Disclaimer: I do not own CSI or the song Little Talks by Of Monsters & Men.

A/N: So I'm really excited to post this. It's a different kind of post Forget Me Not story, at least I hope it is. I started it awhile ago but only just revised it enough for me to feel like it could be posted to you guys. I really hope you like it. I'm working on another story related to CSI's 300th episode (and if you guys don't already know the most exciting thing about that episode you should go look it up but I'm not gonna say it because I don't want to spoil it for you) but I have no idea when it will be finished. Enjoy!

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There's an old voice in my head that's holding me back

Well tell her that I miss our little talks

Soon it will all be over, and buried with our past

-Little Talks- Of Monsters & Men

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"Sara, you deserve someone that can put you ahead of everything else, always, and even though I love you, you know I've never been able to do that. You need someone else that can."

"I don't want someone else. I want you… We can fix this, if we just try harder to make time to be together. I can fly to you more-"

"No, honey, we can't. We've been like this for too long. We've both changed but I'm not ready to come back to Vegas and I couldn't ask you to give up what you have there. This is what's best for you."

"How can you decide what's best for me when we haven't been together in months?"

"That's exactly why we need to do this. You were miserable the last time you came to visit."

"I'd rather be miserable with you than without you."

"That's just it, either way you're without me."

Ten years later...

The doorbell rang, echoing through the house and, still laughing over her daughter's antics, Sara opened the front door, her heart dropping to the floor as she met the familiar blue eyes of the man standing in front of her.

Leaning against the door for support, she found it to be a struggle for words, "How did you find me?" Her tone barely hid the fact that she wanted to throw her arms around him and crush his body to hers. She hadn't expected the rush of emotions upon seeing him again.

"I talked to Nick" was the only explanation he offered.

Her eyes fell over him, taking in his haggard appearance. He was in his mid-sixties now and aging had not been overly kind to him. His grey hair was now white and he looked worn down, even his voice sounded tired. In truth, he felt worn down, and definitely everyone one of his sixty-six years. After their separation and subsequent divorce, he had continued to travel, afraid to settle down because he knew if he did he wouldn't be able to bear life without Sara.

"Can I come in?" he asked.

After he broke her heart she didn't owe him anything, especially now, when her life was finally back on track, even if it was with the wrong man. This wasn't fair, but since when had anything in her life ever been fair. She moved to the side, letting him in.

From the outside, the old house appeared small but it was decorated appropriately to dissuade that original thought. Located in one of the many suburbs of Vegas, it was far enough to avoid the tourists and casinos but close enough that her commute to the lab didn't take hours out of her day. Grissom had Googled Mapped it before heading to the address Nick had reluctantly given him.

For almost an hour, Grissom had sat at the curb in his rental car, trying to gather the courage to knock on the door. After thirteen years of an "on again off again" relationship, they were back to where they'd started. He recalled sitting in his car outside her apartment years ago, weighing in his mind whether or not he should knock on her door. Maybe it seemed stalker-like to some people, but he did not sit there in his car every day, just when he needed the reassurance of being near her, like after Adam Trent.

He doubted she wanted to see him, but now that they were in the same city there was no way he could leave without checking on her. He had denied his love for her for the past ten years and now his heart felt ready to burst upon seeing her again and rightfully so. She was just as beautiful as he remembered, though older, but it seemed like a certain light was missing from her eyes.

He followed her down a hallway that opened up to the living room. Imagine his shock when he recognized some of the furniture from their house. She had kept a bookshelf, the wall unit, and what had become "his" chair for watching baseball. There was no way she would tell him that, on bad days, especially after nightmares, she would come to the living room and curl up in his chair, imagining she was back at their house and Grissom was just running late from the lab, holding onto the fact that the chair still smelled of their old house. If she noticed his surprise at the familiar items he couldn't tell, after all he had not wanted the house or the furniture in the divorce agreement.

Wary of his presence, she sat down stiffly on the edge of the loveseat, trying her hardest to remain casual. He sat hesitantly on the couch opposite her, not sure exactly how to start. Over the phone, Nick had informed him of little, tossing in a warning of not to hurt her again because he would surely "ring his neck". Grissom knew that she was married and that she was no longer a full time CSI but instead now a consultant, though when the lab was short staffed she would offer a hand. He eyed the space around him, looking for any photos that might give away what she had been up to these past ten years, but there were none, a sharp contrast to all the picture frames he had recalled being spread around their home, the few times he had come to visit that is.

Sara couldn't stand the silence any longer. "Why are you here?"

After a moment's hesitation, "My mother died," his voice wavered. Well, that explained why he was back in Vegas, but not why he was here, in her house.

"I'm so sorry," she said softly, truly meaning her words. During their marriage Sara had made an effort to get to know Betty Grissom, more to please Gil than anything else.

For a few months after the case at the deaf school, they had shared breakfast together a handful of times a week when Sara got off work. But even though they had tried to get to know each other, Betty's opinion on their marriage always snuck its way into the conversation. Sara also got the feeling that for whatever reason Betty believed she wasn't good enough for her son. They had drifted apart quickly, their only similarity the fact that they both loved Grissom. And after their marriage fell apart, Sara didn't go looking for the 'I told you so' she was sure her mother-in-law wanted to sign with glee.

"That doesn't explain why you're here," Sara said, folding her hands in her lap to stop any nervous movements.

"I needed to see you, know that you're okay."

"It's been ten years Grissom," she said, exasperated, making it clear that she had not forgiven him for ending their marriage, despite the years that had passed. "It would've been nice if you had checked up on me then... Do you even know what I went through?" she asked, folding her arms across her chest, not expecting an answer.

"…Russell called me after Basderic and told me you weren't coping," he said softly.

"How was I supposed to cope? The man I had loved for over thirteen years, was married to for three, had just called to say we should separate, that it was what was best for us, for me specifically. And a short while later I'm accused of murder because I was with a man with the hopes of forgetting about you for a night, just one night. So I'm sorry if I couldn't get over you so quickly."

"Honey, that's not what I meant."

"Don't call me that," she bit out.

This was too painful, why was he doing this to her? It had taken years for her to recover. After Basderic, Sara had let the guys check up on her but it was smothering and easier to just pretend that she had moved on even when just the thought of doing so was so unbearable that it made her heart crumble in her chest.

A tear fell down her cheek and Grissom ached to reach out and wipe it away, to caress her cheek, to touch her. Just then a little girl came darting into the room, princess costume and all, her long brown hair flying behind her.

"Mommy!" she jumped into Sara's lap, settling with her head tucked under her mother's chin. Sara winced, the glitter on the dress scratching the sensitive skin of her neck. Just by looking at the young girl, there would've been no doubt in Grissom's mind that she was Sara's daughter. They shared the same chocolate eyes and brown hair, though Sara's was greyer than he remembered. All that was missing was a gap between her front teeth.

"Baby, go see what Daddy's doing. I'm in the middle of something," Sara said, easing the little girl back onto the floor.

"Why are you crying?" the little girl asked, touching her mother's cheek. Sniffling, Sara wiped at her eyes with a tissue she'd snatched from the side table.

"I'm okay. Go find Daddy," she said, urging the four year old girl out of the room. As she skipped to the hallway she looked back at her mother and, as if for the first time, noticed Grissom seated on the couch across from Sara. She looked him over before darting from the room, scrambling to find her father.

"She's beautiful," Grissom said, still looking down the hall where the little girl had scampered off to.

"I know." A few moments of silence passed between them as Sara contemplated her next words. "I know what you're thinking... I never lied to you when I said I didn't want kids. It was a few years after I met David that I found out I was pregnant, and up until the moment she was born I still didn't want kids... But then I held her in my arms and..." She trailed off, having revealed more to Grissom than she originally intended. Time couldn't stop her tendency to over talk around him, but he didn't deserve her explanation either.

"How long have you been with David?" Grissom asked, and Sara almost took pleasure in the way it appeared painful for him to ask about her husband. He wasn't oblivious to the ring adorning her left hand.

"Seven years, we got married before Juliette was born." Juliette, Grissom thought. Sara had always been fond of that name, because it sounded like the name of a princess but mainly because the Shakespeare reference reminded her of him.

"He's good to you? Both of you?" She liked to believe that Grissom's opinion didn't matter to her, but she was quick to reassure him that David wasn't a bad guy.

"Yes. He would never hurt me." Grissom felt like her statement was a dig at all the times he had hurt her, not physically of course, though his words had probably caused more damage than his hands ever could have. "Or Juliette," she continued.

"And you love him?" Grissom found himself choking out the words, but needing the reassurance that he had been right, that she'd been better off without him.

"I do, but never like I love you."

He didn't have time to contemplate her use of "love" instead of "loved" as what he assumed to be David's voice boomed, "Sara!" He entered the living room, carrying and tickling a squirming Juliette. Sara quickly wiped her eyes again, not wanting to give the impression that something was wrong. David was a tall man, well-built, the muscles in his arms clearly defined and not hidden by his short sleeved short. He was attractive, a year or two older than Sara, not fifteen.

"Who's this?" David asked, his usual manners absent after Juliette had informed him that some man had made Mommy cry. Sara had told David the bare minimum about Grissom and she intended to keep it that way.

"David, this is Gil Grissom," she said, her voice expertly void of emotion.

"The man that broke my wife's heart," David stated bluntly. Okay, maybe David knew her better than she thought. With that Grissom stood up, his knees creaking with the movement.

"I should go."

David, as if suddenly remembering his usually polite self, asked "Why don't you stay for dinner? You can tell me some stuff I don't know about Sara here," he said, wrapping his arm around her waist in a move that was meant to be possessive. And Grissom got the message loud and clear.

"Thank you but I can't. My flight leaves tonight," Grissom said, heading towards the door. Of course he would come speak with her right before he would run away on a plane to God only knows where. Some things never changed.

He turned to Sara in the entranceway. Now with some distance between the two of them and her husband and daughter, he said sincerely, "I'm really glad things worked out for you, Sara."

And then he was gone and the hole in her heart was ripped open again, larger than the last time, just when she'd thought she'd finally moved passed him. She twisted her wedding band around her finger as she watched him get into his rental car, wishing for the millionth time that it was the ring he had slid onto her finger so many years ago.

Fin.

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A/N: So I'm off to my freshman year of college on Monday! Review and wish me luck? :)