Pillow Talk

Summary: Tony still isn't happy about Tim's pranks. Sequel to Family Tradition. Warning: discussion of spanking. Don't like? Don't read!

Disclaimer: I don't own them, I'm just playing with them.

A/N: This is part of my discipline series and builds on a larger plot arc. This takes place the morning after the events in Family Tradition and won't make much sense unless you read that story first.

Warning: this story includes discussion about adults being spanked by their boss. If you have a problem with that, click on that 'back' button now. You've been warned.

Tim stepped out of the elevator and glanced at the watch on his right wrist. He was relieved to see that he wasn't late. The bus could be a bit unpredictable in the morning, but at least it meant he didn't have to sit down. And he'd left his car in the parking lot downstairs last night, anyway.

Reaching his desk, he dropped his bag on the floor and reached for the large bottom drawer of his desk. After that fiasco of a stakeout, he'd moved the files he'd kept there into one of the other cabinets and stuffed an old pillow into the drawer instead. It would definitely come in handy today.

To his dismay, he saw that the drawer was now empty.

'Lose something, Probie?'

Tony sounded particularly smug. Tim's eyes narrowed in understanding as he turned towards his partner.

'Tony, gimme back my pillow!'

'Why should I?'

'Because I want to sit down.'

'So? Sit.'

'Tony....'

'I assume that Gibbs punished you last night for that stunt you pulled yesterday... you know, the one where you set me up and got me yelled at in front of the entire office by the Director? Well, consider this your punishment from me.'

'Tony... gimme my pillow.'

'Nope. Sorry, Probie. Pillow's confiscated until I'm sure you've learned your lesson.'

Tony was using his annoying 'authoritative' voice that he'd developed during Gibbs's 'retirement' in Mexico. It still drove Tim to distraction.

'Tony! Stop being mean...'

'Mean? MEAN?! You don't think you were mean?!'

Tony somehow managed to combine 'authoritative' and 'petulant.'

'I already apologised, Tony...'

'Yeah, because Gibbs made you!'

'I still meant it.'

Tim's voice had become very quiet in response to the hurt look on Tony's face. His mind raced through the possibility that his ill-conceived prank might have actually damaged his relationship with his partner... his friend.

'Well, you can have the pillow back when I start to believe you.'

Tony turned his back to him and started working on something on his computer. Tim hesitated a moment longer, then reluctantly sat down, gasping in pain at the unwelcome contact with his still-sore backside.

X X X

'Here.'

Tim looked up to see Tony holding his pillow out to him. He practically leapt to his feet before snatching it and tucking it between the arm-rests of his chair. He settled on it carefully; sitting was still painful, but this was much better.

'Thanks, Tony.'

'Yeah, well, Gibbs will be done with his meeting with Fornell soon, so...'

Tim smiled at the thought of how their boss would react if he arrived to find Tony withholding the pillow. A second later, the smile was wiped from his face by a hard impact with the back of his head.

'OW! Tony! What the...?!'

'Just passing on the Gibbs-slap I got yesterday when he thought I'd put that screen-saver on my computer.'

Unsure how to reply, Tim simply rubbed at the back of his head and went back to work.

X X X

Tim reached for his stapler, gasping in pain as his shifting weight reignited the fire in his backside. Much to his annoyance, he heard a quiet chuckle coming from the direction of Tony's desk. Tony seemed to have thawed a bit over the course of the day, although Tim wasn't sure how much of that was due to whatever Gibbs had said to him when he'd dragged him off to the elevator. He wondered if he should expect another slap upside the head, though, now that their boss had left to get more coffee.

'So, what'd he do to you, anyway?'

'Huh?'

'Gibbs. I'm kinda curious, seeing as how it was almost me and all.'

Tim hesitated, not really wanting to talk about the previous evening's events. Finally, he answered quietly.

'What?' Tony asked, cocking his head in a way that made it clear he hadn't heard his response.

'I got paddled, ok?' Tim huffed, a bit too loudly.

Tony chuckled.

'Yeah, that's bad. Your first time?'

Tim nodded, a bit confused by Tony's reaction. From Gibbs's comments, he'd thought that the old wooden paddle hadn't been used for a couple of decades... but Tony was talking as if he'd been paddled by their boss, too.

'Oh, yeah. That sucks. Having to stand there and make the damned thing first... it doesn't hurt any less the next time, but at least you don't have to that more than once!'

Huh?

'What are you talking about?'

'The paddle, Probie. Didn't Gibbs drag you down to his basement and make you make a paddle for him to use on you?'

Tim paled just at the thought.

'Uh...no. You mean he... you...uh...had to...uh...'

'Yeah. I did. After that thing with the tank.'

Tim nodded, remembering the incident. The expression on Tony's face suddenly changed.

'Hey, wait a minute! If Gibbs didn't make you make your own paddle... he didn't use my paddle, did he? 'Cuz that's just so not cool...'

'Uh, no. He used... uh... he said it was one he had to make when he was a ...'

'No! The one his dad made him make after he took apart all the locks?'

'Yeah.'

Tim smiled shyly at Tony, feeling a strange camaraderie at them both having been told the same story from their boss's childhood.

'I wonder why he had you make a new one?'

'He said it was because it was how his father dealt with him.'

Despite the horror he felt just thinking about having to go through such a ritual himself, Tim felt a surprising pang of sadness at the realisation that Gibbs apparently didn't think that he should be included in what he obviously saw as a family tradition. Despite his own repeated insistence that Gibbs didn't see him as a son the way he saw Tony as one, he had started to feel like maybe his boss did include him in some of his paternal affections, after all. The stark reminder that he didn't struck an unexpected blow.

'I wonder why he kept it all this time. I mean, the one I made? It's going into a bonfire the first chance I get!'

Tony's carefully casual comment was meant to disguise the fact that he was struggling to ignore rising bitterness and resentment. It was bad enough that Tim had been spared the ordeal of making the instrument of his punishment. But for Gibbs to use his own paddle, sharing a part of himself with McGee in a way that he never had with him, was galling.

'He told me his father kept it.. and then he was going to use it with his daughter but... uh... I guess he never had the...'

Tim trailed off, feeling rather uncomfortable talking about Kelly.

Tony bit back a surge of jealousy, his mind overfilling with the idea that Gibbs would use something intended for his own child with Tim, but not with him. As usual, he covered his own discomfort by lashing out.

'I guess you were right, Probie.'

'Huh?'

'Gibbs doesn't see you as a son... he sees you as a daughter!'

'Very funny,' Tim mumbled, trying not to show that the first part of Tony's taunt had cut him like a knife. 'I'm just glad I didn't have to try making a paddle. My high school shop class was an absolute nightmare... I couldn't do anything right, my teacher hated me, and I ended up failing....'

There was something about his tone that made Tony think there was more to the story.

'I don't suppose Gibbs knows that you flunked shop?'

Their boss could be a bastard in a lot of ways, and most people would probably consider spanking his subordinates part of that characterisation, but Gibbs was remarkably conscientious about not exacerbating old traumas... and for McGee, failing a class probably counted as a trauma.

'Uh, yeah... actually... he does...'

Tim didn't bother to explain the context in which he'd discussed the disastrous class with his boss. He was still embarrassed by the outburst that had prompted the conversation, even though he actually remembered the rest of the day rather fondly.

Then, suddenly, he understood why Tony had asked, and realised why Gibbs hadn't had him make his own paddle.

'That must be why he used his old paddle... he knew how hopeless I am, and didn't want to be bothered trying to teach me how to do it.'

Embarrassed by the admission, Tim was staring at his desk, and missed Tony's vehement head-shaking, followed by a slightly horrified expression. He looked up in shock at the sound of Gibbs's voice, right behind him.

'No. Just didn't have any left-handed tools for you.'

Tim sputtered, embarrassed at being caught talking about his punishment with Tony. Glancing up, he found Gibbs looking steadily at him. The expression in the older man's eyes made it clear that he was referring to something more than Tim's physical ability to complete the task.

Tim had been deeply bothered about failing the class, and hadn't realised, until Gibbs had pointed it out, that his teacher should have known that the problem was exacerbated, if not caused, by the school's right-handed tools. In a flash of recognition, he understood that Gibbs wouldn't punish him in a manner likely to remind him of that childhood experience. It wasn't just that Gibbs was far too knowledgeable to make him try to make a paddle without the right equipment; he knew what emotional baggage would, for Tim, be associated with any order involving woodworking.

Tim nodded, meeting Gibbs's eyes, trusting that his boss would recognise his understanding behind the gesture. Gibbs nodded in return, with a brusqueness that clearly declared the subject closed.

Glancing over at Tony, Tim wondered if his partner agreed that everything was resolved.