NCIS BIGBANG Brats, Badges and Hoses: Chapter 4 - The Kid's a Cardvark
Brats, Badges and Hoses: Chapter 4 - The Kid's a Cardvark
See Warnings and other info on Chapter 1
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Chapter 4 - The Kid's a Cardvark
The car ride was fun as Maggie explained all the volunteer options that were available. Tony realized that Maggie was far more observant than he ever thought. She must have overheard almost all of her parent’s conversations about the event. Tony thought she’d probably be a good agent someday.
“I want to do the car wash. It’s easy and fun and you get to meet lots of people,” Maggie said. “Painting might be fun, too but I don’t really like Mrs. Carmichael and that’s whose house they’re painting.”
“Why don’t you like her?” Gibbs asked.
“I took piano lessons with her but I didn’t like them and then Mr. Carmichael died and she stopped giving lessons for a while so I had a reason not to go but now she’s teaching again but I didn’t want to restart them. It would feel weird to go back.”
“So it’s not that you don’t like her, it’s that she makes you uncomfortable?”
“Yeah, I guess.” She sounded distant. Maggie was one of the most well-adjusted children Tony knew but that didn’t mean she didn’t have her issues.
He turned and shook his head at Gibbs to indicate he shouldn’t keep on the topic. He’d tell Gibbs later the specifics. Maggie had seen the car accident that killed Timothy Carmichael two years prior and sometimes she still had nightmares about it. She had been in her school bus and Carmichael had been racing to a fire in his own car as he hadn’t gotten to the station house. All the children had an unfortunate front row seat to the accident but it was a bit worse for Maggie since she knew him from her lessons.
Like the mind-reader he sometimes suspected Gibbs was, he seemed to understand it was not something to pursue.
“What other activities will there be tomorrow?” Gibbs asked Maggie instead.
“There’s a group of people that will be going to a school to plant some stuff. Not my school but some of the other kids go there. Planting is fun so I could do that but I think I’d rather wash cars. I don’t want to do the bake sale - that’s totally boring!”
Gibbs and Tony laughed. “I didn’t offer that. One I can’t bake that well and two, I’d probably eat all the profits,” Tony said with a laugh.
“Do all the kids volunteer too?” Gibbs asked.
“You have to be ten and not everyone does it but they’ll let you if an adult will sponsor you. Mom will sponsor me but I’m hoping whoever buys Tony will let me volunteer with him. I have to do chores all the time with Mom and Dad so it wouldn’t be any fun to hang out with them all day.”
“Okay, if whoever buys me is okay with that, then you can tag along.”
“Do you get to choose what you want to do?” Gibbs asked Tony.
“Yeah, I had to write a little blurb about myself and what I was willing to do and they’ll announce it from the stage. Also, we’ll be required to do things like get drinks, snacks, and assist our “buyers” any way they want,” Tony used air quotes around buyers.
Gibbs looked at him sharply.
“Within reason, Gibbs. This is a family event.” Tony rolled his eyes at his reaction. “There are rules.”
Gibbs nodded and looked back at Maggie. “So are you going to bid on Tony?” Gibbs asked her.
“Don’t be silly. I don’t have any money. You’re going to buy him,” she stated.
“I am?” Gibbs asked, jokingly.
“Of course! He’s your friend. You have to. I went to all that trouble to make sure you could share a room and all - you have to be with him tomorrow!”
Tony turned to look at her and Gibbs glanced in the rear view mirror and saw her looking very determined with her arms crossed as if no was not an acceptable answer.
“What do you mean you made sure we could share a room?” Tony asked, almost afraid to hear the answer.
He could hear her shuffling around in the backseat during the long moment she took to answer. She finally leaned forward as far as she could in her seatbelt and spoke between the seats. “You never bring anyone home so I know he’s like your boyfriend and you should be able to share a room just like Mom and Dad. You talk about him all the time - ‘Gibbs this, Gibbs that’ when you’re telling us about what’s going on. I overheard Mom say she thought you had a crush on ‘Gibbs’ with how much you talk about him.”
Tony felt himself blushing with mortification before glancing over to see Gibbs’ reaction. He assumed he’d be pissed or at least mildly annoyed.
“Boss, I…just work,” he started to explain as he saw Gibbs watching him with a raised eyebrow and a modestly amused expression.
Maggie continued, oblivious to the unspoken drama happening in the front seat. “She said she was worried about you having a crush on your boss. Dad doesn’t think you do but then Dad didn’t know I liked Jeremy Boyer. Mom knew right away ‘cause she said I always talked about him like you do about Gibbs. So, I think that means you like Gibbs the way I like Jeremy. I mean, he’s so cute, right?”
She tapped on Gibbs’ shoulder to indicate she was asking him the question. They were pulling into the driveway and Tony was glad the conversation was about to be over.
Gibbs shrugged. “I’ve never met Jeremy so I can’t answer that.”
She released her seatbelt now that they had stopped and smacked Gibbs’ shoulder. “I mean Tony. You think Tony’s cute, right?”
“Maggie!” Tony said as unbuckled his seatbelt and turned around to face her. “You wouldn’t like me telling Jeremy Boyer what you think about him, would you?” he asked gently.
She blushed and shook her head furiously, apparently realizing that maybe she’d said too much.
Gibbs smiled at Tony, obviously trying not to laugh as they all got out of the car. Maggie got out on Gibbs’ side and he crooked his finger at her. He bent down and whispered something in her ear that made her laugh.
She ran to the front door and opened it with her key.
“What did you say to her?” Tony asked Gibbs quietly.
“I answered her question.” Gibbs said, enigmatically. Tony’s curiosity was burning. He needed to get some answers from Gibbs. It suddenly dawned on him how hinky the entire situation was.
Maggie ran into the kitchen to get a drink as Tony and Gibbs walked into the living room. Gibbs looked around and Tony waited to see his reaction. He suspected Gibbs was surprised at the modest house, expecting most of Tony’s friends to be people who lived the high life. He didn’t seem to have any reaction except for picking up a photo of Pete, Maggie and him at her fifth birthday party that Angie had taken. All three of them had blue icing smeared across their face when Maggie had insisted on feeding them cake like she did her dolls.
“You want some lemonade?” she called out from the kitchen. Tony answered in the affirmative.
“She’s a good kid, Tony,” Gibbs observed.
“Yeah, she really is.” He looked out towards the kitchen fondly, seeing her bouncing around.
“You were really good with the rest of the kids at the game, too.” Gibbs continued and stepped towards Tony after setting the picture back down.
Tony glanced up and wondered where he was going with this.
“Makes me wonder why you always seem have issues with children during cases,” Gibbs asked him.
“I don’t always have issues with them.”
“You usually seem uncomfortable dealing with them.”
Tony shrugged. He wasn’t sure how to explain why it was different with the kids on cases. Maybe he couldn’t deal with the trauma they’d been through. Maybe he related to them just a bit too much between losing his own mother at 8 and his entire childhood relationship with his father. Knowing those kids were going to go through the same type of hell he had made it difficult for Tony to know how to handle them. He knew he’d never stay in touch with them so to allow himself to bond with them, even a little, would just make it worse for him and for them.
These kids weren’t like that. They were generally having the idealized version of childhood Tony wished he had and he knew he’d see them every year. Maggie he’d known since she was born. She wasn’t just a kid, she was Magpie.
“That’s just different. It’s not like I’d ever see those kids again and I’m no good at the sympathy thing.” He didn’t look Gibbs in the eye.
Gibbs reached up and chucked his chin forcing Tony to look up at him, “That’s a load of crap. There’s no one more sympathetic than you. Maybe too much so, but I’ll let it go.”
Tony knew Gibbs would call him on it but was glad Maggie was nearby so he wouldn’t force the issue.
“It’s okay if you want to kiss each other in front of me. I’ve seen Glee,” Maggie announced standing next to them with two glasses of lemonade and a large grin on her face.
Tony flushed again and backed up. On second thought, maybe he wasn’t glad Maggie was nearby. “I’d better go get ready,” he said with a nervous laugh. “You two behave yourselves while I’m gone.” He grabbed the lemonade from Maggie and went back to his room.
Gibbs smiled at her. “Thanks for the drink.” He sat down on the couch and she flopped down next to him.
Tony heard her sigh dramatically. “What a day…”
She really was going to be handful as she got older.
---
Tony tried to hurry things along in the shower. He didn’t trust those two together for long, afraid of the stories each would tell the other.
He opened the door and looked out to find Gibbs and Maggie sitting at the dining room table playing cards. From the look of it, she’d convinced him to teach her how to play Blackjack.
“Bathroom’s free, Magpie.” Tony had to dress in his own room, so he stepped out in an old robe he kept here for visits. Gibbs looked up and Tony felt himself warming up and seeing Gibbs blue gaze looking at him from head to toe. The shower hadn’t done enough to cool his thoughts from wandering where they had no business wandering.
Maggie’s observations had hit a little too close to home. Gibbs occupied way too much space in his brain at times, even if he hadn’t recognized it for the crush Angie had so accurately described it as. He acknowledged that truth now. Tony had realized long ago that Gibbs was out of reach and he’d been able to subsume those desires when they flared up.
But seeing the way Gibbs was looking at him as he stood in the hall damp and naked except for the robe made Tony wonder if he hadn’t read the man wrong. After all, he was here, wasn’t he?
Maggie ran past him, whispering loudly, “Watch that guy, he’s a cardvark.” She ran into her room and grabbed her own robe and headed back to the bathroom.
Tony blinked and then yelled back, “Card Shark, Maggie,” correcting her.
He turned back to Gibbs. “Sometimes it’s like being with Ziva,” he said with a smile.
“I like my term better!” Maggie yelled before closing the bathroom door.
“She started doing it when I would tell her some of the funny things Ziva would say when she mixed up words or expressions. To this day, she still calls them Porcuswines.” Gibbs chuckled. “She decided she wanted to make up her own words and expressions, too.” Tony laughed and brought his now empty glass back out to the kitchen. “Need another one, Boss?”
Gibbs was gathering up the cards. “Sure.”
Tony realized they were alone and thought maybe this was the time to get some answers. He refilled his own glass and sat down at the table in the chair vacated by Maggie.
“So - I uh…you sure you want to go to dinner or stay? You don’t have to, Boss. There’s still enough time to get back to DC.”
“Wasn’t here because I had to be, Tony. And don’t call me Boss. We’re not on duty.” Gibbs shuffled the cards and laid out a game of solitaire.
Tony watched and decided maybe it was time to lay the cards on the table, so to speak. He figured Gibbs was just doing something to avoid this conversation.
“Why are you here?” Tony asked bluntly.
Gibbs paused for a second and then resumed his actions. “Wanted to see the game.”
“How did you even know about it?” Tony asked. “I mean I almost didn’t make it,” he trailed off as a sudden epiphany hit him. “You did know. That’s why we’re not on call this weekend.”
Gibbs didn’t say anything but Tony saw the slight involuntary nod that confirmed it.
And Tony saw that Gibbs was the reason he had always been able to make the game. Tony felt a flush of warmth go through him. Gibbs wasn’t always demonstrative. Tony almost snorted at the thought - hell he almost never was, but he showed he cared in other ways.
Gibbs flipped up a card and laid the Jack on the Queen.
“For fear of sounding punny - you want to deal me in on what’s going on?”
Gibbs looked up and half-laughed. “That was bad, even for you,” he said.
“But it got you to look at me,” Tony said evenly. He put his hand over Gibbs’ hand holding the card he was about to play.
“How long? Since I started?”
Gibbs took a deep breath. “Before actually.”
That took Tony aback.
Gibbs pulled his hand out from under Tony and sat the cards down. Tony eyed them and looked back up at Gibbs.
“You weren’t the first case I worked on with Baltimore PD. I had friends there before I met you,” Gibb started.
Tony blinked in surprise and disbelief. “Friends?”
“Okay - contacts. Friends might be too strong a term for it,” Gibbs acknowledged reluctantly. “Anyway, one was close enough to call me to sponsor him for this crazy fundraising idea a new rookie of theirs had to raise money for the families of policeman and fireman lost in the line of duty. I thought it sounded like a good idea but decided to check out the game. I was damned impressed. That rookie had done an incredible job of creating this fun event for families who had been through terrible tragedies. I’ve been going ever since.”
“So, you knew me when I tackled you in that alley?”
“Took me a minute to recognize you, but yeah, I knew it was you.”
“Huh…” Tony said, not knowing where to put that information.
“When I was considering you for NCIS, I called Rick and asked what would happen to your event if you left. He assured me they would continue it and that you would always be welcome since you had created it.”
“Rick Townsend was your contact?” Tony squeaked. Rick had had a crush on Tony but since Tony was engaged, Rick never tried anything but his crush had been a little obvious. Tony had been sure to fix Rick up with an old frat brother of his to deter his interest and it had worked. He thought Rick and Kyle were still together although he hadn’t heard from either of them for several years since Rick left the force. Back then, being a gay cop hadn’t been exactly the safest thing to be and Rick had always thanked Tony for being more tolerant than most of the guys. If Rick had only known that Tony had always been bi, he probably wouldn’t have been so grateful. At that time though, Tony had been too head over heels in love with Wendy so he didn’t notice anyone else until he had tackled a man with the most startling blue eyes he had ever seen. Tony knew back then that there had been a strong attraction to the man that now sat across from him.
He wondered if Rick was part of the reason Gibbs had hired him as he imagined Rick had given Gibbs a rather glowing recommendation.
“Yes. And I made sure he was good as his word until he left the force. By then though your friends Pete and Angie had taken over and I knew you’d always be welcome.”
“By why did you never tell me?” Tony asked. “Why continue coming to the games?”
This time, Gibbs reached out and covered Tony’s hand with his own. Tony couldn’t help but look at them, so like holding hands and yet, not quite.
“You were a dedicated agent but sometimes it’s good to have something outside. Something that reminds you of why you should be dedicated. This was something that was yours and yours alone and I wanted to make sure you had this so I’ve always tried to make sure this weekend was available. I cancelled more than enough of your other plans over the years, but this one I vowed you would be able to do because it meant more to you than anything else. I knew that just by the fact you never told anyone about it.”
Tony looked at him confused. “What does that mean?”
Gibbs began to run his thumb over the back of Tony’s hand. “Tony, you never talk about the things that are really important to you. You never have. You can yap for an hour about a blond you spent an hour with that you’ll never see again or go on and on about some shoes you spent a fortune on, but deep down you don’t care about them or you’d never wear them in the field, but you always clam up when it’s something that means something to you.”
Tony felt uncomfortable and pulled his hand away. “That’s rich coming from…”
“A functional mute like me?” Gibbs laughed. “It’s why I can see it. In some ways we are more alike than you think.”
“And in others?” Tony whispered.
“Just different enough to make this work, I hope,” Gibbs said, reaching out again, this time hesitantly running a finger along Tony’s jaw line.
“Make this work?” Tony whispered again, hearing a little too much hope in his own voice.
“I think you know why I continue to come. I couldn’t not come and see you at your happiest.”
“We’re home!” Angie yelled as she came through the door.
Gibbs and Tony both jumped up, breaking apart, looking surprised and guilty.
“Angie, is …oops,” Pete said as he ran into Angie’s back, who had frozen in the doorway. “Sorry, honey” Pete said to her.
Angie looked knowingly between Gibbs and Tony. “Yeah…what he said.”
“Aw, Mom you have the worst timing!” Maggie yelled. Tony realized she had been spying out of the bathroom door at them. She closed the door and went back to finish whatever she was doing.
“I’d better...uh go finish up,” Tony said and almost ran down the hall to the guest room.
There was a long pause before Tony heard Gibbs ask Pete and Angie, “So, can I help you unload?”
----
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See Warnings and other info on Chapter 1
Go to: Previous Chapter
Chapter 4 - The Kid's a Cardvark
The car ride was fun as Maggie explained all the volunteer options that were available. Tony realized that Maggie was far more observant than he ever thought. She must have overheard almost all of her parent’s conversations about the event. Tony thought she’d probably be a good agent someday.
“I want to do the car wash. It’s easy and fun and you get to meet lots of people,” Maggie said. “Painting might be fun, too but I don’t really like Mrs. Carmichael and that’s whose house they’re painting.”
“Why don’t you like her?” Gibbs asked.
“I took piano lessons with her but I didn’t like them and then Mr. Carmichael died and she stopped giving lessons for a while so I had a reason not to go but now she’s teaching again but I didn’t want to restart them. It would feel weird to go back.”
“So it’s not that you don’t like her, it’s that she makes you uncomfortable?”
“Yeah, I guess.” She sounded distant. Maggie was one of the most well-adjusted children Tony knew but that didn’t mean she didn’t have her issues.
He turned and shook his head at Gibbs to indicate he shouldn’t keep on the topic. He’d tell Gibbs later the specifics. Maggie had seen the car accident that killed Timothy Carmichael two years prior and sometimes she still had nightmares about it. She had been in her school bus and Carmichael had been racing to a fire in his own car as he hadn’t gotten to the station house. All the children had an unfortunate front row seat to the accident but it was a bit worse for Maggie since she knew him from her lessons.
Like the mind-reader he sometimes suspected Gibbs was, he seemed to understand it was not something to pursue.
“What other activities will there be tomorrow?” Gibbs asked Maggie instead.
“There’s a group of people that will be going to a school to plant some stuff. Not my school but some of the other kids go there. Planting is fun so I could do that but I think I’d rather wash cars. I don’t want to do the bake sale - that’s totally boring!”
Gibbs and Tony laughed. “I didn’t offer that. One I can’t bake that well and two, I’d probably eat all the profits,” Tony said with a laugh.
“Do all the kids volunteer too?” Gibbs asked.
“You have to be ten and not everyone does it but they’ll let you if an adult will sponsor you. Mom will sponsor me but I’m hoping whoever buys Tony will let me volunteer with him. I have to do chores all the time with Mom and Dad so it wouldn’t be any fun to hang out with them all day.”
“Okay, if whoever buys me is okay with that, then you can tag along.”
“Do you get to choose what you want to do?” Gibbs asked Tony.
“Yeah, I had to write a little blurb about myself and what I was willing to do and they’ll announce it from the stage. Also, we’ll be required to do things like get drinks, snacks, and assist our “buyers” any way they want,” Tony used air quotes around buyers.
Gibbs looked at him sharply.
“Within reason, Gibbs. This is a family event.” Tony rolled his eyes at his reaction. “There are rules.”
Gibbs nodded and looked back at Maggie. “So are you going to bid on Tony?” Gibbs asked her.
“Don’t be silly. I don’t have any money. You’re going to buy him,” she stated.
“I am?” Gibbs asked, jokingly.
“Of course! He’s your friend. You have to. I went to all that trouble to make sure you could share a room and all - you have to be with him tomorrow!”
Tony turned to look at her and Gibbs glanced in the rear view mirror and saw her looking very determined with her arms crossed as if no was not an acceptable answer.
“What do you mean you made sure we could share a room?” Tony asked, almost afraid to hear the answer.
He could hear her shuffling around in the backseat during the long moment she took to answer. She finally leaned forward as far as she could in her seatbelt and spoke between the seats. “You never bring anyone home so I know he’s like your boyfriend and you should be able to share a room just like Mom and Dad. You talk about him all the time - ‘Gibbs this, Gibbs that’ when you’re telling us about what’s going on. I overheard Mom say she thought you had a crush on ‘Gibbs’ with how much you talk about him.”
Tony felt himself blushing with mortification before glancing over to see Gibbs’ reaction. He assumed he’d be pissed or at least mildly annoyed.
“Boss, I…just work,” he started to explain as he saw Gibbs watching him with a raised eyebrow and a modestly amused expression.
Maggie continued, oblivious to the unspoken drama happening in the front seat. “She said she was worried about you having a crush on your boss. Dad doesn’t think you do but then Dad didn’t know I liked Jeremy Boyer. Mom knew right away ‘cause she said I always talked about him like you do about Gibbs. So, I think that means you like Gibbs the way I like Jeremy. I mean, he’s so cute, right?”
She tapped on Gibbs’ shoulder to indicate she was asking him the question. They were pulling into the driveway and Tony was glad the conversation was about to be over.
Gibbs shrugged. “I’ve never met Jeremy so I can’t answer that.”
She released her seatbelt now that they had stopped and smacked Gibbs’ shoulder. “I mean Tony. You think Tony’s cute, right?”
“Maggie!” Tony said as unbuckled his seatbelt and turned around to face her. “You wouldn’t like me telling Jeremy Boyer what you think about him, would you?” he asked gently.
She blushed and shook her head furiously, apparently realizing that maybe she’d said too much.
Gibbs smiled at Tony, obviously trying not to laugh as they all got out of the car. Maggie got out on Gibbs’ side and he crooked his finger at her. He bent down and whispered something in her ear that made her laugh.
She ran to the front door and opened it with her key.
“What did you say to her?” Tony asked Gibbs quietly.
“I answered her question.” Gibbs said, enigmatically. Tony’s curiosity was burning. He needed to get some answers from Gibbs. It suddenly dawned on him how hinky the entire situation was.
Maggie ran into the kitchen to get a drink as Tony and Gibbs walked into the living room. Gibbs looked around and Tony waited to see his reaction. He suspected Gibbs was surprised at the modest house, expecting most of Tony’s friends to be people who lived the high life. He didn’t seem to have any reaction except for picking up a photo of Pete, Maggie and him at her fifth birthday party that Angie had taken. All three of them had blue icing smeared across their face when Maggie had insisted on feeding them cake like she did her dolls.
“You want some lemonade?” she called out from the kitchen. Tony answered in the affirmative.
“She’s a good kid, Tony,” Gibbs observed.
“Yeah, she really is.” He looked out towards the kitchen fondly, seeing her bouncing around.
“You were really good with the rest of the kids at the game, too.” Gibbs continued and stepped towards Tony after setting the picture back down.
Tony glanced up and wondered where he was going with this.
“Makes me wonder why you always seem have issues with children during cases,” Gibbs asked him.
“I don’t always have issues with them.”
“You usually seem uncomfortable dealing with them.”
Tony shrugged. He wasn’t sure how to explain why it was different with the kids on cases. Maybe he couldn’t deal with the trauma they’d been through. Maybe he related to them just a bit too much between losing his own mother at 8 and his entire childhood relationship with his father. Knowing those kids were going to go through the same type of hell he had made it difficult for Tony to know how to handle them. He knew he’d never stay in touch with them so to allow himself to bond with them, even a little, would just make it worse for him and for them.
These kids weren’t like that. They were generally having the idealized version of childhood Tony wished he had and he knew he’d see them every year. Maggie he’d known since she was born. She wasn’t just a kid, she was Magpie.
“That’s just different. It’s not like I’d ever see those kids again and I’m no good at the sympathy thing.” He didn’t look Gibbs in the eye.
Gibbs reached up and chucked his chin forcing Tony to look up at him, “That’s a load of crap. There’s no one more sympathetic than you. Maybe too much so, but I’ll let it go.”
Tony knew Gibbs would call him on it but was glad Maggie was nearby so he wouldn’t force the issue.
“It’s okay if you want to kiss each other in front of me. I’ve seen Glee,” Maggie announced standing next to them with two glasses of lemonade and a large grin on her face.
Tony flushed again and backed up. On second thought, maybe he wasn’t glad Maggie was nearby. “I’d better go get ready,” he said with a nervous laugh. “You two behave yourselves while I’m gone.” He grabbed the lemonade from Maggie and went back to his room.
Gibbs smiled at her. “Thanks for the drink.” He sat down on the couch and she flopped down next to him.
Tony heard her sigh dramatically. “What a day…”
She really was going to be handful as she got older.
---
Tony tried to hurry things along in the shower. He didn’t trust those two together for long, afraid of the stories each would tell the other.
He opened the door and looked out to find Gibbs and Maggie sitting at the dining room table playing cards. From the look of it, she’d convinced him to teach her how to play Blackjack.
“Bathroom’s free, Magpie.” Tony had to dress in his own room, so he stepped out in an old robe he kept here for visits. Gibbs looked up and Tony felt himself warming up and seeing Gibbs blue gaze looking at him from head to toe. The shower hadn’t done enough to cool his thoughts from wandering where they had no business wandering.
Maggie’s observations had hit a little too close to home. Gibbs occupied way too much space in his brain at times, even if he hadn’t recognized it for the crush Angie had so accurately described it as. He acknowledged that truth now. Tony had realized long ago that Gibbs was out of reach and he’d been able to subsume those desires when they flared up.
But seeing the way Gibbs was looking at him as he stood in the hall damp and naked except for the robe made Tony wonder if he hadn’t read the man wrong. After all, he was here, wasn’t he?
Maggie ran past him, whispering loudly, “Watch that guy, he’s a cardvark.” She ran into her room and grabbed her own robe and headed back to the bathroom.
Tony blinked and then yelled back, “Card Shark, Maggie,” correcting her.
He turned back to Gibbs. “Sometimes it’s like being with Ziva,” he said with a smile.
“I like my term better!” Maggie yelled before closing the bathroom door.
“She started doing it when I would tell her some of the funny things Ziva would say when she mixed up words or expressions. To this day, she still calls them Porcuswines.” Gibbs chuckled. “She decided she wanted to make up her own words and expressions, too.” Tony laughed and brought his now empty glass back out to the kitchen. “Need another one, Boss?”
Gibbs was gathering up the cards. “Sure.”
Tony realized they were alone and thought maybe this was the time to get some answers. He refilled his own glass and sat down at the table in the chair vacated by Maggie.
“So - I uh…you sure you want to go to dinner or stay? You don’t have to, Boss. There’s still enough time to get back to DC.”
“Wasn’t here because I had to be, Tony. And don’t call me Boss. We’re not on duty.” Gibbs shuffled the cards and laid out a game of solitaire.
Tony watched and decided maybe it was time to lay the cards on the table, so to speak. He figured Gibbs was just doing something to avoid this conversation.
“Why are you here?” Tony asked bluntly.
Gibbs paused for a second and then resumed his actions. “Wanted to see the game.”
“How did you even know about it?” Tony asked. “I mean I almost didn’t make it,” he trailed off as a sudden epiphany hit him. “You did know. That’s why we’re not on call this weekend.”
Gibbs didn’t say anything but Tony saw the slight involuntary nod that confirmed it.
And Tony saw that Gibbs was the reason he had always been able to make the game. Tony felt a flush of warmth go through him. Gibbs wasn’t always demonstrative. Tony almost snorted at the thought - hell he almost never was, but he showed he cared in other ways.
Gibbs flipped up a card and laid the Jack on the Queen.
“For fear of sounding punny - you want to deal me in on what’s going on?”
Gibbs looked up and half-laughed. “That was bad, even for you,” he said.
“But it got you to look at me,” Tony said evenly. He put his hand over Gibbs’ hand holding the card he was about to play.
“How long? Since I started?”
Gibbs took a deep breath. “Before actually.”
That took Tony aback.
Gibbs pulled his hand out from under Tony and sat the cards down. Tony eyed them and looked back up at Gibbs.
“You weren’t the first case I worked on with Baltimore PD. I had friends there before I met you,” Gibb started.
Tony blinked in surprise and disbelief. “Friends?”
“Okay - contacts. Friends might be too strong a term for it,” Gibbs acknowledged reluctantly. “Anyway, one was close enough to call me to sponsor him for this crazy fundraising idea a new rookie of theirs had to raise money for the families of policeman and fireman lost in the line of duty. I thought it sounded like a good idea but decided to check out the game. I was damned impressed. That rookie had done an incredible job of creating this fun event for families who had been through terrible tragedies. I’ve been going ever since.”
“So, you knew me when I tackled you in that alley?”
“Took me a minute to recognize you, but yeah, I knew it was you.”
“Huh…” Tony said, not knowing where to put that information.
“When I was considering you for NCIS, I called Rick and asked what would happen to your event if you left. He assured me they would continue it and that you would always be welcome since you had created it.”
“Rick Townsend was your contact?” Tony squeaked. Rick had had a crush on Tony but since Tony was engaged, Rick never tried anything but his crush had been a little obvious. Tony had been sure to fix Rick up with an old frat brother of his to deter his interest and it had worked. He thought Rick and Kyle were still together although he hadn’t heard from either of them for several years since Rick left the force. Back then, being a gay cop hadn’t been exactly the safest thing to be and Rick had always thanked Tony for being more tolerant than most of the guys. If Rick had only known that Tony had always been bi, he probably wouldn’t have been so grateful. At that time though, Tony had been too head over heels in love with Wendy so he didn’t notice anyone else until he had tackled a man with the most startling blue eyes he had ever seen. Tony knew back then that there had been a strong attraction to the man that now sat across from him.
He wondered if Rick was part of the reason Gibbs had hired him as he imagined Rick had given Gibbs a rather glowing recommendation.
“Yes. And I made sure he was good as his word until he left the force. By then though your friends Pete and Angie had taken over and I knew you’d always be welcome.”
“By why did you never tell me?” Tony asked. “Why continue coming to the games?”
This time, Gibbs reached out and covered Tony’s hand with his own. Tony couldn’t help but look at them, so like holding hands and yet, not quite.
“You were a dedicated agent but sometimes it’s good to have something outside. Something that reminds you of why you should be dedicated. This was something that was yours and yours alone and I wanted to make sure you had this so I’ve always tried to make sure this weekend was available. I cancelled more than enough of your other plans over the years, but this one I vowed you would be able to do because it meant more to you than anything else. I knew that just by the fact you never told anyone about it.”
Tony looked at him confused. “What does that mean?”
Gibbs began to run his thumb over the back of Tony’s hand. “Tony, you never talk about the things that are really important to you. You never have. You can yap for an hour about a blond you spent an hour with that you’ll never see again or go on and on about some shoes you spent a fortune on, but deep down you don’t care about them or you’d never wear them in the field, but you always clam up when it’s something that means something to you.”
Tony felt uncomfortable and pulled his hand away. “That’s rich coming from…”
“A functional mute like me?” Gibbs laughed. “It’s why I can see it. In some ways we are more alike than you think.”
“And in others?” Tony whispered.
“Just different enough to make this work, I hope,” Gibbs said, reaching out again, this time hesitantly running a finger along Tony’s jaw line.
“Make this work?” Tony whispered again, hearing a little too much hope in his own voice.
“I think you know why I continue to come. I couldn’t not come and see you at your happiest.”
“We’re home!” Angie yelled as she came through the door.
Gibbs and Tony both jumped up, breaking apart, looking surprised and guilty.
“Angie, is …oops,” Pete said as he ran into Angie’s back, who had frozen in the doorway. “Sorry, honey” Pete said to her.
Angie looked knowingly between Gibbs and Tony. “Yeah…what he said.”
“Aw, Mom you have the worst timing!” Maggie yelled. Tony realized she had been spying out of the bathroom door at them. She closed the door and went back to finish whatever she was doing.
“I’d better...uh go finish up,” Tony said and almost ran down the hall to the guest room.
There was a long pause before Tony heard Gibbs ask Pete and Angie, “So, can I help you unload?”
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