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Divorce From A Dream

By Manda

When I was seven, my mother had brought home a spirited Irish Setter, Sa-ra, and for months our biggest problem had been training her not to chew our brand-new gray-and-blue throw rug in the foyer. She would grasp her teeth into the braided surface and pull, shake, worry the tightly knitted threads into a state of chaotic unraveling. Reality had, at this point in my life, sunk it's teeth into my dreams and shaken them, much like Sa-ra had desecrated the rug. I couldn't go back, couldn't bear to look forward and imagine what was going to happen to me and mine.

When we came home with Lindsey, pink with freshness and wrapped in a soft orange blanket from Eddie's mother, we settled her into the bedroom at the end of the hall, two feet from our door. For the sake of worry, I had a baby monitor in the kitchen, my bedroom, the bathroom, and the laundry room in the basement, making our house seem as if it were full of babies, rather than only one small, squawking form.

But as much as I had imagined things would change...they stayed exactly the same. Of course, there were the occasional changes; Eddie and I never spent a moment alone anymore...never ate dinner with Lindsey or walked down the Strip...and I never danced for my husband again.

Eddie left me a month later, and the only love I recieved was from my infant daughter, too young to understand that her father hated me, yet doted on her. Hardly enough to stay, and thankfully not enough to take her away from me, although I imagine that may have been better than to live with her addict mother. Yes, I was an addict, coming home from work every morning only to fall into bed half-naked and holding my crumpled bags of cocaine, freshly bought from the dealers I had come to know so well.

And that's how Grissom found me, a week later, knocking on my door because I didn't show up for my tutoring session in advanced chemistry. The fall was to be the time I enrolled in UNLV's Forensics program...and he'd offered, out of compassion or perhaps a feeling of obligation, to prep me.

"You're supposed to knock." I commanded, when he'd stuck his head through the crack of the open doorway. Only for the sake of hearing my wailing infant had I left the door to my bedroom open, cursing at the broken baby monitor as I sat cross legged on my bed in jogging shorts and a fawn-colored tank top that closely resembled swiss-cheese, my bag of coke in one palm. The weight of the purchase was comforting to me, like a security blanket, and it was only by necessity that I quickly shoved the snow-white powder out of sight beneath my quilt. "What the hell are you doing here, Gil?"

"You didn't come to your session today." He commented, pushing the door open further, but not stepping inside. "Catherine...you told me you were serious about this."

"And I am. I just...didn't feel like going out today. Lindsey's been sleeping well...and the thought of leaving her with a babysitter wasn't what I wanted. It was only an hour, Grissom...and it won't kill me. Besides...you're here now."

"But that isn't the point." He looked at me, then...really looked at me, all the confusion of the past months transferring across the invisible connection established between us. He didn't understand how much I went through every day, and the look in his eyes was enough to send me into a downward spiral, anger blossoming in my chest like roses from Eddie had when I put them in fresh water. "You're on thin ice, Cath, until you pass the entrance exam. If you want UNLV to accept you...you've got to dedicate yourself to this. That means never missing a session if you can help it...until it's all over."

"It was one goddamned session, Gil! One. And for Christ's sake, if you're here to lecture me...just get out." She swung her legs over the edge of the bed, dislodging quilts and sheets in a waterfall of color, each pouring to the beige carpet fluidly.

When the bag fell, there was a soft thump, and a cloud of white powder. I fell to the floor, hastily scooping up the bag and waving away the gentle, sugary smoke from the air, never once glancing in Grissom's general direction until I'd closed it and shoved it gently beneath the bed. And when I did look up, I found him staring, the unnerving look in his eyes enough to make me grimace.

"Coke."

"It's not powdered sugar for donuts." I knew my tone was sarcastic, so I spoke again, softly. "When Eddie left me, Grissom...he didn't just leave me the pieces of his pathetic life to clean up. He left me the pieces of mine....Lindsey...and a coke habit that I can't seem to break." My smile felt weak I folded her legs beneath me and stared at my hands. "And a lot of other things have been broken in the meantime."

His hand covered mine, and I looked up, finding his nose inches away, breath warm on my skin. For a minute it was like the old times, when we would have kissed passionately, breathing each others air and winding their bodies together beneath the freshly washed bedsheets.

But even with Eddie gone...and the freedom present to do so...it didn't happen. And suddenly...just as suddenly as I knew I could quit cocaine with his help...I knew that It would never happen again. There were too many variables in place, too much at stake for either one of us to throw in the gauntlet and say what we were really thinking...that we were meant to be in love and had as much of a right to that as I did to become a forensic scientist.

"I never thought I'd be going through two divorces at the same time," I whispered, pressing my forehead to his. And I hadn't imagined such a thing...although one marriage didn't feel at all deserving of such a fate.

"Admittedly, this is my first." Grissom's voice held more sadness than I'd expected, and as we pulled away, he sighed. "Someone once said, 'Never say that marriage has more of joy than pain.'"

"Shakespeare?"

"Euripides." We stood up, slowly, hands wound together until the point at which we were both able to support our own weight. And he kissed me, the shortest, sweetest kiss I've ever known in my life, brushing a finger down my jaw before turning toward the door. "Catherine?"

"Yes?"

"When you quit...call me, and we'll set up your next tutoring session...provided you still need it." His smile implied that he had confidence, and I felt it, standing alone in the center of my bedroom, bag of coke nudging at my bare toes from beneath the bed. The lure of the cool lump of powder didn't demand my attention, I felt my lips curve into a smile.

"I'll do that." I didn't even see him leave, my eyes moving quickly to the vanity mirror, my own saddened, bloodshot reflection staring back from beneath a film of murky cigarette residue. I barely smoked cigarettes anymore, either, although I the infusion of Grissom's faith made me think that if I wanted to quit, right now, I could...because he wanted me to.

And I did, weeks later, pull of the extreme miracle of quitting cocaine, throwing my reserve stashes in the river and walking along the banks, images of rogue goldfish high on grade A cocaine swimming through my thoughts and making me laugh aloud.

But with the end of my marriage...of both of them...came the lack of anyone to laugh with.

But the man I wanted to laugh with...that man had given me a chance for marriage again one day.

I knew that eventually, I was going to take that chance.

-End