Title: Too Late

Author: Raven Morbisk

Email: whatever_who_cares@msn.com

Disclaimer: I don’t own the characters otherwise Sara/Catherine would’ve happened.

Fandom: CSI

Pairing: Sara/Catherine

Rating: PG-13

Summary: You say "Sorry" like the angel heaven let me think was you.

Sara POV.

Author’s Notes: Inspired by Timbaland’s ‘Apologize’.

A/N2: Thanks to Wiccanwillowrose8 for being my beta!!

We’ve been together for almost five years, Catherine and me. I’ve moved in with her and Lindsey a little over three years ago. The guys at work know but they don’t care as long as we’re happy. Grissom was a little shaken up because it was a few months after I asked him out but he got over it and is happy for us as long as it doesn’t interfere with our work. He probably believed I was still waiting for him. I was done waiting for someone who might love me when Catherine promised me a lifetime of love. I know she loves me, under all those harsh words she does love me but sometimes it just gets too much and I blow up.

We never fight when Lindsey’s in the house but it doesn’t matter, she knows we fight. Last week she came up to me and asked if I was happy living with her mom. I told her I was still very much in love with Catherine. She sighed as if to stay that I wasn’t getting the point and asked me again. So I just said as long as she was happy, I was happy, too. She told me she was happy whenever we were happy but lately, we just weren’t.

I thought that by moving in with my Catherine and Lindsey the stress might dissolve and we’d fight less but that wasn’t the case. We didn’t fight more but it didn’t lessen either. The only difference is that Greg now knows how our relationship really is. When I still had my apartment and we fought I’d just go back to my place but now I stay at Greg’s place until she says ‘sorry’ again. I can apologize when I know I’m wrong and if I’m wrong I don’t leave, I stay on the couch but when she’s in the wrong I head to Greg’s place. He always has a spare bed for me. He doesn’t ask anything unless I tell him what happened.

I know she has a quick temper. I knew that when we first met and I knew when we started dating that her mouth often outruns her mind. It still doesn’t change the fact that she can send me spiraling in my personal dark abyss. Like when we were together for a year when we were on the Melton case and I still hadn’t told her about my past. I think she got tired of waiting for me to tell her in my own time and quite furiously asked my why I got so affected by abuse cases. I may have been out of line in our work relationship but she was out of line in our romantic relationship.

I went home straight after Ecklie suspended me and had just taken a beer when the doorbell rang. It was either Grissom or Catherine; no one else would dare to have talked to me then. So when I opened the door and saw Catherine our little spat just continued until my anger got the best of me and I threw my bottle of beer against the wall. Catherine just looked at me, not saying anything and then I broke, I told her about my mother killing my father after years of abuse. I told her about the trips to the hospital that just seemed normal until they told me it was everything but.

I didn’t cry but Catherine did. She cried and for the next twenty minutes after that I was angry at her for pitying me. I was yelling at her and for twenty full minutes she didn’t yell back, she only said I shouldn’t have gone through all that and that she was sorry for blowing up like that. When I began to realize she really wasn’t going to yell at me, she let me control her. I had her pressed up against the wall, kissing her like no tomorrow. We had made soft and gentle love before and we’ve had just plain sex but this was neither. It was rough and painful but she didn’t say stop once. She felt I needed total control and allowed it.

I wouldn’t let her touch me where I needed it. She tried though, she was begging to touch me and just like that I made her beg for her release. I’ll never forget the way she looked when she surrendered her entire being to me. Sweat was touching every inch of skin that was absolutely mine in that moment, her eyes rolling in the back of her head before I ordered her to look at me. She screamed my name then and there, against the wall next to my door with one wrapped around my waist and my hand buried inside her. Her clothes were torn and spread on the ground somewhere behind, next to and in between us. When she came back down I carried her to my bedroom and placed her in my bed. When I crawled in my bed next to her I broke down and she held me as I cried. She didn’t do anything else, she just held me.

We’re fighting again. It started with something that had nothing to do with our relationship; a twelve year-old girl had been beaten to death by her father. Catherine refused to get some sleep for three full days. She wanted the bastard in jail and I did, too, she knows I wanted him in jail just as bad as she does but when I confronted her about it and told her that she should go home, spend a few hours with Lindsey and get some rest she blew up in my face. Saying I shouldn’t tell her what to do with Lindsey, that Lindsey’s her daughter and I’m not. It hurt, it really hurt when she said it but I let that one slip because she was tired. I had walked away from her then and just continued working the case fuming on the inside while desperately trying to ignore my heart falling to pieces and by the end of the shift she came looking for me, apologizing for her behavior and telling me I’m not Lindsey’s parent, that I was everything Lindsey wanted me to be, that I meant the world to her. I sucked in any retort that almost slipped past my lips and told her I was fine. The moment we got home however her mood shifted again, without any warning.

“Come on, baby, let’s get you to bed.” I had said. I just wanted to sleep, just hold her in my arms but that’s not how Catherine took it. We had just entered our home when she turned to me with her beautiful blue eyes positively burning with rage.

“Is that all I am to you?” She asked me. I had no idea where that came from. I was tired and my mind was busy figuring out what the hell she meant by that but it took too long to answer I suppose because the next thing I knew she started accusing me of only wanting her for sex. Like all I wanted was to show her off, show the world that I, Sara Sidle, was with a former stripper. I almost wanted to smack her when she told me that I’ve probably been telling everyone that I was her savior after her coke-addiction, or better yet, that I was the one that kept her from going into prostitution. For God’s sake, I didn’t even know her back then!

“You’re staying home tonight.” I told her after that accusation. She was going to get some decent hours of sleep because it was getting out of control. Again. I pulled out my cell phone only to have it snatched away from me and thrown against the wall. That’s where we’re at right now.

“Don’t tell me what to do, Sidle.” She hisses, pointing her index finger at me. I barely refrain from rolling my eyes at her motherly act. It seems like she keeps forgetting that I’m supposed to be her lover, not her child.

“You’re exhausted, Catherine.” I tell her trying to find some form of reason in that otherwise logical mind. “You need to sleep goddamnit!” I almost, almost shout at her when she tilts her head backwards and lets out a biting laugh.

“Why?” She asks me with acid dripping from her tone. She runs her hand through her hair and begins to pace. I open my mouth to say something; anything but she beats me to it. “So you can play tonsil-hockey with Gil behind my back?” Oh God, that freakin’ subject again. I swear she gets more jealous of Grissom than any woman hitting on me when we go out.

“For fuck’s sake, Catherine.” I’m really losing my temper fast. “I’ve asked Grissom out –once- five years ago.” Should I play the dirty card? Yes, no? I don’t know. I’m so angry at her for still being jealous when it comes to Grissom but I can’t, I just can’t. “What about your constant flirting with Warrick? Or any guy for that matter?” Okay, apparently I can. I know she does it to keep me interested or to get her way in some cases but that doesn’t mean I like it. In fact, I hate it when she does that and she fucking knows it.

“Just because we happen to be in a relationship doesn’t mean I don’t need to keep my options open.” That’s it. I can’t handle any more of this. God, why does she always have to say these things? Doesn’t she fucking realize how much she hurts me when she says things like that? Shit, a car stops in our driveway. Is that Nancy’s car? I check my watch and it says ten a.m., I forgot Lindsey doesn’t have school for another week.

“We’ll finish this later.” Catherine says also remembering Lindsey’s summer break. I snort loudly but keep quiet when Lindsey comes in and gives both of us a cheerful hello. I give Lindsey my best fake smile and say something about going to a friend for a couple of days. Catherine doesn’t say anything but I can feel eyes burning in my back as I retreat to our bedroom and grab my bags.

“You’re fighting again, aren’t you?” I hear Lindsey asking her mother in an angry tone. Catherine denies it, just like always. She tells Lindsey I’m going to Greg’s because he needs his best friend, it’s always the same excuse. “Don’t lie to me, mom.” Lindsey’s voice is getting louder and I cringe a little, this is not going to end well. Catherine’s already in a foul mood.

“Don’t talk to me that way, young lady.” Before Lindsey can reply I walk in the living room with my bags in hand. Both Willows turn to me, one with tears forming in her eyes at the sight of my bags and the other staring at me like I threw away her favorite shoes.

“Linds, can I get a hug before I go?” I ask the younger Willows woman. She stares at me before reluctantly moving forward as I set my bags on the floor. When she’s close enough I wrap her in my arms but I can feel she’s tense so I let her go just as quickly. I don’t want to force her.

“You shouldn’t be going in the first place.” She states with an angry edge to her voice. I don’t know if the anger is for me or her mother. I don’t think Lindsey knows either. I pick my bags up again and give her a crooked smile.

“I know.” I shift a little nervously at the stare Lindsey’s giving me. “We’re still on for Friday, right?” She had begged me a few weeks ago to take her to see the newest horror flick. Catherine hates the stuff so I finally relented and told her I’d come with her if she behaved. For the weeks that came, she was an angel, up until today that is but I’m not going to cancel our date now.

“Whatever.” The classic words when you’ve had enough, don’t you think? Lindsey storms out to her room and turns up her stereo’s volume to the maximum, leaving me and Catherine in the living room looking at each other in relative silence. She’s not even yelling at Lindsey to turn it down.

“Please stay.” Catherine pleads as she takes a few steps to me. Sure, now she’s calmed down. I shake my head at her and move to the doorway but she takes a hold of my arm so I stop but I can’t look at her. I know that whatever we’re going through it always disappears when I hold her; she makes my monsters go away.

“Sara, please, I need you.” Those words, they always make me stay in the end. Nobody has ever needed me like her before. I’m still standing with my bags in my hands a few feet away from the door. It seems so far and yet so close. Do I really need to go? Maybe it’ll be different this time around? Isn’t that what I always tell myself when she comes for me at Greg’s place or-

“Baby, I’m sorry. Please, don’t go.” God, I hate when she says she’s sorry. She’s apologized so many times the words have lost their meanings. I close my eyes; take a deep breath and turn to face her. When I open my eyes I can see Catherine crying silently, it doesn’t even look like she’s breathing, there are just tears running down her perfect face.

“It’s too late.” It’s the first time I’ve said those words and I think they have effect because when I turn my head again, Catherine lets go of my arm and begins to cry uncontrollably. It takes every ounce of my willpower not to drop the bags and collect her in my arms as I walk out of the place I call my home. Maybe, just maybe, I’ll be able to stay away this time.