It shouldn’t have hurt so badly. I should have been able to smile, give him a final hug and wish him a ‘God speed, John Glenn’. But it did and I couldn’t. He didn’t give me the chance.

I have no idea how long I’ve been here; sitting, remembering, crying, cursing. It could have been five minutes, it could have been five hours. I have no clue, no feeling of time passing as I sit on the cold floor, the small of my back barely touching the wall behind me. I’m numb; my body, my brain, my heart, my soul. I think I’m done crying, but my cheeks are still wet, so maybe I’m not done. Maybe I’ll never be done.

I vaguely remember opening the door to his condo, and in mind it will always be a condo no matter what the city zoned it as, and seeing it empty. Save the high-tech CD player and speakers on the shelving, repeating the same sorrowful tune over again and again.

I remember the shock I felt as I stupidly, and hopefully, checked his bedroom and bathroom for him. But it was useless. He was gone. Just like he had said he would be. No cake, no party, no good-byes. He would simply be…gone. Vanishing, like the ghost he said he was. He understood so much, knew so much. But what he never understood or knew was that he wasn’t a ghost and he would be missed.

The pain came after the shock. That searing, choking, awful pain that started in my chest and grew until the scream ripped from my throat, echoing around the empty walls and floors, bouncing eerily back at me. At first I started, looking around for the person screaming before realizing that I was the one making that sound.

How could he do this to me? After almost twenty years, I deserved more than to drop by for coffee, carafe of my special brew in hand, and find out he’d left. Without a word, without a trace. I deserved…I don’t know what I deserved. He was my friend, maybe my best friend. God knows we’d spent enough time together, unlike my friends outside work whom I rarely saw.

After almost twenty years, I thought I knew him. I’d been there for him countless times. He’d been there for me…well, he was not there for me more than he was there, but still, I knew that he cared. He just couldn’t show it. Or did he really care? I thought I knew him, everyone thought we were so close and maybe that’s what hurts the most. The sinking, gnawing feeling that as much as I thought I did, I didn’t really know him at all.

The CD player is still softly playing its mournful tune. That’s all he left me. And I know it’s for me. He knew I would be the one to look for him. Not Warrick, or Brass, or Sara. But me. So it’s his message to me. But there’s no explanation, no note, no forwarding address, no nothing. Just this damn song that tears at my already shredded heart.

I grab the carafe lying forgotten on the floor next to me and heave it at the player. I wanted to break the damned thing, but all it did was stutter to a stop. All I succeeded at was hitting the off button. The music was gone, but I knew I would hear it in my mind for the rest of my life. Just like I’d hear his voice. Or see his frown of concentration. Or see his rare smile of amusement.

I feel a hand on my shoulder and I look up, trying to focus through my tears. I guess I still am crying. Funny that you can cry and not be aware of it.

For a brief second, hope floods me. He came back. To say goodbye. To tell me he’d miss me. That I was his best friend and he would never be the same again. That I was worthy, and not everyone in my life left me. That he was the one unchanging part of my life that I could actually count on. Like the sun rising in the east or the moon controlling the tides.

But it isn’t him, it’s Warrick. Why is Warrick here? Did Gil call him? Tell him, but not tell me? Did Gil know that I was sitting in his empty condo, the friendship I thought we’d had lying scattered at my feet?

Warrick squatted in front of me and answered my unspoken question. Or maybe I actually did ask it aloud. I can no longer distinguish my thoughts from what’s happening in reality.

“The sitter called, wondering why you haven’t come home.” He looked around the room and then turned those green eyes back at me. “You didn’t answer your cell and neither is Gris. Now I know why.”

“He’s gone,” I tell him, my voice shaking with emotion, yet oddly, it sounded flat and empty to my ears. “He didn’t even let me say goodbye. All I wanted to do is say goodbye. That’s all!”

He nodded. “I know, Cath. I wanted to say goodbye too.” He sat next to me and slid an arm around my shoulders.

I lay my head on his strong shoulder and really let the tears flow. “Why didn’t he tell me?”

I felt him sigh. “I don’t know, Cath. Maybe he thought you’d talk him out of it.”

“But I wouldn’t have!” I insist. “I wouldn’t have! He was my friend and I just want him to be happy!”

“I know. But maybe…” He hesitated. “Maybe goodbye would have been too hard. For him.”

I process that for a moment, then nod silently. Warrick helps me to my feet and we walk to the door, gathering my purse that I’d dropped just inside the doorway.

“Give me a second,” I say to Warrick and watch as he steps outside. I turn and walk to the CD player, opening it and extracting the still intact cd. This is his note to me and I know I’ll keep it forever. I shuffle on leaden feet to the door, but pause before leaving. Taking one last look around, I see it as it was. On the few, but cherished times I’d spent here with my good friend, celebrating life and inevitably death, but only because it meant another case solved. Another chapter closed. Another shift ended.

“God speed, Gil Grissom,” I whisper before leaving, shutting the door on my past and walking into my future.

One of these mornings
Won’t be very long
You will look for me
And I’ll be gone

AN: I’m adding this at the end for a change of pace. And so you can read the fic as a whole, with no preconceived notion of what is going to happen. The song is One of These Mornings by someone, whom I can’t remember. Sorry! It was used in the best ep of Without A Trace that I have seen and one that still haunts me, even though it was shown in season 1.