Title: A Lifetime of Tears
Disclaimer: Not mine. Sorry. I just wanted to play. Don't sue me.
Authors' Note: Ok so I understand that I am supposed to be writing another story. But let me tell you, I've got a terrible case of writers block and I've found the fastest way to unstick it is to write something else. So I did. I didn't run this one past my beta, (Sorry Sol!) Because I didn't want to bore her with my drabble. :o) Not that she would have been bored. Ok, so anyway, please leave me some nice feedback, 'cause I've got a whole other story building and some positive reinforcement would be welcomed. This is my first attempt at a one-shot, so please be nice! If you feel the need to flame me...well, who am I to stop you right? Just be gentle. :o) Enjoy!
Gil Grissom could count on one hand how many times in his adult life he'd cried. It wasn't his thing, and he'd never felt better after doing it.
His mother used to tell him that only two people in this world should ever be able to bring him to tears. And one was himself. The other? The person he loved more then anyone else. Nobody else should ever matter. She used to tell him that when he'd come home from school upset because the other kids were picking on him again. And she was right.
Mothers always are.
He'd been a quiet boy, when his father died his home life had become one where no words were ever spoken. The only way to communicate with his mother had been through the use of his hands and body language. There were some things that you just couldn't express that way. Pain had been one of those things. He could always tell her how he felt. But without her having the ability to hear the emotion in his voice, he always thought that she didn't really understand.
By the time he was eleven years old, he had almost forgotten how to cry. How to put that emotion into his voice. Things were spoken in an even tone, in a voice too solemn for such a young boy. His teachers suggested counselors and therapists, they said a young man should be yelling and playing. Not acting like nothing ever affected him.
Things did make him happy, sad, and angry; but, and it's difficult for him to understand even now, he had started hiding those emotions at a very young age. He didn't know if it was because he was protecting his mother, or learning what he grew up with. Even after his dad died, he had never seen his mother cry. She celebrated his life, she mourned his death, but not one tear was ever shed.
She laughed often though. But even more often she told him that she missed the sound of his laughter, often enough that eventually he had stopped. Because if the one person that wanted to hear it couldn't, why should anyone else? Once in a while, something would just tickle him, and a trickle of laughter would spill from his lips. But for whatever reason it made him feel guilty.
By the time he was 23 years old, he realized he could no longer remember the last time he'd done more as a response to a joke then just shake his head or roll his eyes. Laughter was as foreign to him as tears. Until he met the other person that could make him cry.
She was a leggy brunette with a personality that lit a room. Seemingly confident and happy, Sara Sidle had brought out all those emotions in him that he had long ago figured he'd lost the ability to express. That week with her was the first time since he was a small boy that Gil Grissom had let himself show his happiness. And the end of that week was the first time he had let himself cry.
FLASHBACK
Grissom climbed into the rented car, destined for the airport; for Las Vegas. The night before still fresh in his mind. The sounds of his own laughter still ringing in his ears. Her words still running through his head.
oOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoO
"But Grissom! Why can't you stay?" Her lips forming a pout and her long hair whipping in the late night breeze.
"I told you when I came, that I'd have to go back, that we shouldn't do this..." He had taken her hand and held it tight.
"There will never be enough time..." She let her whispered words trail off and immediately he knew what she meant.
OoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOo
It had been a week full of new experiences and a lifetime of laughter. He'd let himself fall for her. And there was no safety net to catch him when he hit the ground. And what was worse, was looking into her eyes and knowing she was falling too. All the time in the world would never be enough.
He'd taken her hand and led her into the hotel room that had been hishome for the last week. That night was the first night he'd kissed her. The first night he'd fallen asleep with an angel in his arms. They hadn't made love... he wasn't going to take advantage of such a beautiful girl, just to leave her in the morning. His mother raised him better then that. But he had held her all night long, whispering words of longing in her ears long after she was asleep.
His heart shattered every time she murmured in her sleep, knowing this was the last time he'd ever hear her sleepy sounds. His breath hitched in his throat when she'd wrapped those legs around his and mumbled his name. When her breath had found the sensitive spot in the crook of his neck, he almost came emotionally unhinged. He was going to miss her so much.
He was awake all night that night, watching her sleep, memorizing everything about her. From the way her hair splayed out around her face; to the way she would release a contented sigh when he ran a hand down her back. That night was spent showering her face in butterfly kisses and filling her subconscious with words expressing a love he had no idea he could feel.
The next morning he'd held her close and tried to tell her everything he was feeling. This time the words just wouldn't come.
Instead he kissed her lips one last time, still trying to convey every emotion into that gentle touch. When he'd looked into her eyes, he thought that she didn't understand. She didn't know how hard it was for him to get into that car and leave her standing there with her heart on her sleeve.
When he'd finally put the car into drive and driven away, he couldn't bear to look back. Couldn't stand to see the tears he knew were falling from her beautiful brown eyes. Driving down that dusty road on the outskirts of San Francisco, Grissom had felt the first tears inyears to slip down his cheeks. His mother had been right again.
END FLASHBACK
He sat here today, surrounded by so many people that loved him. So many people he cared so much for. But all he could think about, was the times she made him cry. She used to be the only one that could cause his tears, and she still was the only one he let soothe them away.
FLASHBACK
To many years later, he still thought about her. He still wished she was with him. He'd been in contact with her all this time, he knew she was happy, but that didn't make his own ache any less. She'd moved on, she'd forgotten the words he'd spoken to her that last night. But he hadn't. They talked and they laughed, but still he felt like he was missing a part of him at night when he climbed into bed alone.
When he'd called her, to tell her he needed her; it had come out wrong. Sure, he needed her to fill a position on his team, but he also needed her - wanted her. A woman he hadn't seen in years. She'd accepted the position without hesitation and had been within arms reach a week later. He put on a good act. She was his friend, and she was his colleague. But that was all she was. He fought the urge every day to fight his way back to her heart, to hold her and tell her all those things he'd been unable to tell her so long ago.
But she bought his act. She didn't pry her way into his life, and so he didn't try to insert himself into hers. For the second time in his life, Gil Grissom grew solemn. He lost the joy she'd shown him years ago, and returned to the lost little boy he thought he'd outgrown.
And then his world had started to grow quiet. He'd been so frightened of living the life of solitude his mother lived, and as withdrawn as he already was, he started cutting people off. He put back up all the barriers he'd used as a child to protect himself from the other kids. He shut out the one person he wanted to let in.
And when she'd come to him that day, and asked him to have dinner, it was those barriers; that internal shield that had forced him to say no. He couldn't share himself with someone when he was losing what little he still had. She deserved to be loved by someone that would always know the sound of her laughter.
The look on her face, the words she said, the hurt in her eyes... if he could have taken back that hasty 'no' he would have.
That night was the second time she'd reduced him to tears. Alone in his townhouse, with half a bottle of cheap wine resting on the floor between his feet, Gil Grissom had broken down. Half out of anger; for his own childish behavior, and half because he was losing the one person he knew he needed. Mom was still right. He could make himself cry sometimes too.
END FLASHBACK
He still remembered that night like it was yesterday. He remembered every emotion that ran through his body, and how hard it had been to start over with her; to be her friend again, when he realized he still could.
The first time she had looked at him, years later, and he knew that it wasn't too late yet... that she still felt what he did. And it was that night that she again reduced him to tears.
FLASHBACK
He'd been standing next to her car for fifteen minutes, praying that he had read that look right. That she still needed him like he did her.
Soaked completely through; from a rare Nevada Downpour, and shivering in the light breeze, he waited.
She was running towards him, trying desperatly not to get to wet. When she saw him standing there dripping wet, she came to a complete stop.
He knew that fear had to be written all over his face because every beat of his heart sent another wave of panic directly to his stomach.
She frowned at him, not coming even a step closer, letting herself getting drenched.
He ran a hand over his face, trying to clear the rain fromhiseyes so he could see, once and for all, how she felt.
When she finally did step closer, he reached out his hand and without any hesitation on her part, she took it.
"I'm sorry Sara." Was all he could find words to say.
She sent him a half smile that sent shivers up his spine. He couldn't decide if it was a good thing or not. It could be pity, it could be love... she wouldn't meet his eyes, and he couldn't tell.
"Me too." Her gaze collided with his and he knew he'd found the love he thought he had lost.
"There will never be enough time..." He trailed off the words she had whispered in desperation so very very long ago.
She wrapped her arms around him and he held the woman he loved. When her warm breath tickled his ear, he felt her words hit his heart. "But this moment is time enough..."
"Everything I could ask for..." He found his voice.
"...But not more then I need." She finished what he was feeling.
In that moment Grissom realized that sometimes mothers were wrong. Or at least they didn't know everything. She never told him that happiness also caused tears.
Standing there in the pouring rain, holding Sara, he felt complete again. Like that part of him that she held had been put back into place. No more regrets, no more pain.
"I love you Sara." Finally again speaking the words he'd whispered over and over to her so many nights ago as she lay sleeping beside him. She put her hands to the sides of his face and smiled.
"I know." She kissed his lips, and he knew. She'd known from that last kiss; that last message he had tried to send her had gotten through. "And I knew you'd remember someday too."
"I never forgot." His lips found hers again as he tangled his fingers through her wet hair. "I just thought you were happy without me."
"I've never been as happy as I was that week you were with me. I'll never again be as happy as I am right now, in this moment. This a once in a lifetime Gris. Let's not let it go again ok?"
To answer her question he kissed her lips again, this time with the same gentle pressure as he had before he'd driven away that morning a lifetime ago. She slipped her arms back around his waist and pulled him as close as she could. "I love you too."
END FLASHBACK
Sitting here now, with his newborn daughter wrapped in his arms, Grissom looked down at his wife, his friend, his soul mate. He bent over to kiss the tears from her cheeks as she spoke.
"I was wrong."
"When?" He couldn't stop the puzzled expression from forming on his face.
"When I said I would never be happier. Because I am. This time I have you. And we have her." She smiled as she closed her brown eyes, rich with weariness.
He dropped a kiss on each eyelid and she smiled soflty as she drifted to sleep.
As Sara lay sleeping that night, Grissom sat beside her bed, holding her hand. In the other arm, he held the sleeping angel that was his firstborn.
He was mesmerized by every movement she made, from the gentle sucking action of her lips, to the way she gripped his finger like she would never let go. This night, Grissom was awake, learning as much as he could about the only other girl to steal his heart at first glance.
He knew for sure then that mothers didn't know everything.
Sometimes there were two people in the world that mattered enough to shed tears for. He silently wiped one away as his daughter opened her eyes and met his for the first time.
This wasn't a moment he thought he'd ever want. It wasn't a moment he ever thought he was missing. Until he had it in his arms and knew that it was a moment to cry for.
Ok ya'll it's that time again. Hit the review button. Seriously, it'll make my day.
ETA: I went back through and fixed some run on words - which is what happens when I try to edit in this screen...I dunno why. Anyways, I still hope you enjoyed this. Because you know what? I totally enjoyed writing it, I'm thinking my next story will be all ewy gooey loveness and just skip out on the case file. Yeah. Sounds good to me. Thanks a million for reading. :o)