Summary: Tony's crazy little ninja is heartbroken and all Tony wants to do is make her smile.
Ziva David sat at her desk in the office. It was late, very late. Far too late for anyone to be at work, and yet, that's where she and Anthony DiNozzo found themselves on that Saturday night, typing away furiously, hoping to get rid of mountains of paperwork on each of their desks. Why'd McGee decide to take time off during the slowest week ever when all they had to do was a never-ending amount of filing and paperwork?
"This is not how I wanted to spend my Saturday night..." Tony muttered under his breath with a scowl at the file in front of him.
Ziva scoffed a bit, "As if this were how I wanted to, Tony? I had plans that, even though they were cancelled, there are many more things I would much rather be doing at this moment."
Tony gave her one of his infamous smirks, "Oh yeah? Like what?"
"Do not ask questions you do not want the answer to, Tony." Ziva warned and winked at him with a mischievous smile tugging at her own lips.
Tony wasn't very sure how to reply to that comment, not that he was able to as the Israeli woman had now turned her attention back to her computer screen and was typing away again. He let his eyes linger on her a bit longer. Her dark brown curls laid in a flawless mess just past her shoulders, her eyebrows were furrowed slightly in confusion, her dark brown orbs... Oh, how beautiful those brown eyes of her were. He could drown in them as if drowning in a pool of chocolate if he stared into them long enough, which he never did because she usually would snap at him for staring at her before he could even jump in.
She looked up at him suddenly, her mouth half open, about to ask him his reasons for staring at her, when their eyes locked. Ziva completely forgot everything she was going to say and what she was even doing. Her breath caught in her throat and time seemed to stand still just for a moment before the chime from her cellphone tore them away from their unannounced contest and forced Ziva's attention to it like a crying child begging for her mother's attention.
Ziva looked at her phone, realizing that the reason why it had made that sound was because she had received an email. Instead of reading it on her phone, like she usually did when she was away from a computer, she quickly signed into her email account and opened up the email. Tony cleared his throat lowly after breaking gazes with her and awkwardly looked back down at the paper in front of him. Seconds turned into minutes slowly and the silence between the two seemed to stretch out to what felt like an eternity to Tony. The senior field agent finally looked up to ask her something, "Hey Zee..?"
The brunette didn't look up at him right away from where she was writing on a file. When she did look up though, Tony spotted instantly a missing spark in her eyes that had been there just ten minutes before and they were red, glassy almost, as if trying to swallow some sort of emotion but failing, which explained why she continued to blink rapidly while she tried to not break her gaze from Tony. However, it was getting harder to keep hold of the stare into his blue eyes without crying. Tony was one of the few people who could read her soul just from looking into her eyes and as much as that scared her, his ability to do that, it made her try even harder to abate any of the emotions that were threatening her at that moment.
"Yes, Tony?" Her voice sounded hoarse to his ears, compared to the playful tone it carried just a few minutes before. What had changed?
"Yeah, I was just wondering, what di-" he paused, his eyes squinted slightly at her to get a better look and frowned, "Are you okay, Ziva?"
She gave him an odd look, pretending to know not what he was talking about; but they both knew that she could never lie to him. "Of course I am, DiNozzo. Why wouldn't I be?"
"Glad you asked."
Tony sprang from his comfy computer chair suddenly and strode in two steps over to her. Before she could process what was going on and what Tony was doing, he swiped his right thumb over her left cheek, swiftly removing the tear that had been slithering down her smooth skin. Tony would relish in the softness of her cheek under his fingers later. He outstretched his fingers and cupped her left cheek before whispering, "Because if you were okay, that wouldn't have slipped out. And all the others that seem to be following it as well." With his other hand, he wiped her other cheek.
"I," she frowned. She felt very ashamed all of a sudden. Standing quickly, Ziva rounded her desk corner and quickly walked to the bathroom, throwing a disconsolate 'Excuse me' over her shoulder.
Tony sighed and rubbed his face, now leaning against her desk and looking onto his. She looked so upset and there was honestly nothing more that broke his heart than to see Ziva cry. He admired her strength mentally, physically and emotionally. So if she was ever crying, it made him think: what was happening or what was causing her so much pain to break her either emotionally, physically or mentally? And of course, at that thought he just wanted to go and eradicate that thing off the face of the earth.
He opted on giving her a few minutes before following her. He walked into the women's bathroom like it was nothing. He and Ziva were the only ones in the office, so he walked in as if it were the most normal thing in the world.
"Ziva? Ziva, you in here?" He called.
However, even if she was going to lie to him and say no, or not reply at all, the sniffling coming from the very last stall that was designated for handicap was a dead giveaway that the Israeli woman was there. A frown graced Tony's otherwise flawless face as he neared the stall and softly he said, "Ziva? Are you okay?" He knocked softly on the door.
"I'm fine, Tony..." She whispered and sniffed again.
He raised a brow, "Really? Then why don't you come out here and show me that, hmm?"
Knowing that he wouldn't leave until she complied, Ziva stood from the toilet that she was using as a makeshift chair and unlocked the bathroom door. She looked up at the face looking back at her. There was this unspoken concern deep in his beautiful blue eyes. Ziva felt, for the umpth time that night, herself getting lost in them. So lost that she hadn't realized when his lips started moving nor could she hear or understand what he was saying to her. Her eyebrows knitted together in confusion.
Tony realized that she had gotten lost in thought, or so he reckoned, so he repeated, "I said, I don't know what happened that made you so upset and I don't think I want to know, because I think I'd kill the guy... Person who made you cry..." He swallowed and chuckled a bit, "I mean, c'mon, you're...Ziva David; crazy little, Israeli ninja chick who can't ever get her English idioms right despite the fact that she knows like ten languages."
He got a weak laugh out of her and then continued speaking, "You're practically superwoman if you ask me. You can kick ass, you lack a bit of tact but you make up for it in how you protect those around you and how you care for them. You're tough and you don't take any crap from anyone and you're incredibly hot!"
She swatted his arm, still laughing. Gently, he reached up and brushed the tears that fell from her eyes and continued speaking lowly, "You're an absolutely amazing woman, Ziva. When you let down those barriers and let people see you for who you really are... Man, what the world is missing out on! And, if he didn't know how to appreciate what you had to give, the real you, then he didn't even deserve you in the first place."
"How did you know...?" She whispered to him, bowing her head.
"I saw the email..." He replied, and put two fingers under her chin to make her look at him, "Hey, he's not worth your tears. And if he was, he wouldn't make you use them."
Ziva shook her head and explained, "I... I loved him, Tony. Our relationship was going amazing and he was amazing and everything seemed perfectly fine. We had such... We never argued, we had a lot in common, it just seemed perfect... Too perfect." She couldn't seem to get rid of the pain in her chest. It hurt her to think about it. Did she really mean that little to the man she loved that all he did was send her an email to tell her that he had found somebody better? AN EMAIL!
Tony felt his heart break and he watched her ramble on. She didn't deserve this. He knew that and he only hoped she knew this too. She deserved so much better and he... He could give her more than this, couldn't he?
His index finger found her lips and he pressed it there to shush her. "Smile," he said simply.
The confused look that plastered her face was the most adorable look he'd ever seen. "What?"
"Smile," He said again and gave her a smile and wink of his own.
She chuckled weakly and shook her head, "Tony, if this is another one of your-"
"Smile though your heart is aching. Smile even though it's breaking. When there are clouds in the sky, you'll get by," the Italian man began singing.
Ziva's mouth opened slightly, "Wha-"
"What? You guys never heard of Nat King Cole in Israel?" He teased gently and chuckled.
"We have, it's just... You're singing..."
"Well, what else would we dance to?" He wrapped his arm around her waist and took her hand, beginning to sway and spin around slowly with her.
"If you smile through your fear and sorrow. Smile and maybe tomorrow, you'll see the sun come shining through for you..."
Ziva laughed at the ridiculousness of the situation. They were standing, no, dancing in the women's bathroom late at night in the office, after her boyfriend had broken up with her through an email. Yep, this was one of those unbelievable nights.
"Tony, st-stop..." She said weakly through the low laughter that left her lips. She looked up at him; his eyes were closed as he continued singing the words in his best Nat King Cole impression.
"Light up your face with gladness. Hide any trace of sadness. Although a tear may be ever so near, that's the time you must keep on trying. Smile, what's the use in crying? You'll find that life is still worthwhile, if you'll just smile..." He began humming through what she guessed was an instrumental interlude.
"Tony this is ridiculous..." She said to him, still laughing a bit and looking up at him. She began pulling away.
"Shh Ziva, or you'll ruin the moment," he whispered and pulled her back and continued singing again. At that point, Ziva decided that she would just give up and give in to what he was asking of her. Her own arm snaked up around his neck and she began to sway with him, while he held her other hand and his arm was around her waist again.
"That's the time you must keep on trying. Smile, what's the use in crying? You'll find that life is still worthwhile, if you just..." He opened his eyes and looked down at the beautiful woman he was now holding close in his arms. Their eyes locked as he whispered the last word of the song, "smile."
She then couldn't stop the smile that was gracing her otherwise flawless skin. No other words needed to be exchanged as she pulled him closer and hugged him tightly. He hugged her back just as tightly.
This idea had been bothering me since December of 2010. It's ridiculous to be honest. Finally today I decided to finish the story and post it. I hope you enjoyed it, and yes, it might be very out of character. I'm sorry, but for the sake of the story I had to go non-canon. lol! Let me know your thoughts on it?