Post - "Heartland"
In which a trip to Gibbs' hometown becomes so much more than a case.
Stillwater is a small town in Pennsylvania. Coal country. Primarily known for the mine, but only slightly less well known as the birthplace of one Leroy Jethro Gibbs... My mind is spinning with questions, I mean have you ever thought about it? He actually came somewhere, he didn’t just appear you know? He didn’t just start Gibbs, he was a boy and then he grew...
Tony sulked in Abby's lab and took a dejected pull from her CafPow. "Check on the Taylors. What the hell, Abs?"
"Tony," Abby said, drawing the two syllables out as she tucked the evidence bag with the ring back into the box. "If a case from your hometown dropped into your lap, would you want to take your--would you take your girlfriend there if she'd never been before?"
Tony shifted a glare at his forensic tech. "Did you just make me the girl? Why the hell am I the girl? And it's not like it was a... hometown. It was a city, with estates. Totally different. This is... Americana Gibbs-style. Not the DiNozzo Dysfunction Hour."
"And maybe he'd rather show you his favorite fishing hole, or his high school or anything there without a case wrapped around it." She moved to take Tony's hands in hers, squeezing, her eyes earnest and a little dreamy. "He'd want it to be special, Tony."
He sighed and kissed her forehead, highly doubting it. Gibbs was private. Their life wasn't open to anyone's speculation, and his past was never up for discussion. Little snippets, now and then, but only as far back as Shannon. "I mean... there are people who knew him as a kid. Can you imagine Gibbs as a kid? He was like... small and played and... Gibbs had a hometown. And McGee is seeing it. Ziva could never appreciate that," he moped.
Abby closed her eyes at the gentle kiss and squeezed his hands again before letting him go. "You know, he's going to need more hands up there once the case gets bigger. If you get a lead that takes you there to follow up, there's no way he can stop you. Or us." She smiled at him. "All it takes is one piece of evidence and we're on our way."
"My eternal optimist. Better get on it, then." He stopped at the door of her lab, then turned back around, questioned quietly, "Do you really... ya know... think I'm the girl? I'm not a girl, Abs. All man." Skimmed a hand down his chest to hook in the expensive leather belt. "Seriously. Very manly all man."
"Oh, you're both all men." Abby winked at him. "The stuff I picture with you two is all man, trust me." She turned back to her work and put her music back on. "Go check on the Taylors. I'll see what I can find here. We'll be in Stillwater before you know it."
He was about to admonish her, then paused and grinned hugely. Abby totally fantasized about them. He returned to his desk with a swagger to his step, and starting clicking into his e-mail. He needed to update his information request and check a few databases. So the e-mail from Tommy's Girl made him pause a moment before he opened it.
From: Tommy's Girl
To: Tony
Subject: Home
Left a lot of things behind when I left home last time. Need to do a proper threat assessment before you come up here. I know you and Abby will be here soon enough. Will call tonight.
J
So when he finally did call, it was hours after Tony had time to adjust to the thought of Gibbs having a father! That was alive and relatively cool by all reports.
He picked up the phone on Gibbs' side of the bed. "DiNozzo."
"I take it McGee and Ziva filled you in?" Gibbs leaned back on one of his father's porch chairs, looking out at the too-familiar street.
"That you've got a father? That he's pretty cool? That you act like you're fifteen around him?"
"Pretty cool? Well gee, DiNozzo, I'll have to let him know you said that." He didn't address the last part of the sentence. "Think you'll have that warrant for me tomorrow?"
"Yeah... DiNozzo Delivery is full-service... How's everything back in Stillwater?" He relished the way the name of the town rolled off his tongue.
Gibbs sighed and let the chair come back down to all four legs. "About the same as I left it," he said. "Same rivalries. Just older." He'd felt more than a few watchful eyes today; he didn't like it. This place really does make me feel fifteen again. "Bringing Abby too?"
Tony gave a little smile. "Yeah, boss. Abby wants to meet your dad." I do, too. "Need anything?" More personal, not work, just Gibbs-and-Tony.
Gibbs smiled at the idea of Abby meeting Jack, and again at the gentle question. "I'm okay." He ran his hand through his hair, brushing away a few ghosts and glancing back at the front door before saying, softly. "Miss you. How's Penny?"
Tony warmed at the lowered tone and question. "You, too. On your pillow, purring. I think she found a new spot. Which, frankly, thank God, cause... fighting her for mine was getting old." He figured the general chatter would soothe him just enough. "Gonna take me to the soda shoppe?"
"Think it's a clothing store now," Gibbs said, "Pretty soon this place is gonna have a FHC to put it on the map." He worried a little at that, knowing how his father depended on having one of the big chain supermarkets just far enough away that his place was still more appealing.
At least his Dad knew how to make a cup of coffee that rivaled FHC.
"Aw, c'mon Gibbs. There has to be like... a little cafe with a waitress named Maria that's been working the same hair-do and the same tables since 1965, and serves cold coffee. Little towns don't get Fresh Hot Coffees, because it ruins the little-town vibe. Are you really staying with your dad? What does your bedroom look like? Is it the same as when you were a kid? Are you there right now?"
"Throttle it back, DiNozzo." Gibbs could hear the eager smile in Tony's voice. "You'll see it soon enough." He paused, lowering his forehead to his fingertips as he realized what he'd said. "You tell Penny that I'll be wanting my pillow back."
"I thought that's what I always did, Jethro," Tony said innocently, then ruined it. "Want to have phone sex at your dad's house?"
Gibbs snorted out a soft laugh and shook his head. "I'll see you tomorrow, Tony."
"Count on it. Sleep well. You're gonna need it." Wow... Stillwater. He tugged the kitten under his chin and kissed her head while she batted, offended, at him. "Gibbs wants his pillow when he gets back," he told her seriously, then placed her back on it, petting her into submission.
*~*~*~*~*~*
They'd wrapped the case (naturally), and he'd tried to remember that men who got hard watching other men drive gorgeous Challengers probably got beaten, hung and lit on fire in Stillwater.
It still didn't kill the charm and sense of wonder he hadn't been able to quell since driving into town with Abby babbling in his ear. Which was the only reason that he was walking the sidewalks, admiring the decorated store fronts, the soft streetlights, and the well-kept wooden benches that dotted along the mainstreet, like the town expected you to stop and stare, to sit and gossip.
He could even see the stars here, a virtual pipedream with the light pollution, and the regular kind hogging the skies.
Jackson locked the door on his way out; Leroy had gone back to the house already to wrap things up, and he'd seen Abby to her car earlier with a kiss to the back of her hand. He'd invited the rest of the team to stay at the house, but a look from Leroy had them declining and getting rooms at the local hotel.
The only one who hadn't demurred yet was currently walking up the street, and he lifted his hand in a wave. "Tony," he called to him. "Got time to walk a little farther?"
Gibbs had nixed his planned interrogation of his father, so the smile split Tony's face wide and true at the salutation. "Sure thing, Jack!" He jogged the last few steps to catch up with the man, and stuffed his hands into his pocket to ward off the early autumn chill nipping the air. "How's business?" he asked, friendly and inquiring.
"Good enough," Jack said, and added with a grin, "Though I probably lost a few payin' customers after all this." It was a shame, a child losing his father because of this stinking business; he shook his head at that; Leroy's gut may have steered him right, but it was still a damned shame.
But that wasn't why he wanted to talk to Tony. "How long you been working for Leroy, Tony?" He started walking up the block, back the way Tony had come, in a route that would steer them away from prying eyes or ears. This wasn't a conversation he wanted overheard.
Tony kept his eyes carefully on the streets around them, and cleared his throat, kept stride with the man that had raised his lover. "About seven years, sir. Gibbs found me in Baltimore." He kept his tone easy with long practice.
"Jack, please." He waved away the honorific as he listened, keeping an eye on the younger man. "Seven years...mm." He'd thought he'd seen something when Leroy looked at Abby, but the more he'd watched him, the more he'd seen... "How long of that have you been--" He cast about for an opening word. "--close?"
Tony tripped on air and recovered just enough to try to suppress the heat he wasn't sure the other man could see in the dim light. He remembered the years, and the fights and the way they'd ripped and torn at each other... The way Gibbs tossed a ball with Gianni, kissed him stupid sometimes when he walked in the door, just because.
The shiny red grill on his back porch. "Gibbs keeps a close eye on me, helped me become the agent I am." He knew he wasn't answering the question, was pretty sure Gibbs would scalp him and leave his intestines strung on a line as a warning to anyone else who'd dispense personal information.
"We've been friends, though, for a few years. Look out for each other," he gave out tentatively.
Jack nodded again, the reaction and the cautious-yet-casual response confirming, a little disconcertingly, that he'd guessed right. "You met him after, of course, so you might not have seen it." He looked down at the sidewalk. "A light went out in Leroy's eyes when he lost his wife and little girl. I haven't seen or spoken to him since the funeral until this week, but even an old man like me can see that he's been through the wringer and back. Couple of new scars here and there, a hell of a lot more snow on the roof." He felt the wry twist of his smile as he scruffed his hand through his own hair. "Least he won't lose any of it." He looked over at Tony, kept his eyes on him. "But that light's back. Thought I saw it when he looked at Abby, but then I watched a little more and it's when he looks at you."
Tony met his gaze, and stopped walking, his chest tight and warm, but his belly full of churning dread. He'd started frowning when Jack started listing the marks he used as affirmation that Gibbs was still standing. Things he was proud of. "Gibbs is a good man," he told his father firmly as the muscle in his jaw twitched anxiously. "That's what you should see, doesn't matter who put the light there."
Jack stopped when Tony did, thumbs in his belt loops as he regarded the lifted chin, the little twitch in his jaw as the younger man frowned.
Oh Leroy, you never do things the easy way, do you?
Would he have preferred his boy found himself cavorting with that young Abby, or Ziva? Maybe. But wanted Leroy to be happy, even if it opened up a whole new world of opposition for it. The way Tony was looking at him...that was a partner that would give Leroy as good as he got.
Just like Shannon did.
He smiled at Tony, and lifted his hand to clap him gently on the shoulder. "You'll do."
Tony remembered hearing the words from familiar lips with a stranger's eyes, and knew, unerringly, that this was different. That Jackson Gibbs probably saw through both of them, their subtle glances, or the studious not-looking, the casually professional relationship they kept on the job.
He searched the blue eyes (that's where Gibbs got them) and a smile that was more open than his son could manage most days. Tony took a deep breath and nodded once. "He's worth the effort, Jack, even when he is a stubborn ass."
Jack's smile became a grin, then a laugh, and he clapped him on the shoulder again. "He sure is." He resumed the route back to his house; Tony wouldn't be staying at the hotel, not after this.
Tony followed, a little wary, but companionably quiet until they got close to the porch. "I'm sure he won't stay away so long this time," he said earnestly, then realized he was making promises for Gibbs. "I mean... it's the least he can do for losing you paying customers.."
Jack saw the tremble in the younger man's shoulders and took the white sweater off the hook by the door. "Just send a Christmas card every now and then," he said as he draped it over Tony's shoulders. "There's a guest bedroom upstairs and to the left, whenever you're ready."
Tony started to hand the sweater back on principle, but couldn't think of a good reason when the soft thick cotton got closed in his hand, but he stammered, eyes like saucers in the porch light. "I-- I couldn't. I have a room, at the--" He gestured vaguely behind him, "I don't think--" his mind was full of sentences that kept rear-ending one another and none of them could finish.
"I'll see you in the morning." Jack smiled at him and headed inside. He needed to be up early to make breakfast.
Tony watched the man take control of the situation with grace and ease and almost swore. He sat, kind of stunned on the stairs to the Gibbs home, and slid his arms through the sweater and pulled it a little closer.
He was almost positive, five years ago, if someone had told him that he'd be in love with his boss and meeting his father, who was, incidentally, oddly calm and unshakable for everything that had gotten stirred up, and a sweet man... Tony would have laughed or punched them out.
Both.
The sweater smelled like autumn, with leaves and woodsmoke and chill wrapped up in the fibers while his fingers played in the cuffs. Jackson had all but ordered him into the guest room, without even giving him a chance to say no.
He wondered what Gibbs would do with it all, if it'd make him mad, if they'd have to fight. Of course, Tony wasn't averse to slapping Gibbs on the back of the head and telling him to call his damned father, either.
God. What could he have been like with a good father, and Gibbs had thrown one away.
"Heard you were sleeping over."
Gibbs stepped barefoot onto the porch, clad in his white shirt and a pair of cotton sleep pants, and leaned on the rail.
Tony watched his toes for a minute, then looked up, following the line of legs to a familiar broad chest and finally into those blue damn eyes, shadowed by the night. "Only if I get s'mores and a blanket fort," he joked quietly while he shrugged. "Told him I have a room at the-- Look, I didn't... he knows."
Gibbs looked out at the quiet street. "He's not a stupid man, DiNozzo." He looked down at Tony, brushed his fingertips into his hair. "Knew he'd be able to see it when you got here." He'd never been able to get much past him, right up until the time he enlisted.
He tipped his head into Gibbs' light touch, the smile contented as he spoke. Gibbs knew his father could see he loved Tony.
God, Abby'd make this into a romance novel if he wasn't careful. "No, Jack's not stupid, even if his son is, sometimes." It was a soft rebuke, but a serious one.
Gibbs stiffened one finger, tapped once hard in acknowledgement, then stroked to smooth it away. "Point taken." He and Jack had already smoothed some of the rough waters he'd created at Shannon's funeral, and he'd shown Jack that he was more than an angry man wanting vengeance. Now Jack had sealed things with not only acknowledging, but accepting enough of his relationship that he'd invited Tony to stay here...it meant a lot, after such a long silence.
"Coming in?"
Tony heard the silent invitation as clearly as he'd registered Jack's demand, and he turned his head enough to press a surreptitious kiss, more of a graze of his lips, to his fingertips. "Wanna sneak me into your room so we can makeout and listen to records? Over the clothes, above the waist. Swear."
Gibbs shifted his weight from one foot to the other, the soft look hardening quickly. "If you're not careful, I'm tossing a sleeping bag out in the backyard for you." He offered a hand up. "And I'm not kissing you while you're wearing my Dad's sweater."
Tony sulked for a few seconds but accepted the hand, did a classic stumble, I'd like to thank the Academy... and let Gibbs catch him by the hip while he whispered, close and warm, "Your dad wouldn't let me sleep outside. Besides, the sweater thing? Easy fix, boss. Gotta put on pajamas anyway. Do you have The Clash on vinyl?"
"We are not doing anything while we're here." Gibbs steadied him until he was on his feet and ushered him inside. "Come on. I'll get an extra blanket for you."
The guest room was just across the hall from his room, and he smiled to himself as he got a blanket from the linen closet. If Tony had any sense at all, he wouldn't push the issue. He sighed into the closet; if he had any sense at all, he'd stop him if he pushed the issue.
Tony took the blanket with a last sulk, a little smile at the corner of his mouth before he told Gibbs goodnight and slipped into the guestroom. The little look of almost disappointed shock on Gibbs' face was this side of priceless. He stripped down and put on his sleeping clothes, something he deeply, truly resented: sleeping required no fashion, just skin and sheets.
He curled on the bed, picked up a fly-fishing magazine that looked a couple years old and started to flip through it.
Gibbs got back into his own bed, looking at some of the childhood decorations that Jack had kept before he turned off the light. He kept an eye on the light under the door to see if Tony had settled in, but the day's events took more out of him than he expected, and he was asleep before ten minutes had gone by.
Tony gave it almost an hour, set aside the magazine and picked up his iPod, shuffling through till he found the playlist he'd made the minute everyone knew they'd have to go... When Tony knew he'd get to walk the streets Gibbs had as a growing man. He tried and mostly failed the keep the grin off his face as he slipped quietly out of his room and took long silent strides across the hall and into Gibbs' preserved childhood.
He was already sleeping, arm on his chest where Tony usually laid under, so he pulled back the blankets and crept in, pressing a finger to his lips, and his own to his ear and whispered, "Go with it, Leroy." The name felt odd on his tongue, so he flicked it out over the pink shell of it before slipping the ear bud in and hitting play.
Gibbs' eyes snapped open at the touch and the whisper, the plastic odd and hard in his ear until the music started playing. He drew back and squinted, seeing the other ear bud in Tony's ear. "What...?" He couldn't be, not here, not now...
Tony grinned into his eyes, then lowered them bashfully and pressed his lips, closed and dry, tentatively to the other man's. Once, twice, and the third he just kissed his bottom lip while the sounds of Blue Swede's Hooked on a Feeling flowed through their tiny headphones. "We have to be quiet," he breathed, "I'll get kicked out if your parents know I'm here."
Gibbs slid his arm around Tony's waist, his hand between his shoulder blades. "We have to stop," he whispered, making no move to push him away. "Can't go further than this." The tentative reconnection with his father was enough to hold him to that; he was not going to...not in his house.
Tony wetted his lips, close enough that his tongue brushed Gibbs' mouth and he nodded. The heat of Gibbs' hand against his t-shirt clad back made him scoot closer. "Never gone all the way," he confessed softly, hiding his nose in a warm throat before kissing it softly. "Just kissing, okay?"
Gibbs puffed a soundless laugh through his nose at the pseudo-confession, holding him closer as the music played on. "Okay." He kissed Tony's forehead, then his nose and finally his lips.
After his childhood, his good memories began the day he left Stillwater. He could take a liberty or two with this to add to the small gathering of happy memories that began with his talk with Jack earlier in the day.
Tony felt him relax into the kiss, and kept it slow; meandering kisses with no teeth, hands skimming as far as the little dips of muscle at the base of his spine and no further while the music changed their pace or angles, and Tony let out a long sigh as Stuck in the Middle With You cued, and he mumbled his appreciation half-distracted by the mouth chasing his.
Gibbs enjoyed the slow burn with a seventies soundtrack, the kisses soft and the caresses gentle and definitely something he'd want to repeat when they got back. As the song ended and his eyelids got heavier, he furrowed his fingers into Tony's hair, holding him as he drew back. "We got a long drive tomorrow," he murmured into what started as his final kiss of the night and became the third-to-last kiss. "Need to sleep."
Tony nuzzled into Gibbs' cheek with a soft, sleepy smile of his own. "Love you," he spoke softly. "Get some shut-eye." He skimmed a finger across Gibbs' swollen lips one more time before he slipped out of the room as quietly as he'd come, leaving the music in the other man's bed.
"Love you," Gibbs whispered against Tony's finger, watching him leave as he picked up the iPod. He smiled at the new song and thumbed the 'stop' button. Hell of a trip home, he thought, waiting until the light under Tony's door went out before rolling over and going back to sleep himself. He adjusted himself with his hand and gave his erection a firm 'at ease', falling asleep a few minutes later as he hoped he wouldn't wake with it.
Once ensconced in the bedsheets, Tony allowed himself one stroke while he thought about the smile on Gibbs' face, then buried his own in a soft pillow and forced himself to behave. He wondered what the odds were of waking up early enough to beat both of the Gibbses to a cold shower; decided not good, but he refused to worry about it. Both of them seemed to think that Tony would do.
Stillwater is a small town in Pennsylvania. Coal country. Primarily known for the mine, but only slightly less well known as the birthplace of one Leroy Jethro Gibbs... My mind is spinning with questions, I mean have you ever thought about it? He actually came somewhere, he didn’t just appear you know? He didn’t just start Gibbs, he was a boy and then he grew...
Tony sulked in Abby's lab and took a dejected pull from her CafPow. "Check on the Taylors. What the hell, Abs?"
"Tony," Abby said, drawing the two syllables out as she tucked the evidence bag with the ring back into the box. "If a case from your hometown dropped into your lap, would you want to take your--would you take your girlfriend there if she'd never been before?"
Tony shifted a glare at his forensic tech. "Did you just make me the girl? Why the hell am I the girl? And it's not like it was a... hometown. It was a city, with estates. Totally different. This is... Americana Gibbs-style. Not the DiNozzo Dysfunction Hour."
"And maybe he'd rather show you his favorite fishing hole, or his high school or anything there without a case wrapped around it." She moved to take Tony's hands in hers, squeezing, her eyes earnest and a little dreamy. "He'd want it to be special, Tony."
He sighed and kissed her forehead, highly doubting it. Gibbs was private. Their life wasn't open to anyone's speculation, and his past was never up for discussion. Little snippets, now and then, but only as far back as Shannon. "I mean... there are people who knew him as a kid. Can you imagine Gibbs as a kid? He was like... small and played and... Gibbs had a hometown. And McGee is seeing it. Ziva could never appreciate that," he moped.
Abby closed her eyes at the gentle kiss and squeezed his hands again before letting him go. "You know, he's going to need more hands up there once the case gets bigger. If you get a lead that takes you there to follow up, there's no way he can stop you. Or us." She smiled at him. "All it takes is one piece of evidence and we're on our way."
"My eternal optimist. Better get on it, then." He stopped at the door of her lab, then turned back around, questioned quietly, "Do you really... ya know... think I'm the girl? I'm not a girl, Abs. All man." Skimmed a hand down his chest to hook in the expensive leather belt. "Seriously. Very manly all man."
"Oh, you're both all men." Abby winked at him. "The stuff I picture with you two is all man, trust me." She turned back to her work and put her music back on. "Go check on the Taylors. I'll see what I can find here. We'll be in Stillwater before you know it."
He was about to admonish her, then paused and grinned hugely. Abby totally fantasized about them. He returned to his desk with a swagger to his step, and starting clicking into his e-mail. He needed to update his information request and check a few databases. So the e-mail from Tommy's Girl made him pause a moment before he opened it.
From: Tommy's Girl
To: Tony
Subject: Home
Left a lot of things behind when I left home last time. Need to do a proper threat assessment before you come up here. I know you and Abby will be here soon enough. Will call tonight.
J
So when he finally did call, it was hours after Tony had time to adjust to the thought of Gibbs having a father! That was alive and relatively cool by all reports.
He picked up the phone on Gibbs' side of the bed. "DiNozzo."
"I take it McGee and Ziva filled you in?" Gibbs leaned back on one of his father's porch chairs, looking out at the too-familiar street.
"That you've got a father? That he's pretty cool? That you act like you're fifteen around him?"
"Pretty cool? Well gee, DiNozzo, I'll have to let him know you said that." He didn't address the last part of the sentence. "Think you'll have that warrant for me tomorrow?"
"Yeah... DiNozzo Delivery is full-service... How's everything back in Stillwater?" He relished the way the name of the town rolled off his tongue.
Gibbs sighed and let the chair come back down to all four legs. "About the same as I left it," he said. "Same rivalries. Just older." He'd felt more than a few watchful eyes today; he didn't like it. This place really does make me feel fifteen again. "Bringing Abby too?"
Tony gave a little smile. "Yeah, boss. Abby wants to meet your dad." I do, too. "Need anything?" More personal, not work, just Gibbs-and-Tony.
Gibbs smiled at the idea of Abby meeting Jack, and again at the gentle question. "I'm okay." He ran his hand through his hair, brushing away a few ghosts and glancing back at the front door before saying, softly. "Miss you. How's Penny?"
Tony warmed at the lowered tone and question. "You, too. On your pillow, purring. I think she found a new spot. Which, frankly, thank God, cause... fighting her for mine was getting old." He figured the general chatter would soothe him just enough. "Gonna take me to the soda shoppe?"
"Think it's a clothing store now," Gibbs said, "Pretty soon this place is gonna have a FHC to put it on the map." He worried a little at that, knowing how his father depended on having one of the big chain supermarkets just far enough away that his place was still more appealing.
At least his Dad knew how to make a cup of coffee that rivaled FHC.
"Aw, c'mon Gibbs. There has to be like... a little cafe with a waitress named Maria that's been working the same hair-do and the same tables since 1965, and serves cold coffee. Little towns don't get Fresh Hot Coffees, because it ruins the little-town vibe. Are you really staying with your dad? What does your bedroom look like? Is it the same as when you were a kid? Are you there right now?"
"Throttle it back, DiNozzo." Gibbs could hear the eager smile in Tony's voice. "You'll see it soon enough." He paused, lowering his forehead to his fingertips as he realized what he'd said. "You tell Penny that I'll be wanting my pillow back."
"I thought that's what I always did, Jethro," Tony said innocently, then ruined it. "Want to have phone sex at your dad's house?"
Gibbs snorted out a soft laugh and shook his head. "I'll see you tomorrow, Tony."
"Count on it. Sleep well. You're gonna need it." Wow... Stillwater. He tugged the kitten under his chin and kissed her head while she batted, offended, at him. "Gibbs wants his pillow when he gets back," he told her seriously, then placed her back on it, petting her into submission.
*~*~*~*~*~*
They'd wrapped the case (naturally), and he'd tried to remember that men who got hard watching other men drive gorgeous Challengers probably got beaten, hung and lit on fire in Stillwater.
It still didn't kill the charm and sense of wonder he hadn't been able to quell since driving into town with Abby babbling in his ear. Which was the only reason that he was walking the sidewalks, admiring the decorated store fronts, the soft streetlights, and the well-kept wooden benches that dotted along the mainstreet, like the town expected you to stop and stare, to sit and gossip.
He could even see the stars here, a virtual pipedream with the light pollution, and the regular kind hogging the skies.
Jackson locked the door on his way out; Leroy had gone back to the house already to wrap things up, and he'd seen Abby to her car earlier with a kiss to the back of her hand. He'd invited the rest of the team to stay at the house, but a look from Leroy had them declining and getting rooms at the local hotel.
The only one who hadn't demurred yet was currently walking up the street, and he lifted his hand in a wave. "Tony," he called to him. "Got time to walk a little farther?"
Gibbs had nixed his planned interrogation of his father, so the smile split Tony's face wide and true at the salutation. "Sure thing, Jack!" He jogged the last few steps to catch up with the man, and stuffed his hands into his pocket to ward off the early autumn chill nipping the air. "How's business?" he asked, friendly and inquiring.
"Good enough," Jack said, and added with a grin, "Though I probably lost a few payin' customers after all this." It was a shame, a child losing his father because of this stinking business; he shook his head at that; Leroy's gut may have steered him right, but it was still a damned shame.
But that wasn't why he wanted to talk to Tony. "How long you been working for Leroy, Tony?" He started walking up the block, back the way Tony had come, in a route that would steer them away from prying eyes or ears. This wasn't a conversation he wanted overheard.
Tony kept his eyes carefully on the streets around them, and cleared his throat, kept stride with the man that had raised his lover. "About seven years, sir. Gibbs found me in Baltimore." He kept his tone easy with long practice.
"Jack, please." He waved away the honorific as he listened, keeping an eye on the younger man. "Seven years...mm." He'd thought he'd seen something when Leroy looked at Abby, but the more he'd watched him, the more he'd seen... "How long of that have you been--" He cast about for an opening word. "--close?"
Tony tripped on air and recovered just enough to try to suppress the heat he wasn't sure the other man could see in the dim light. He remembered the years, and the fights and the way they'd ripped and torn at each other... The way Gibbs tossed a ball with Gianni, kissed him stupid sometimes when he walked in the door, just because.
The shiny red grill on his back porch. "Gibbs keeps a close eye on me, helped me become the agent I am." He knew he wasn't answering the question, was pretty sure Gibbs would scalp him and leave his intestines strung on a line as a warning to anyone else who'd dispense personal information.
"We've been friends, though, for a few years. Look out for each other," he gave out tentatively.
Jack nodded again, the reaction and the cautious-yet-casual response confirming, a little disconcertingly, that he'd guessed right. "You met him after, of course, so you might not have seen it." He looked down at the sidewalk. "A light went out in Leroy's eyes when he lost his wife and little girl. I haven't seen or spoken to him since the funeral until this week, but even an old man like me can see that he's been through the wringer and back. Couple of new scars here and there, a hell of a lot more snow on the roof." He felt the wry twist of his smile as he scruffed his hand through his own hair. "Least he won't lose any of it." He looked over at Tony, kept his eyes on him. "But that light's back. Thought I saw it when he looked at Abby, but then I watched a little more and it's when he looks at you."
Tony met his gaze, and stopped walking, his chest tight and warm, but his belly full of churning dread. He'd started frowning when Jack started listing the marks he used as affirmation that Gibbs was still standing. Things he was proud of. "Gibbs is a good man," he told his father firmly as the muscle in his jaw twitched anxiously. "That's what you should see, doesn't matter who put the light there."
Jack stopped when Tony did, thumbs in his belt loops as he regarded the lifted chin, the little twitch in his jaw as the younger man frowned.
Oh Leroy, you never do things the easy way, do you?
Would he have preferred his boy found himself cavorting with that young Abby, or Ziva? Maybe. But wanted Leroy to be happy, even if it opened up a whole new world of opposition for it. The way Tony was looking at him...that was a partner that would give Leroy as good as he got.
Just like Shannon did.
He smiled at Tony, and lifted his hand to clap him gently on the shoulder. "You'll do."
Tony remembered hearing the words from familiar lips with a stranger's eyes, and knew, unerringly, that this was different. That Jackson Gibbs probably saw through both of them, their subtle glances, or the studious not-looking, the casually professional relationship they kept on the job.
He searched the blue eyes (that's where Gibbs got them) and a smile that was more open than his son could manage most days. Tony took a deep breath and nodded once. "He's worth the effort, Jack, even when he is a stubborn ass."
Jack's smile became a grin, then a laugh, and he clapped him on the shoulder again. "He sure is." He resumed the route back to his house; Tony wouldn't be staying at the hotel, not after this.
Tony followed, a little wary, but companionably quiet until they got close to the porch. "I'm sure he won't stay away so long this time," he said earnestly, then realized he was making promises for Gibbs. "I mean... it's the least he can do for losing you paying customers.."
Jack saw the tremble in the younger man's shoulders and took the white sweater off the hook by the door. "Just send a Christmas card every now and then," he said as he draped it over Tony's shoulders. "There's a guest bedroom upstairs and to the left, whenever you're ready."
Tony started to hand the sweater back on principle, but couldn't think of a good reason when the soft thick cotton got closed in his hand, but he stammered, eyes like saucers in the porch light. "I-- I couldn't. I have a room, at the--" He gestured vaguely behind him, "I don't think--" his mind was full of sentences that kept rear-ending one another and none of them could finish.
"I'll see you in the morning." Jack smiled at him and headed inside. He needed to be up early to make breakfast.
Tony watched the man take control of the situation with grace and ease and almost swore. He sat, kind of stunned on the stairs to the Gibbs home, and slid his arms through the sweater and pulled it a little closer.
He was almost positive, five years ago, if someone had told him that he'd be in love with his boss and meeting his father, who was, incidentally, oddly calm and unshakable for everything that had gotten stirred up, and a sweet man... Tony would have laughed or punched them out.
Both.
The sweater smelled like autumn, with leaves and woodsmoke and chill wrapped up in the fibers while his fingers played in the cuffs. Jackson had all but ordered him into the guest room, without even giving him a chance to say no.
He wondered what Gibbs would do with it all, if it'd make him mad, if they'd have to fight. Of course, Tony wasn't averse to slapping Gibbs on the back of the head and telling him to call his damned father, either.
God. What could he have been like with a good father, and Gibbs had thrown one away.
"Heard you were sleeping over."
Gibbs stepped barefoot onto the porch, clad in his white shirt and a pair of cotton sleep pants, and leaned on the rail.
Tony watched his toes for a minute, then looked up, following the line of legs to a familiar broad chest and finally into those blue damn eyes, shadowed by the night. "Only if I get s'mores and a blanket fort," he joked quietly while he shrugged. "Told him I have a room at the-- Look, I didn't... he knows."
Gibbs looked out at the quiet street. "He's not a stupid man, DiNozzo." He looked down at Tony, brushed his fingertips into his hair. "Knew he'd be able to see it when you got here." He'd never been able to get much past him, right up until the time he enlisted.
He tipped his head into Gibbs' light touch, the smile contented as he spoke. Gibbs knew his father could see he loved Tony.
God, Abby'd make this into a romance novel if he wasn't careful. "No, Jack's not stupid, even if his son is, sometimes." It was a soft rebuke, but a serious one.
Gibbs stiffened one finger, tapped once hard in acknowledgement, then stroked to smooth it away. "Point taken." He and Jack had already smoothed some of the rough waters he'd created at Shannon's funeral, and he'd shown Jack that he was more than an angry man wanting vengeance. Now Jack had sealed things with not only acknowledging, but accepting enough of his relationship that he'd invited Tony to stay here...it meant a lot, after such a long silence.
"Coming in?"
Tony heard the silent invitation as clearly as he'd registered Jack's demand, and he turned his head enough to press a surreptitious kiss, more of a graze of his lips, to his fingertips. "Wanna sneak me into your room so we can makeout and listen to records? Over the clothes, above the waist. Swear."
Gibbs shifted his weight from one foot to the other, the soft look hardening quickly. "If you're not careful, I'm tossing a sleeping bag out in the backyard for you." He offered a hand up. "And I'm not kissing you while you're wearing my Dad's sweater."
Tony sulked for a few seconds but accepted the hand, did a classic stumble, I'd like to thank the Academy... and let Gibbs catch him by the hip while he whispered, close and warm, "Your dad wouldn't let me sleep outside. Besides, the sweater thing? Easy fix, boss. Gotta put on pajamas anyway. Do you have The Clash on vinyl?"
"We are not doing anything while we're here." Gibbs steadied him until he was on his feet and ushered him inside. "Come on. I'll get an extra blanket for you."
The guest room was just across the hall from his room, and he smiled to himself as he got a blanket from the linen closet. If Tony had any sense at all, he wouldn't push the issue. He sighed into the closet; if he had any sense at all, he'd stop him if he pushed the issue.
Tony took the blanket with a last sulk, a little smile at the corner of his mouth before he told Gibbs goodnight and slipped into the guestroom. The little look of almost disappointed shock on Gibbs' face was this side of priceless. He stripped down and put on his sleeping clothes, something he deeply, truly resented: sleeping required no fashion, just skin and sheets.
He curled on the bed, picked up a fly-fishing magazine that looked a couple years old and started to flip through it.
Gibbs got back into his own bed, looking at some of the childhood decorations that Jack had kept before he turned off the light. He kept an eye on the light under the door to see if Tony had settled in, but the day's events took more out of him than he expected, and he was asleep before ten minutes had gone by.
Tony gave it almost an hour, set aside the magazine and picked up his iPod, shuffling through till he found the playlist he'd made the minute everyone knew they'd have to go... When Tony knew he'd get to walk the streets Gibbs had as a growing man. He tried and mostly failed the keep the grin off his face as he slipped quietly out of his room and took long silent strides across the hall and into Gibbs' preserved childhood.
He was already sleeping, arm on his chest where Tony usually laid under, so he pulled back the blankets and crept in, pressing a finger to his lips, and his own to his ear and whispered, "Go with it, Leroy." The name felt odd on his tongue, so he flicked it out over the pink shell of it before slipping the ear bud in and hitting play.
Gibbs' eyes snapped open at the touch and the whisper, the plastic odd and hard in his ear until the music started playing. He drew back and squinted, seeing the other ear bud in Tony's ear. "What...?" He couldn't be, not here, not now...
Tony grinned into his eyes, then lowered them bashfully and pressed his lips, closed and dry, tentatively to the other man's. Once, twice, and the third he just kissed his bottom lip while the sounds of Blue Swede's Hooked on a Feeling flowed through their tiny headphones. "We have to be quiet," he breathed, "I'll get kicked out if your parents know I'm here."
Gibbs slid his arm around Tony's waist, his hand between his shoulder blades. "We have to stop," he whispered, making no move to push him away. "Can't go further than this." The tentative reconnection with his father was enough to hold him to that; he was not going to...not in his house.
Tony wetted his lips, close enough that his tongue brushed Gibbs' mouth and he nodded. The heat of Gibbs' hand against his t-shirt clad back made him scoot closer. "Never gone all the way," he confessed softly, hiding his nose in a warm throat before kissing it softly. "Just kissing, okay?"
Gibbs puffed a soundless laugh through his nose at the pseudo-confession, holding him closer as the music played on. "Okay." He kissed Tony's forehead, then his nose and finally his lips.
After his childhood, his good memories began the day he left Stillwater. He could take a liberty or two with this to add to the small gathering of happy memories that began with his talk with Jack earlier in the day.
Tony felt him relax into the kiss, and kept it slow; meandering kisses with no teeth, hands skimming as far as the little dips of muscle at the base of his spine and no further while the music changed their pace or angles, and Tony let out a long sigh as Stuck in the Middle With You cued, and he mumbled his appreciation half-distracted by the mouth chasing his.
Gibbs enjoyed the slow burn with a seventies soundtrack, the kisses soft and the caresses gentle and definitely something he'd want to repeat when they got back. As the song ended and his eyelids got heavier, he furrowed his fingers into Tony's hair, holding him as he drew back. "We got a long drive tomorrow," he murmured into what started as his final kiss of the night and became the third-to-last kiss. "Need to sleep."
Tony nuzzled into Gibbs' cheek with a soft, sleepy smile of his own. "Love you," he spoke softly. "Get some shut-eye." He skimmed a finger across Gibbs' swollen lips one more time before he slipped out of the room as quietly as he'd come, leaving the music in the other man's bed.
"Love you," Gibbs whispered against Tony's finger, watching him leave as he picked up the iPod. He smiled at the new song and thumbed the 'stop' button. Hell of a trip home, he thought, waiting until the light under Tony's door went out before rolling over and going back to sleep himself. He adjusted himself with his hand and gave his erection a firm 'at ease', falling asleep a few minutes later as he hoped he wouldn't wake with it.
Once ensconced in the bedsheets, Tony allowed himself one stroke while he thought about the smile on Gibbs' face, then buried his own in a soft pillow and forced himself to behave. He wondered what the odds were of waking up early enough to beat both of the Gibbses to a cold shower; decided not good, but he refused to worry about it. Both of them seemed to think that Tony would do.