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In a sea of 100s, she instinctively picked him out from the crowd as she stepped out of the Arrivals gate at Dulles. His raised chin at seeing her too, lifted her spirits. It had been an emotionally taxing trip and his blue eyes were a comforting oasis as much as his small grin. Still, she knew there was one more thing she needed. Walking quickly with her Army duffel and garment bag, she was pleased that he was meeting her half way, because she could barely wait to drop the bags and curl into him. If he was surprised by her action, it was only momentary, because it took a fraction of a second for him to wrap his arms around her.
"That's better," she whispered to his heart.
He said nothing, and she loved that about him, his ability to let the moments speak for themselves. The world went on around them and he shielded her until she was ready to face it again. Pulling back, she wiped away a small tear.
"Horrible flight," she said. "Guy beside me ate hard boiled eggs the whole trip."
He knew it her way of deflecting the spotlight on her emotions, and he gave her the respite.
"Didja tell him you were a federal agent and would have him arrested when the plane landed?"
She lightly tapped her forehead. "Damn. I didn't think of that."
They stood in comfortable silence until Gibbs reached down for her bags. “You wanna head home or-?”
Unsure what ‘home’ meant to him (hers? his?), she suggested, “I know it’s late, but I’d kill for a good cup of coffee.”
“I know just the place.”
…..
“Agent Gibbs.”
“Cathy.”
They were greeted as they entered the diner, and Gibbs bypassed the counter and waited for Jack to slide into a booth. The waitress was immediately at the table with a coffee pot.
“So you don’t just come here in the morning,” Jack smiled at him, both because of the greeting and the service.
“Some late nights have brought me around,” he admitted.
Cathy poured two steaming cups and asked, “Anything to eat?”
Glancing at her watch, Jack said, “I shouldn’t. Maybe just a soup? Chicken?”
“It’s homemade,” Cathy replied. “Good choice.” She looked at Gibbs. “The usual, or is it too late for you?”
He snorted. “Is it ever too late?”
She winked. “Be back in a jiffy.”
Left alone, he watched her close her eyes and absorb her surroundings. He had brought her here a hundred times but never at night, and it was like he was seeing her for the first time. It seemed she felt the same about the diner, because a small smile formed.
“I love this place.”
Her simple confession warmed him in ways he couldn’t explain. Like he had shared something personal and she had brought it into her life like it was hers. When her eyes opened, she looked right at him, finding and giving a quiet comfort. She held his gaze for a second, then reached for the sugar. Her focus was on the white grains hitting her spoon before they fell into the coffee.
“California was hard.” The spoon tilted once, twice, a rhythmic fill-and-dump twist of her wrist.
He waited for her to continue on her own terms.
“It was like burying my dad a second time. Except he wasn’t, so-”
This time, she didn’t continue, so he did it for her. “You felt you couldn’t grieve.”
The clink of metal against ceramic stopped. “I guess not. I felt more like a therapist than a family member, but that was probably more of a defense mechanism than how they were treating me. I just didn’t know how to deal with it.” She placed the spoon by the cup, brushed her hair back and rested her chin in her hand. “Anyway.”
She watched him lift his mug and was fascinated at the simple task of taking a drink, his hands so big and the cup so small that it almost disappeared behind his fingers. Reaching into her pocket, she pulled out a small item and placed it on the table. The bronze glinted under the diner lights. He waited for her nod before he reached for it.
“Distinguished Service Cross,” he said.
“Korean War.”
He nodded his appreciation. “The 625. Army?”
“Air Force. He never failed to remind me. Flyboys.”
Gibbs chuckled. “He give this to you?”
“Left it to me in his will.”
“He gave it to you for a reason.” He didn’t try to catch her attention when she shook her head and looked away. Instead, he recited the criteria for the medal. “Distinguishes himself by extraordinary heroism while engaged in an action against an enemy of the United States. The act of heroism must be so notable and have involved risk of life so extraordinary as to set the individual apart from his or her comrades.” He steeled himself at the sight of her lower lip trembling. Rubbing his thumb over the ‘For Valor’, he repeated, “He gave it to you for a reason.” He reached for her hand and pressed the medal into her palm before gently closing her fingers and wrapping his around them. The tears came as he expected, as he knew they needed to, and he let her cry quietly in the comfort of the empty diner.
…..
She came back from the bathroom, as refreshed as she could manage, and took her seat again. She bit back the apology that was on her tongue, knowing he didn’t want to hear it and knowing, deep down, that the situation didn’t warrant it. He would never expect her to apologize for being honest about her emotions, and she felt so much better that she wasn’t sorry at all. She chose something else that she knew he’d wave away, but that she needed to say.
“Thank you.” As she suspected, he tried to play it down, but she jumped in before the words left his mouth. “Just say ‘You’re welcome, Jack’.”
Cathy came to the table with their food and raised a warning eyebrow at Gibbs. “I’d listen to this one if I were you.”
“Yeah, I’m startin’ to figure that one out, Cathy,” he drawled to the waitress. Looking across the table, he said, “You’re welcome, Jack.”
Cathy patted him on the shoulder. “The more you say it, the better you’ll get at it, sweetie. Now, if you need anything else, just give me a shout.”
Admonished by two women, he held out his hands and asked the air, “Can I eat now?”
She laughed- really laughed- for the first time that night.
…..
"Guess I was hungrier than I thought."
He looked at his plate, now on her side of the table, missing half his burger and most of his fries.
"Ya think?" The words, normally filled with sarcasm, were laced with humour.
She shrugged and popped the last crispy potato into her mouth. "I make no apologies."
While it had pained him to see her cry, allowing herself to do it seemed to have lifted the cloud over her, and he'd take that trade-off all day long.
"Ready to head home?"
There was that word again, and she wanted it to mean so much more.
"Sure."
He drained the last mouthful of coffee, a small distraction to give him time to think. But maybe thinking was the problem.
"You could stay at my place." He pretended not to see her surprise. "It’s late. Ya got a change of clothes in the back of the truck. I got a bed no one uses." His shrug tried to make the words sound casual.
She knew they were at a crossroads in whatever was developing between them; she knew it when she came back from California for a single day, just to get some kind of comfort from seeing his face. She knew it when she slipped into his arms in her office and in the airport. She definitely knew it now from the way his blue eyes went crystal clear.
"Okay," was all she said, like the simple word didn't carry the weight of possibilities.
…..
"Take a left here."
He had done the drive from the diner to his house and back so often, he could've done it blindfolded. But after the first turn out of the parking lot, she had directed the trip. He agreed without question, curious where she was taking him. It didn't take him long to figure it out, but he waited until he put the truck in park.
"Hains Point."
"It was one of the first places I found when I moved here," she said, looking out into the night. "Good place for thinking. And making out." He looked out the driver's window to hide his grin, but it didn't go unnoticed. "So I've heard. About the second one."
His grin broke into a chuckle. "Thought you were gonna tell me the story about the guy with the hook for a hand."
She mirrored his smile with hers. "Pretty sure I'm safe."
Unclipping her seat belt, she opened the door and slid out of the truck. He watched her walk to the front of the truck but avoiding the headlight's glare. The light shone forward into the dark, catching her in its peripheral and casting shadows. She seemed to be looking at her phone and he wondered what was going on in her head when she looked up.
"You coming or what?"
"Didn't know I was invited," he groused. The door shut behind him, and he cut through the bright light to stand in the partial shadow by her side. "You're not thinking of murdering me, are ya, Sloane?"
A song flowed through the phone and she reached for his hand. “Not right now, no. But I’m sure that will change in the future.”
“Gee, thanks.”
“C’mere.”
He knew exactly what she was leading him into, but he gave no fight. The hand that reached for his left curled into his palm while her opposite hand trailed up to his shoulder. When her hips swayed close to his, he slid his right hand around her waist and pulled her even closer. They swayed to the music that wafted through the night air.
"You're a good dancer."
"I've done it once or 4 times."
The idea that he only danced at his weddings was so ridiculously, dryly Gibbs that she laughed and he basked in its warmth. Their lips came close then retreated, both from the sway and the delicious inevitability of the moment.
“Thought you wanted an Italian restaurant and a nice bottle of wine."
She shouldn’t have been surprised he remembered what she had said the last time their mouths were this close.
“Like the murder, I reserve the right to change my mind at any moment.” His laugh tickled her lips. “Can I tell you something?”
“Anything.”
“This is the memory I want.”
It was the only invitation he needed, and when his lips finally touched hers, when she gave up a little moan in his mouth, and when he felt the final piece of her fall into the space of him, he knew it was the memory he wanted, too.
…..
“Still don’t know what it’s like to make out on Hains Point,” she sighed when they pulled into his driveway.
He pulled back, pretending to be offended. “We necked.”
“‘Necked’,” she repeated with a grin. “Do kids still call it that these days?”
“What the hell do kids know?”
Her laugh turned into a yawn and she covered her mouth. “Sorry.”
“Let’s get you into bed.” She wasn’t so tired that she couldn’t quirk a playful eyebrow. “To sleep, Sloane.”
“Mmm,” she murmured disapprovingly, following his lead to the house. “At least let me take a shower first.”
He nudged the door open with his foot and let her in first, then made his way up the stairs with her bags. She took a left towards the kitchen.
“I’m going to grab some water; be right up.”
The faint light from the lamp near the couch guided her way past the dining room table and to the small kitchen galley where she opened the fridge and grabbed a bottle. Breaking the cap seal, she closed the door and leaned back, enjoying the quiet comfort his home had given her since the day they met. The bottle just touched her lips when she saw it; something in the small alcove between the dining room and the living room.
The Rorschach.
She wasn’t sure what she thought he would do with it when she gave it to him, but she was pretty sure she never imagined him hanging it up across from his dining room table.
“Call me crazy, but I'm startin' to think it's a moth."
He had come down the stairs to find her in the kitchen doorway, bottle paused at her lips.
She took a drink, used her shoulders to push off the fridge, then said, “First, I’m a psychologist; I would never call you ‘crazy’.” They met halfway. “Second,” she paused. “I don’t have a second. I’m surprised.”
“That you don’t have a ‘second’ or that I hung it up?” His head tilted towards the print.
She gave him a small hip check. “Wise ass. That you hung it up!”
“What else was I supposed to do with it?”
“With you, who can say?” He hip checked her back. “I don’t know. I guess my best case scenario was that you’d hang it up in the basement. Somewhere you can see it but away from prying eyes.”
“Yeah,” he admitted, “I’m gonna hear about it from Fornell on our first poker night back.” He lifted his chin, almost defiantly, as if daring himself to be truthful about his feelings. “I like havin’ it there. It goes with my coffee and paper.” That was about all he was willing to confess, but it was more than enough.
“Symmetry,” she whispered into his shoulder.
“Yeah. I guess so.”
Rubbing her cheek into the flannel, she asked, “You coming upstairs tonight?”
It was a question that offered but didn’t expect.
“No. But I might not make the same mistake tomorrow night.”
His smirk lit up his eyes and lifted her heart. Stretching up, she kissed his cheek, then the corner of his mouth. “Understood.” She swung the bottle and her hips on the way to the stairs, where she turned and said, “If you change your mind…”
He chuckled and shook his head, and when she was out of sight, he pulled out his chair opposite the print and thought of the woman upstairs.
…..
Before she hit the shower, she stepped into the bedroom to leave the water on the side table, and for the second time that night, something caught her eye. This time, it was the small pile of clothes at the foot of the bed. She recognized the pajama shorts with the cartoon clouds, but the shirt neatly folded on top was new- a white T-shirt with ‘USMC’ emblazoned across the front.
He could hear her laughter all the way down the stairs.
…..
-end