Title: The Family Home
Prompt:
comment_fic prompt (
here)
Rating: G
Word Count: 683
Fandom: NCIS (sometime vaguely between Season 3 and Season 11)
Character(s): L.J. Gibbs, team
Summary: (this was the prompt: ) No one could argue that everyone moving into Gibbs's house was the best idea anyone'd had in at least a year.
The Family Home
No one could argue that everyone moving into Gibbs's house was the best idea anyone'd had in at least a year. Although, considering the rest of the decisions they'd made lately, it didn't really have a lot of competition.
It had started with McGee's broken arm. Since he'd broken his right arm, and McGee was left-handed, it was more an inconvenience than a real problem, but Ducky had insisted that he shouldn't stay by himself until it had healed.
Surprisingly, Tony had offered McGee his spare room. Although the two partners bickered almost constantly- once going so far as to actually divide the apartment in half with masking tape- they each found that sharing an apartment might not be such a bad thing after all. So much so that when McGee's cast came off the same day his own apartment lease was up, he'd simply driven back to Tony's and neither of them had mentioned it again.
Only a week later, Ziva's building was evacuated due to a fire. Her apartment, clear on the other side, had been unaffected, but the entire structure needed to be inspected again before anyone could move back in, and that was estimated to take several weeks. Abby eagerly offered to have the other woman stay for as long as she needed. When Ziva's apartment was declared unlivable, they simply packed up the rest of her belongings and found a place for her knife collection next to Abby's coffin.
The real catalyst, though, was Ducky's tumble down the stairs. He wasn't seriously hurt, only minor bruises, but the incident was the last factor in convincing him that he didn't really need such a large house all to himself. He had been staying with Gibbs for the first few days after leaving the hospital, and it had just seemed like the most logical thing in the world to make the move permanent.
Not long after that, a particularly nasty flu bug had gone around the NCIS office and Tony, with his prior exposure to the plague, had been hit harder than most. McGee had done a good job looking after him, until he’d caught it, too, and Ducky had ordered them both to Gibbs’s house where he could keep an eye on them - especially once Gibbs had been the next to catch it. The team was on stand-down with half of them out sick, so Ziva stayed to help while Ducky and Abby tried to stagger their working hours.
One morning, Gibbs woke up with a much clearer head, throat a little sore but feeling much better, and found that his house was full of people. Tony and McGee were still asleep, tucked into the twin beds in the spare room, both of them wheezing a little through their stuffy noses. Ziva and Abby were sharing the bed in the master bedroom, curled away from each other like backward parenthesis and sleeping peacefully. Ducky was in the kitchen, already dressed and stirring a pot of oatmeal on the stove.
“Feeling better, I see,” the doctor said, smiling.
Gibbs nodded, and made his way toward the coffee pot. “Kids are still asleep,” he said, without thinking about it, and Ducky hmmed in agreement.
They made excuses after that - Tony was still recovering from being sick, Ziva had a possible concussion after brawling with a suspect, McGee had stayed at work late and it was too long a drive home, Abby was just ‘stopping by’ right at dinner time - until one night when Gibbs dropped four fresh-cut house keys on the kitchen table.
All four younger people grinned at each other, then Tony said, smirking, “You know you never lock the door, boss.”
“They’re symbolic,” said Gibbs. “You want ‘em or not?”
“Of course we do,” Abby told him, jumping up to hug him. “We’d love to stay here with you.”
“Yeah, boss,” added McGee, softly.
Gibbs looked around at them, working hard not to smile, then gave Abby’s shoulders a squeeze and pushed her gently away. “Eat, before it gets cold. And you’re cooking tomorrow, DiNozzo.”
Tony grinned. “Yes, boss.”
THE END
Current Mood:
cynical