Epilogue: Chasing Rabbits

By the time Sara made it back to Desert Palms it was late, a lot later than she had originally intended, and well past the ward's posted visiting hours, but then marriage did have its privileges regardless of the actual time.

Still, she tiptoed into the darkened room, wishing to see, though not wake, her sleeping spouse. It was silly she knew, but after spending the day confined in an interrogation room with Hannah West, Sara wanted - needed - the comfort of her husband's snores.

Not that she would admit that to him. Ever.

She would just linger for a moment at his bedside, maybe reach out to smooth his hair, perhaps tug the covers up a little tighter; probably fail to resist leaning in to brush a kiss along his forehead before settling in to the chair beside the bed.

However careful or quiet, she apparently didn't prove careful or quiet enough, for her hushed ingress was greeted with the soft, warm sigh of "I don't even have to open my eyes. I'd know those footsteps anywhere."

Though Grissom did, as well as click on the over bed reading light.

"I was trying not to wake you," Sara rued.

"You didn't."

"Please tell me you weren't waiting up," she said.

"Just worked out that way," Grissom replied looking happy that it had. "You should have gone home, dear."

"I am home," was all Sara said by way of reply and leaned in to gently bestow the kiss she had playfully denied him earlier in front of the guys.

Despite his sore, chapped, frostnipped skin, the omnipresent whole body ache even the painkillers couldn't entirely banish away at least not without turning him into a drug-induced zombie, Grissom's subsequent grin reached all the way to his eyes.

"Soon enough for you?" she asked.

"No," Grissom replied, drawing her in to kiss her in return.

Unlike her whisper soft brief caress of a kiss, his proved long and lingering, the pure pleasure far outweighing any hint of pain.

Against her lips he murmured, "'Da mi basia mille, deinde centum, dein mille altera, dein secunda centum, deinde usque altera mille, deinde centum.'"

Sara laughed. "Translation, Gil?"

"'Give me a thousand kisses, then a hundred, then another thousand, then a second hundred, then yet another thousand, then a hundred...'"

While not a thousand or a hundred, Sara did give him another.

Still grinning, she asked, "Brushing up on your Italian out of boredom?"

For Sara knew it had to be hard for him, being trapped here in bed all day, the prospect made all the worse by his being unable to fully use his hands.

"Latin actually."

"Close."

"More apples than oranges," Grissom countered reasonably.

Sara had to work not to roll her eyes.

"Gaius Valerius Catullus," he continued in that ever knowing way of his Sara actually loved, though would never admit to being fond of. "First Century B.C. Roman neoteric poet. His work tended towards the very... intimate."

"I see."

She gave him a look that plainly said smart-ass.

"Is that a no?" he asked.

"About the kissing? No."

And utterly unable to resist him as ever, Sara kissed him again, though she was still shaking her head when she withdrew.

Grissom apparently ignored this. Instead, he indicated a napkin draped melamine bowl on the bedside table. "Speaking of which... I saved you something from dinner."

Sara didn't even bother to attempt to smother her sarcasm. "Hospital food, yum."

She was soon singing a different tune once she'd peeled the thin paper aside to reveal the quartered half of an orange.

"Gil," Sara sighed, recognizing the reason.

The pair had been rather partial to the fruit ever since that late Saturday afternoon in Costa Rica when they had come back from their first trip to la feria together and Grissom had with very little ceremony but much fondness produced a single orange from his pack. Upon deftly slicing the fruit in two before passing half of it to her, he'd murmured something in his not entirely fluid Spanish that Sara hadn't quite been able to catch, but which ultimately translated into her being the other half of his orange; the Tico version of his "other half," as he'd gladly informed her.

Back in the present he maintained, "You still are."

Sara smiled, then set about separating the peel from the flesh from first one then the other of the quarters. She passed a piece to him before biting into her own, smirking fondly as she did so at the man she knew she would never entirely figure out, but would luckily get the chance to continue to try.

Once they'd consumed their fruit in companionable silence, Sara, noting her husband had the bed and the room to himself said more statement than actual question, "I take it Hank's back at Robin's?"

Grissom nodded. "Sound asleep and snoring."

"Like you should be," Sara said. "I'm starting to think you want the doctors to throw me out."

While this possibility hadn't seemed to occur to him before, Gil Grissom seemed to seriously consider it now.

"Gilbert -"

Her admonishment however lost some of its power when Sara couldn't quite conceal her grin.

"I'd ask how you're feeling," she said, "but -"

"Never ask a dumb question?" he finished, gingerly easing himself over in the bed to make a space for her to sit beside him. Sara did, feeling the full weight of the day lifting merely in his presence.

It was then that Grissom's bedside table caught her eye, its contents having increased exponentially since that morning.

Sara reached out to finger a large origami crane perched upon a neat pile of books.

"I see Greg tackled the crossword."

Grissom only scowled at the defacement of his precious puzzle.

"It wasn't all that good anyway," Sara attempted to soothe albeit to no avail.

Opting for a change of subject, she appraised the enormous bouquet of sunflowers which most certainly had not been there when she had left.

"Very cheery," she said. "Who's the admirer?"

"Not mine," Grissom replied and Sara could swear there was just the twitch of a grin. "Yours. It's your name on the envelope."

Her brows furrowed as Sara reached for the card. It really was her name neatly printed on the outside.

"You?" she asked.

He shook his head.

No less puzzled, Sara flipped the simple white envelope over, hesitantly popped the flap and even more bemused reached in retrieve the message inside.

Scanning the brief text, she smiled.

Odd and yet so very Betty all at once.

"From your mother," she said and passed the note over for Grissom to review.

It was his turn to turn curious as he read:

Sara -

I'm glad. So very glad.

Betty

"Glad?" Grissom echoed. "About?"

Sara indicated her wedding ring. "Us."

"Ah... Me, too," he agreed.

So did she. "Yeah. Yeah."

"Although," Grissom began his face feigning disappointment, "I'm starting to think she likes you better than me, too."

Sara didn't even bother to dignify this with a response.

"We... uh... had a long talk. Mom and I," he was still saying.

Indicating his bandaged fingers, he said, "She did most of the talking."

"About?" It was Sara's turn to echo.

He replied, "You, of course," as if it were utterly obvious.

"And -" she prompted when he offered nothing more.

Grissom shrugged. "The usual. Us remarried or no, when it comes to you, I'm still a moron, a coward -"

"And a fool," Sara finished, having heard this refrain before.

Not that she hadn't occasionally - perhaps not entirely occasionally - agreed with her mother-in-law's assessment. However, she was about to attempt something conciliatory when he interrupted her intentions with an oddly pensive:

"And I don't deserve you."

"Gil -" Sara sighed.

"She's right, you know."

"Perhaps," she conceded, the hint of a tease in her tone. Her next words however proved far more tender: "Thankfully, we don't always get what we deserve.

"Sometimes we get better."

Recognizing his own words in this, spoken not all that long ago to her, Grissom smiled and nodded at the truth of it.

Sara patted his hand. "I love you," she said simply and meant it.

God, was it good to be home, she thought.

Even like this, with him still attached to IVs and equipment - with hospital beds not being the most comfortable to sit or even sleep upon - with them here and not curled up on the couch in her old apartment or even better cuddled close in their narrow bunk on Grissom's boat - it was still heaven, being together like this.

Her husband broke into her musings with a nonchalant: "Oh, and apparently I need to feed you better.

"As you're 'looking too thin.' Her words, not mine," he quickly amended even if he privately agreed with the sentiment.

Even back together again as they had been these past few months that Sara was as yet almost painfully thin beneath his fingers hadn't escaped his notice.

Sara for her part fought back a sigh, but couldn't contain the wry smirk. Betty was still Betty after all. Blunt as hell. But then Betty Grissom didn't do subtle. She never had. Heck, there were times when she made her not so infrequently clueless son look positively tactful by comparison. Still, there was nothing for it. Some things didn't change. Her mother-in-law certainly proved one of them.

"Yeah, I heard," Sara half-lamented, albeit in truth more indulgent than irritated.

Grissom motioned to a large bag propped against the side of the bedside cabinet. "She left something for us.

"But first, how did it go?" he asked.

Sara didn't have to inquire after what he meant. She knew he meant Hannah. And the overly long chat that had kept her from his side for the better part of the day.

"It's over. That's probably the best that can be said."

Understanding this, he nodded. "That good, huh?"

"There won't be a trial. Hannah copped to everything."

Good thing, too, as the priority of the preservation of life had made a muddle of any evidence there might have been in the anatomy lab freezer. Not that they didn't have plenty of other evidence. Only Sara didn't relish even the possibility of giving a good defense attorney any opportunity to get Hannah West off.

"Against her lawyer's protests, of course," continued Sara. "D.A. said she didn't even attempt to deal. Took the full penalty. Only wanted one thing."

"To see you."

This was definitely not a question.

"Yeah."

From that one tight word, Grissom could imagine the conversation.

Having once been on the other side of the glass during the interrogation of said young woman before, he knew all too well what mischief the girl was capable of inflicting. He seriously doubted Hannah went gentle. From his wife's pained expression, Hannah hadn't. But sensing, too, Sara wasn't really up to discussing it, at least not here and now, he respected that fact and didn't press.

"You're okay," Sara said after a while. "Well, as okay as you can be after all of this -"

"I'm fine," he insisted and despite the energy draining pain, the entire body ache and the perpetual feeling of coldness, he was - for the most part. His cuts and bruises would heal. His blisters settle back into skin. He would likely wear jackets even in warm weather, but then he usually did that anyway. He certainly wasn't about to let Hannah have him continually looking over his shoulder. He would, however, hold Sara tighter, keep her closer and never forget how brief - and therefore precious - this life really was.

Treasure that it was, he certainly had no intention of wasting a moment more than he had to of it thinking of Miss West.

"At least this way she can't hurt you - us - ever again. At least not for a very long while."

However something in Sara's stiffness troubled him. "You don't sound all that pleased," he observed concerned.

Sara shrugged. "In the end, it doesn't really matter, not to Hannah.

"Like I said, true, she can't hurt us, but Hannah's whole life's been a prison since Marlon died. It's only the view that will change."

To which Grissom somberly intoned, "'The mind is its own place, and in itself can make a Heaven of Hell, a Hell of Heaven.'"

"Shakespeare?" Sara asked.

"Milton. Paradise Lost."

"Figures."

Sara sat silent for a while. Grissom let her. Not all silences were hurtful. He simply sat there his hand covering hers, quiet.

Ultimately, she was the one who broke the silence. Although her words nearly rendered him speechless.

"I so easily could have been her," she finally said.

After all they weren't all that different: both smart, strong-willed women who while still young had to face down the loss of their families, and yet the two had taken two very different paths.

"Impossible," Grissom insisted.

Sara scoffed. "'Each of us have a heaven and hell within us.' I can quote, too, you know."

"Oscar Wilde?" he inquired, not entirely sure of the source of the quotation.

Sara nodded. "The Portrait of Dorian Gray.

"And, Gil, we both know that nothing is entirely impossible."

This from Grissom's experience was indeed generally true. Though not in this instance.

"No, Sara -"

"Besides," she interjected with a sad half smile, "we're married. You have to say that."

"No, I don't."

"You can't say - can't know - that," Sara insisted.

"I can," Grissom persisted. "Tell me, Sara, what's the difference between a hero and a psychopath?"

Sara let out a nervous laugh. "Is this the punch line to some joke I haven't heard yet?"

Only her husband was serious. Very serious if his eyes were any indication.

"Didn't Joseph Campbell once say something about a hero being 'someone who had given his or her life to something bigger than oneself'?" asked Sara.

When this didn't appear to be the answer he was looking for she added, "What's the difference between a hero and a psychopath? Apart from the obvious? No clue."

To which Grissom began to tick off his points on his bandaged fingers. "Both heroes and psychopaths tend to be impulsive, argumentative. Have problems with authority. They break rules, even risk their lives when they know they are in the right. Any of this sound familiar?"

It did. A little too familiar. Not that Sara was about to admit it.

"The difference between them, however, boils down to a single character trait: empathy. That capacity to sense other people's emotions; to be able to put oneself in someone else's shoes. To be able to suffer with someone else - that's the heart of where the word comes from after all, etymologically speaking."

Sensing he was starting to drift into the esoteric Grissom concluded, "Something you have more of than anyone I've ever met."

"That wasn't always considered to be an asset if I remember correctly."

"It wasn't the emotion but what you did with it that worried me," Grissom replied. "I guess I didn't want to see you get hurt."

A sudden hardness crept into her voice.

"Thankfully, I didn't prove as fragile as you thought."

"No. You're the strongest person I know. I was just... being overprotective."

Not that she hadn't needed it a time or two, Sara had to concede, as annoying, vexing and infuriating as his interference had sometimes proved.

"What I'm trying to say is," Grissom finished firmly, "is no, you could never have become her. You weren't built that way."

"And I'm saying you're just saying that to make me feel better."

Which it did, truth be told.

"I wouldn't dream of it, my dear."

Still, Sara wasn't sure she bought this. "Cite your source, Gil."

This complete non sequitur caught Grissom off guard. "What?"

"Prove it. Cite your source."

Grissom goggled at her for a moment before stammering, "Article in Scientific American 2011 - April, no, March, I think.

"You got your phone on you? I could pull up a copy for you."

Sara laughed, recalling quite another conversation playing out in much the same way only in reverse. Grissom, too, must have caught on to the similarity as he gave her an equally amused grin him reply.

Old times. Good times. Thankfully, there would now be time for new times equally good.

"You forgot something," Sara said with a smile of her own.

"You.

"You believed in me when I could no longer believe in myself.

"That - you - changed everything."

"No, you did that all on your own," Grissom insisted.

"It's not like you to dismiss the power of faith, Gilbert.

"Don't."

Understanding, he nodded.

"And the Freeman trial?" he asked after a bit, not sure if he really wanted to bring it up, not when Sara was finally back to smiling again, but it was after all what had brought them to Vegas in the first place.

"Still mired in jury selection and judicial motions," she replied. "And will be for the rest of the week."

The delays - and the rancor - didn't bode well; unfortunately presaged an even more difficult than usual trial to come.

Yet she smiled and that tease was back in her tone. "But you'll be rid of me for a while soon enough. Finally get your peace and quiet back. A chance to enjoy that pumpkin of yours."

To which Sara was happy to see her husband giving her a look which plainly indicated he wasn't in the least bit of a hurry. That though he did still value his solitude, he treasured his wife's company far too much to ever willingly wish it away.

As for why she could still smile over the whole thing: after nearly losing Grissom, the trial, having her and her mother's history publicly outed, none of it seemed as monumental a deal as they had to her only a few days before.

Sure, it would still suck. And yes, Sara still had to break the news to the team. They had had far too many surprises foisted on them already as of late.

Sara would deal with the defense when it came. Like she always had and did.

For while Grissom wouldn't likely be able to sit in the gallery during the trial now, she knew he'd be with her all the same. And that, she knew, too, was what mattered most.

Giving the large parcel beside the bed a gentle nudge, Sara asked, "So what's in the bag?"

Grissom shrugged. "Mom didn't say. I didn't ask."

"That doesn't sound like you," said Sara.

If curiosity could kill, as it did the proverbial cat, Gil Grissom would have exhausted his nine lives a very long time ago, likely long before Sara Sidle had even been born.

Grissom simply shrugged again. "Mom just said something about a wedding present that might come in handy."

Both wondering and reticent at the same time, Sara placed the bag onto her lap. It proved heavy, but not too heavy, the contents soft rather than hard.

Her brown eyes went wide as she extracted from the tissue paper wrappings an antique patchwork starburst wedding ring quilt. While the blue and greens and golds might show signs of the slight fading of time, the fabric itself remained in pristine condition. Sara ran her fingers across the neat line of what were obviously hand-fashioned stitches.

"It's... It's beautiful," she gasped.

Sara wasn't the only one awestruck. Grissom, recognizing precisely what Sara held in her hands, stared agog.

"It... It was my parents'," he stuttered still dumbstruck himself. "A wedding gift from my grandmother. My father's mother. I don't think I've ever seen it off mom's bed."

The explanation even more than the actual gift floored Sara. Tears began to itch at the corners of her eyes, touched as she proved more than she could ever say by her mother-in-law's gesture.

"I... I have something for you, too," Grissom said reaching for the pile of books on top of the bedside table. "Had Greg bring it by."

When his sausage thick fingers fumbled at the volumes more than grasped, Sara stepped in to help.

"The wrapped one," he indicated, frustrated and yet grateful for the assistance all the same.

How Sara could have missed the slim, plainly wrapped package perched beneath his reading glasses and a copy of The Life of Pi, she never knew.

"Was saving it for Christmas -" Grissom said.

Sara turned the package in her hand. "I thought we agreed we weren't exchanging gifts this year."

"Like that has ever worked."

True.

Sara already had a package for him squirreled away back on the Ishmael. Not that Grissom was to know that. Or at least she hoped her husband didn't. The boat, while not all that large, did provide quite a plethora of hiding spaces. Whether he knew of hers...

Still staring at the gift, she observed, "It's barely past Thanksgiving."

"Feels like Christmas to me," Grissom countered.

"Besides, Christmas isn't really Christmas you know. The twenty-fifth of December wasn't established as a Christian holiday until 336 A.D.

"Set then to coincide with the Roman holiday of Saturnalia. The early church leaders figured that if you couldn't simply banish pagan traditions, it was best to adopt them.

"The historical record places the actual birth of Jesus some time during our summer months.

"So Christmas is more a state of mind than an actual date."

His impromptu lecture complete and Sara still sitting there gobsmacked, Grissom nudged her. "Go on," he urged. "Open it."

As Sara undid the neatly knotted string, he added, sounding particularly pleased with himself, "I finally managed to track down a first edition. Stumbled across it in the back of Shakespeare and Company of all places."

"So that's where you disappeared off to that afternoon," Sara replied thinking of the day she had returned from some last minute solitary shopping of her own to find Grissom gone from their hôtel Paris.

Thus when she peeled back the brown paper, Sara wasn't surprise to find a thin volume rested inside. Aged and a little page worn, the well-read and obviously well-loved copy smelled of books and time, time far greater than either all of her or Grissom's years.

That it proved to be a children's book, she hadn't expected.

On its cover, the title The Velveteen Rabbit by Margery William punctuated the sepia sketch of a worn, winsome plump plush rabbit perched on a tiny hillock.

Sara smiled.

"I haven't read this in ages," she said.

Still a bit confused, she added, "I know your grandfather kept them, but since when are you into rabbits?"

"It's not about just any old rabbit," Grissom replied. "As to why, look inside."

Having carefully eased the cover open, Sara flipped the first few blank pages aside, only to find herself caught up short at the sight of the inscription.

There in Grissom's neat hand, the one reserved not for crossword puzzles or case files or supervisor signatures, but for love letters and more meaningful ephemera, he had scrawled:

Thankfully, never needed a blue fairy.

I have you.

- G

Her fingertips lingering over the ink, her heart twisting, nearly aching with love, Sara peered up at her now again husband in speechless joy.

When she extended the book for him to read, he shook his head.

"You."

Giving her that beseeching look Sara never could ever resist and having painstakingly shifted onto one side, Grissom padded the space on the bed beside him. Sara, taking the hint, carefully so as not to jostle him or brush against his damaged skin or upset his IV, slipped between the sheets, drawing Betty's gift over them both as she did so.

As the two nestled nearer, Sara thought her mother-in-law was indeed right about one thing: the quilt definitely did come in handy, very handy, indeed.

The two having contentedly resumed their earlier cozier positions: Grissom's head on her shoulder, his hand resting at her waist, Sara propped the book against her belly the better for them both to see.

Awkwardly, Grissom rifled the pages until he had found what he wanted.

"Here. Start here," he insisted.

So Sara did.

"'What is REAL?' asked the Rabbit one day, when they were lying side by side near the nursery fender, before Nana came to tidy the room. 'Does it mean having things that buzz inside you and a stick-out handle?'

"'Real isn't how you are made,' said the Skin Horse. 'It's a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real.'

"'Does it hurt?' asked the Rabbit.

"'Sometimes,' said the Skin Horse, for he was always truthful. 'When you are Real you don't really mind being hurt."

"'Does it happen all at once, like being wound up,' he asked, 'or bit by bit?'

"'It doesn't happen all at once,' said the Skin Horse. 'You become. It takes a long time. That's why it doesn't happen often to people who break easily or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby.'

"I rather like you loose in the joints and shabby," interjected Sara.

To which Grissom only gave her a rejoining Go back to your reading glare.

"'But these things don't matter at all,'" Sara read, "'because once you are Real you can't be ugly, except to people who don't understand.'"

Sara leaned in, the better to snuggle with him.

"'I suppose you are Real?' said the Rabbit. And then wished he had not said it, for he thought the Skin Horse might be sensitive. But the Skin Horse only smiled.

"'The Boy's Uncle made me Real. That was a great many years ago; but once you are Real you can't become unreal again -'

From memory, Grissom finished the last of the line for her:

"'It lasts for always.'"

Finis

xxxxxxx

AN: Chasing rabbits. That's what we used to call it all those years ago - more than ten now if the date stamps on my files are correct - following where all those plot bunnies took you.

And over the years they have certainly covered the miles and run the gamut.

I first started writing fanfic because I'd read a bit — okay admittedly more than a bit of it — and thought it would be fun to try my hand at it. Plus, as there were so many unanswered questions, so many blank spaces left ready to be filled, I just couldn't resist.

I certainly never expected to end up writing 102 stories nor to love it as much as I have nor to have learned more than I could ever have imagined, from all the science to all the seemingly insignificant details that make up the magic of life, to life itself and love and even how to (hopefully) be a better writer.

These stories have been with me through more than a decade's ups and downs, highs and lows. In sickness and health. During moments of joy and grief. Of love and loss. All of life I suppose.

And I wouldn't trade that for anything.

For those of you who have suffered through prose part of that journey with me I am and will forever be grateful. A story is nothing but yet another collection of lifeless words without a reader to bring them to life.

These stories - whatever life — magic — reality — they've become are as much your doing as it is mine.

Thank you.

They say things end —

That's true. But they begin, too.

With equal parts gratitude and hope I leave these pages — these stories — both in your quite capable hands and to your infinite imaginations.

To happy beginnings —

Never forget to make the most of them.

Karen

March 2018