Note: The part in italics is not so much a flashback, as it is a scene out of order.
Thanks for all your reviews, they have been very encouraging :) Real life has been kicking my butt, so many commitments and job interviews. I just have no time to write at the moment and it's only going to get worse. But, I'll still be writing, just very slowly! I have started two new fics and I still have plenty of ideas for this one. Oh and I'm very slowly finishing the last chapter of Time.
--
The elevator announced their arrival with a subtle ping. The doors opened to reveal Abby and McGee and their daughter. Abby was beaming and holding onto the handle of the car seat that contained the baby, whereas McGee looked harassed and was weighed down by four different bags. The rest of the team were expecting them, so when Tony saw the couple stepping out of the elevator he dashed over to help McGee with the bags. The couple suspected he was aiming for the position of godfather and was doing his best to act responsibly and impress them. Privately the couple had already discussed the issue and had agreed that Tony would make a wonderful godfather for their daughter. However, they had also agreed to tell him closer to the event, because they knew how grating the inevitable Godfather impersonations would be.
McGee was a little annoyed that they had been called in today. Well, really it was Abby that they had wanted, but she had managed to convince him that it would be a good time for him to catch up on some paperwork and for their daughter's first trip to the NCIS office. Abby had some evidence that needed to be finished and signed off for a case that was going to trial soon. She hadn't finished it before the baby was born and now the case was on a rush. McGee had expected the temp to finish it, but apparently it was more 'consistent and appropriate' for Abby to do it; not that he was sure what that meant.
Abby had been pleased to be asked to come in. It gave her a reason to leave the house, which could only be a good thing. She had missed her lab dearly and couldn't wait to return to work fulltime. She prickled at the thought of someone else touching her mechanical babies and moving her mementos and photographs. As much as she enjoyed being at home with her daughter, she missed adult conversation and the job she loved.
With most of the bags dumped on McGee's desk, hugs given out to everyone present and Tim settled in front of his laptop, Abby kissed her husband's cheek and turned to leave with the baby carrier.
"Where are you going?" McGee asked, narrowing his eyes in suspicion.
"To my lab…" she replied incredulously.
"Abby, you are not taking her with you." He said firmly.
"What?! Why not?" She exclaimed.
"It's a laboratory Abs, there are chemicals and dangerous…things. She shouldn't be there." He argued.
"Tim, she can barely hold up her own head. I don't think she's going to fix herself an acid-colada anytime soon." She countered, whilst rolling her eyes.
At this point another voice weighed in;
"Hey Abs, maybe you could just leave her up here, so that she can hang out with her Uncle Tony." DiNozzo said, with a hopeful smile.
Abby looked between the two men with her eyes narrowed; she disliked them ganging up on her, but she also knew this was a fight she wouldn't win. She knew Gibbs would side with Tim as well, so this time she reluctantly decided to concede. She muttered something under her breath as she lowered the baby carrier on her husband's lap, kissed her daughter farewell and headed towards the elevator.
McGee placed the baby carrier on the desk so his daughter could face him and he could keep an eye on her. Not that a month-old baby got up to much mischief, but it reassured him. He watched as the little girl moved, she was quite awake now and flailing somewhat wildly. He hoped she wasn't becoming restless, because when she did, nothing but Abby would do. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Tony trying to catch his attention. He was smiling goofily at the baby, or possibly him, he couldn't quite tell. Tony kept trying to catch his eye; McGee knew what he was aiming for and apparently Gibbs did too.
"Why don't you just ask, DiNozzo?" Gibbs said, his eyes remaining on the paperwork in front of him.
"Can I, Probie?" Tony asked, already half out of his chair.
"I suppose so," McGee said with a sigh, "just be careful."
Tony practically leapt from his chair and eagerly made his way over to the younger agent's desk. Tony reached into the baby carrier, picked up the little girl and held her to his shoulder. McGee could tell that Tony doted on the little girl already, as he watched his friend stroke the soft downy hair on the back of his daughter's head. Tony didn't have much in the way of family, so it made sense for him to be so close with the members of the team. McGee remembered that after Tony had gotten over the initial shock, he had been so excited to hear that the couple were expecting a baby.
"See, this isn't so hard Probie," Tony said, turning to face McGee with a smug look, "I dunno what you're always complaining about."
McGee frowned and opened his mouth to speak. Before he could get a word out, Tony had turned around and revealed a trail of spit up dribbling down his shoulder. He grinned and started typing. But, he couldn't help muttering under his breath, "That's my girl."
--
"Hi, I'm Cathy," said the woman behind the desk, waving her gloved hand, "you must be Abby."
Returning the wave, Abby looked at the woman standing behind her desk. The woman was short, had curly, shoulder length, mid-brown hair and a kindly, plump face. Abby guessed Cathy was her senior by perhaps ten years. For some reason, Abby had convinced herself that her replacement would be younger, smarter and more attractive. She cursed her hormones once again.
"Yep, that's me. I'm just here to play with some evidence, and then I'll get outta your way." Abby said flatly as she searched for her lab coat, which to her surprise, was still hanging on the same peg she left it on nearly a month ago. Maybe Cathy wasn't so bad after all.
--
The last test strip slowly turned purple, as she had expected. Cathy had tried to strike up a conversation with her several times, but Abby had remained aloof. Now all she had left to do was a quick write-up and seal the evidence. The whole process had taken her just under two hours, but she couldn't help but wish that it had taken longer. Abby sighed, on one hand she was itching to get back behind her desk and help catch some bad guys, yet on the other, she missed her baby. An unfamiliar, anxious, gnawing feeling had descended upon her the moment she had left her daughter's side. She had told herself to suck it up and get on with things, but the damage had been done, the doubt had set in. Now she worried that she wouldn't be able to go back to work at all. At the moment, there was only one floor between her and her little girl, who was currently safe with her father, but not even that could soothe Abby's worries. What if she couldn't manage coming back to work and leaving her daughter behind?
Abby began to cross the lab, in order to start packing up the evidence in its respective box. As she traversed the floor, she looked over at the desk. Abby was curious to see if the temp had moved any of her belongings around. On inspection Abby noticed that everything was in its rightful place, nothing appeared to be missing or even moved from its usual spot. There was one difference though. Right next to the computer desk was a picture frame. Detecting the foreign item, Abby looked at it in a little more detail. It was a simple wooden frame, containing a picture of two young boys.
"Are those your kids?" Abby asked quietly, feeling slightly ashamed of her previous rudeness towards the woman.
"Hmm? Oh, the photo," the woman replied, "yeah, those are my boys."
Abby moved closer to the desk to inspect the picture further. She guessed at least one of the boys was in his mid-teens, the other was a little younger. The boys seemed happy in the photograph, the younger boy was leaning against the older one in a mutual display of affection.
"They're really cute," Abby said with a smile, "how old are they?"
"Well, Kevin's 12," she said, pointing at the younger boy, "and Danny just turned 15."
Reaching out and picking up the frame, Abby wondered if she would be like Cathy some day, with photographs of treasured offspring replacing her current ones of macabre injuries. Perhaps such developments weren't so far off, she had already been coerced into putting the crib where she would have preferred to keep her coffin…
"I heard you've just had a baby." Cathy began slowly, trying to build upon the tiny piece of common ground the two women had.
"Yep, she's nearly a month old now." Abby replied with a small smile, as she felt herself slowly warm to Cathy.
"Really?! A month? You look so good. At a month I was still laying on the couch and eating candy bars!" The older woman replied, allowing herself to gush slightly.
Abby smiled and waved her hand dismissively. She suspected she would still be on that couch if it wasn't for Tim…
--
Gently pressing the door closed, he gingerly walked through the house. The very last thing he wanted was wake the baby or Abby, because he suspected the latter would be angry at his lateness. Gibbs seemed to have forgotten that he was supposed to be taking the time off to spend with his family. But McGee knew the team needed him, so for the last few days he had agreed to go in to do a little work, and then today he had ended up staying a lot longer than he meant to. Now he was trying to creep back into his own house in the early hours of the morning, desperately hoping he would be able to slide into bed next to Abby without having to explain himself.
Finding himself thirsty, he decided to grab a glass of water to take up to bed with him. As he approached the kitchen, he noticed the light spilling from the crack underneath the door. Abby wasn't usually awake this late, not since the baby had been born; now she tried to grab every spare minute of sleep she could get. Instinctively his hand hovered over the weapon at his side, as he turned the doorknob. He pushed the door open and was relieved to be greeted with the sight of Abby with her back turned to him. He presumed she was nursing the baby, because she was looking down and concentrating on something in her lap and her shirt, or rather his shirt, was sliding off her shoulders and revealing inches of her pale back. He never quite knew where to look when she was feeding the baby and he wondered if all fathers felt this way. It was a tough concept for him to understand, because for the last twenty-five years he had been imagining breasts had a very different function indeed.
She gave him a half-hearted greeting. Now he feared he was in trouble, perhaps she was going to complain about his tardiness. Preparing himself for a hushed reprimand, he was surprised when she remained silent. Making his way over to the sink, he picked up a clean tumbler from the sideboard;
"How was your day?" He whispered, as he stood at the sink to fill the tumbler.
"Fine." She replied, staring blankly at the wall.
A few minutes went by; neither of them said anything. It was an uncomfortable silence for McGee, he could tell Abby wasn't pissed off. If she was pissed off, she would have let him know about it, like she usually did. This time though, she just seemed… empty. Her spark appeared to be missing. Needless to say, he was worried and had no idea what to say to her. Much to his disappointment, he never quite understood Abby. There was always a gulf between them, something he didn't get. But he had come to expect that now, so he just did the best that he could.
"Do you want me to take her?" he said, noticing she was struggling to button up her shirt whilst holding the baby.
Abby merely shrugged in reply. Not understanding her answer, he moved towards her and took the baby from her arms. He swung round, picked up one of the many napkins they had lying around the house and laid it between his daughter's head and his shoulder. His daughter had an uncanny ability for spitting up all over his work clothes. He looked back at Abby; she didn't look like herself and she was wearing the same clothes as she had been this morning. In fact, she wore them yesterday too.
"When was the last time you left the house, Abs?" he asked, gently rubbing his daughter's back.
Once again, Abby shrugged and made a non-committal noise. McGee frowned; suddenly he felt all the pieces of the puzzle were coming together. She turned to walk away, but he caught her shoulder with his free hand, causing her to turn back around. Briefly, they made eye contact, and the look he received confirmed his suspicions. She wasn't leaving the house, she no longer cared about her appearance and she was becoming distant from him and their daughter. So many of the baby books had warned him about this. It was textbook, it was obvious, and he had still missed it. He had been so caught up in work and being a dad that he had forgotten about Abby. He was so disappointed in himself; he had let her down badly.
"I'm gonna call Gibbs; I'll tell him I'm not coming in tomorrow." He said firmly, silently resolving himself to fixing this situation.
"Doesn't he need you?" she mumbled, casting her eyes down to the floor.
"You two need me more." He replied.
She began to say something, but didn't get past the first syllable. Instead she moved closer to him and clung to his side. Encircling her waist with his free arm, he whispered words of comfort in her ear. Eventually she broke away from the embrace and looked him in the eye, silently thanking him for noticing that she was drowning.
--
"My partner, he rocks." Abby ventured, a small smile playing on her lips.
"Oh yes, Agent McGee comes down here a lot," said the woman, animatedly waving her hands as she spoke, "I'm afraid I know plenty about you already."
Abby looked puzzled. She supposed that Cathy could already tell a multitude of things about her from the trinkets that decorated the lab. But it was still strange to think that people talked about her whilst she wasn't there.
"You're so lucky, Agent McGee is such a sweetheart. He always shows me all the latest baby pictures." Cathy continued, her curls bouncing as she spoke.
"Then you must be pretty bored by now." Abby said, with a smirk.
"Oh don't be silly, I love babies. He's just excited is all. New Dad Syndrome," the older woman replied, briefly pausing as she sensed Abby's discomfort, "but you know, every time he comes down here, he's disappointed it's me sitting in that chair and not you."
Abby smiled and looked slightly embarrassed. She hadn't thought that Tim would miss her at work. She had assumed that he saw enough of her at home and that work was a welcome break from diaper changing and early morning bottle feeding. Though it would explain the broad smile he always gave her when he got home from work. Sometimes it took someone else to point out the obvious.
--
The elevator sounded and Abby walked out. She immediately rushed to check up on her daughter, who seemed to have survived her absence, this time.
"Hey guys! Gibbs, I'm all done." She chirped.
"Good work, Abs," he replied, "you can go as soon as McGee's done."
"Uhh Boss, I'm pretty much done here." McGee said.
Abby made her way over to McGee's desk, bending over to hug him from behind as he continued typing. As her husband sent the last couple of documents to print and logged off his computer, she glanced over at Tony.
"Does Tony know he has spit up on his shoulder?" she whispered in McGee's ear.
McGee shook his head and smiled at his little triumph, and Abby giggled in reply. He tapped her on the arm to signal that he was ready to pack up his stuff and leave. They both rose to standing and began organising their various bags. Abby helped pile the bags onto her husband's shoulders and picked up the baby carrier. The couple said their goodbyes, encouraged the two men to come and visit soon, and walked back towards the elevator. Abby pushed the button to call the elevator and they waited patiently by the unopened doors.
Before long, two of the women McGee recognised from the secretarial pool showed up and began cooing over the baby. Abby rolled her eyes, she hated it when people, especially women, got all gooey over babies they barely even knew. It was so stereotypical. The women seemed to love McGee, just like the rest of the women who worked in the building. Not that Abby was worried, it was that platonic, little brother kind of affection that most women felt for him. Apparently these women were called Carolyn and Lois and they thought that the baby was "so adorable". Carolyn looked like another career-girl Barbie and Lois clearly had a fetish for leopard print and pastel makeup. So far, neither of them had said a single word to Abby, which was hardly surprising, seeing as most of the people who worked at the secretarial pool were scared of her. If it wasn't her appearance that put them off, it was the story of her bathroom altercation with some girls she had caught making fun of Ziva.
"She's too precious! What's her name?" Lois purred, stroking the baby's cheek.
Concerned that Lois was going to poke out one of her daughter's eyes with her long pink talons, Abby shifted the baby carrier to her other hand, away from the neon claws.
"This is Alice. Alice Eve McGee." Tim answered, smiling down fondly at his daughter.
The women both squealed in delight and made McGee promise to take her over to the secretarial pool next time he brought her to work, and with that the two women departed.
As they walked away the couple overheard Lois say to Carolyn; "I told you he wasn't gay."
McGee's mouth dropped open and he turned to look at Abby, his eyes full of indignation, but it was all Abby could do to stifle her laughter. Seeing his wife's amusement, he simply groaned and muttered Tony's name under his breath.
When the elevator finally arrived, the doors opened to reveal Ziva holding a stack of files.
"Hey Ziva!" Abby said excitedly, hugging the other woman with her free arm.
Ziva greeted the small family and promptly excused herself, as she had another video conference in fifteen minutes. The couple said goodbye to Ziva and bundled into the elevator. They watched Ziva cross the bullpen and stop dead in front of Tony's desk. She pointed at Tony, and he turned his head to look over his shoulder. They only heard a little of what Tony said, but it seemed to be something about his favourite Ralph Lauren jacket. He stood, obviously pissed, and frantically tried to shake the jacket off. Sensing it might be a good time to take their leave, Abby hit the button for the next floor. Tony directed his attention towards the elevator and pointed at the departing trio, the two adults were waving and smiling. Tony had just opened his mouth to say something, when the elevator doors slid shut.