What happened?"

"I really can't get into this." He finally spoke to put an end to her questioning.

She nodded sadly, her heart braking for him in that moment. Suddenly his appearance was given new light. The extent of his grief on full display through his slumped shoulders, sagging face, dull eyes and lack of attention. He wasn't just grieving Warrick, but he was grieving Warrick alone. And mourning the loss of Sara. Even though she lived, he lost her out there in the desert, Catherine realized. And she never really ever came back to him.

The two left the morgue a short while later and walked back through the hallways. He looked around to see the empty labs.

"Where is everyone?"

"They're in the break room waiting."

"Waiting for what?"

"Waiting for you." Ecklie turned the corner and joined Grissom's stride, "I know you got the memo. I put it on your desk myself." Ecklie spoke as he ushered Grissom to the break room where many of his lab colleagues were waiting. Grief pamphlets stacked neatly on the table.

"My name is Patricia Alwick. I'm a peer grief counselor for the department's employee assistance program. I deal primarily with law enforcement which means I know that none of you wants to listen to me, so I'll keep it short. With the death of Warrick Brown, you've lost a colleague and a friend. I'm here to help you through it. Our conversations will be informal and confidential. You may feel, right now, that you're okay. That you can handle things fine on your own. But sometimes, if you're not looking, grief can sneak up and bite you. I've been doing this a long time. I know what I'm talking about."

"Mrs. Alwick will be up in room 4E if you'd like to make an appointment call her at extension 2922." Ecklie added. "Alright guys. We're done. Thanks for coming."

Grissom thought about what Patricia said. About grief creeping up on you. And he could feel it already. It didn't need to greep. It was already at home in his chest. He thought he could deal with this. In the past, if he wanted to avoid feeling, he'd bury himself in his work. But that wasn't doing it this time. He felt Warrick in every inch of this lab. He felt his absence next to him in every step he took.

Warrick was ripped from him too soon. Every aspect of his death was hard to swallow. But he was grieving more then that. He was angry he was grieving alone. He felt Sara could have done more to stay. The intense despair and sadness he felt when she left the first time was back. But this time it hurt so much worse.

"Are you performing a Headspace SA?"

"Yes. Which I believe is your job. Where have you been?" Grissom responded to Hodges as he entered his own lab.

"I was just uh... no where. You want me to finish up?"

"I'm almost done." Grissom continued to mix the chemicals.

"Um, hold on a second."

"What?" Grissom looked up annoyed.

"You added the liverating agent."

"Yes."

"Then the sulfuric acid. You skipped over the sodium-diathinoid?"

"Yes.. I think I did..." Grissom's voice softened as realization washed over him, "I think I must have done it with all of these."

"It would be best to redo the whole SA. Look, I can do it." Hodges grabbed his white lab coat and slipped it on, "I should have been doing it to begin with. Don't worry about it. I know it's been a long day."

"Every day is a long day." Grissom responded sadly causing Hodges to double take at his demeanor.

He walked to the break room to grab another cup of tea. Patricia was sitting there, "Hello, Patricia" he spoke as he walked past her.

"Looking for me?" She responded, watching as he poured the hot water into his mug.

"No, just getting more tea."

"I was hoping we might get a chance to chat."

"I'm very busy right now." It was the truth. He'd been pulling doubles and triples with no end in sight. Every minute of every day felt exhaustingly long. Even with Riley Adams now on the team, they were still so short handed. He found himself uncharacteristically uninterested in taking the new hire under his wing. He used to relish the idea of a new young mind to shape. Now, he couldn't care less as long as she was doing the job correctly.

"I know you've got a lot going on right now, but I think it will do you good. When you get the time, I am here."

"Thank you, I appreciate that." Grissom nodded as he turned and faced her, "Look... this may be a little out of your are of expertise, but lately I've been have some problems with Hank—"

"Grissom!" Hodges rushed into the break room. "Carbon Monoxide in all the vics as well as the dead lice."

"Excuse me." Grissom said to Patricia as he left the room with Hodges.

"Dr. Grissom." Patrica spoke as she entered his office to find him sitting behind his desk, "May I have a word with you?"

"Yes of course. Come in."

"I wonder why you hold what I do in such obvious contempt."

Grissom furrowed his brows in confusion, "Excuse me?" He knew the statement to be false, but couldn't understand what gave her that idea.

"When we last spoke you mentioned you were having problems with Hank. Now, out of concern for you and because I take my job very seriously, I started asking around. I was met by a mixture of bafflement and smirks by most of your staff until David Hodges took pity on me and informed me that Hank is not your child, but in fact, your dog."

Realization washed over his features, shaking his head softly, "I apologize. It was a serious question."

"Oh really?" She asked as she took up the seat opposite him.

"For the last few weeks by dog's been... listless. He barely eats, he's sluggish on walks. And I just wondered, if you thought it was possible, that pets could take on the emotions of their owners." Grissom shrugged sadly.

"Well," Patricia began, her voice softening considerably at his candor, "Companion animals were bred to respond to human beings. At some level, yes, I do believe that they resonate with what their owners are feeling. So what are you feeling?"

"I've just been... a little distracted lately. I'm having a hard time focusing on the details."

"That's normal."

"Not for me." He paused, he wanted so badly for the suffering in his heart to seize, "I wondered if you knew, typically how long this should last."

"There's no typical. Days, weeks, sometimes years. The important thing is to talk about it and to acknowledge it." She scanned the supervisor and took in his exhaustion. "Have you ever grieved a loss like this before?"

He took a moment before responding, "My father died when I was nine. But it seemed different. My mother just kept the house running as it always had like nothing had changed. And after a while, it just felt like that's always how it was.

"What does your support system look like outside of work now?"

He simply shrugged in response.

"I see. Not married? No children?"

"No." He shook his head, "My um..." He tried to think of what to label Sara. Was she his fiancée? His grandmother's ring that she left next to the Sea Shepard departure itinerary and the sonnet made him think perhaps not. "I was engaged recently, but I'm not sure what that relationship is anymore." He spoke honestly. He hadn't heard a word from Sara since she left over a month ago. All he knew is that she would have boarded the sea Shepard last week to head south. Where? He was unsure.

"I see." Patricia leaned in a bit, "Hank may be morning that loss as well. I assumed you two lived together? That Hank was her dog as well?"

Grissom nodded, "He sleeps with her sweatshirt."

"And you?"

He shook his head, "I don't sleep much."

"It sounds like neither work nor home are truly safe for you any more. I would urge you to find a neutral location that doesn't carry the weight of these losses. Somewhere you can rest. When you don't take the time to give your body and mind the rest it needs, it chooses to do so for you. Often at the most inopportune times, in the most unhelpful of ways."

Grissom smiled sadly as his office line rang, cutting the conversation short.

"Thank you, this has been helpful." He spoke to her before answering the phone.

November 2008

Sometimes before the calm, comes the storm. And the storm rages on.

Grissom laid in his bed. Hank's head resting on his abdomen. He'd arranged the pillows to take up Sara's side of the bed. It felt too big otherwise. Too empty. The space felt like it could swallow him whole.

He stared up at the ceiling, his mind journeying through his thoughts. He'd been thinking a lot about what Patricia the grief counselor had suggested. A neutral place. But he couldn't think of anything. Where he could really rest, think, breathe. He'd gone to Gilbert College the week before. Hoping that sitting outside in the quiet but bustling quad would earn him some solace. But it didn't work. He felt her there too.

Hank's ear's perked up at the sound of an email pinging the computer in the other room. Grissom pulled his hand up to his face, covering his eyes and pinching the bridge of his nose. He sighed a full breath out.

He'd been thinking a lot lately, more then usual. About if people could change. Really change. He found himself more emotional on cases then he'd ever been before. Had something changed in his core being? Especially when children were involved. After holding Eli at Warrick's funeral, something switched in him. Or was it after Sara had left? Or Warrick died? It all began to blur together.

He'd felt such despair at solving a case that incriminated an abused HIV+ Korean boy, only 8 years old. He'd held the boy's hand in the hospital for hours while comforting him and collecting his statement and evidence. He'd found himself feeling very protective of the boy. And while cases that involved children always hit him harder, this felt different. The pain was more raw. He'd even lashed out at Riley upon realizing she'd interviewed the boy without his social worker present. A clear violation of a rule that is in place to protect the child's wellbeing.

He sat up causing Hank to readjust himself against Sara's sweatshirt. Hank's nose pushing the fabric against Grissom's side. He wondered if it carried any scent of her anymore. If, perhaps, only such trace amount remained that it would take the nose of a dog to detect.

He walked into his study and sat down, waking up the computer with a quick shake of the mouse to see one new email had come in. His heart skipped a beat seeing her name in the sender line. He hovered the mouse over her unopened message for a moment. Hesitating.

Eventually he mustered up the courage and opened it to find no message at all, just an attached video. He double clicked to find Sara's glowing, sun-kissed face filled the screen. Her Sidle-famouse gaped grin flashing at him. A calmness washed over him at the sight of her. Like a splash of cool water on a hot, humid day. The ache in his chest disapated for what would turn out to be a very fleeting moment.

"Hello from Puerto Ayora!" Sara's voice filled the room after he'd pressed play. Grissom leaned in a little bit to get a better look at her. At her surroundings, too. It had been two months since he'd last seen her. Since she walked out of his office and didn't turn back. He'd missed her voice so much, he realized in listening to it again. Her tone, her cadence. The little gap she'd take in her sentences sometimes as she changed her inflection.

"We've been at sea for a little over a month now. You wouldn't believe the crew. Students, scientists, activists. The dinner conversations alone are mind blowing." A small smile danced on Grissom's lips as he listened to describe this incredible voyage. "There's even this Marine Biologist that reminds me a little bit of you. He's like an entomologist of the sea. I actually think you'd enjoy his company. He quotes the classics with a similar speed as you." She smiled fondly at the thought before she continued, "I wish we could talk in person but, uh, this is the best I can do right now."

Grissom detected the nervous nature of her soft laugh that followed this statement. It made his stomach churn. He could already tell he was going to regret what he was about to hear.

"I want to apologize for being out of touch." His face lost all of its color. His breath became stuck in his throat and that ache in his chest started to ring its alarm bells again. He listened to her continue, "I've been thinking about us a lot. All the moments. I thought we could survive anything. I thought after all those years trying to convince you to take a chance on us, that the rest would be simple. That once we were together, we would just be together. I really thought love was enough but, I see now I was wrong."

He shook his head as she spoke, regret soaking through every cell and every pore in his being, "This trip has given me a lot of clarity. That last year, in Vegas, I could barely breathe let alone think. But, um, now, for the first time in what feels like a really long time, I'm happy. Before I left, you said some things that I tried not to hear but now, I think you were right."

His face grew sad realizing the weight and finality her words carried.

"If a relationship can't move forward, it withers." His words thrown back at him in her voice, "I've been waiting for you to decide but, sometimes not making a decision is making a decision. I don't want you to worry about me, Gil. I'm good. Really good. And honestly, I think it's better this way." She nodded in an attempt to convince herself too.

A sharp pain hit his chest, his heart constricted tightly. Tears swelled behind his eyes. What did I do?

"I'll always cherish the time we had together. Those two years with you, they filled my cup for a lifetime. I loved every moment of the life we shared before..." She paused a moment to recompose herself in the light she wanted to be portrayed in, "I'll miss you, Gil. Take care of yourself." She looked down from the camera for a moment before her eyes flickered back up, "Goodbye." She nearly whispered just before the video cut out to black.

Grissom was left sitting at his desk with the eerie sound of the empty loft surrounding him. Why can't I breathe? His head fell into his hands. He didn't realize the severity of his inaction until this moment. Nor did he understand the finality of what severing ties with Sara would really feel like. He was wrong, not having her at all was worse then having her inevitable departure over his head.

How could one person deal with all this loss? Warrick and Sara were arguably two of the most pivotal people in his life over the last decade plus. He shuffled himself back into the bedroom and collapsed on the bed. Suddenly he felt too heavy to carry his own weight. He heard Hank trot in after him, whimpering as he jumped onto the bed beside him, carrying her sweatshirt in his mouth.

The little moments. He thought about her words and wondered which moments those were for her. He knew his favorite moments. The ones his mind would feast on in the depths of his darkest hours of solitude. The vignettes flicker across his mind's eye:

That first time he caught her in his field of vision. Ordering coffee at the shop just across the street from the lecture hall. Her gap-toothed smile as she paid and pushed a hair behind her ear.
Catching her eyes during the lecture. Her fervent note-taking and attention on him.
Her ponytail, bouncing as she approached him.
The heat that emanated through his body when she first touched him, shaking his hand.
The sound of her voice as she approached him for first time in Vegas. "It's me."
Those flirtatious moves she made in the hight of a case, "Tie me up."
That feeling of her warm hand on his cheek as she touched him to wipe off some drywall dust. His insides liquifying at the very sensation.
The feeling of her body folding into his that first time he'd hugged her, really hugged her. When he showed up at her apartment after they found Nick.
The kiss that followed, tender and soft and breathtaking. The pressure cooker of sexual tension that had enveloped him for years washing over him like a cool stream.
That look in her eye when she was about to break a case or solve a puzzle.
The way her head fit so perfectly in the space between his shoulder and chest. When her soft hair would touch his jaw and fill his senses.

His chest.

The surge of pain grew more poignant. Sharp and dull simultaneously.

His phone began to ring but he couldn't pick up. He felt physically and mentally paralyzed. He just laid there, staring up at the ceiling, listening to the phone's shrill. Over and over again. As tears began to fall freely.