A/N: This story was inspired in part by the song Kiss The Air by Scott Alan. It is intended as a "filling in" scene detailing what happened the night Tony spent at Ziva's childhood home in Past, Present and Future. It is an attempt to tie up a few ends while being mindful that there were two wonderful scenes that came after it. I hope you enjoy it!
Kiss The Air.
He'd never get used to this heat. It wasn't a heat like summer in D.C. it was a constant blazing sun, she hit you from all angles, unrelenting and cruel. There was nowhere to find shade, no let up with the casual passing by of fluffy white clouds, it was just a sweltering, dry heat that tainted his American skin the colour of blushed tomatoes and caused his lips to crack. He'd taken refuge with her inside what he could best describe as an uninhabited shack. It was a modest place of living he guessed, probably quite illustrious for many here, but in comparison to his air conditioned luxury bachelor pad back home, it was more of a dust strewn hovel. There were no carpets here, not even polished wood floors; the windows had bars on them, though he guessed that made sense in a country so unsettled in the political world. The furniture was so-so, not a patch on his custom made designs but then he hadn't come to scout new home furnishings; he had come for her. He knew this was her childhood home and nobody had been in it for a great number of years, but he thought that even the great Eli David would have had something a little more upmarket.
"You should not have come." Her voice was sincere, honest and yet there was still life in it, it wasn't like that time in the desert when she had all but accepted a fate of death and nothing more.
Oh great. He thought to himself. I'll just head on back then shall I? It's not like I tracked you across the world. It's not like I risked my career for you. Though, truth be told, he'd give up everything for her. He'd known that for a long time but he'd never been willing to accept it.
She turned and walked away and he watched the way her hair swayed as she moved. His mind was flying in a million different directions right then, caught up in the struggle between what he wanted, what he could ask for but knew he shouldn't; it was like a plot from McGee's damn Deep Six series, only when it was actually happening to you it wasn't nearly as fun to ridicule. He found his eyes drawn to that hair and he considered how it had changed with her personality over the years. It had been wild and unkempt when she first arrived, unpredictable and surprising; he'd simultaneously loved and hated that Ziva. Loved the girl that she was, the skills she held, the mystery surrounding her and yet he had hated what she represented, an alliance with the very people who had taken his ex-partner, the woman she was supposed to replace. Gradually her hair had calmed, she'd started to wear it up, straighten it, even added a touch of colour a time or two; sleek, preened and controlled; she had learned to control her instilled instincts, she'd transformed from so much more than an assassin, she was a woman who thought, who cared, who loved. And now she stood before him, her hair in waves, long and beautiful; natural, just like her.
"Ziva…" he called walking after her, but she'd closed the door and he heaved a heavy sigh. He'd come here with a purpose, he wasn't going to let it pass him by.
He took a walk. Back out into that unmerciful dry heat, and as much as he didn't like it, he found that it brought him a sense of clarity. He had the Star of David pendant in his pocket, he turned it over and over in his fingers running his thumb across the chain and imagining it around her neck. That had been as much a part of her as anything else. He'd gotten it for her when they returned from Somalia. No words had been exchanged, just a small gesture from him that meant so much more to her. It was part of her message to him. Leaving it with that picture meant she was thinking of him, to anyone else it would be a sign that she was okay, alive and well, but to him it had confirmed what he already knew, that she did care, he did matter.
When he had returned to the house he found her sitting on the couch, the weight of the world was resting on her small shoulders. He handed over the pendant and felt his stomach flip with elation where it brought a smile to her face. He explained how he had found her, detailed the steps he took, following her tracks, thinking ahead and realising he had to re-trace the past if he was to get anywhere. He spoke about Ari, and Tali, he reminded her about her mother and friend, he commented on all those important places she had been and long since forgotten until her journey of rediscovery. She shook her head slightly, not enough for him to really notice; he'd remembered it. All of it. He knew her in a way nobody ever had before. She'd mentioned stories of her childhood in passing and he'd made witty jokes or thrown a haphazard comment her way as if it never mattered; but he'd heard it all and taken it in, nobody had ever done that for her before and she was genuinely shocked and delighted that he had bothered to show her that consideration. But it wasn't enough, she still hated herself.
"You had to kill Ari. One person loving him doesn't change that." He reassured her after she poured out her heart.
"But I loved him. Just as I loved my father and my mother and Tali. How can I not think for every man I killed, there's someone out there crying for him?"
This was eating her up. He could see it in her eyes and it tore him up to know that he couldn't fix that. He was Tony DiNozzo, his job was to throw a sarcastic comment or make some stupid joke or quote a movie and that made things better; but that wasn't going to work here. She had lost everything. Everyone. He couldn't change that and no amount of jokes would make it better.
"The centre of all this pain is me." Never had words hit him as hard as those. She blamed herself, for everything. It wasn't true of course; she couldn't control what had happened to Tali and her mother, and Ari, well, she hadn't been given a choice on that one, and her father…? All she had ever done was try to make him proud, for every life she took she did it because she was following orders. She was obedient and smart. She was loyal and strong. It was what made her perfect for Mossad and also what prevented her from ever living up to the standards her father demanded.
"Ziva… this isn't you." He needed to reassure her, she needed to know she had done nothing but try and be the person everyone wanted her to be. That wasn't her fault. It couldn't be.
"This is me. This is what I made of myself. But it's not who I wanted to be."
"I know." He told her and instantly he saw the confusion on her face.
How could he know? She had had hopes and dreams once. She was not born the assassin everyone believed she was. She had been a little girl just like everyone else. She wanted to dance, she wanted to travel; she wanted to experience the world! But all of that was gone now. That little girl gave up her dreams in the pursuit of love and approval from her father; approval that she still sought, despite him being long gone. He could see a hint of that girl behind her eyes, the one he saw in pictures, the one he'd never known, she was there, fighting, like she always had been, it just happened to be that somewhere along the way Ziva had learned to tune her out.
"It's never too late." He said. He wasn't just referencing her new start. He was also talking about them. It wasn't too late for them to start out. They had something special right from the get, they'd had false starts and bumps in their road but overall they were a strong union and they owed it to themselves to take a shot at things.
"There's plenty of room on the back of this list… to start a new one?" he unfolded the dog-eared page that had remained buried for so long it was a wonder anyone ever found it. He looked at the yellow tinge to the page and the dirt that had settled in the softened creases of the paper, she had been a different person when she wrote this, someone she couldn't be again, but she could make herself a new person, a person she wanted to be, a person that made her happy and proud; the person he saw every time he looked at her.
"Maybe I could help you with that?" He had a million ideas buzzing through his brain. Of course they had to be hers; she had to be the one to make the list. But he sure would like to make a "we will" list, a place where they could plan out a life, a future for themselves, together.
She took the page and rubbed the paper between her fingers as though reading a braille version of her list. She didn't speak; instead she just gazed at him as though waiting for there to be a catch. Everyone in her past had wanted something from her in return for what she could offer. Be it intel, an assassination, even sex on some occasions, she had grown used to the idea of having to offer up a part of herself in order to get any kind of assistance. But not with him. Tony had never wanted anything more than her trust and partnership.
The rest of that day would be one that stuck in his memory for the rest of his life. They had connected in a way they never had before. She had only one bed in that house and after days of travel to track her down, his sleep pattern had been completely compromised. She hadn't slept properly in a while either, not because she was constantly on the move but because she was grappling with her conscience and guilt at the life she had led. They had shared a bed before, it was no big deal. She invited him to settle beside her in a bed that barely passed for a double. No matter how they positioned themselves, their bodies were always touching. He could feel her soft olive skin brushing against his, her lightly chilled toes taking the edge off the burning heat that still nestled inside his. The moon shone brightly through the window that neither of them had bothered to draw the light curtains across and it cast delicate shadows from the minimal fixtures across the bed. The room was clothed in silence as the two of them lay static beside one another.
"Ziva?" Tony whispered eventually.
She didn't reply but instead turned her head to face him, her chocolate eyes catching the light, flecks of gold shimmering light glittered as they settled on him.
"I know that I can't change the way you feel about things, but you can."
She furrowed her eyebrows, her lips parting ever so slightly.
"The past is just a story," he reassured her. "And once you realise this, it will have no power over you. The past is what you remember it to be, if you fixate on everything you think you did wrong, it will always control you. But, like a story or a movie, you can choose to only remember the good parts. It's like the Star Wars Franchise, people love it! New generations love it, old ones love it; it's stood the test of time and still it's got money pouring into it. But episode one? Don't even go there, that was a stinker. I mean I'm not Star Wars expert so I thought the movie was okay but McGee informs me otherwise, but that's my point. If I went into the office and started spouting off about how terrible it was, he'd come to its defence. Why? Because it's a story and people only remember the good parts. If you let go of all these things, the ones you think make you a bad person, you get your control back, you get your life back." It made so much sense to him. There was so much he had shut out about his past, his mom's death, his father's words the day he dropped him off at boarding school and never returned, he could wallow in them or he could forget them, his life was his story and he could choose how to tell it.
"Lying to myself is not going to fix things Tony." Ziva replied flatly.
"It's not lying. It's omitting."
"Semantics."
Tony breathed a sigh.
"I just want to fix things." He admitted gently.
Ziva rolled over, she pushed her foot between his and entwined their legs. She sat her right hand on his hip and brushed it up his arm, over his neck and let it come to rest against his stubble covered cheek. Her hand looked so small against his face; he closed his eyes and pressed his skin closer to hers feeling just how small and delicate she was against his frame. He felt her begin to brush her thumb over his jawline and he opened his eyes to look at her.
"I know you do. That is who you are and I would not want you to change." She admitted. "I love that about you. You are an optimist. You see the good."
"We could put that on your list you know? I will be more like Tony… I'll give you lessons, I'll discount you too, say 5 lessons and I'll settle for a dinner and 007 marathon as payment." He smiled when he heard her laugh and then turn her hand so she could brush the backs of her fingers over his cheek.
"I will consider your offer." She grinned.
The two of them lay again in silence. Ziva kept her hand against his skin and Tony moved his hand to brush a curl of hair from her face, keeping it between his fingers and gently twirling it forwards and backwards. Neither of them could say how long they stayed that way; it could have been minutes, it could have been hours, there was a comfort between them that meant that time melted away, it didn't matter, they were with each other and somehow that closed out everything that wasn't right there in that room.
It was only when their eyelids really began to draw heavy that he plucked up the courage to ask, he figured she'd simply agree if she was that tired and then everything would be okay.
"You are coming home with me, aren't you?" he whispered.
Her eyes were almost completely closed but once the words spilled out she had no choice but to open them and face him.
"You're gonna come back right? Home? With me?" There was a sudden realization in his emerald eyes that suggested he hadn't considered that she might say no.
"Tony I…"
"Wait… before you say no, just hear me out…" he propped his head up on his hand now, her hand dropped from his cheek to the grey t-shirt covering his chest, right above his heart. She could feel it beating beneath her touch and a part of her regretted being the one to cause his spike in heart rate. "We are good together, we've always been good together, I trust you with my life and I hope you could trust me with yours. I lost you once and it almost broke me, the team needs you, you make us all better. Gibbs loves having you on the team, he'd never admit it but I think he likes you more than anyone else, Abby included. You are his surrogate daughter, I think he sees a lot of himself in you and he likes being there when you need him. There's a different side of Gibbs that nobody sees unless you are there, it's subtle, maybe you haven't even noticed it, but it's there, you have to trust me on that one. And McGee, he'd have quit a long time ago with me ragging on him all the time, you're there to defend him, to stop me doing stupid things that really would affect him, he's grateful for that every day, and now you're the new Probie I think he finally feels this superiority even though we know you'd run circles around him in every aspect of being an agent… well accept maybe computers, I mean really the guy is practically married to one. After Kate, I didn't think Abby would ever accept another agent in her place, but you worked your way in there, it was tough going I know but she's a strong minded person, usually when her mind is made up, it's set. But you were the exception. You changed her mind and that doesn't happen. She loves you. Just like Ducky and Jimmy… you're our family, our friend. The team needs you… I need you. I tried to function without you once before and I'd be lying if I said I fell to pieces. I kept going but that's all it was. Motions. I went through the motions, without you I lost all the excitement in life, it's like asking modern cinema to return to black and white and stop using CGI… they could do it but who'd enjoy that? I need you to come home with me Ziva… please."
He hadn't meant to deliver quite the monologue he had. Nor had he intended to come across quite as needy and… well Hugh Grant like, but he sensed the urgency here, she needed to know what he was thinking, she needed to know how her decision could affect everyone else and he was going to make sure she did.
"In all my life, I have never met a person quite like you," she began with a hint of a smile on her lips.
Tony opened his she assumed to make some joke but she cut him off before he had the chance to even begin by firmly pressing her index finger to his chapped lips.
"You are infuriating and childlike, you are funny and kind, you are sweet and honest and you are the best person I know." She paused for just a second to let that sink in. His eyes were wide as he locked on to hers not entirely sure where her thoughts were heading. "You are amazing, you make a great agent, a brilliant partner but most of all you make the best friend. There is nothing hidden about Tony DiNozzo. What you see is completely and truly what you get. It is refreshing and new and it has been both my favourite and worst part of being with you." She laughed. "I care about you more than you can ever know. You have made me better, and you make me want to be better."
"So come back with me." He spoke, his words slightly mumbled through her finger. He knew she hadn't finished, even a deaf person would have heard the "but" coming but a part of him hoped that jumping in would cause her to reconsider. That part was wrong.
"But… if I stayed with you I would be living a lie." She said it with a tinge of disappointment, as though she didn't want it to be true, if that was the case, he could change her mind, he knew it. He pushed her finger away and sat himself up a little more.
"There's no lie here. I know exactly who you are and you know who I am, there's nothing hidden."
She was nodding in agreement.
"Exactly. I need a fresh start. A clean page. You know my past, not just some of it, you know it all, I need someone who does not know the things I have done, the things that I regret."
"Well that's your lie right there!" he raised his voice now, he was confused, angry. "You told me you couldn't hide your past from yourself because it was lying, but hiding it from someone else isn't so?"
She put her hand on his hip to try and calm him but it seemed to do little for his increased breathing rate.
"I did not mean it like that. I am not going out to find someone new to spend my life with; I just mean that if I need that figure at some point, I would need someone who did not judge me on my past."
"And you think I do? You think I judge you because of who you were? That doesn't matter to me Ziva, it never has. Why can't you see that?"
"I do see that." She explained. "It is not you that is judging. It is I. It might not matter to you who I was or what I did but it matters to me. The fact that you know makes it harder for me to forget. I will always be the person who shot her brother, the one who fell foul to the tricks of a man who was playing me, the one who threatened to put a bullet in you because I could not accept that I was wrong. I was the person who asked someone to pick between the man he had worked with for many years, a man he knew to be a good, loyal agent and me, all because my wounded pride told me to. My past is littered with mistakes that I cannot take back."
He could make out the look of regret on her face even through the shadows; she was hurting and she needed comfort, but for some reason she seemed to find self-flagellation a better option.
"Isn't everyone's?!" he spouted. "There are things I regret, things I wish I had done differently but there's no way to make that happen. Your past is your past, what you did then is not what you'd do now. Whatever it is you are worried about, I don't care about it! I only care about you."
His eyes flitted between hers, he was desperately searching for a sign that he had made a difference to whatever was happening in her mind but she had the best poker face he'd ever seen, she gave nothing away.
"I want you to come home with me Ziva, I want you to come back and we'll figure this out together. You want to change then we'll change, the both of us. I want to make a life with you, make it work with you, I don't care if that includes being at NCIS or not, I'll do whatever it is you want… but you have to come home." It wasn't often he bared his soul for someone else, but if NCIS had taught him anything it was that life could be wiped out in a heartbeat. You could be here one minute and the next everything could be falling apart, he'd lived that already, and he didn't want to go through it again.
"Tony…" her voice was barely a whisper. She wasn't going to say it, she wasn't going to agree.
"Don't. Don't." He urged, dropping eye contact across the darkness.
"I owe you an explanation." She urged.
"No," he rolled over in the bed, put his head back on the pillow and faced the wall, watching the gentle dance of the tree branches in the shadows. "You really don't have to."
He felt her fingers brush over his upper arm, just below where his t-shirt stopped against his skin. She had such a delicate, feather-like touch for a woman he knew was capable of such strength and power.
"I want to." She spoke softly, leaning so close to his ear that he felt her warm breath against his neck. It brought a tingle to his spine; this might be the last time he ever got that from her and that was something that terrified him more than anything she had to say.
"If," she stressed. "If I stayed with you, came back and we became… whatever it is we would become, I would be living a lie,"
Now she had his attention, he turned back over, remaining led down, he looked up at her from the pillow, the moon shone on the highlights of her hair.
"I would be lying to myself, to Gibbs… to you… I have had enough lying for one lifetime. I want things to be good from now on; I want to be good from now on."
"You're already good-" he interrupted but her incessant head shaking stopped him from finishing his thoughts.
"No, you see, that is all you, you see the good in people, you find it even when it is buried deep, it is you who is good, it is you who is selfless and kind and strong," she pressed the flat of her hand over his chest, moving just her fingertips to settle over his heart. "You deserve a love that my heart cannot provide. I am not the one who can give you all the things you need, you are better off without me."
"That's ridiculous." He spat pushing himself back up so that he could see her face to face. "Everything about my life has gotten better since you've been in it, how can that not be what I need?"
"That is not true and you know it. You have held back, for all these years you have stopped yourself finding happiness because of me, you have sabotaged every good thing you have had and that is only because I have been around."
"No, you're wrong." He protested.
"When was the last serious relationship you had?" she questioned. "Because I do not remember you having one in any recent time."
"Neither have you!" he reversed. "You ruined every relationship or potential relationship because of me, that has to mean something."
"It means we are destructive."
"It means we care."
She shook her head again; he didn't appreciate all her flat out denial.
"You are like a bird in a cage with me. You cannot see beyond the barriers in front of you. You are too important to me to stay trapped inside. You need to get out there and live your life without me holding you back."
Tony furrowed his eyebrows.
"Are you even listening to what you are saying? Are you trying to convince me or yourself? I have never felt like you hold me back, you can't go making assumptions about the way other people feel." He was raising his voice a little now, there was a definite anguish and irritation to his tone and she felt that regret course through her veins again.
"I did not mean to hurt you." She reassured, rubbing her thumb over the backs of his fingers. Silence passed between them as he refused to meet her eyes, instead looking down at her hand on his. "But it proves my point… I am not what you need."
Tony went to open his mouth to speak but she held him off.
"I need to stay here; I need to be the person I want to be before I can be the person you want me to be."
"I don't want you to be anything but who you are."
"But who I am is not the person you think I am. I know this is not what you want to hear, but one day you will thank me for this, for not coming back with you." She reassured, her hand resting on top of his leg, she felt his body tremble just a little under her touch but she took no pleasure in that the way she once might have.
"Why would I ever thank you for this?" He was angry, yet his tone had no resentment in it, he was simply broken, too resigned to fight.
"Because," she tucked the edge of her finger beneath his chin and forced him to raise his head and look her in the eyes. He saw the light behind them and the smile creeping over her lips; how she could find happiness through these muddied waters he would never know. "There will be a time when you come home from work, park in your driveway and open the gate of your white fence. In the garden you will be greeted by a loyal golden retriever, undoubtedly named Bogie or Brando or Astaire," she giggled lightly when she saw him try to fend off the smile that dared to crack his sullen gaze. "And once you step through the threshold you will be stampeded by two, no three, four, four children, three girls and one very handsome boy who will love you more than you know. They will wrap their arms around you and you will lift the littlest one off the ground and swing her over your shoulder, carrying her while she roars with laughter into the kitchen. And that is where she will be waiting, dinner on the stove, a chilled beer with the top freshly cracked on the counter."
"I don't know who she is." Tony sighed.
"But you will." Ziva smiled, running her thumb over his cheek. "You will find her and she will be perfect because that is what you deserve at the very least you are owed perfection."
"You're perfect." He whispered, his hand grazing gently across her thigh. She shook her head.
"You are looking through daisy-tainted glasses."
He smiled and licked his lips.
"Rose-tinted." He corrected.
"Whatever. I am not that person, I cannot be that person. You want that image, yes? The wife? The kids? The dog? Even the fence? It is the American dream."
"I'd be lying if I said it didn't sound appealing, I've never put much thought into it but yeah, I guess I want that, but I want that with you. That woman, in my picture she is you and those girls? They are you too."
"No, Tony, they are not. You would not get that with me."
"Then I don't get it. I can live with that, but I can't live without you." Now he moved his hands to her cheeks he locked onto her eyes through the dark and he stared at her as though his eyes could say more words than his lips ever could.
"You will learn to." She reassured him, her voice barely resonating through the silence. "In a year, I will be a passing ship in the night, I will not matter, I will not be important. I will be gone and you, you can be happy. Maybe you will even have met her by then."
"I don't want to meet her."
"Do not do that. Do not close yourself off to love; you are too good a man to let yourself be jaded."
"You don't get to do that, you don't get to ruin us and then tell me how to feel!" he hissed. "You are all I have wanted for so long and now we finally have a chance to make it work you want to take that away?"
"This is something I have to do Tony, for the first time this is something I get to do for me."
And that was it. Those were the words that finally got through to him. She had spent her life following orders, her parents, her brother, Mossad, NCIS, Gibbs, even him. She was the caged bird, not him. If he loved her the way he thought he did, he had to set her free, he had to let her spread her wings, let her fly because that was the only way to make her happy. He understood that now. But it didn't mean he had to like it.
"So that's it? We're done? Just like that?"
She pursed her lips and fought back the tears that threatened to spill down her cheeks; she wasn't as okay with this as she made out, but it was the right decision, she knew that.
"We have tonight." She shrugged. She pushed her hands to his chest until he was lying back on the bed, his neck resting on the flat pillow. She nestled her body next to his, tucked herself into the crook of his arm and pressed her face against his warm body, feeling the gentle rise and fall of his chest beneath. He took her right hand in his left, entwining their fingers and softly twirled a curl of her hair off of her back with the fingertips of his right hand.
"I love you Ziva David." He whispered.
"I know." She replied.
Time stood still with her lying with him like that. He knew that each passing moment was a moment closer and closer to this finally being over. He could fight, and he would, but ultimately he knew it wasn't going to get him anywhere. She was stubborn, just like he was, and when her mind was made up there was no changing it.
She hadn't begun to snore yet, but her eyes were firmly closed and her breathing was rhythmic, she was just between the living and the resting and he didn't want to wake her because in this moment he could pretend, for however short a time it was, that he had won, that she was his and this was the way they would spend each night for the next forty-plus years. He longed to press his lips to her head but the slightest movement could jostle her awake and shatter his illusion, so he settled instead for a soft kiss of the air which he hoped would somehow find its way to her sometime in the near future and change her mind. And bring her home.