A/N: This has been in my head a while, and you know what happens if something stays in my head too long...it just comes out, in word vomit, on paper. So please, enjoy my word vomit. Ok, that just sounded wrong. Really wrong.

Disclaimer: I don't own NCIS: Los Angeles...If I did, it might turn into some cheesy sitcom, because I'd forget to write the actual crime part in.

This is what I like to believe happened after he opened the box. Well, at the end. First we have to have a slightly angsty rundown of season 5, cause that's just the way I roll.

He is her fatal flaw. She knows that now. After Jack, she let no one close. No one. But somehow that annoyingly wonderful shaggy haired nuisance found a crack in her walls. She's not exactly sure when it all happened, but suddenly he's there. In the back of her mind. All. The. Time.

And it was only a matter of time before they both gave in. But he made the first move. Although one could argue, technically, she kissed him first.

It was most definitely not a cover kiss.

She tried to convince him of it, but she couldn't even fool herself.

But when he kissed her that fateful day, on top of the hill, she knew she was too far gone too turn back.

Then he got captured. And tortured. And he said he needed time away from everything. Including her. Well, that hurt like hell.

Too long went by with no contact, and it was literally driving her insane.

Until the night she couldn't take it anymore. Armed with Yummy Yummy Heart Attack, she'd gone to his apartment, determined to get in. And for the first time in what seemed like forever, he answered the door. That night, his words lulled her to sleep.

"It's a love story."

They danced around a little, getting their groove back. It shouldn't have surprised her, his little speech at the restaurant. And it didn't really. It just put her in momentary shock.

That night was perfect. That night, she knew she was addicted for life. He was completely intoxicating. Now that she'd had a taste, she couldn't ever go back.

Of course, since nothing ever comes easy for them, why should the morning after? Or rather, the day after. And just when they were figuring things out, she finds herself in Afghanistan.

She misses him so bad for those months. Sat phones, selfies, and messages just aren't enough.

When she's captured, he's her lifeline. The only thing that convinces her it's all worth the fight.

And when she's in his arms again, it feels like coming home, even though she's still stuck in the God forsaken desert.

And they try to get their groove back. Again. But of course, they get shaken up. Again. So she just flat out asks him. Or course, in a slightly cryptic way. No reason to stop the cycle now.

He gives her the knife back. Even though it's placed in her hands, it feels like he stabbed it into her gut and twisted it deeper into the growing knot in her stomach.

Then he makes a comment, about raccoons. A comment that is so utterly...Deeks.

So she opens the box. Sort of.

And she drove away, speeding home like a pack of wolves was chasing her.

Now she sits on her living room couch, wishing she'd stayed and hidden somewhere, just to see his expression.

There's a knock at the door, and she looks through the peephole to see him standing there.

She opens it, and he utters one of the greatest and relieving sentences she's ever heard in her entire life.

"Sometimes a knife is just a knife."

A/N: So did you enjoy my word vomit? If you did, or if you didn't please leave a little word vomit of your own in a review. It would make my day! ;-)