This story is also posted at fanfiction.net (see link). The youngest of our trio has begged to write and post her story. It is rated "M" because of the ending. We are posting the beginning here and the link, because some of it needs to be re-worked to post here! http://www.fanfiction.net/s/4887323/1/Chapter 1
A month?thirty days?to prepare for the rest of his life. Gil Grissom had made a decision. He had checked his calendar a dozen times in two days as he made calls, wrote emails, and met with the sheriff, Ecklie, a financial planner. Rain marked the beginning of the end if he had been marking a calendar. In reality, he knew the end of one phase and the beginning of another had occurred months ago. It still took thirty days?preparing a house for absent owners, finding a way to announce his decision, making travel plans, finding Hank a temporary home.
A few things had been easy. Finding Hank a home came down to a simple offer from a friend. Dismantling an office of years of accumulated possessions proved to be uncomplicated?he stacked most of it in boxes and put those in the house. Locating Sara had been easier than he thought; most people were romantics at heart and when he explained he wanted to surprise his fianc?, he was provided all the information he needed. His team?Catherine, Nick and Greg?seem to know he had made the decision to leave before he said the words. Catherine had made his announcement easy?she already knew, or at least she said she did; she just did not know details.
The most difficult task has been the push?over a blind precipice into dark drowning depression had been the most difficult forty-eight hours of his life. It would take passage of time before he could look back on those hours with a degree of understanding of the anger, frustration, and sense of isolation he experienced. Even when Warrick died, he had not been as alone as he had been in those hours.
When the message popped up that afternoon and he saw the sender?s name, he smiled. He knew she was angry as well as disappointed when he would not go with her, would not leave Las Vegas. He could not leave?everyone, everything depended on his work, physically being at work. It was out of his hands. There was no one to take his place. No one. No one until he got her video. In a very short time, he realized his life was no longer in Vegas.
It had been more than thirty days since they had spoken to each other. Sara had not given him an ultimatum; she had called saying she had volunteered for two expeditions?one at sea, another in a Costa Rican national park. She sent an itinerary by email and a week later, she was gone.
The video opened and he almost reached to touch the screen. She looked rested, calm, peaceful, beautiful. As he watched her face and heard her words, his heart broke?yes, he decided later, he knew the meaning of a broken heart. The heaviness, the hurting in his chest as he watched the video over and over; his phone rang and he ignored it as he replayed her message. He heard her happiness, saw her smile, watched as an expression of uncertainty crossed her face as she repeated his words back to him. He learned what a broken heart meant that day.
Grissom drove in the rain, hearing Sara?s voice inside his head. He could not concentrate. He could not hear. His mind jumped from case evidence to the words playing over and over?Sara?s words?happy, saying she was gone, not to worry about her, she had found an amazing life. Her voice trembled, her eyes moistened as she said her words, but at the end, she said he shouldn?t worry about her. She was good.
She was gone?away from him?further than she had ever been. Even when she left the lab that last night, he had traced her quickly, knowing where she would be. He had always had that connection with her, the ability to know where she was. Not now, she was somewhere in the Pacific telling him she was happy. He was driving in the rain hearing her voice.
?The door opened and he heard his name. He was soaked, miserable, unsure of his actions. He stumbled out his reason for coming?a case, a murder with sadistic wounds. Heather talked, and then she asked questions. She asked about Sara. He bristled, not comfortable when Sara entered the room. Not physically, returning in his mind with her voice when Heather said her name.
Heather asked, ?Where is Sara?? and in his face, she realized how desperate, how lost and bewildered his life was. Heather?s and Sara?s words become the same. He heard Heather saying ?most relationships are over before they officially end? and he wanted to object, but her words were Sara?s. Confusion whirled inside his head as he agreed to Heather?s offer of her guest room.
He slept for the first time in weeks, hours of dreamless sleep in a strange bed provided by Heather. She sat with him as he talked about Sara, and later, when he woke, she gave him tea and food. He knew he would leave Las Vegas. Heather knew he had made a decision. He would find his life, his love, his Sara?
