Title : AS SURE AS THE SUN
Written by SeudSidle
A/N: Thanks my Beta, Rachel for all her work. Again, all mistakes are mine.
Chapter 6
[Catherine
Willows]
“Okay, Jim, what did Grissom tell you last night?” I asked Brass while I opened
the door to Sara’s apartment.
Warrick held onto a box of food and Jim had brought a cake. It was Greg’s idea,
actually. To tell the truth I didn’t know if it was good idea to be there at
all. Sara and I had never been best friends; we tolerated each other pretty
well, up until her outburst.
She had a point in her anger, and I had a point in mine, so now we are two
people with two different points. I don’t hate her. In fact, I actually like
her. She’s intelligent, funny, independent, and she never says no if you ask her
to switch days off. But she’s also stubborn, intractable, young, and has an
answer for every question.
“Grissom didn’t say anything, but Nicky did – he has a big mouth. You need help
with the lock or are you just trying to torture us?” Brass said.
It wasn’t an easy job to open that door. I wondered if Sara had taken the lock
from the Pentagon. Finally, after five minutes, I managed to open the door from
hell and we stepped inside. Sara’s apartment wasn’t as I had imagined it. I had
always imagined her going for more of a Japanese style. Her place was sparsely
decorated, but it was nice and warm.
“Wow, I like the couch. I would never have guessed she’d go for something like
that.”
Brass smiled and put the cake in the middle of the coffee table. Warrick took
his box of goodies to the kitchen. I looked outside Sara’s living room window
and thought how astonishing the view must be at night. I’ve lived here in Vegas
for nearly half my life, but I still enjoy the city lights. I like the casinos,
the 24 hour bars… I like the fact that people dream in Vegas. Vegas in not
sophisticated like New York or sexy like New Orleans, but if there is one place
that people can dream of a better life, it’s here.
“You know, you can learn a lot about a person from the books that she reads.”
Brass said while looking at Sara’s bookcase. Jack Kerouac’s On the Road
and Steve Anchell’s The Nude At Big Sur were two of the books that caught
his eye. “Yesterday I went and bought her the new issue of B & W. $7.95
for a magazine with black and white photos.”
“Think that’s expensive? My daughter wants me to buy her some new Nike shoes,
$360. Yeah, right!” I told him, laughing.
“Oh well, you can’t have it all.” Brass joked, shrugging his shoulders.
I continued to look around Sara’s place, enjoying the experience. Sara has a
very ‘earthy’ taste: wooden furniture and earthy colours. Sara apparently hadn’t
forgotten all of her hippie roots.
I half expected to see a Doors poster on the wall. But then I remembered that
Sara grew up in Frisco, so if she had any posters, they would probably be of the
Grateful Dead or Jefferson Airplane. I looked at the pictures she had displayed
in frames – all of them were of landscapes: The Golden Gate Bridge, Frisco at
night, and a marina. None of her pictures were of people, none of them of Sara,
just beautiful, faceless, landscapes.
She and Grissom are so alike, I thought to myself. He doesn’t have pictures
around his place either, just framed butterflies and beetles. What was Grissom
favourite beetle, I tried to remember. Popillia japonica? I can’t remember his
favourite, but that was mine.
Sara’s apartment was clean – there was no dust even though she had been gone for
two days. I wondered how she manages that, because my place is always a mess.
But Sara doesn’t have a twelve-year-old daughter running around! I wondered when
was the last time that Sara invited someone over. She had never invited me, for
sure. I thought back on Nick’s surprise when she invited him for a movie and
pizza. He was bubbling for days after that.
Her desk was clean and everything was in perfect order. She had an inkwell; I
had never imagined Sara as an ink person, having seen how she writes at work. I
held back the urge to search her notes by turning to her stereo system. I pushed
“play” and was surprised by the music that began to play.
Beg you listen me, don't be kissing me 'til I'm done
Unsung champion, reason, like seasoning
Pepper your thoughts with spice, and entice you to a space
Where I dwell with bass players and layers and loops
Think what I think with my prayers. It's nice.
My world is everything I've become
Contained in the hum between voice and drum
I'm coming from the same place I'm still running from
But even sitting in the garden one can still get stung
“That’s nice, leave it.” Warrick said, and I was content to leave it on for him.
“The Garden” ended and a new one began. Acid Jazz. I never had Sara pegged as a
jazz person. Sara’s more jazz than Grissom and Greg together, I thought to
myself. I hadn’t seen Greg for a while and I had actually started to miss him. I
never thought that day would come, missing Greg! I really miss feeling like a
family.
I continued to wander through her small apartment and noticed that she had
fifty-two messages on her answering machine. Whoa! Fifty-two messages?? Are we
at the right apartment? I wondered to myself in surprise. The last time that I
had that many messages was…never. I was beginning to believe that Sara Sidle has
a life. A normal life! Brass came up next to me and saw what I had just seen. He
looked over at Warrick, back at me, and then hits the “play” button. I looked at
him with my jaw dropped and he shrugged his shoulders and mumbled an ‘oops’.
Beep.
“Hey Sara, its Paul. Uh, you didn’t come today…Give me a call when you get home,
okay?”
Beep.
“Sara, its Justin. I’m still in LA, so today’s off again. I’ll call you again.”
Beep.
“Are you two listening to Sara’s messages? You know she will kill you if she
catches you.” Warrick warns us.
“The key word there is ‘if’ she catches us,” Jim says, and I laughed, secretly
wanted to hear the rest of her messages.
We listened through ten more messages, most of which were from men. I realized
from a later message that Justin must be her therapist. I recognized his name. I
think that I had worked with him at the past. Black guy, in his sixties, two
kids, and a cat. Why was Sara seeing him? I wondered.
Jim bit his lower lip. I could tell from the look on his face that he hadn’t
known about that part of Sara’s life. Why he should have? Sara is as private as
Grissom, is and if it hadn’t been for Nick’s friendship with her, none of us
would never have known about her DUI. Nick was so upset that day; he kept saying
that it was his fault. When Sara took some time off, he was heartbroken. It took
Grissom a while to convince him that Sara wasn’t leaving.
“I shouldn’t be here.” I said, suddenly, having second thoughts. I didn’t wanted
to upset Sara.
“What? Why?” Warrick asked from the kitchen.
He had dished the food out onto plates. This is how rabbits celebrate, I thought
to myself, looking at the food. Mushrooms, carrots, potatoes, cheese, black
bread, more mushrooms… I shook my head. Call me old fashioned, but I want a
well-done steak with my veggies, but, hey, this is what Sara eats so I had
nothing to say about it.
“Hey, a little help here, please!” Nick’s voice called out from the door.
I turned around, but couldn’t see Nick anywhere. All I could see was a huge
teddy bear. Brass laughed at the sight of Nick buried behind a huge stuffed bear
and headed over to help Nick with his armful. Where did he find that? I
wondered. Great, I grumbled to myself. Now I am the only one who didn’t have
something for Sara, I worried to myself. Greg and Brass had already given her
something, Warrick brought the cake, and now Nick shows up with a huge bear.
“So what do you think? Is she going to like it or not?” Nick smiled proudly at
his huge find.
“I like it.” Brass joked and Nick’s smile vanished.
Warrick laughed at the look on Nick’s face. I love Warrick’s laugh – it’s so
melodic. His cell phone rang and he excused himself to a quieter room. I went
into the kitchen and finished dishing out the food for Warrick. I put some chips
in a bowl and then placed the Cokes in the fridge to get cold. I was really
surprised to find that not only was her refrigerator full of food, but she also
had twelve rolls of film nestled in the door.
“What is she going to do with twelve rolls of film? Eat them?” I wondered out
loud.
“Photography lessons.” Nick explained, sounding a little unhappy.
What’s wrong with Sara taken photography lessons? I wonder to myself. It’s about
damn time if you ask me. Good for her, I thought. She’s getting a life, and who
knows? Maybe she’ll find someone who’ll give her something more than a simple
plant. I love Gil, I really do. He was the first one to believe in me and for
that I will always be thankful to him but he really needs to pull his head out
from under the microscope and look around.
“Okay guys, they’re here. Greg just called from the parking lot.” Warrick said
excitedly.
Sara and Grissom are so alike, I thought to myself. If I didn’t know that Gil is
an only child, I would believe that she’s his little sister. They are awful
together and yet they are great together. Give them the most messed up case and
they will find who did it and why, in no time. Ask them to talk about their
feelings for each other and you’ll be in line for a disaster. Maybe it’s for
balance, I decided, no one deserves to be too perfect.
I looked over at Brass. He had been watching me with raised eyebrows. Had he
been reading my mind? I felt really nervous about seeing Sara all of a sudden. I
felt like it was my first day at school… I felt like an outsider. I didn’t know
why I was feeling that way – I had known Grissom for nearly fifteen years, Jim
too. I had known the guys, aside from Greg, for nearly ten years, but that night
I didn’t feel like I fit in.
All my worries faded away when I saw Sara. She didn’t look like herself at all -
she looked like crap. Grissom was pushing her in a wheelchair. Her left side had
taken the brunt of the blow; both her left leg and arm were in casts. Warrick
had told me about her injuries, but he hadn’t told me about her face. Her neck
was covered with bruises and I could see clearly where Smarnimoff had grabbed
her. Her face was discoloured from the bruising and her eyes were bloodshot.
Seeing her for the first time caused me to gasp. She looked rather like a
Halloween mask that I used to have.
“Oh my God!” I couldn’t help but exclaim as Grissom and Greg carried her up the
steps into her apartment.
“Please, just call me Sara.” She retorted, with as much of a grin on her face as
the swollen bruises would allow.
Whoa, Sara's joking! She took me by surprise. “What kind of drugs are they
giving you?” I asked her, joking right back with her.
“Not very strong ones,” she said, “because when Grissom hit my foot on the door
I felt it.”
“Hey now, I only bumped you into the door once!” Grissom protested, laughing.
“It still hurt, mister!” She quipped back at him, but I could tell that she was
smiling.
“Don’t get lippy with me, Sidle.” Grissom warned her, a sparkle in his eyes.
I was thoroughly confused by their display of easygoing banter. It was like I
was watching some old, independent movie with unfamiliar actors – they seemed
like strangers to me. The last time I had seen Sara before then, she was ready
to bite my head off when I questioned her about being on-edge whenever it came
to abuse cases, and now she’s Ms. Bright-eyes. I had expected her to react
differently to seeing me… Well, maybe I was wrong about her.
“Hey Sara, if you need any help…” I started to say
“We’re here for you, girl.” Warrick finished my sentence and I threw him a huge
grin. One of these days, I thought to myself, I’ll find the courage to I’ll ask
him out.
**********
[Warrick
Brown]
“We’re here for you, girl.” I couldn’t help but finish Catherine’s sentence.
I glanced over at her and saw the biggest grin on her face. One of these days, I
thought to myself, I’ll find the courage to I’ll ask her out. What’s the worst
that could happen? Well, on second thought, she could turn me down and then
treat me like a second-class citizen for the rest of my life…No, that wouldn’t
be such a good thing since we work together. More precisely, I work for her.
She’s my boss, and a bitchy boss at that!
I’d take working for Grissom over Catherine anytime. Things were great back
then, but Ecklie had gone and messed it all up. Working for Griss, I knew that I
didn’t have to worry about anything. He’s look at me as though I were a
two-year-old whenever I disappointed him, but that was it. Plus, back then
Catherine and I were equal and I could flirt with her. Now she’s my superior and
she’s constantly trying to prove that she’s a better supervisor than Grissom.
She probably is - Grissom never cared about his supervisor position in the first
place. But I have to hand it to him, he’s the only one who can handle Sara. He
just has a way with her, for better or worse!
I don’t even stand a chance with her. I can handle Nick, but Sara? No way. She’s
like a wild horse, you never know what she’s about to do or when she’s about to
take off. To this day, I haven’t been able to figure out what bothered her more
- that Grissom gave to me the shift or that she didn’t trust me enough for that
position. I’ve worked with her for five years and I still don’t know if she
trusts me.
She trusts Greg. From day one, she’s trusted him. Although I don’t know if I
have her trust, I do have her friendship, that’s for sure. She would do
anything, and I mean anything, for me. Maybe it’s my fault that she doesn’t
quite trust me. Ever since she told me about her date with what’s-his-name, and
then I told Catherine, who told Nick… Well, ever since then Sara hasn’t shared
much with me.
Well, the night was about Sara, so I decided to put those thoughts behind me. I
glanced around her place and noticed that Greg and Nick were searching through
her CD’s, and that Brass, Catherine, and Grissom were talking to each other in a
corner away from the rest of us, but that Grissom kept looking at her every now
and then. I hope that this whole ordeal has served as a wake-up call for him.
Sara isn’t always going to wait around for him. Love is a two-way street, but
sometimes I doubt that Grissom really understands what love is. Love is
everything and nothing, but, most of all, love is about compromise. You can only
expect to receive exactly what you give.
I walked over to Sara and sat down next to her. “Can I write something to your
cast?” I asked her.
“Will you write me a poem?” She asked gently.
She’s definitely still under the influence of whatever drug they gave her in the
hospital, I noted. Although I didn’t like to see her hurt, I did like to see
that different side of her. She was so much more relaxed, which made it a lot
easier to talk to her. It’s so hard to talk to someone when they’ve got a
fortress of walls built up around them. Yeah, I thought to myself again, I like
this side of Sara.
“You’ll see.” I tell her, smiling, taking the black marker in my hand to her
cast.
I laughed to myself realizing how childlike it is to write on someone’s cast,
but she looked like a child in that moment, sitting there helplessly in a
wheelchair, without the make- up and the clothes she usually wears. It looked
like she was wearing one of Nick’s shirts, swimming inside of it.
“It’s mine.” She said
“Huh?” I wrinkled up my forehead in confusion.
“The sweat suit, it’s mine,” she said, having caught me staring at it.
I first thought she was joking because it had to be at least two sizes too big.
There was no way that it could be hers. Maybe it’s Hank’s, I thought to myself.
We all knew about Hank. He was a well-built guy, but a major asshole for
cheating on his fiancé with Sara, lying to both women. But I do give him some
credit for wanting Sara...
“You don’t believe me?” Sara asked, playfully.
“Nope” I admitted, grinning.
She smiled at me and then said, “When I stopped swimming I gained twenty five
pounds.”
“Damn!” I whistled in disbelief. “No offence, but although you could stand to
gain a few pounds right now, I can’t imagine twenty five!”
“Yeah, I know. Well, just so you know, I had gained a few pounds, but then I
lost it all while in the hospital.” She confessed to me.
“Yeah, well, you need to put on more than just a few pounds girl, you’re too
skinny.” I told her.
I didn’t know that Sara was a swimmer. She does have the right body type for
swimming. She’s tall with long legs. Yeah, I could picture her with a swimsuit
and goggles, her natural competetiveness pushing her to get better and better. I
wondered why she stopped. It’s never been her style quit anything. If there is
one thing about her that drives me nuts, it’s her need to finish what she
started, even if it’s killing her.
“Hey Sar, how are you?” I asked her seriously. “I mean, how are you really? Not
the ‘I’m fine’ bullshit of yours.”
She looked at me and I could literally hear the gears in her head thinking. The
“Sara look” clouds over her face, or rather the “Grissom look”, as she prefers
to call it.
“Sore,” she admitted to me. “I hurt every time I breathe, but you know what? I
can’t describe it, but I feel free. I feel that the circle is finally closed,
and that feels good. I feel good. I can’t walk, I can’t even go to the bathroom
alone, but I feel so liberated. Strange, isn’t?”
“Yeah,” I sympathize with her. “You feel like you were carrying around three
hundred pounds and then, all of a sudden, that weight is gone? I have felt that
way too.” I tell her.
I really did understand the feeling she was describing. When you have nothing
else to lose, it’s easier to start all over again. When I stopped gambling, I
felt like I was going to die. The boringness almost killed me. If it weren’t for
Nicky or Grissom, I would be still out there losing myself. I found peace, and
now Sara has found peace. I could see it in her eyes. Whatever it was that had
been driving her mad, it was gone.
“Okay, all done,” I said, replacing the cap on the pen. “You want me to read it
to you?”
Sara nodded and I cleared my throat:
“Sometimes the sky's too bright,
Or has too many clouds or birds,
And far away's too sharp a sun
To nourish thinking of him.”
“Sometimes the Sky's Too Bright, Dylan Thomas.” Sara smiled when she recognized
the poem.
“And here I thought that you wouldn’t know it!” I said, chuckling.
“Is there a meaning behind this?” She asked and I laughed. Sara Sidle was always
looking for the meaning.
“No girl. I just like that poem.”
“And I like you, Ricky.” She said, grinning.
I love it when she calls me Ricky. I can never be mad at her when she calls me
Ricky or when she looks me like she was at that moment. Her eyes are brown, the
most common eye color in the world, but when I look into her brown eyes, I see
everything I want to see. I see warmth and passion. Sara is a very passionate
person. Everything she does, she does passionately.
I leaned over and kissed her forehead. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see
that we had Grissom’s attention. He was at the kitchen bar preparing a dish,
which was certainly for Sara.
“You better eat something, you’re on heavy medication.” Grissom says to her as
he brings her a plate. His voice was different when he talked to her. It’s
softer and sweeter, almost like a lullaby. He came closer to her and although he
didn’t touch her, I had the feeling that he did. They have this unexplainable
bond where they always seem to know what the other is thinking without even
saying a word. But even still, they seem to have such a hard time communicating!
“I’m not hungry.” Sara protested.
“I’ll make you soup.” Grissom tried harder to get her to eat.
I’ve known Grissom for years and he’s never made soup me. I’m even his favourite
CSI! Of course I’ve never been attacked, but still I know he’d never take such
attentive care of me. He’s never cared for Cath this way, either. Sure, he cares
about her and all, but he didn’t even tell her that Eddie was cheating on her.
No, Grissom cares for all of us, but he cares for Sara on an entirely different
level.
At first it seemed like a mentor-mentee relationship, but it quickly became
clear that there was something else there between them. I don’t know where they
met, but I’m sure that when they met there was something there, even if neither
of them acted on it.
“Hey Ricky, don’t take this the wrong way, but I’m kind of tired.” Sara said, a
bit uncertainly.
“Hey, it’s okay! We’re gone, girl.” I assured her.
I motioned to Cath that it’s time to go, and she waved back, and then signaled
to Nick and Brass who started to get their coats on. I assumed that Greg was
planning on staying because he took my place next to Sara. He’s lucky, I thought
to myself, he’s got one of the best to teach him.
“Take good care of her, Griss.” I said as we exchanged goodbyes.
“I will Warrick, I will.”
TBC…