A/N: I wrote a poem the other day, no big deal and it's not very good. It's just that every time I read it, I'm reminded so much of Ziva that I have to fight writing a fanfic about it. So now I'm writing that fanfic – the fanfic bunnies need to stop hopping, they're giving me a headache.
Disclaimer: I do not own NCIS, any characters and blah blah blah, you know the drill.
You laugh
You cry
You say good-bye
You spread your wings
But do not fly
Ziva David had always been the laughing type. It was the one way she could manage to do what she did: by laughing at everything, by joking, by teasing. No matter what she did, she always managed to find the fun in it and laugh.
When she came to NCIS, she kept laughing. All the time, she laughed; she laughed while teasing Tony, while joking with McGee, while bringing evidence down to Abby, while dealing with the Director, while listening to Ducky's stories and while doing what Gibbs told her to. She was the laughing type, and so she laughed.
But slowly, the new family she had gained brought up unexpected things in her character. She became a little more emotional, a little more prone to sadness. She didn't cry when Ari died: when she shot her own brother in Gibbs' basement, not a single tear fell. She sang him the lullaby in Hebrew, escorted his body back to Tel Aviv, spoke at his funeral, but she did not shed a tear.
When Gibbs was nearly blown up and she tried to help him remember, that was the first time she cried in over four years. Four months later, speaking to Gibbs in Mexico on the phone, was the second time. Then came Roy Sanders, and Jeanne Benoit and the La Grenouille mission, and Jenny's death, and Ziva found herself crying a lot more often than she ever thought she would.
Finally, she had to say good-bye. Director Vance's voice shattered her world. Officer David. The liaison position with NCIS has been terminated. Simple words, words of power, and all she could do was say good-bye to her team, her friends, her family.
And then she was coming home again, she was back on Gibbs' team, she had a boyfriend of sorts in her Mossad partner, Michael Rivkin, she had her friends around her, and everything seemed perfect. But then came the betrayal: her partner shot her boyfriend in her living room. And she said good-bye again, this time thinking it was for good.
In Somalia, all she was thinking was that she should not have abandoned NCIS. In Somalia, she wanted to leave this world for good, to join her sister and her brother and Jenny and perhaps even Michael in a place where no one could touch her. In Somalia, she spread her wings, ready for departure. In Somalia, she heard Tony announce that he could not live without her. In Somalia, she saw Saleem fall with a bullet-hole through his head.
And she did not fly.
And she was glad she did not.
A/N: This was my first piece in a long time, and don't really expect anything more from me in the nearest future. But you know, I always welcome reviews!