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Salut!
It was
brightillusions birthday yesterday/today/tomorrow/stamps feet in annoyance at time zones, so what we have here is BIRTHDAY FIC!
*throws tinsel in the air*
I may only know you on the internet, but you have seriously made the past year much more enjoyable. You're always ready to offer kind words about fic, comfort about personal things and crazy-ass NCIS reviews that I look forward to each week as much as the episodes themselves. HAPPY BIRTHDAY my dear!!!
She charged me with the task of writing a fifth variation of Lila's first word, and that word had to be Mickey. So, here we have it!
Please be warned. This is so saccharine it'll cause tooth decay. I know many of you probably don't have any teeth left, what with my propensity to write fluff, but...well, here you go. I have some angst on the way.
Gibbs didn’t even have a chance to bark his name into his phone before the person on the other end launched into a panicked spiel.
“Gibbs! We’ve lost him. You haven’t seen him, have you? I rang the supermarket and they said they hadn’t seen him. They thought I was nuts, but what can you do? I mean, when you’ve got a screaming baby, you do pretty much all you can, right?”
Gibbs blinked, though the effect was lost over the audio waves. “What?”
“Oh Gibbs! Mickey, we’ve lost Mickey!
He was about to tell her that lost toys didn’t stack up against lost people, but then he heard Lila wailing in the background, the distress in her cry evident.
“Give me a minute, Abs. I’ll see what I can do.”
. . . .
An hour later he was standing in the bathroom of their house, staring at Abby’s bottle of homemade perfume. He looked at the toy in his hands, somewhat guiltily. He’d searched high and low in Abby’s lab for Mickey to no avail, before hitting the toy store a few blocks from work.
With a sigh and a quick glance to make sure the coast was clear, he reached for the bottle and sprayed a smidgeon of perfume behind the baby hippo’s ears. If it smelled sufficiently of Abby, Lila may never cotton on.
He went up the stairs, still hesitant about his plan. “Abs?” he called out on the landing.
“In here.”
He suppressed an amused sigh at her not-so-helpful reply, but followed her voice to the bedroom. Lila was lying in the middle of the double bed, her eyes red. She wasn’t crying but whimpering softly. A soft glow from the ensuite could be seen, the sound of a tap running filtering into the room.
He shucked his shoes off and crawled onto the bed, coming to lie beside her. He put the small hippo on her chest, waiting to see if she’d go with it or stick her nose up at it. She studied it for a second, then smiled delightedly and grabbed it with chubby fingers, gurgling happily.
He let out a breath he hadn’t known he was holding, before shifting closer and snuggling her.
The door from the ensuite opened with a squeak. “Oh, thank god you found him. We’ve had such a bad day, haven’t we Lil?” The baby, reunited with her toy, had no room for her parents. “Well, we have.” With that, she flopped down, careful not to land on any arms and legs, and buried her head into the pillow.
“Mm gon slip fr yrs” - was her muffled comment into the blue cotton.
Laughing, he scooped Lila and Mickey up and padded out of the room, shutting the door softly.
. . . .
Gibbs woke up to a poke in the back. “What the hell are you doing?’
“You’ll never guess what I just found.”
The tone of her voice told him he just might. “You found Mickey.”
“Darn tootin’!”
He groaned. “Abby, I looked everywhere at work. If you didn’t find him at home, that’s not my fault.” He wound his arm around her waist, rolling her to lay on top of him. “Go to sleep.”
“Gibbs! We can’t live a lie! We have to give her the old one back tomorrow. Ok?”
He sighed. “Sure, Abby.”
She lay still for a minute, before springing up, her hands flat on his chest. “Hey! When I lost Bert last month, did you give me a fake one or a real one? Don’t lie to me.”
“Abby. I would never give you a fake Bert.”
. . . .
Gibbs came down to living room, the old hippo in his hands. Lila, who was on the couch with her mum watching re-runs of Captain Planet, had her new hippo clutched in her grasp. He paused, unsure of how to go about the exchange.
He didn’t have to find a solution; as soon as Lila saw him with the toy, her face lit up. “Mickey!” she squealed, reaching for him.
Gibbs blinked. “She knew. She played us.”
“She spoke! She said Mickey. The girl’s got class; you got to give her that.”
“It’s a stuffed hippo,” Gibbs said, bemusedly.
“It’s her Mickey! You just don’t understand the importance of our hippos.”
He reached down and gave her the toy. It smelt the same, of Abby and sweetness with tang, but it was slightly more well worn.
Instead of casting the fake one aside, she clung to them both.
Abby smiled. “Girl also knows to hang onto what’s hers. I can’t believe she said her first word.”
Sighing, Gibbs sat down on the ground, leaning against the couch. “Pretty soon there’s going to be more hippos than people in this house.”
Also, question! When people comment, I usually like to reply. It seems rude not to, especially since you're all so nice. It occurred to me this morning that I'm potentially spamming people inboxes. If you'd like me to stop replying to your comment, please feel free to tell me! I won't mind! :) :) :) :)