Sonorous

Gibbs heard a sonorous clang from the kitchen. Rushing up the stairs to make sure Tony was ok, Gibbs blinked as he stared at the set of metal bowls scattered across the floor. He raised his eyes to meet Tony’s, who seemed no worse for wear as far as Gibbs could tell.

Tony shrugged. “Oops.”

“What happened?” Gibbs asked. He’d known that Tony was planning to cook lunch, but hadn’t expected him to send all the metal bowls onto the floor.

“I needed the bowl behind these and accidentally knocked all of the bowls in front of it off the shelf trying to get it.” Tony smiled sheepishly at Gibbs.

“No worries. No harm done.” Gibbs commented as he picked up the bowls and started washing them so that they could be put away again.

“You don’t have to do that.” Tony protested. “I’d have cleaned up after myself.”

“No worries. You’re cooking. I can clean. I used to do it for Shan, all the time.” Gibbs remembered fondly.

Gibbs had never hidden his penchant for Shannon until he lost her, but after Mexico he’d found that his penchant for Tony was even stronger than his penchant for Shannon. As such, Gibbs could share bits and pieces of his life with Tony that he’d never shared with anyone else other than Shannon.

Tony still felt bad about Gibbs having to clean up his mess. Especially since, Tony was the guest. Sure, Gibbs had told Tony that he could come over whenever, but Tony didn’t believe it. He couldn’t.

Tony made sure to always bring something when he came over and to check with Gibbs to make sure it was ok before coming over. Usually, he just brought some beer or something when he came over to talk things out at night after a rough case or whatever. Today, though, he’d wanted to make something that required a lot more space than his tiny kitchen had.

He’d asked Gibbs if it would be alright if he came over and cooked if he brought the ingredients. Gibbs had grunted and hung up. Gibbs usual method of indicating agreement.

Tony had never intended Gibbs to help clean up. He’d planned to have the kitchen cleaned except for serving dishes and their plates by the time Gibbs came up to eat. He’d ruined that with his clumsiness that Gibbs was even now taking care of.

Tony also didn’t know what to make of Gibbs bringing up Shannon. He knew from Ducky that even Ducky hadn’t know about Shannon and Kelly before Mexico. Ducky and Gibbs still weren’t fully resolved, so Tony was pretty sure that Gibbs hadn’t mentioned anything about Shannon to Ducky.

It just blew Tony’s mind that Gibbs was sharing something like that with him, when he hadn’t even shared it with Ducky who was a much longer term friend than Tony could ever hope to be. So rather than argue, Tony turned back to his meal preparation.

Maybe if he cooked a good enough meal, Gibbs wouldn’t feel put out. Maybe Gibbs would still let Tony come over when he needed to, if the meal was good enough.

Gibbs was completely oblivious to Tony’s thoughts. After cleaning and drying the metal bowls and putting them back where they belonged, Gibbs headed back to the basement. He knew the meal was in good hands.

Only it seemed that the clumsiness that resulted in knocking over the metal bowls was only the first thing to go wrong with the meal. Oh nothing else resulted in a loud enough noise to send Gibbs up to investigate, but there were many major mistakes.

Instead of using salt like he was supposed to, he’d accidentally dumped sugar in. He’d unintentionally mixed the dry and wet ingredients together when they should have been kept separate. It took him a good 3 tries before he got the dough right.

Even worse than that though was when he started on the filling. He’d only brought enough ingredients for one recipe of filling. He’d gotten lucky with the dough since Gibbs had most of the ingredients he needed on hand, so he could try again easily.

That wasn’t the case with the filling, so when he mistakenly used sugar instead of salt again he knew he’d just have to make it work and hope it didn’t taste too bad. He’d been planning to use green peas in the filling, but ended up putting green beans in instead. Rolling his eyes at himself, he tried to focus so as to not make any further mistakes.

It was a lot harder than normal for him to focus, however, as he really wanted to make something special for Gibbs to make up for the mess he’d made that Gibbs had already cleaned up. The extra pressure he was putting on himself was really getting to him and despite his attempts to follow the recipe exactly, many other switcheroos occurred unwittingly.

By the time it was cooked and ready to go on to the plates, Tony was beside himself with worry. He hadn’t even been able to bring himself to taste it, not wanting to know if it was completely horrible. He finally called out that dinner was ready, somehow managing to keep his voice steady despite his nerves.

Gibbs quickly bounded up the stairs, having worked up quite an appetite. When he arrived at the table, he noticed Tony wringing his hands nervously. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.” Tony quickly replied, shoving his hands behind his back before they gave him away too badly.

Gibbs raised an eyebrow at Tony, but sat down at the table without probing further. Tony quickly sat down too, keeping his hands below the table so that Gibbs couldn’t see them shaking.

Gibbs wasn’t much for ceremony and immediately dug into the food. He let out a little moan, “That’s good.”

“Really?” Tony perked up surprised. He had been certain that it was the worst dish he ever cooked.

Gibbs nodded and continued to eat the food.

Feeling more courageous after Gibbs’ pronouncement, Tony too started eating. He almost spat the food back out, only managing to keep it down with a generous gulp of water. He had no idea how Gibbs was managing to eat this and claim that it was good on top of it.