Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death.
It was one of her favorite psalms. It was so much one of her favorite psalms that it was one of the the psalms she had memorized in multiple languages in a manic biblical scholar phase in college. Nam et si ambulavero in medio umbrae mortis didn't have the same ring as Quand je marche dans la vallée de l`ombre de la mort. She'd memorized it in Latin anyway, though, and when she had a bad day, she recited it to herself. Sometimes she recited it just once in just one language. Sometimes she recited it more than once in more than one language. She tried to avoid three-language days, but they happened.
One of the reasons she loved Psalm 23 so much in so many languages was that she walked through the valley of the shadow of death. Her NCIS family did too: Gibbs, McGee, Tony, Bishop, and Ziva, even though she wasn't here. They all walked that road and they feared no evil. Or maybe they did sometimes, probably they did, because they were human, but they knew they didn't have to fear much. They knew what death looked like and they respected it, but they didn't fear it enough to let it control them.
Papa Gibbs didn't fear evil either. He'd stared it in the face many times, and he didn't fear evil. In turn, he taught Gibbs not to fear evil, and that had changed so much about Gibbs' life. There were all those kitten motivational posters about parents molding their children, and they were almost always a little true, but Gibbs would not have been Gibbs without Papa Gibbs to make him that way.
Papa Gibbs was a shepherd. He shepherded men, he shepherded stuff, he shepherded her. And she had loved him for it. As the priest finished the psalm, she quickly wiped her eyes with her black lace mourning hankie. Tony glanced at her in concern, as did McGee, and she managed a small smile for them both. Her boys. They were shepherds too. So was Bishop, who didn't get a frilly shepherdess dress. It wouldn't suit her.
The painfully young honor guard folded the flag with all the respect and care she expected and then presented it to Gibbs. Even with the psalm reading, she hadn't really needed her waterproof makeup until she saw Gibbs clutching that flag to his chest as if he were hugging his father one more time. Then the trumpet player started playing Taps. Would Taps ever not make her tear up even more than she already was? She hoped not. She hoped she never reached that point, that she was never in the shadow long enough that she couldn't hear Taps and know what it meant. She slipped her hand into Tony's elbow and sniffled freely. He glanced down and then put his hand over hers without another word. What did he need to say?
When the ceremony was completely over, she hugged Gibbs and then stood looking at Papa Gibbs until Tony said gently, "C'mon, Abs. Time to go back to the car," and started pivoting her that way. Shepherding her. Taking care of her.
Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life.
It did. It had. And it would. She had one more shepherd up above that would make sure of that.