Disclaimer: Still don´t own them … but whom do I tell???

Rating: T (although, maybe it is not)

A/N: No oneshot, but would be a short one. Please read ... and please let me know what you think about it.

-x-

Notice Of Resignation

It was late in the evening when she dialed his extension number for the umpteenth time within the last two hours. She wanted to be absolutely sure that he hadn´t come back.

He had left about two hours ago. She knew, because he had come down to her lab to get the latest results, or, to be precise, to have instead been told once again that the results he impatiently was waiting for would only be available the next morning. And to be even more precise, these would be the last results he would get from her. Ever. But that she hadn´t told him -- of course!

She wasn´t able to go on like that anymore. She just couldn´t stand this any longer.

In the morning he would find what he had asked for at his desk, together with an application for leave -- she would take all her remaining holiday as from the very next day on -- and her notice of resignation. So much for that.

But well planned things almost always turn out differently, that much is certain. And of course they did this time as well. And, looking back at that night´s events, things were much better now than before. They had turned out in a really satisfying sort of way.

But, first things first.

So, before leaving, she dialed his number again -- just to make sure one last time -- and with trembling hands she took the notice of resignation, the application for leave and the results, which in fact had not been ready when he had left, but the test had not taken her the whole night either of course.

She walked out of her lab and turned to look back one last time before switching off the lights, swallowing hard as she did so, to fight down the growing lump that had formed in her throat and persistently threatened to suffocate her.

She took the elevator up to the squad-room. With the back of her free hand she wiped away the tears that were silently running down her cheeks.

The squad-room was almost dark, only the dim emergency lights that never went out, sparsely lit the room. It was sufficient, though, for her to walk over to his desk, she would even have been able to approach it in complete darkness.

After standing in front of his desk for endless minutes -- during which she remembered all those moments that she had been standing here, being looked at by him, every single one of those moments had engraved itself in her memory -- she put the sheets of paper down and whispered:

"Bye, Gibbs."

To be continued...