Aestival

“Come on, Tony. Get in the car.” Gibbs opened the passenger door invitingly eager to get on the way.

“Geez, Jethro. Calm down. Where’s the apocalypse?” Tony counteracted Jethro’s hurry with his own lazy balmy intonation.

“You know, we’re liable to get called in the longer we stick around here while we’re on vacation, right?” Gibbs tried to reason with Tony and get him moving faster.

“You really think they won’t call us in from our destination if they need us? Where are we going anyway?” Tony asked raising an eyebrow at Gibbs almost wheedling.

“I think they’ll try, but they’ll have a hard time.”Gibbs smirked his I know something you don’t know look.

“Just where exactly are you taking me, Jethro?” Tony questioned more pointedly knowing something was up.

Gibbs winked, but did not respond beyond a “Get in the car, Tony.”

Throwing the last couple of bags into the trunk, Gibbs stood at the driver’s side door. The passenger door still stood wide open. “Come on, Tony. Everything’s in. Let’s go.”

“We’re not going to Stillwater. Are we, Jethro?” Tony asked as he climbed into the car knowing that Gibbs patience was wearing thin and he’d be left behind if he wasn’t careful. Despite the fact that they’d been on multiple dates previously and had agreed to spend the weekend together, Tony had no idea what Gibbs had planned.

“No.” Gibbs curtly replied. “I’m not inflicting my father on you or me.” Gibbs still hadn’t forgiven his father for taking a date to Shannon and Kelly’s funeral. He had a sneaking suspicion that Tony would eventually work on getting him to forgive if not forget if they continued to date, but for now he continued to ignore his father as much as possible.

Tony watched the road as Gibbs drove them out of town taking in the hot aestival air as the summer sun shown brightly on them. He still had no clue where they were going besides out of town. Gibbs seemed to be taking roads at random though without fail they led deeper into forests and national park type areas. “You better not be taking me camping. I need my creature comforts.” Tony warned as they drove on deeper into the wilderness.

Gibbs rolled his eyes. He had known that long before he ever suggested dating to Tony and while some day he might take Tony camping in an attempt to get him to appreciate the wilderness better he had no desire to scare him off this early on. “We’re not camping.”

Tony continued to look at Gibbs suspiciously for a brief moment after that statement before returning his gaze to the wilderness on all sides of them.

Knowing Tony needed a distraction, Gibbs reached out the hand he wasn’t using for driving and placed it on Tony’s knee reassuringly.

Tony’s gaze shifted from the wilderness to the hand on his knee in bewilderment. He knew Gibbs was trying to comfort him and he appreciated it, but really dating Gibbs wasn’t anything like what he expected. He had expected a lot more nights watching Gibbs work with his boat and so far none of the dates or evenings they’d spent together had even included Gibbs working in his basement on the boat.

Finally Gibbs slowed the car as they neared a dock. Turning into the area marked for parking, he parked the car. Waiting for Tony to get out, he grabbed their supplies from the car and led the way to the dock once Tony had grabbed the rest.

As the got closer and closer to the dock, Tony began to get suspicious that a boat would be involved in this date. “Uh. You do know I don’t know how to drive a boat, right Jethro?”

“It’s called steering, Tony, and I know.” Gibbs stated matter-of-factly, giving nothing away.

Gibbs gave Tony a short and brief tour of the boat. Basically pointing and gruffly announcing the name and purpose of each area, Gibbs didn’t even bother to open most of the doors much to Tony’s dismay. Dropping their gear in the cabin and leaving Tony to explore the rest of the boat, Gibbs made his way back up to the top deck to start the boat and steer it out into the water. He didn’t plan to go far tonight. Just enough to be away from land and most prying eyes. Finding a nice secluded cove, he dropped anchor and let the boat drift as it would with the current.

Surprised Tony hadn’t found him yet, he wandered down below deck in search of where he might have gotten off to. He wasn’t surprised to find that Tony had found the portable dvd player he’d snuck into one of the bags and was busy watching a movie on the couch. Lifting Tony’s legs up from where he was stretched out on the couch Gibbs sat down on the couch and moved Tony’s legs into his lap.

Looking up from his movie, Tony smiled at Jethro. “Hey.” He said softly.

“Hey.” Gibbs replied, patting Tony’s leg not wanting to distract him from his movie too much. After all the boat may not have all the creature comforts Tony preferred, so Gibbs was content to let him enjoy the ones it did.