'Sup. So this thought bunny hopped into my head about five hours before my Physics exams were about to start, and it annoyingly wouldn't leave me alone until I wrote it down. This is my first time - and I'm deathly scared about it, mind you - and if there are grammatical errors present in this, I apologize.
And why, yes, I'm still not over Jenny's death.
Hope you enjoy! :)
I don't own NCIS! CBS does.
Special Agent Timothy McGee looked up from the paperwork he was doing, noticing the increasingly loud argument coming out from the Director's office.
He sighed. "Not again," McGee muttered.
"Hey, McGoogle, five dollars Gibbs is gonna win!" Tony piped up from his desk. With his feet propped up and a mountain of ignored paper work on top of his desk, Tony smirked at McGee with his signature grin.
"Tony -" McGee started.
"It is not amusing anymore," said Ziva from her desk. She looked genuinely concerned for the well-being of her boss and boss' boss. She knew about what had happened between them in Paris – Jenny opened up to her after a night of heavy drinking – and knew that neither of them had managed to move on.
"They've been getting rather heated up these days," commented McGee, now ignoring the chapter for his book he was writing before the argument had started.
"You mean more so than usual?" Tony asked. "Yeah. What's Gibbs mad about anyway?"
"Well -"
What the hell happened to you, Jen? I don't remember training you to become a heartless bitch!
"Oooh, snap," Tony said with a dumbfounded look on his face, looking on as Gibbs exited the office, slamming the door with a bang that echoed throughout bullpen. McGee mirrored the look on Tony's face, but quickly resumed working on his chapter when he saw his angry boss striding towards them. Ziva looked positively murderous.
"What happened in there, Boss?" asked Tony, his face still plastered with that shocked look.
"None of your business, DiNozzo. Get back to work!" Gibbs barked.
"Well, I am going to see the director,"said Ziva, standing up and moving around her desk to walk towards the stairs. Gibbs' icy blue eyes followed her up as she went, meeting Ziva's as she took a second to glare at him before entering the director's office.
Jenny has had enough.
What the hell happened to you, Jen? I don't remember training you to become a heartless bitch!
She cringed as the door slammed shut in front of her, sure that those hinges weren't going to last any longer. Once Jenny was sure Gibbs was safely down the stairs, she heaved a great sigh and started to cry. Not tiny little trickles of tears, no, but tears that contained the heartbreak, the anger, and all other emotions Jenny had kept bottled inside her for years.
She didn't think she could last any longer.
Quieting her sobs so Cynthia wouldn't hear her from outside, Jenny slumped down on her desk, crying over everything she could think of – Paris, La Grenouille, her father, Gibbs. Jenny didn't even notice a certain Mossad officer enter until she was standing in front of her desk, concern etched all over her exotic face. Ziva let her cry for a little while longer, knowing that Jenny would soon open up to her.
"I look like a mess, don't I?" she finally said, trying to lighten the mood.
"Rightly so. It is not everyday someone calls you a heartless bitch, is it?" asked Ziva with a smile to make her feel better. "I heard everything and came straight up."
"I don't know what's wrong with me, Ziva!" complained Jenny, bringing a hand up to wipe her tears off angrily, smudging her eyeliner in the process. "I shouldn't let him get to me like this…"
"And that's exactly what you have been doing, Jenny – not letting him get to you. But once in a while, it's simply too hard to ignore it. It is okay to break down once in a while," Ziva replied wisely.
"Not when I have an agency to look after, Ziva!"
"Right now, you're not the Director. You are Jennifer Lee Shepard, and you are hurting," Ziva said sternly. Her face faltered at the sight of her friend looking ready to break down again. "And you are not heartless."
"I'm starting to believe it, though," whispered Jenny, looking at Ziva right in the eyes. Ziva had never seen her look this vulnerable, save for the night Jenny drank herself into oblivion and recalled what had happened in Paris.
"Don't you dare. That's not the Jenny I know."
"Yeah, well, the Jenny you know left ages ago," Jenny smirked emptily.
"I don't think so. I think she's still in there somewhere – carefree Jenny, witty Jenny, the Jenny who'd fight for what she wanted," Ziva listed them out with her fingers. "I think that's why Gibbs is so harsh with you, yes? Because he misses that Jenny, too."
Jenny scoffed. "Yeah, well, he hates me now."
"But you love him."
"Doesn't make a difference, Zee."
"Jen -"
"Ziva, downstairs now," said a baritone voice suddenly. Ziva whirled around while Jenny's face darkened at the sight of him. Engrossed in their conversation, the two of them didn't notice the stealthy sniper sneak in, and Ziva mentally chided herself for forgetting to close the doors.
"Leave her alone, Gibbs," Ziva hissed. She didn't think Jenny was well enough to handle him, let alone another argument with the Marine.
"Downstairs. Now." Gibbs repeated the order.
"Gibbs, don't even think for one second that I -"
"Ziva, I can handle this," commented a tired voice from behind. Ziva turned around to face her again, wanting to make sure that she could take it. Jenny wasn't crying anymore; dark circles lay underneath her tired, green eyes and the eyeliner that smudged her face was wiped off by the tissue crumpled up in Jenny's hand. She looked like hell.
"Are you sure?" Ziva said quietly.
"Just go," Jenny replied resignedly.
Ziva glared at Gibbs as she left the room, hoping her telepathic message of 'Make her cry again and I'll slit your throat' got to him. As Ziva shut the door quietly behind her – still giving Gibbs the death glare, mind you – Jenny suddenly felt a tad worried of what's to come.
This'll be the first time she couldn't be able to look him in the eye in an argument.
"Which agency's pissing you off this time, Agent Gibbs?" Jenny started, putting on her glasses and still not looking at his eyes, choosing instead to look at a button on his shirt. She raised her eyebrows at the lack of words. "If this is about the FBI taking the case again, I'm afraid I can't do anything about it – no matter how hard you fight me."
"Jen." Gibbs' voice was surprisingly gentle albeit with a touch of fatigue.
Well, the Director certainly wasn't expecting that.
After a moment of silence, Gibbs stepped closer but stopped when he noticed Jenny's body tense up. She still couldn't lock her eyes with his, still focusing her attention on that little blue button.
"Jen." Gibbs said again, this time putting his hand on her shoulder. Jenny visibly and involuntarily flinched, and suddenly Gibbs felt a sense of hurt.
Jenny was scared of him.
He sighed.
"If you have nothing to say, Agent Gibbs, I suggest you leave," Jenny said rather coldly. Appearing rude was better than appearing vulnerable in her eyes. "Please."
"I'm not going anywhere, Jen," said Gibbs in a firm manner. "We need to talk."
"I don't want to talk about anything right now, Jethro, so please just go," Jenny said, finally looking at him in the eyes. She mentally head-slapped herself for sounding so desperate.
"I don't like seeing you like this."
"Then leave."
Gibbs ignored the blunt retort. "I don't like what's going on between us."
Silence ensued.
"Exactly how much of the conversation did you hear?" Jenny asked, changing the subject and looking back down once more, suddenly interested in her brown nail polish.
"Just enough," Gibbs replied, cautiously taking a seat on her desk and facing her. "And for the record, I don't hate you."
Jenny scoffed slightly, still picking on her nails.
"Look at me, Jen," Gibbs said quietly, putting a finger underneath Jenny's chin and tilting it upwards. Jenny gasped at the sight of his eyes. She had never seen it as concerned as it was now, and the icy blue depths pulled her right back in and reminded her why she had fallen in love with him in the first place.
Gibbs, on the other hand, wanted to slap himself. He could now see the extent of the damage - how hurt Jenny's feeling – and wanted to fix it. Her forest green eyes were still staring at him, waiting to see what he would do next, and he couldn't help but feel quite delighted to see that her eyes were still the exact shade of green as he remembered.
Green was always his favourite colour.
"I don't hate you. I want you to know that," he said again.
To Jenny's horror, she could feel tears prickling up again at the back of her eyes. Don't be a fool, Jenny thought, don't cry in front of him! But that's exactly what she did.
She brought her head back down and started to cry again. Gibbs pulled her into a hug, hoping that she wouldn't push away, but Jenny wrapped her arms around his torso even tighter. Gibbs edged around the desk knowing that they were both in an awkward position to be hugging, pulled Jenny off her chair and pulled her back down onto his lap.
Jethro stroked her long, red hair – Gibbs liked it better this way – and waited until her sobs gradually decreased. Soon, only the sound of her hiccups could be heard.
"We're a bunch of fucked up idiots, aren't we?" Jenny finally commented, laughing a little. Gibbs felt relieved.
"I guess we are," he agreed, pulling her tighter as Jenny's head rested sideways on his shoulder.
"What else did you hear?" Jenny asked again.
"It's not what I heard, Jen, it's what I didn't hear," he replied mysteriously.
"What does that even mean?"
"I didn't hear you denying Ziva when she said you still had feelings for me," Gibbs explained.
"Oh." Jenny looked down once more on her now-chipping nail polish. She really needed to get rid of this habit – it was worse than her right eye twitching.
Gibbs studied her for a few minutes, still having an arm wrapped around her and a hand curling a lock of her hair.
"You know, if you're up for it, we could try this again," Gibbs said slowly, looking at Jenny intently, hoping to get a reaction from her. He didn't know what to expect. "It's gonna take a while, knowing our history and the crap we put ourselves into, but -"
"I'd like that," Jenny said with a smile.
Words weren't really necessary for the both of them, and soon they both lapsed into a comfortable silence, content with being around each other. They both felt as if heavy loads had been lifted off their shoulders, something they haven't felt since Paris.
"Jen?"
"Hmm?"
"Wanna bet Tony's making a bet about us?"
Jenny's laugh reverberated around the room.
I'm not that satisfied with the ending. I ran out of ideas by that time. x_x
But anywho, drop a review! Or not. I don't really mind. ^_^