***

I thought it would be weird. Well, not weird necessarily, but awkward. We’ve known each other for nearly twenty years now and we’ve had a comfortable relationship. Nothing ever developed between us, we were always friends, much to my irritation.

It’s a hard thing to admit: that you’re in love with your best friend. It’s hard to try and figure out a way to subtly make that transition from friends to lovers. I wanted to make it smoothly, with as little pain for either of us as possible.

Problem was, I wasn’t sure if he wanted to make the transition at all.

Gil is one of the most caring and passionate men I have ever known; he just chooses not to show it. Sara seems to have this whole theory worked out about how he has some kind of deep fear of being hurt. I think he likes being invisible.

Unfortunately for me, his desire to be invisible and not show his emotions, made it damn near impossibly to figure out if he even though of me as more than his friend. I will freely admit that patience is not my strongest point.

So, exactly one year ago today, I kissed him.

***

It wasn’t an out of the ordinary shift.

Nothing big was happening, it was actually a slow night. Not a dead body in sight. Obviously the killers of Las Vegas had all needed a night off. We were all catching up on some back logged paperwork. Greg was thankful for the break while the rest of us were going stir crazy.

We’d all huddled together in the break room. Our excuse was that we were helping each other…..somehow, I think the game of footsie that Sara and Nick were playing under the table may have gone against us should we have had to prove that theory.

Warrick, the only one of us really working, looked up from his file. “Where’s Grissom?”

“In his office” I replied automatically. “Why?”

“We need his signature on this case we worked. The Henderson murder?” He told me, holding up the file and eventually handing it out to me. “Want me to go?”

I sighed. “No, it’s fine, I’ll do it.”

Taking the file, I exited the break room and headed through the halls to Gil’s office. He’d not been in a particularly nice mood that night. Paperwork always made him angry. He hated it. He still does, I suppose. But he’s a lot more….content these days. I like to think I’m one of the reasons for that.

Anyway, when I reached his office, the door was closed. It was unlike Gil to close his office door. He liked to let people know that he was here for them.

I didn’t bother knocking. I never did with Gil. I just opened the door, stuck my head around the corner to make sure he wasn’t preparing to blow an experiment up, made sure it was safe and walked in.

He was standing in front of his desk, leaning on the edge, reading a file. I wish that I could say he was looking more handsome than normal, but he wasn’t. He looked the exact same that night, just like Gil. There is really no plausible explanation as to why I had the overwhelming urge to confess everything to him in his office that night, but I did.

When he looked up and acknowledged my presence with a quietly spoken “Cath?” I meant to open my mouth and ask him to sign the paperwork inside the folder in my hand. I meant to greet him with a sassy comment and a smile.

Instead, I took two steps forward, pressed my body flush against his, grasped the back of his neck with my folder-free hand, and brought his lips down to mine. I am as subtle as a freight train when I want to be, I know.

Honestly, I don’t know what kind of response I was expecting from him. Maybe for him to recoil in horror. Perhaps I expected shock, confusion, maybe even anger.

But, for as long as I live, I will never forget what happened next. Gil, the man I’ve loved for more years than I can count, dropped the file he’d been reading, brought his hands to my hips to pull me closer to him (if that was possible) and let his tongue out to play.

God, I nearly turned into a puddle of goo at his feet.

Our first kiss. Ever. The ones on the cheek doesn’t count. I felt like I did when I was 13, sharing my first kiss with James. Amazed. Awed. Inspired.

Kissing Gil was like nothing I had ever done before, nothing I had ever experienced. I felt like he was inspecting my mouth, tasting me, feasting on me. I felt like the center of his world, the only thing that mattered to him. He was so thorough, like he is with everything else, meticulous.

I am more than happy to report that even in our year together, that has not changed. He still kisses me like he did that day, and I still have the urge to melt at his feet.

When we finally pulled apart to stare at each other, and to this day I still do not know how long we stood there kissing, he was grinning at me. He arms were the only things keeping me upright, and he knew it. “Do you greet everyone like that or should I just feel special?”

“Guh…..” Where had my sass gone? Where had my humor, wit and sarcasm gone? Where?

“I’m going to take that as a no and just feel special.” He’d grinned a bit more, if that was possible.

“I meant to say hello.” I had offered weakly, still held up by his arms.

He had grunted at me, in a very masculine and very sexy manner. “I don’t doubt it.”

“That works too.”

“I’m ok with it.”

“Really?’

“Yep.”

***

And that was that.

We weren’t dating, we weren’t a couple, we weren’t partners, we weren’t even sleeping together, much to my dismay. We just…were.

We still are.

Even though my original plan was to tell him that I was in love with him, and had been for a while, it took us over a month to actually say it. We both knew how we felt, I guess we had always known to a degree, but saying the words proved to be more difficult for me than I imagined.

I think, for me, there was still some fear of rejection. With the exception of Lindsey, who squealed for hours when she caught Gil and I making out on the sofa, the people I loved tended to hurt me. I knew that Gil never wanted to hurt me, he told me often enough, but fear is often ingrained into us.

Fear makes us weak, and I think of myself as many things but weak. So I told him.

***

“Can you pass the salt, please?” I had asked, smiling over the table at him as we had sat in a quaint little restaurant eating pasta. It wasn’t a date, per se. Like I said, we weren’t dating, we just were.

But Gil liked to take me out, he still does. He thinks I should have the world, and he wants to be the one holding the silver platter to deliver it to me. I don’t want the world, I never did. As long as my little girl if safe and happy, and I have this man by my side, I can survive anything. I knew it then as sure as I know it now.

He had passed the shaker to me, a soft smile on his lips. He always looked so happy since that kiss in his office. “I love you.” I had told him without thinking. It seemed that I had done a lot of that in our month together, stopped thinking and started just feeling.

Gil’s eyes had lit up, shining just a little brighter than before. “It’s only salt, Cath. What are you going to do if I pass you the pepper?” Most people don’t realize it, but my Mr. Grissom is actually a very witty man. When he’s comfortable, in his element, he cracks jokes. He makes me laugh.

“I have a few ideas,” I’d told him, looking down and smiling up at him through my eyelashes. “But we are in public.” And then I’d winked at him, pleased that I’d finally told him, and equally pleased that my sass hadn’t abandoned me for once.

“I love you too, you crazy woman.”

***

And that was that.

After that night at the restaurant, we had began to say it all the time. He would call me when he got home, just to say it, and then hang up before I could reply. Which, naturally, made me call him back and say it and then hang up. We played phone tag a lot. He filled my answering machine tape up with words of love, and I could never bring myself to delete them, so I got a new tape. Likewise, I did the same for him.

I have e-mails, handwritten letters, cards and so many memories of all the times he’s said “I love you.” He says it with words, his eyes, actions and body.

As well as being surprisingly funny, to some people, my Mr. Grissom is also a very affectionate man. He likes to hold my hand when we walk around in public. He likes to give me foot massages, so not complaining. He likes to brush my hair out. He likes to touch me full stop.

Not that I mind, you understand. Not in the slightest. He always gives me tingles, and all he has to do is brush by me. Even the smallest, insignificant, touch from him turns me on. He knows it too, I can’t hide it from him. It would make most men smug, I know, but it just makes Gil love me more.

That’s actually how the others found out about us.

***

Sara had been called to a crime scene. Gil and I had both managed to get the night off so that we could go out to dinner, and, if I had anything to do with it, spend the night making love. Unfortunately for us, we’d been called to help Sara. Her crime scene turned out to be a triple homicide. The entire two-story house became a crime scene.

And I was in Stilettos.

Gil and I didn’t have time to change, we just jumped in his car and got there as fast as we could. No one questioned my attire- a slinky black dress, the tiniest g-string in the world and the shoes of death. Like I said, I was trying to seduce my man. Gil looked casual, slacks and a dress shirt. He could have been dressed for work, for all the others knew.

So we spent four hours processing the house. Four hours in the shoes of death, and blisters like you wouldn’t believe.

When we had got back to the lab, I was limping. I’m normally not such a baby when it comes to shoes, I used to dance in stilettos for a living. But these were four inches high, and not designed for walking in, let alone processing a mansion.

Gil had taken my arms and helped me limp to his office. Sitting me down in the corner of his couch, he’d sat at the opposite end and pulled my feet to his lap.

Let me be specific here. At the beginning of the evening, I was talking to Nancy as she picked Linds up, and she asked what I had planned for the night. And I replied; “I plan to be in Gil’s lap, if I have anything to do with it.” This was not what I had meant. Not at all. But hey, at that point, I would have taken whatever I could have gotten.

He was so careful, so tender with me as he slowly undid the clasp around my ankles. His thumbs were tracing slow and laze patterns across my skin, and my breathing was labored. His touch had always done something to me, ever since the first time I met him, but now it was like I was hyper-aware of every little thing her did.

I couldn’t help but wince a little as he slid the shoe of death of my left foot. The gentle caress that he gave me helped though, his fingers carefully massaging the tender areas.

“Why don’t you want to sleep with me?” I had blurted out, unable to stop myself.

His hands hadn’t stilled, he hadn’t gotten tense and uncomfortable. He’d just calmly smiled at me while his hands continued to work on turning me into that familiar puddle of goo. “And what makes you think I don’t?”

“We’ve been….whatever it is we’ve been doing” And I still don’t have a name for it, even after a year. “for a month now Gil, and you haven’t….”

“Pushed?”

“Exactly.”

He had shrugged, “Why would I push? We waited nineteen years for our first kiss, what’s a few weeks?”

A lot of lonely and frustrating days and nights, my mind had helpfully supplied. “But Gil….” I don’t like to think of how I sounded as whining, but damnit, that’s exactly what it was. I was whining. The man could get me excited just by looking at me, and he didn’t appear to want to go any further than some serious make out sessions. Not so good for a girl’s ego, let me tell you that.

I pouted.

Gil just grinned at me again, he was doing that a lot at this stage, yanked on my feet until I was lying on his couch, and lent over me. “Be careful what you wish for.” He had told me, and then leant down further until he was in a very awkward position, but then his lips were on mine, and I didn’t care.

Somehow, we managed to maneuver ourselves so that he was on top of me, his body cradled between my thighs. I had my left leg wound around his waist. My other leg, with the shoe of death still attached, was hanging over the arm of the couch, mindful of the potentially painful spike.

I can’t honestly say if we would have had sex there and then, in his office. From the way we were grinding in to each other, I think it’s a definite possibility. Unfortunately, we were interrupted by three identical gasps from the door and one “Oh My God this is so cool!”

Yes, Greg, I thought so too until you guys turned up.

Their little interruption had led to us all having a very serious discussion in Gil’s office. It also included our promise that there be no more make-out sessions at CSI.

Unless we locked the doors, Greg had added cheekily.

***

And that was that.

After we told them, or rather, they caught us, walking into the lab holding hands at the beginning our shift and walk out in the same manor in the end became normal for us. There was no preferential treatment involved. I wasn’t pared with Gil on more cases than normal. No one had cause for complaints, we all made sure of that. Everything stayed the same as far as work was concerned.

It was at home that things had changed. Lindsey was much happier now, her teachers had commented on it to me in various conferences. I was much happier too. Everyone could see it. I had so much to smile for. Nothing gave me more pleasure and joy, than seeing Gil and my little girl together. The way that he would pick her up and spin her around while she squealed always made my heart flutter. His kindness and tenderness with both of us would bring tears to my eyes.

Nothing has changed in that department, except now Lindsey calls Gil ‘daddy’.

***

I will freely admit that I bawled my eyes out when she first did it.

We were at the park, a real family outing. The fact that Gil loves my daughter as much as I do only made me love him more. He was there at her birth, while Eddie was god knows where with god knows whom. The man who had pushed my daughter on the swing that day had been there while I screamed at him as I brought her into the world.

Gil had been pushing her, complying when she cried to go higher. She was so full of energy, my little Linds, and growing up way to fast for her mothers liking. Eventually, though, she had demanded that they stop for lunch.

He’d grasped the swing and brought it down slowly and carefully, until it had stopped enough for Linds to get off. She’d turned around and jumped up into his arms, kissing him soundly on the cheek. “I love you, you know?” She’d asked, with all the finesse of an eight-year-old.

“I know sweetheart, and I love you too.”

“My mom loves you too, you know.”

He smiled indulgently and the bundle of energy in his arms. “I hope she does.”

“Are you my daddy now?” She had asked it with such innocence, such curiosity, and I had held my breath, waiting for his reply. Gil and I hadn’t discussed things like marriage and family. We were trying to take it slow, just see where this new thing led us.

“Honey, you had a daddy, and he loved you very much. I would never try and take his place, but I will always be there for you.” It was the perfect answer, and I couldn’t have come up with anything better if I’d had a week to think about it.

“You can still be my daddy though.”

***

And that was that.

From that day onwards, Uncle Gil became Daddy. No one questioned it. Soft smiles were shared when the guys at work heard her say it for the first time. Lindsey felt comfortable saying it, and I know that Gil was thrilled to hear it.

As much as he loves my little girl, I know that he would like one of his own. A baby. And I’m giving him one, he just doesn’t know it yet. I’m going to tell him tonight. I’ve dressed up for the occasion. Black silk.

Linds knows, and she volunteered to go to Nancy’s tonight. She said she wanted to give us some privacy….my little girl has grown up so fast. She’ll make a perfect big sister.

I want to do this right, I want it to be perfect. But, knowing me, and the way he turns me into an all too familiar pile of goo, I’ll probably blurt it out the second he walks through the door.

Wish me luck.

***

That’s all she wrote folks…..for now. ;-)