| Chapter 9 |
| Any comments, suggestions or questions can be directed to the author. Thank you for taking the time to read and I hope you found something that you could enjoy. Disclaimer: I do not own anything in relation to C.S.I., Alliance Atlantic, CBS, William Petersen, Jorja Fox or any other characters contained herein... I just like playing with them now and then while stretching my writing muscles. And if you think there's any money to be gained by suing me, you're in for a horrible disappointment. |
| Check out All the Author's Works in Progress at FanFiction.net |
| I expected to hear back from Sara later that night, but her call never came. And each time I tried to call her, the cell phone was still shut off. By the second day, I finally gave up and left a message. I tried not to sound as desperate as I felt, and I spent most of my time apologizing for calling when she had not directly asked for me to call. Feeling like a complete fool, I spent the next two days doing everything I could to take my mind off of Sara. Not that any of it helped. When I was cleaning out the fish tank, I noticed that the guppy habitat was filled with babies once again, and I was reminded of the way Sara always delighted in the sight of the tiny fish swimming around in their seclusion. I also remembered how sad she would get when I had to turn them loose in the frog terrarium as the food source they truly were. She would always make me wait until she had left for work before I was allowed to perform the transfer. For all of her toughness, she most definitely is the single most tender-hearted person I have ever had the pleasure of knowing. As I refilled the bird feeder out back, I recalled the moment she first noticed the finches dancing in the air through our backyard. How she practically beamed with joy to see their swoops and falls, and how she insisted we investigate the proper foods with which to fill the feeder she had personally selected. Sara loved to sit in a chair out back, Hank lying at her feet, pretending to read a book as she closed her eyes to better hear their delicate songs. I often found myself staring at her from the window, relishing in the sight of her absolute enjoyment of the tiny songbirds. Perhaps the most revealing moment was when I was cleaning out the refrigerator in my office. I could count on one hand the number of times it had been cleaned before Sara moved in with me, but it became a weekly chore following her arrival. Not because she demanded it, or that she even asked me to perform this task. No, it was because she stopped coming into the office to find me after a few weeks. When I asked her to come in there to keep me company one evening she turned up her nose, and said that she was busy reading. It took some doing, but I was finally able to dislodge the reason for her absence in the office; the smells from the fridge made her nauseous. I began the weekly chore of cleaning out the fridge from that moment forward. And even now, with her gone, I have to admit that the odor really does get bad if I let it go for more than a week. Strange how I never noticed before, but now, it starts to bother me if I forget to perform my weekly duty. Once all of my chores were done I rewarded myself, and Hank, by taking a quick drive down to the ice cream parlour. It had become something of a tradition in the house that once the weekly chores were complete we would go out for ice cream. It seemed a shame to punish Hank simply because the ice cream fanatic was currently missing from our lives. Besides, I had to do something about the amount of weight I had been losing lately, and ice cream seemed like just the right thing. Hank knew the moment we got into the car where were going, and I was suddenly irritated with myself for forgetting his drool towel. We hadn’t taken many trips in the car lately, and I’ve gotten out of practice in regards to transporting a full sized, overly excited Boxer. The place we went to catered to people and their dogs, so it was perfectly acceptable for Hank to accompany me into the shop. And of course they also carried a little snow cone inside of a peanut butter dog treat cone. Hank could barely contain himself until we got outside to eat his, and it was one of the rare times that his obedience training would fail. After I got him to sit nicely again, I handed him the treat and sat down at the table outside to enjoy my own cone. The sun was shining, and it was a pleasant January day in Las Vegas. By the time we got back to the house, both of our moods had improved considerably, and we paused to play a little tug of war in the front yard. From time to time he would wrestle the rope out of my hand and take several steps away before he remembered who was playing with him. Sara always chased him when he would win, and Hank delighted in being able to dodge and weave out of her grasp. It was their special game, because the very moment Sara would plop down onto the grass, he would sneak up to her and ceremoniously drop the rope into her lap to serve as his reward for her attention. That was my happy moment, watching the two of them wrestling in the grass over a piece of knotted rope, only to end up sitting face to face with big smiles on their faces as they prepared for the next round. However, my reverie was disturbed when Hank suddenly bolted away from me on a head long course for the street. On pure instinct I shouted the proper command of, “Hank, Heel!” His training instantly kicked in and Hank froze in place just before he dropped his backside to the ground and desperately waited for me to release him from the command. As I walked up to him, I found the source of his sudden attempt at escape; the Fedex guy was walking up the path. He handed me the package and his digital clipboard the moment we met at the sidewalk. As I signed for the package, he bent down and asked if it was safe to pet Hank. I nodded that it was indeed safe, and the man reached out to scratch behind the dog’s ears. For some reason, I’ve begun to believe that Hank can telepathically transmit to all newcomers that his ears are in dire need of scratching, as it seems to be the first thing anyone who meets him wants to do. We waved the Fedex guy off on his way and took our package into the house. As we reached the entry table, I grabbed for the reading glasses I had left there and put them on so that I could find what piece of garbage I had ordered this time. If it wasn’t for the need to have it for work, I would have disconnected the internet at the house in an attempt to curb my insomnia induced shopping fits. The shipping label came into view and I was struck dumb; it was from Sara, in Chicago. |
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| FEDEXOVERNIGHTFEDEXOVERNIGHTFEDEXOVERNIGHTFEDEXOVERNIGHTFEDEXOVERNIGHTFEDEXOVERNIGHT |
| FROM: Sara Sidle S. Sidle 2245 Port Chester Avenue Chicago, IL 60614 TO: Gil & Hank G. Grissom 4657 Western Ave #15 Las Vegas, NV 89110 |
| FEDEXOVERNIGHTFEDEXOVERNIGHTFEDEXOVERNIGHTFEDEXOVERNIGHTFEDEXOVERNIGHTFEDEXOVERNIGHT |
| A sharp pain filled my chest as I read the label. Was it possible that Sara had decided to stay in Chicago, of all places? It was the first thing she had sent to me that contained a return address on it, and the fear gripped my heart so tightly that I was momentarily unable to open the package. The box was unbelievably heavy, and I was without a single idea as to what could be inside. Wanting a little more time to gather my composure, I set the box down on the kitchen island and got some water for Hank, as well as myself. Never once did my eyes leave the package for more than a split second. It sat there on the counter mocking me; mocking me with my own fears and doubts. However, something in the box seemed to have gotten Hank’s attention, because he stood up on the counter and sniffed at it quite enthusiastically. I didn’t even bother admonishing him, because my focus was on the possible contents, so I just shooed him off the counter and prepared myself to open the carton. Blowing out a last calming breath, I reached for the pull tab on the side of the box and ripped the package open. I don’t know if I was expecting a bomb, but I stared at it for a few moments before I attempted to touch it again. When I did, I tipped it up on its side and all of sudden a large mass came sliding out. It was a bag of what looked to be smashed electronics, bearing the seal of a certain Italian police authority. After the initial shock, I picked up the box again to discover that there was more inside. Two more boxes rested in the other end of the package, and an envelope. Knowing that there was usually an explanation in anything Sara sent, I went for the envelope first. |
| I took the hard drive out of the debris bag and set it down beside the larger box. Then I took the smaller box and removed the presents for Hank. The moment he sniffed the chew toy, he started prancing in place until I gave it to him. After that, he was off to the living room to begin his work. None of Hank’s chew toys ever stayed intact. It was his personal mission to reduce them all to a paltry, rubberized version of their former selves in the quickest amount of time possible. The Greenie went into the bin with the rest of them. The larger box remained unopened as I took it and the other contents into my office. I put the debris bag with the insurance papers, so I could bring it up to the agent the next day, and find out what could be done about it. As I sat down at my desk, I tried to prepare myself for opening this newest gift. Sara would have no way of knowing until I told her, but these notes, messages, post cards, letters and gifts were the things by which I measured not only her progress, but also mine. As I received each item, I found myself at first dreading, and then anticipating her words. Even when they were brief, I studied each one carefully, seeking out their hidden meanings, trying to solve the puzzle that was her journey. While I understood her need to come to terms with her past, I struggled to understand why she needed to do it alone. She has spent the last eight years trying to tell me that it was pointless to go it alone when I didn’t have to, so then why now did she believe this had to be done alone? I knew she didn’t want to leave me behind, and these correspondences have reminded me that even though we are separated by physical distances, we are still very much in each other’s thoughts at all times. But it was still difficult for me grasp the truth of her assertions that she needed to do this on her own. Doesn’t she know that I am willing to walk through fire and floods to be with her? Doesn’t she understand that I would gladly lay down my life to provide her with even a moment’s peace? The answers were a little more than I was ready to handle, because I knew full well she couldn’t possibly know these things, as I have never told her so. It was quickly becoming apparent to me that this journey was not Sara’s alone. While my sabbatical taught me how much I needed her, it failed to teach me how to express that need to her. And with Sara’s journey, she was trying to learn who she was, but she was also teaching me that not only did I need her, but we truly needed each other. However, I was learning that time, distance and pain had little affect on the depth of our feelings for one another. If anything, these things only seemed to strengthen our devotion. There was one other lesson for us to take from this ordeal. We were both capable of living lives without the other, but they were not the lives of our choosing. Our independence had not been destroyed by our relationship, which had long been a fear for the both of us. No, instead of growing dependent upon the other, we retained our fiercely independent natures, and simply learned to integrate the other into our respective lives. We were independent forces, choosing to exist in an equal and symbiotic relationship with one another. We have avoided the pitfalls of our past examples, and overcome the handicaps of our upbringings. With that revelation, I was ready to open the last box. I lifted the lid away and reached in for the gift. Carefully sliding it out of the box, I found a 2007 Season Cubs Batting Practice ballcap. When I turned it over I found the haphazard scrawl of the team’s manager, Lou Piniella, on the underside of the brim. Just above his signature I was able to make out the words he had inscribed there. To Gil- One Lucky SOB Lou Piniella I smiled at the meaning behind those words, and said to no one in particular, “You have absolutely no idea, just how lucky I am.” |
