Ziva was still groggy from sleep when someone knocked on her front door. She looked through the peephole; it was Tony. "Go away!" she yelled through the door.
She went back into the kitchen and resumed fixing herself breakfast. A soft clicking noise told her that Tony had picked the lock. "Ziva," he called, "Come on; there's not a lot of time!"
She tried to resist responding for she wanted nothing more than to go back to bed and wait for the day to be over, but she gave in quickly. "Time for what?"
"Your birthday, now let's go! I asked- begged- Gibbs to give us the day off, so we're not wasting any of this time!" she could feel his eyes on the back of her head.
She took a deep breath. "Tony, I really do not want to do anything special. I want to do nothing but treat today like a normal day."
Tony wasn't listening to her. He reached out and put his hand gently on her upper arm. She considered stabbing him with the knife she was using to cut her grapefruit. "Ziva, you always get like this around your birthday," Tony said softly, "I just want you to have a good time this year."
He sounded so sincere that Ziva soon caved. "Fine, but let me finish my breakfast first."
Tony did his best to be patient while she ate, but he wanted to leave as soon as possible; they couldn't be late.
When she was done, he tossed her one of her jackets. She put it on and followed Tony out to his car. They rode in silence to the destination of Tony's idea of birthday fun.
Ziva was confused when they pulled into the parking lot. "Why are we at a police station?"
Tony smiled. "A buddy of mine works here. They're having a little shooting competition today, so I cleared it with them to let us have some fun too."
She gave him a sideways glance. "So, you are taking me to do something that I do every day?"
"No, you shoot a gun everyday," Tony explained, "Today I am giving you the opportunity to emasculate some of my friends."
Ziva was excited at the prospect. She joined Tony on the sidewalk and the two walked towards the entrance of the station. Tony's friend, Jeff, was waiting for them when they made it to the front doors. "Tony, long time, no see! Oh my, miss, you are lovely. Tony didn't mention that on the phone," he fell into step with Tony as he led them behind the station to the shooting range; Ziva followed a few paces behind them, "You didn't say the person you were bringing was a girl," Jeff whispered to Tony low enough that Ziva could not hear, "The guys aren't going to like this."
Tony laughed inwardly, "She'll be fine and they'll get over it," Tony reassured his friend; the idea that anyone was a better shooter than Ziva was ridiculous, except perhaps Gibbs, but Tony put him in a category of his own.
The trio arrived at the range. A large knot of police officers were clustered at one end. Jeff stepped up to address the group, "Alright gentlemen, this is Tony DiNozzo and," he broke off, realizing that he did not know Ziva's name.
Tony stepped up to take over for his friend. "This is Ziva David. We're from NCIS, and we're ready to beat you all very soundly in this little shooting match of yours."
Some of the men smiled evilly; Jeff was right about them not liking the idea of a girl being allowed to shoot them, but they looked forward to beating her.
They each stepped over to the table where guns were lined up and took their spots on their marks, preparing to fire at the targets. "Five shots!" Jeff yelled.
Each of the men and Ziva fired five bullets at their individual targets. When they were all finished, they retrieved their targets to compare shots. Ziva looked at hers and smiled. There was only one hole, but it was slightly larger than the average hole. A glance at her backstop told her that she had hit the mark with all five.
Jeff was making his way down the line. He periodically called out the current leader of the contest. "Mike is winning with two head shots and a heart tap!"
The men he had already passed were crowding around him and followed him down the rest of the line. Finally, he made it to Tony and Ziva. "Alright, it looks like Tony wins with four head shots and a heart tap!"
"Ahem," Ziva cleared her throat.
Tony knew that there was no way he had beaten Ziva, and he was interested to see how she would show up all of the men she was surrounded by.
"I can see from here that you have one headshot Miss David, through it is well placed," Jeff said arrogantly.
One of the less rude men had wandered over to the backstops. "Jeff, come look at this!" he called.
He was standing at Ziva's station where all five bullets were clustered together, no more than mere millimeters apart. "Impossible," several of the men mumbled.
They each took turns looking at Ziva's target. It was a large piece of paper that showed an outline of a person. The hole formed when her five bullets flew through it was directly in the middle of the fake man's forehead.
Another arrogant man set up a fresh target and handed Ziva a new gun. "Do it again," he demanded.
The rest of the officers stood clear and Ziva fired. One-two-three-four-five! Jeff checked the target and backstop. All five were, once again, clustered together; this time, they were all over where a heart would be.
"Move," Ziva commanded to Jeff while pulling one of her knives out of her jacket.
He ran back to the group and watched in amazement as she nodded to Tony. Tony sighed but played along. He placed his hand tight over her eyes as he spun her around. Several of the officers became alarmed. Tony stopped her in line with the target and kept his hand over her eyes.
Without hesitation, Ziva pulled back her arm and threw the knife. Tony was about to remove his hand as the weapon stuck into the backstop with a thud, but she same arrogant man that had her do a repeat performance interrupted. "Wait! Before she can look, where did it land?" he directed the question at Ziva.
"Throat," she answered confidently.
She removed Tony's hand from her eyes and smiled; she had hit her mark. After retrieving her knife from the neck of the fake man, she returned to Tony's side. "I think I am ready to leave," she told him, "Thank you for the wonderful birthday."
"The day isn't over yet, Ziva," Tony replied.
He said goodbye to his still stunned friend and led Ziva back to his car. During the ride, Ziva replayed the officer's facial expressions in her mind. She didn't realize that she had giggled until Tony turned to her while they waited at a stoplight. "What's so funny?"
"Should we have told them that I was trained by Mossad?" she had enjoyed showing those men that they were not as good as they thought they were.
"Nah," Tony accelerated when the light switched to green, "That wouldn't have made it as funny."
He pulled the car into a parking space at a small café around the block from Ziva's apartment. "We are going out to eat?" Ziva had not expected him to do anything else for her.
Tony did not reply. She followed him inside to one of the tables. "The day off is Gibbs' present, and McGee pushed me to take you shooting, and those guys needed a healthy dose of humility. This part of your present was my idea."
They gave drink orders to the cute, young waitress. It did not escape Ziva's attention that Tony did not look at the girl once. "Can I ask you something?" he sounded hesitant.
"Certainly," she had a feeling she knew what was coming.
"Why do you get so… upset around your birthday?"
Ziva took a deep breath. "You remember my sister Tali," she said softly, "She was born exactly five years after I was. My birthday reminds me of all the birthdays that she will never have."
Tony felt bad for bringing it up. "I'm sorry."
"It is alright. It feels good to tell someone," Ziva looked into Tony's eyes, "Thank you for everything," he could see that she was grateful to have someone with her today.
Tony saw the sadness and vulnerability in her eyes; it made him want to fix everything that had gone wrong in her life. He took a chance and leaned over the table and kissed her softly. He was sure it was a mistake doing that, she didn't like him like that. He was going to pull away, but her surprise wore off and she kissed him back. Kissing Ziva was even better than Tony had thought it would be; he was paralyzed by her lips.
The waitress set their drinks on the table. "Are you ready to order?" she interrupted.
Tony waved her away. He finally pulled back when they both needed air. "Happy birthday Ziva."