TITLE: Dawning
AUTHOR: Anansay
SUMMARY: Grissom has come out of his shell. Now he wants to help another come out of their shell.
RATING: PG-13
SPOILER: None. Not really. I don't think so. Usually up to Season 4 but nothing in specific.
DISCLAIMER: Not mine. Never have been, and never will be. Boo hoo!
AUTHOR'S NOTES: Thanks go to Ghibli for beta'ing this for me. Thanks!

~*~

DAWNING

By Anansay
December 12, 2003

~*~

There is nothing more poignant in this world than to watch someone slowly whittle away and be crushed under the weight of their own pain and agony. It was enough to cause a sudden stop in movement and thought, and be caught in the glare of the coldness emanating from her eyes as she disappeared around a corner, leaving him to stand gape-jawed in some sort of flimsy excuse for a melodrama.

His heart sank in his chest and he stood on the stop, files hanging loosely from his limp hand.

~*~

"Sara?"

His voice drifted in through the open door. She stiffened in her seat as her hand stilled on the mouse. The screen stopped scrolling. "Yes?" she said.

She heard him moving into the room to stand beside her. "How's it going?" His hand landed on the back of her chair.

"Fine." Her hand pushed the mouse around and the screen began scrolling again, her eyes peeled to it. Her body sat in the chair, stiff and unmoving. She could feel him behind her, leaning over as he'd always done. Only this time, she didn't lean back, she didn't turn to meet his gaze. She simply did nothing.

After a moment he straightened. She felt the distance keenly but fought down the stab of pain in her heart.

"Okay," he said. The word came out on a breath, low and soft. It flowed over Sara and her heart lurched.

She couldn't understand how she could still react this way, after he had so coldly turned her down. She felt more than saw him step away from her and leave the room. And suddenly it seemed so empty without him. When she was sure he was gone, she let out a long deep sigh, closed her eyes tight and allowed her shoulders to slump down. As much as she tried to maintain some emotional distance from him, there always managed to be some residual fragments of foolish infatuation. A mental shake and she was back to work, the computer screen beginning to scroll once again.

~*~

It was his nose. It warned him before his eyes did and made him stop in his tracks. He stood by the door to the locker room fighting to keep his eyes open, to not give in to the temptation to lose himself in her scent. He knew she was in there, he'd seen her round the corner toward it. And now her scent, diffusing quickly in the air, told him she was just beyond the door getting ready to leave, to go home.

He needed to leave too. They were way past the end of shift and his body was demanding rest from the latest onslaught of perpetual thinking and working. With a deeply drawn breath, he pushed the door open and stepped inside, into the darkness that seemed to have a permanent residence in this tiny room, despite the window granting access to the outside.

He squinted until his eyes adjusted and then he stopped.

Sara was sitting on the bench, head resting in her hands, elbows on knees, body inert.

He stood and watched her, saw how her back curved gracefully over her body, her long thin arms bent at the elbows, her long legs tucked beneath the bench, and how her hair hung dully across her face, obscuring it from his view. A comical thought occurred to him: had she fallen asleep like that?

He took a step forward and considered simply getting his stuff and leaving, leaving her alone. But his locker was past her, and the shelves on the other side of the bench didn't quite afford as much room as he'd liked so as not to disturb her. So he stood and waited. Waited until a better idea came to him, all the while watching Sara.

And then she moved, her head lifted and turned toward his and she was looking at him. Her brown eyes staring at him boldly, her face impassive. Her hands fell, fingers linked and hanging between her legs. She continued to stare at him, waiting.

A sound came from his throat, a guttural utterance of some far off memory of pre-literacy times.

"Something wrong?" she said, her low voice loud in the silent confines of the room.

"No..." he said. A simple word, too simple really but it was the only one that would come out coherently.

Sara stared at him some more as though weighing things in her mind and then stood up, opened her locker door and took out her coat.

She was moving, Grissom realized, moving to leave. He found his footing and moved to pass her when she stepped back and collided with her arm in his chest. They both grunted in surprise and then apologized at the same time.

Sara stepped forward to let Grissom pass and as he did he placed a hand on her lower back, more as an unconscious way to keep her there but also as a furtive means of touching her, maybe one last time. He felt her body stiffen and a momentary pang of grief as he thought that indeed the end was fast approaching.

He continued to move past her, his hand sliding along the material on her back until he'd reached his locker and was too far away to continue touching her.

Sara stood with her body practically inside her locker and wasn't moving, her hand held her coat in mid air, her other one resting on the shelf where her purse was.

"I'm sorry Sara," Grissom said. It just seemed like the right thing to say although he had no idea for what he might be sorry. For touching her? For refusing her? For lying to her? For leaving her in Frisco? For asking her to come Vegas?

He sighed and dropped his head as he opened his own locker door, her silence sweeping over him like a blanket of bilious fog.

A sudden raucous slamming of a metal locker door jarred him back and he stared wide eyed at Sara who stood glaring at him, her hand planted firmly against the closed door. "For what?" she asked, her voice very much like the cold steel against her hand.

He stared at her, his mind struggling to find some rational reason why he should have uttered those words from nowhere.

Sara's face softened at his own silence and he struggled to understand the dynamics of this tentative conversation. It seemed to have come out of the blue and was quickly sinking into the realms of failed attempts.

And then she smiled, but it wasn't a nice smile, it wasn't a typical Sara smile. Although this one reached her eyes, they only accentuated what he felt from the movement: great sadness. "It's okay Grissom. You've said enough. I know." Her coat slung over her arm and her purse on her shoulder, she turned and left the room, leaving Grissom alone in the semi-darkness.

~*~

Sara climbed into her Denali, closed the door and welcomed the uninterrupted silence and solitude. The sun had been up for a couple of hours but people were still in their homes preparing for their workday. The roads were relatively bare and she got home with no waiting.

She greeted the seclusion of her home like a comforting blanket, its dark colours and sparse furnishings only accentuating her own dismal outlook on life. With her coat hung up and her keys, pager and cell phone on the entranceway table, she headed for the bathroom. It had become her custom to drown her sorrows in a hot scented bath and this morning was no exception. She ran the water until steam floated up to fog the mirror and then poured in some bubble bath. Nothing like hiding the body, washing it clean and getting rid of the emotional pain at the same time.

She sank into the bath feeling the water scald her skin. Only when she had stopped moving and had settled into a comfortable spot did her skin stop stinging. She allowed the heat to turn her muscles to jelly for a while before moving to the washing part.

And then she lay there, eyes closed, her body slowly sinking into the sudsy water, allowing it to cover her face and entire body. She kept herself under until her lungs demanded air and only then did she come up.

It was a while before she got out. The water had become tepid and no longer offered solace. With a towel wrapped around her damp body Sara disappeared into her bedroom and slipped into a silk bathrobe. Padding to her kitchen she downed some orange juice from the jug; no one else drank from it, why not, she thought.

She turned on the police scanner that had a permanent place on her coffee table and grabbed the latest forensic magazine. She listened as the disjointed voices came and went, as cruisers jabbered back and forth. Mixed in with the codes and information, Sara had learned to decipher their unique language and sometimes found it rather humorous. Numbers had been made up for things such as 'coffee/donut break', 'bathroom break', 'boring day' and other such mundane events.

Her eyes were just beginning to close when a sound roused her. She was instantly awake and alert, her eyes searching around her for the source of the noise. She was just about to relax again when the sound came again.

A soft knocking on her door. Nothing insistent, just an inquiring knock.

On her way to the door she checked her calendar in case she was expecting a delivery. None. The day was clear. Tightening the sash on her bathrobe she peered through the peephole and almost tripped backward.

Grissom was standing on the other side of her door, looking very much as nervous as a young lad on a first date.

Sara considered ignoring him, pretending to be asleep or simply not home. But her curiosity won over and she found herself leaning against her open door, staring at a pair of rich blue eyes.

"Grissom," she said by way of hello.

Grissom took a deep breath and swallowed. "Sara," he said, his voice sounding somewhat strained.

"What can I do for you?"

Grissom stared at her, eyes wide as they roamed over her, her doorway, down the hall, at his feet and then back again, all the while his mouth working feverishly to get some words out. "Uh, nothing really..." he started to say.

Sara cocked her head. "Then... why are you here?"

"I, uh... wanted to talk to you."

Sara's heart gave a tiny lurch. His entire demeanour was causing havoc with her senses and it almost seemed like a surreal dream. The thought that maybe she had fallen asleep occurred to her. "You did...?"

"Yes. I did." That part came out with a little more vigor than before.

Sara allowed her eyes to wander over Grissom's body, taking in his wrinkled clothes from their previous shift, his shifting stance, the flexing of his hands and his inability to really meet her eyes. She took a deep breath herself to calm her beating heart and stepped aside. "Alright. But only because you've peaked my curiosity."

Grissom offered a small smile as he walked past her and into her living room.

With arms crossed over her chest, she gazed at him, waiting for him to speak. He on the other hand, could only stare at her.

"Well? Are you gonna talk?"

Grissom swallowed audibly. "Are you-uh, are you gonna stay in that?"

Sara shook her head. "What?" And then she looked down: her robe wasn't exactly something she wanted to be wearing with Grissom around.

"Oh yeah, this. I guess I'd better put on something more concealing."

Grissom dropped his eyes. "Maybe..."

Sara came out with grey track pants and a white t-shirt. Her damp hair hung limp and curling by her shoulders. Grissom still stared at her.

"Is this better?" she asked him.

"Better," he nodded.

"Good. Now, what did you want to tell me?" She didn't sit but stood a few feet away from him.

Once again, Grissom took a deep breath and looked at Sara. He didn't like what he saw. Where her normally glowing eyes used to be, forever looking for answers and even more puzzles to solve, there were now dull brown eyes with growing circles beneath them. He hadn't noticed them before but now, in this light, they stood out prominently, pulling on her skin as though it were too tired to stay up. And where her mouth was usually pulled up at least in a tight-lipped grin there was a pulling, but this one seemed to be giving in to gravity, pulling the sides down in a fixed frown. Where she had once stood tall and proud, ready to tackle the world, there stood a woman slowly being crushed beneath some invisible weight, compressing her shoulders as she hunched over more and more. Gone was the Sara that had ignited his passion with her endless questioning, during and even after the series of seminars, picking his brain until it hurt to even think. Gone was the Sara that had haunted his daydreams and populated his fantasies with her ever-ebullient self. Gone was the Sara who'd made his heart skip beats by just hearing her voice behind him, gone was the Sara who caused myriad flutterings in his stomach by standing a little too close to him, gone was the Sara who blinded him with her smile that seemed to light up an entire room, her voice that could draw him from deep thoughts and send his mind on endless forays of finally succumbing to the urges that at times almost drove him mad with desire.

"Sara... you seem different," he said and it sounded so shallow.

Sara stared at him a moment. "What are you talking about, Grissom?"

He looked away. "I... don't know, really. I just..." he looked up at her and the sorrow that gripped his soul shook him to his very foundations. There were no poets from whom he could quote that could accurately detail what he wanted to say. His feelings could not so easily be transferred to language. All he knew was that his Sara seemed to be fading before his very eyes and in her place stood a stranger, a person who walked the halls of CSI labs like a shadow of a person.

Sara was staring at him, her eyebrows firmly knitted together on her brow, her arms crossed over her chest, leaning on one hip. For just a moment, a fraction of one, he thought he glimpsed her former self, that person whose sense of curiosity never let her rest. And then it was gone and the dullness had returned.

There were no words, but there were actions. There were things he could do to hopefully get his point across. So he walked over to where she stood and placed a hand on her face. Just a touch, a caress if he wanted to be totally honest with himself. It had the sort of effect he was hoping for: she reacted.

Her eyes got big and round and her body straightened and tensed, as though ready for action at any moment. She jerked her head away from his hand and took a step back. "What are you doing?" she demanded of him.

Grissom stood his ground, he didn't pursue her. Not yet. "Why do you jump when I touch you?"

Sara's head began to shake from side to side, and her skin to flush, but Grissom knew better than to assume it was a reaction to him touching her. No, this was a reaction born out of heated frustration on her part. "Why would you want to?" Her voice did nothing to conceal her absolute confusion at his sudden emotive actions.

A twinkling insight, an epiphany one might say, flashed before his eyes. At one time he'd felt as though he were drowning, sinking under the weight of his misgivings and worries. All that left him the day he woke up and realized without a doubt that things would not be as he'd feared. So, in celebration of that victory over genetics, he'd grown a beard and allowed that young and still vibrant part of himself out of the cage that he'd built around himself. His humour had returned, his cocky attitude toward people whose insistence on their own stupidity caused him to forget his politics and the first words in his mind were the first words on his lips. For once in a long time, he actually felt alive and hopeful. And when he'd finally come out of his shell, it was only to find Sara so deeply ensconced in her own, it terrified him.

He remembered how her smile and her timid subtle touches would charge him up with that burning sensation and he'd yearned to hold on to it for as long as he could. He wanted his Sara back; he wanted another chance with her. So, with these thoughts in mind, he took another step forward and touched her arm, allowing his hand to glide down to her elbow before finally dropping off.

And once again, her body tensed and she jerked her body away from him. "What is wrong with you, Grissom?"

"There's nothing wrong with me, Sara. Not anymore."

"What do you mean, not anymore? Was there something wrong with you?" Her leaning forward as she spoke signaled at least a momentary return of her curiosity and he took it as a good sign.

"Yes. There was," he said, no longer afraid of it. "I was going deaf, Sara."

She pulled back, more to get a better look at him after his words lodged themselves in her brain for further dissemination. "What do you mean, you were going deaf?"

"A genetic disorder I inherited from my mother. It's called otosclerosis. I had surgery for it a few months back and it worked." He closed his eyes as he remembered the time. "I was afraid. Afraid it wouldn't work and I'd... I'd have to quit."

Sara said nothing, only stared at him as he spoke, her face betraying nothing but mild curiosity and a hint of disbelief. "You were going deaf..." she said, trying to get the words to stick with some sort of tangible meaning. And then it hit her and her mouth dropped open, her arms fell to her sides. "You were going deaf. All those times... when you didn't answer me... you couldn't hear me!"

Grissom took a deep breath as he took in her anger and hurt. "Yes. I'm sorry. I should have told you. I should have done something about it long before I did."

With a loud huff of breath, Sara spun on her heels and stalked off deeper into her living room, only to spin around again, her mouth open, about to speak and then she shut it, and just stared at him, her eyes accusing. "How could you? Damn you, Grissom, how could you?! How could you come here like this, tell me these things and... what did you expect from me? That I would just forget about everything and forgive you?!"

Her anger was more than he'd thought and he took an unconscious step back. "Uh, yeah. I guess so..."

"My god... you are something, you know that? You are really something, Mr. Grissom. You shut me out for over a year, hiding this... this... thing from me, hurting me like you have no idea and now you just expect me to forget about it all?! I can't. I just can't. I can't do that Grissom. You really hurt me, you know that?"

"I know," he said. Her anger came from her pain. The pain fueled her anger and there was nothing he could about it. He'd caused this pain in her.

"No, I don't think you know. I don't think you have the slightest idea just how much you really hurt me. God! I asked you out to dinner! That's how much you hurt me!" And then, as quickly as the anger had come, it was gone. "You have no idea..."

Grissom took a quick step forward and held out a hand. "Then tell me. Tell me Sara. I want to know."

Sara shook her head. "No you don't. You're just saying that. Grissom isn't one to talk about feelings. No one's feelings for that matter. Suffice it to say, Grissom, that I was hurt. But I'll get over it. I always do. I'm strong, you know."

"I know you're strong. That's what I've always liked about you." The words came out soft, before he had a chance to filter them through his intellect. But there wasn't really a want to do that. Not anymore.

Sara huffed again and shook her head. "And it's things like that, that hurt me Grissom. When you start talking like that. And then you change the subject and go off, leaving me to wonder just what exactly you meant by it."

"I know. Sometimes it just came out. I tried to hide it, I tried to make it go away. I didn't want to..." hurt you... ruin your career... lose you because you didn't feel the same way... scare you away... invite you in... lose myself in you... All those thoughts came at him like mad bats in his mind, but none of them made it to his lips.

"You didn't want to what, Grissom. You didn't want to be with me? Fine. Then say it. Don't mess around with my heart. That's just cruel."

"I wasn't messing around with your heart, Sara. All those things I meant, I really did. It's just... I wasn't ready."

"You weren't ready. Grissom, why are you here?"

"What?" Her last question caught him off guard.

"Why are you here, in my apartment? If you don't like me like that, why are you here?"

"I do like you, Sara. I like you a lot. Probably more than I should."

"Explain. I'm not letting you change subjects this time."

"I'm not going to change subjects Sara. Not anymore." Grissom sighed and ran his hand over his face. This was getting harder than he'd anticipated. Really, he hadn't anticipated much, there hadn't been much thought behind his coming to her place. All he knew was that something needed to be done before it was too late.

He moved to sit on her couch, his legs suddenly feeling too weak to carry him, not with the added weight of the conversation entering into the equation. So he sat.

And she sat with him, though on the far end of the couch. There was still so much distance between them, so much that he had to cross to get her to understand.

"Remember when we first met?" he asked her, looking directly in her eyes. They misted over at her recollection. "You were so inquisitive, asking question after question and never settling for anything less than the absolute truth. It was refreshing to say the least to finally have that kind of student, the kind that really wants to learn. You followed me around all over the place, never shutting up, always talking, always asking, always thinking. I liked it. It felt good, you know? Having that kind of attention, and from someone so beautiful as you." Sara squinted her disbelief. "I know, you don't have to say it. But it's true Sara, you are so beautiful." His hand lifted to touch her, but the look on her face stopped him. It was too soon.

"I don't know when it happened, when those feelings changed. It was so subtle. When I left for Vegas, I saw that look in your eyes, though you tried to hide it well. I didn't want to go. You didn't want me to go. But I had to. So I vowed that I wouldn't do anything again to see that look in your eyes.

"But you were the only person I knew who could handle the Holly Gribbs case with objectivity, who wouldn't get sucked in by the feelings around it. You'd use them to fuel yourself into finding the answer. And I knew when I saw you that I was doomed. And I couldn't let you go again, so I offered you a job and you accepted. And it wasn't long before I realized my mistake. That having you around every shift night after night was only going to make things worse for me.

"And then my hearing started to go out. At first it was barely noticeable, I though maybe I had water in my ears or something. But when it started happening sooner and there was no rain well... I had it checked out. And then I panicked and I tried to forget about it. I tried to push it away. If I didn't want to deal with something, I pushed it away."

"So you pushed me away too."

"Yes. I pushed you way. I didn't do anything until I had no choice. It was either deal with it or lose my job. I couldn't lose my job. So I had the surgery. And it worked. I won't go deaf for a long while yet." He smiled to try to soften the blow of that last sentence. It was an inevitable fact but at least he'd bought himself more time.

"And now?"

"And now I can hear and... I'm not afraid anymore, Sara. I can't be or I'll die before I'm dead." He scooted over on the couch closer to her and looked her straight in the eye. "I'm not afraid Sara. And I think I know what to do now." He ducked his head. "I mean, I always knew what to do it was just... there were so many variables that it just seemed easier to try and forget. But I know what to do and I want to do it. Now."

"Now?"

"Yes. Now."

Sara blinked and waited.

"I want to have dinner with you, Sara. I want to see what might happen. I want to know. I don't want to hide anymore. I can't stand seeing you so unhappy and knowing that it's my fault." He took her hand in his. "Will you please consider having dinner with me, Sara?"

Sara only stared at him, her wide eyes never leaving his. They searched his face wide and far, looking for anything that might speak otherwise. Grissom did his best to keep his face open and honest, his eyes pleading with hers to see the truth in them and in his words.

"Grissom..." she said on a breath.

"Please Sara. I promise, no more hiding. No more pushing away. I'm done with that."

Still she held her silence. It was enough to try even the most ardent man's patience, but Grissom knew where her silence was coming from. Her pain held her back, held her in check in case it might be just another slip of the tongue on his part. He knew it wasn't but he also knew that she needed time to realize it. So he sat and he waited, holding her hand in his and gently rubbing the skin with his thumbs. His need to touch her and feel her was too strong to resist and he was giving in to urges that he'd tried to quell for so long; touching only her hand was bordering on torture for him.

Sara swallowed around the lump that had been steadily growing in her throat ever since he walked through her door and when he started to speak, to say all those things she'd only dreamed of hearing him say, the lump just grew bigger and harder. And now it sat in her throat, blocking out most words but his name it seemed. That would probably always roll off her tongue with ease. It did so in her mind every time she tried to sleep.

If he could open up so wide as he'd done tonight and still be sitting there, holding her hand and staring at her hard, then perhaps the worst was over and he'd actually pulled his head out of the microscope and was indeed quite serious.

She'd vowed to keep a tighter rein on her emotions since he'd refused her but that rein was finding tough ground for its continued use and she let it go finally to float away. She took a deep breath, a cleansing breath it seemed and met his stare... and allowed herself to finally get lost in his eyes of pure crystalline blueness.

"Yes."

He blinked.

"Yes Grissom. I'll still have dinner with you."

"So I'm not too late?"

Sara smiled, a small one but it was there all the same and it made Grissom's heart sing for joy. "No, you're not too late. I don't think you could ever really be too late."

In a sudden urge so strong he couldn't resist it any longer, he lunged forward and wrapped his arms tight around Sara's body, pulling her to him in such a fierce embrace she thought she might actually break a rib. He buried his head in her neck as she wrapped her arms around his body, reveling in the fact that this was Grissom's body in her arms and Grissom's face nuzzling her neck and Grissom's lips now kissing her neck over and over again.

"Thank you, thank you," she heard him say against her skin before he finally pulled back and stared into her eyes, his own so open and raw it choked her up again.

And then she knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, what would happen next. Indeed something that was supposed to happen next.

He kissed her.

A kiss that was both gentle and tentative as well as strong and sure. Something that he wanted to do but something that he wasn't quite sure he ought to do.

The feel of his lips on hers, pressing against hers sent a million tiny shock waves to disrupt whatever thoughts might have formed in her mind and she pulled him to her and responded to his kiss, deepening it to where she wanted it to go. There was no way that Sara was going to allow this kiss to remain in the realm of the chaste. She opened her mouth and drew her tongue along his, prodding his mouth open. With a groan deep in his throat, Grissom gave in and welcomed her, their tongues meeting and mating and dancing for the first time.

Time and space seemed to take a distant back burner for what seemed an eternity before they finally pulled apart, their breaths rapid and raspy.

Grissom drew a steadying breath and opened his eyes. Her swollen lips lay parted mere inches from his and he couldn't help himself and leaned in for more of the same, though not as long this time. Like an experiment, it needed many repetitions in order to satisfy the mind that there were no flukes involved and that everything that he was feeling was true and honest.

There truly is nothing more beautiful in the world than to watch the one you love come back to life in your hands and begin to live all over again, sharing everything with each other.

~*~

…the end…

Copyright © 2003 Anansay