Author's Notes: Hi all! I know it's been ages (over a year, perhaps?) since I've last published anything. I've wanted to get back into writing so many times, but well, clearly I've made a million excuses not to! As it's summer break and I have a little free time, I've been re-watching seasons of CSI, starting with season 4, which is the only one I own. Butterflied has always been one of my favorites, as I'm sure it is for any die-hard GSR fan, and it inspired me to write again.

This tale follows the episode and finishes after it ends. I tried to keep it canon enough to be believable, but original enough to make it something other than a blatant plagiary of the writers' wonderful script. I did make use of quotes from the episode with the hope that the original writers wouldn't be offended. As we all know, I own nothing but the gigantic new house I just built, and am not affiliated in any way with CSI or CBS.

Please enjoy and please review!

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Grissom slowly and meticulously bent down to see the victim's face. He certainly wasn't expecting Sara's lifeless face to be looking at him with wide open, startlingly dead eyes. Grissom's heart seemed to stop for a moment. His breathing was suspended. His Sara. Wait, Sara was outside, waiting with Catherine and Warrick for his directions, right? Yes, that was right. Sara was outside. The facts, the facts, state the facts. Grissom admonished his brain, trying to force logic back into his emotionally overloaded brain. It wasn't easy. This wasn't Sara. No. Her name, according to Brass, was Debbie Marlin. Sara didn't have any aliases. This dead woman had a pointier chin than Sara. Yes. Sara's hair was more layered and a slightly different length than this Debbie's and prettier, much prettier. Also, Sara didn't live here. No, he knew where Sara lived, and it was definitely not here. Sara. Logic told him she was alive and well outside, but his racing heart needed to see her just to be sure.

As Grissom exited the front door of the house, his eyes sought and found Sara. She seemed to sense his pointed stare and turned toward him, returning his gaze with equal intensity, though perhaps with confusion as well. "Sara?" he nearly whispered.

"Yeah, what's up?" Sara queried in response. She cocked her head slightly as she wondered why Grissom was still staring at her as though Catherine, Warrick, and Brass weren't standing there, too.

Grissom walked toward Sara, and then stopped within twelve inches of her, never once taking his eyes off of her face. Never one to be slighted for attention, just as Grissom reached out to touch Sara's cheek, to confirm the true presence of her warm flesh out here on the dark driveway, Catherine piped up, "So, Gil, how long are we gonna stand here not actually earning our wages?"

Warrick and Brass looked relieved that Catherine had intervened; the scene that had been unfolding was a bit bizarre. Grissom dropped his hand, remembering where he was and who he was around, and tore his gaze from Sara. She was alive. He wasn't going to be getting any sensory confirmation of that fact other than what his eyes had shown him, and while that wasn't enough, it had to be for now. "Right. For now, no one enters this house except CSI. Warrick, you've got the car."

"Which one?"

"Both."

"Uh, take the Honda," Brass interrupted. "The BMV belongs to the victim's friend over there. She called it in." Why would Gil not have asked? He was always so thorough. Something in that house had him out of sorts.

Warrick sighed. "That's too bad. This'll be a day she'll never forget." He stole a glance at the miserable lady sitting on the bumper of the ambulance, then strode toward the Honda. As Warrick and Brass had exchanged words, Grissom was frantically trying to figure out what to do with Sara. Why didn't he give her the car? She couldn't see the body. She just couldn't. Who wants to see themself with a slit throat? Warrick had moved to the car, and Sara and Catherine were staring at him again. How he wished Catherine wasn't there; she knew. He knew she knew how he and Sara felt. He knew she didn't approve. He knew she'd know why he was acting so strangely the moment she laid eyes on the victim, but without taking Catherine inside, how was he going to keep Sara out?

"Sara, you take the perimeter."

"What? You just did a one hour walk-through; the perimeter can NOT be a priority."

True, but keeping you far, far away from Debbie Marlin is. "I need you to work the outside. Catherine and I will be inside." As Sara rolled her eyes and stalked away to begin her assigned task, Grissom realized he'd risk Sara's anger any day if it kept her from that dead body.

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Many hours and no useful evidence findings later, Grissom sat alone in Debbie Marlin's house. He had sent Catherine back to the lab or home or, well, he didn't know where he'd sent her hours ago. It was probably hours, anyway. He didn't know. He hadn't been able to get Sara's lifeless face out of his mind's eye for long enough to care about little things like time and co-workers. He had wandered into the spare bedroom, where Debbie kept her butterfly collection- entomological specimens, little figurines, sketches, paper art, and jewelry. Sara liked butterflies. She had had several beautiful butterfly prints on one of the walls in her studio apartment in San Francisco all those years ago. Suddenly, Grissom looked up, and saw his reflection in a mirror. His sleep-deprived mind showed him Debbie Marlin in that mirror. Debbie Marlin's face became Sara's, and once again, Grissom's breath hitched in his chest. No. Sara was alive. His phone rang.

"Grissom."

"Hey." She sounds so alive. I need to tell her I love her.

"Sara." Don't tell her over the phone. Don't do it. "Uh, listen, I'm in a bad area. I'll call you back."

"I got a skin tag off of the bathtub drain pipe."

"Skin tag, that's great. Uh, give it to Greg."

"Yeah, I did. Hey, do you want me to come over there and give you a hand?" Again, Sara wondered at the strange tone of Grissom's voice, as though he didn't even know what a skin tag was. She knew him. He did need help, although it didn't seem likely he'd accept it from her.

"No, I'm, I'm fine. I'll, I'll talk to you back at the lab." Click. Sara, I am so far from fine, and I would love nothing more than to hold your warm, live body in my arms right now, but I can't let you see this. I can't let you see these photos of you all over this house. I can't let you see me unraveling like this. I can't stutter at you any more. I have to find your killer.

Shaking his head and turning away from the mirror, Grissom inwardly chastised himself for not having found the evidence he needed to put Sara's killer behind bars. Wait, make that Debbie's killer. Either way, it was time to comb every inch of carpet in this house.

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Finally, the suspect, Dr. Lurie, was in interrogation. Catherine had told him Sara had seen Debbie's body, although she had only admitted to seeing its toes. How could anyone have let Sara see the victim's face, let her see herself stone cold dead on a slab in the morgue? Why would anyone do that to his Sara? Grissom was even more determined to get a confession out of Dr. Lurie for subjecting Sara to such a terrible sight. Unfortunately, Lurie was clever, thorough, and patient; he had not left enough evidence for a conviction. As Lurie and his lawyer stood to leave, Lurie leaving as a free man, Grissom's heart leapt to his throat; Lurie could really get Sara. Images of Sara with her throat slashed flashed through his mind for what felt like the millionth time since the moment he first laid eyes on Debbie Marlin, and without regard to the fact that Brass was three feet from him, he called out, "It's sad, isn't it, Doc?"

Dr. Lurie stopped. He faced Grissom, the man who was trying and failing to get him to confess to murdering Debbie and Michael Clark. Grissom continued in a slow monologue, "Guys like us. A couple of middle-aged men who've allowed their work to consume their lives. The only time we ever touch other people is when we're wearing our latex gloves. We wake up one day and realize that for fifty years, we haven't really lived at all. But then all of a sudden, we get a second chance. Somebody young and beautiful shows up, somebody that we could really care about. She offers us a new life with her. But we have a big decision to make, right? Because we have to risk everything we've worked for in order to have her. I couldn't do it. But you did."

Lurie looked startled. How did this man know him so well? Grissom finished his statement with, "You risked it all, and she showed you a wonderful life, didn't she? But then she took it away and gave it to someone else, and you were lost. So you took her life. You killed them both, and now you have nothing."

"I'm still here," was Lurie's simple response.

"Are you?" Grissom knew not know those words would haunt Dr. Lurie for the rest of his life. All he knew was how his decision to keep Sara at arm's length was killing him slowly. Sure, technically, he still had it all- his work and his team, including Sara, but truthfully, he had lost Sara and therefore, had lost a large part of his heart. He wasn't really still here.

Sara stood transfixed on the other side of the two way glass. He did love her. Why confess it to a murderer instead of to her? She watched Grissom as he sighed and remained seated for several minutes after Lurie, his lawyer, and Brass had all quit the room. She watched him run his hands through his hair, look up at the ceiling as though looking for answers, sigh again, and sit in unmoving silence. All at once, she understood; she had seen Debbie's face, after all. With resolve, Sara walked to the interrogation room door, quietly walked in, and closed it behind her.

Grissom looked up when the door clicked shut. Sara. Had she been watching him? He looked at her silently, even fearfully. She must hate him for confessing his love for her and his unwillingness to act on it, especially to a killer. Sara. I'm sorry. I never meant to hurt you.

Eventually, the silence became oppressive. Sara shut the blinds on the windows in the room. She still had not uttered a word. She just stared at him. Her expression changed from pitying to loving to angry to gentleness to ferocity to shame over and over. Grissom couldn't understand why, and could still not come up with one word to say. What did she want to hear? How could he make this, any of this, right? Unable to bear her silence for even one more second, Grissom quietly choked out, "Sara?"

The word sounded so similar to when he had uttered it in Debbie Marlin's driveway but days ago that Sara's eyes softened immediately. He needed her. She closed the gap between them and grabbed his hands. "Yes, Griss, it's me. I'm here. I'm alive… and I love you."

Still nearly speechless, but never more desperate to touch her, Grissom sighed, "Sara," and pulled her to him. As she fell to his lap with her arms wrapped tightly around him and his hands gently probing her back and her hair, tears wet his eyes and he haltingly said, "Sara, I'm sorry. I thought it was you. He killed you and I felt dead inside, too. I knew I needed you. I let that guy walk away, Sara. I couldn't get him. I let you down. I lost you."

Sara had begun to cry. As several tears dropped onto Grissom's beard, she began to shake her head fervently. "No, Grissom, you have NOT lost me. I've always been here. I've always been waiting for you. I'm still alive and here and I'm in your arms and Griss, I never want to leave them."

"I love you, Sara," was whispered softly into her neck.

"I know, Gil. I love you, too. I always have."

"I know, Sara, I know, and I've been so unworthy and so afraid. Lurie made me realize I could lose you before I made you mine. I'm so sorry I've been so stupid, Sara, I'm so, so sorry. Forgive me?"

Sara bent down, murmured, "Always" at his lips, then closed the gap between theirs in a gentle kiss. She then kissed his forehead just as gently and laid her head back down on his. Grissom had never felt so alive. Sara was finally his and he was finally hers and there was nothing more right in the world.