Disclaimer: NCIS is not mine. The show and the original characters belong to Don Bellisario, Gary Glasberg, and CBS. This was written strictly for fun, not for profit.
Summary: An extended tag to 10.24 Damned If You Do; Resigning from NCIS alongside his co-workers should have been Tony's first clue that it was going to be a summer like no other. Then she offered to be his piano teacher, and nothing was ever the same.
And so with the sunshine and the great bursts of leaves growing on the trees, just as things grow in fast movies,
I had that familiar conviction that life was beginning over again with the summer. ~ F. Scott Fitzgerald
- May -
It was no easy feat startling Ziva David, but she was practically asking for it when she slinked away from the rest of the dinner party and into the shadows cast by the dim lamp light in his living room. Apparently, his baby grand was too tempting for her to resist.
"That's right, you play."
His voice was an electric shock to her spine, straightening further her habitually ram-rod straight back, compliments of the Israeli Army or the ballet classes she once mentioned taking as a young girl, he couldn't be sure. Probably both.
Caught with her fingers on the keys, Ziva glanced over her shoulder, a pose any movie starlet worth her B-List status had perfected. Instead of a smoldering pout, she smiled. It was fainter than the dazzlers she'd displayed for the benefit of McGee and Abby during dinner. It was honest.
"I am surprised you remember that."
Tony blindly took the single step down into the room and sidled up alongside her, all without jostling the glass of wine in his hand.
"You are…unforgettable, Miss David."
They exchanged looks—his pleased, hers appreciative—with practiced ease. It was comforting that some things hadn't changed in a summer defined by changes, starting with the mass resignation from NCIS that saw him, Ziva, and McGee suddenly unemployed and effectively in possession of the federal charges lodged against their boss. At least they were still friends.
Together, the ex-partners stood in front of the piano that served as centerpiece in his apartment, their faces reflected in the glossy black surface. Even in the watery mirror, her expression was clearly forlorn, lost in a past only she could see. One of her willowy fingers stretched out and plunked down on a random key. A hollow tone rose and then faded.
"I used to play," she admitted, adding with sudden insight, "As did you, if I remember correctly."
Tony exhaled a half-hearted laugh, resisting the tug of his own memories. "That was a long time ago."
"You could learn again."
"I'm an old dog, Ziva."
Her brows knit together, communicating her confusion at the idiom.
"Set in my ways," he clarified.
"I could teach you." The offer slipped into existence with no pretense; the corners of her mouth wavered in a shrug as she turned her direct gaze on him, waiting for a response. "It might take our minds off other things…"
It wasn't the first time she'd made the suggestion, but it was the first time he was considering accepting it.
Granted, learning to play the piano wasn't exactly an item on his Bucket List. It was just that he always forgot how endless a week was until he didn't see her for the entire length of one, and that wasn't something he felt capable of repeating every seven days, courtesy of these group gatherings scheduled by their Goth friend, for the remainder of the summer. It was still May.
"Only if you would like," Ziva qualified, after his stunned silence filled an extended moment.
A sip of the ruby liquid from his glass moistened his mouth enough to speak. "I could make some time," he eventually replied.
Tony was pouring himself a cup of coffee when a decisive rhythm of knocks resounded from the front door. Now that he was home more often, the old cougar across the hall had taken to 'stopping by' every chance she got to ask about Senior, or—what really tickled his fancy—for no reason at all. Nine in the morning was a bit early, though, even by her unabashedly intrusive standards.
"What does she want now…" Tony muttered, cinching the terrycloth belt on his robe tighter around his waist and padding bare-footed into the main room. With a sharp tug on the handle, the door swung ajar. "How can I help you, Jennif—" His words dropped off at the reveal of the visitor's identity. "Ziva?"
"Were you expecting someone else?"
A far cry from his desperate neighbor, his ex-partner stood on his welcome mat in one of her usual work ensembles, a beige tote slung over one shoulder. Her eyes swept the length of his body, taking in his state of undress, which on any other day he would have relished, but his brain was dragging.
"Yeah. Kinda."
"You forgot our plans, then."
Like a smack to the back of the head, their unlikely arrangement flew forward, affording him enlightenment. "Oh right, the first lesson. We agreed on today?"
"Yes," she confirmed.
Tony cringed inwardly. "And today is…?"
The absence of his job—the non-stop stream of cases to investigate, suspects to interrogate, leads to hunt down—positioned the workaholic outside his comfort zone, a disorienting sensation not unlike crossing multiple time zones. Not since his last summer vacation from college could he recall waking up in the morning, genuinely unsure what day of the week it was, or if it was, in fact, a weekend. Barely two weeks of unemployment and he was already screwed up.
Taking a step backwards, Ziva gestured aimlessly behind her. "Obviously, this is not a good time for you. Perhaps another—"
"No!" The exclamation was too hasty, and he could see wariness crease at the corners of her eyes. Time, really, was all he had now. "I mean, no, it's okay," he amended, his volume adjusted, and opened the door wider in invitation. "Come on in."
Ziva did what was requested of her, the delectable scent of honey and almonds wafting off her skin as she passed him through the doorway.
"There's coffee in the kitchen, if you want some," Tony choked out, but received only a quiet hum of acknowledgement in response.
Her footsteps maintained their determined speed all the way to her final destination of the piano. She knew her way around his apartment as only someone who'd used it as a safe house could. The tips of his ears heated at the memory of her first visit there. They stayed up late talking with Schmeil, steering clear of any topics that could possibly remind Ziva that her father had been dead for barely over a day. Not a simple task, though the men in her company managed with some impressive tag-teaming.
After her old friend dozed off on the couch, Tony followed her to the door of his bedroom. "If you need anything, I'll be in the other room. Just holler."
Ziva could not meet his steady gaze, her chin almost touching her chest, and he could not explain how that action, out of all the other defensive, self-preservation measures she was employing, worried him the most.
"You have done enough already," she assured him.
But he wouldn't have minded, if she'd asked him for a little more.
While that night was only a few months in their wake, they had lived a small lifetime in the interim. That they were here in his apartment again, entertaining a frivolous activity commonly reserved for children, was almost comical. Except that all her movements were confident as she emptied her bag of its contents: a metronome, two slim music books, and a yellow pencil. And he realized that maybe this, in some strange reversal, was the equivalent of her hollering for him at long last.
Without sparing him a glance from her preparations, Ziva ordered, "Go get dressed, Tony."
His bright smile was wasted on her long stretch of back. "Right. I'll be back in a sec. Don't go anywhere," he tagged on before dashing into his bedroom to change.
Finally, a new purpose.
