A/N: Once again, a big big thank you for all the reviews/subs, I am very grateful to each and every person who takes the time to even read my work let alone comment :o) Originally I was going to split this into two chapters but I opted against that so here's the next installment!

It was unusually sunny the following morning as Elijah wandered through the streets with his friend Jordy on the way to the skate park. Jordy had been his friend since kindergarten when Elijah had asked him if he would like to share some of his lunch with him. The young boy had gladly accepted and the two had been inseparable ever since. Aside from the teachers, Jordy was the only one who knew about Ziva.

"So my mom said she would come pick us up around 2:30." Jordy spoke. "She said if your mom says it's ok, you can stay for dinner." It took him less than a split second to realize what he had said. "I'm sorry man; I didn't mean… how is your mom?"

Elijah shrugged.

"If you ever want to get away from it all, you can always come hang at my house." Jordy offered.

Elijah nodded; Jordy's family were like his own extended family, he fitted in well with his parents and his sister, but he knew that as hard as it was, he needed to be at home. He was about to explain that to him when something caught his eye across the street. Without a single glace for oncoming traffic, Elijah bolted across the street and pressed both of his palms and face against the pane of glass in the shop window. Sitting there were a pair of white ballet shoes coated in a subtle dusting of glitter with a tiny Star of David studded on the top. Elijah knew the star was simply decoration, it hadn't been placed there for religious connotations but that didn't matter because these shoes were the perfect gift, these shoes were what he needed to get his mom for Christmas.

Heavy breathing sounded in his ear as Jordy pulled up alongside him.

"Dude, what the hell?" He asked.

"Sorry Jordy, I have to give the skate park a miss, I need to get home." Elijah called happily taking off back in the direction he came.

"What? Why?" Jordy called back still rooted to the spot.

"I'll explain later, I'm sorry!" He shouted pumping his legs as fast as he could to get back home.

It took less than 15 minutes for him to run the normal 35 minute walk to his house and as he burst through the door gasping for breath he bumped right into Tony.

"Woah, slow down kiddo, what happened? Is Jordy ok?" Tony asked, slightly panicked.

"Yeah he's fine, dad, I need to borrow some money, get an advance on my allowance or something?" Elijah panted.

"What for?"

"Mom's Christmas present." He said, walking into his room with Tony following behind him. He fell to his knees and pulled an old shoebox from under his bed, pulling out a beat up and battered old baseball glove he stuck his hand inside and pulled out a small rolled up wad of notes. He had 23 dollars, his life savings.
"Well how much do you need?" Tony asked.

"I dunno, I didn't look at the price, maybe ten dollars?" Tony looked down at the boy; he was so excited, so filled with joy and with pride that he just couldn't take that away from him. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a ten dollar bill. He pressed it into his son's hand and smiled.

"You want me to drop you back into the stores?" Tony asked.

Elijah shook his head.

"No, I want this to be a surprise for you both." He beamed.

"I don't want you going into the town on your own." Tony warned.

"Dad…" Elijah rolled his eyes.

"It's not safe bud."

"I won't talk to strangers, I won't get in anyone's car, I won't even cross the street, the store I need in on this side of the road, please dad, I need to get this for mom, it's perfect." Tony could see the optimism in his son's eyes and against his better judgement he agreed to let the boy go.

"Be careful." He warned.

"Thanks dad!" Elijah yelled with a happy smile as he took off running out the door once again.

With elation flooding his entire body, Elijah didn't stop running the entire way back into the town centre. He bolted past the busy shoppers picking up their last minute Christmas supplies with only 3 days left to pick up gifts. Pushing past a couple who were arguing over the size of television to purchase their daughter, he weaved his way into the store and ran up to the nearest clerk he could find.
"Excuse me m'am?" He spoke, catching the eye of a young employee, probably just earning some extra holiday cash. She was maybe 19, 20 at a push, with short blonde hair and a scowl; retail at Christmas time was enough to anger even the cheeriest of people. She was dressed in the store uniform, a cream shirt with a green overall, a Santa hat pulled over her hair.

"Yeah?" she replied with attitude.

"The ballet shoes in the window, can you tell me where they are in the store please?"

"That's the last pair." She replied without even looking around the store.

"Oh, ok, um, could you tell me what size they are please?"

The girl exhaled deeply, then slouched off to the window and lifted the shoes in the box to look at them.

"Seven." She called not even bothering to return to the boy.

Elijah punched the air; they were perfect.

"I'll take them!" He grinned. The girl put the lid on the box and shoved them at the boy.

"Good for you." She grunted. "Merry Christmas." She added with a scowl. Elijah was too happy to notice her lack of enthusiasm, and instead wandered in a daze of euphoria, until he had joined the queue of other Christmas shoppers waiting to pay for their goods.

After ten minutes or so he began to anxiously shift from foot to foot as he drew nearer to the front of the queue. The line was really piling up behind him but that didn't matter, all that he cared about was that he had found the most perfect gift in the world for his mom and he couldn't wait to see her face when she opened them on Christmas morning.

"Next?" A tall and older clerk beckoned Elijah to his cashier with a single wave of his hand. The man's hair was greying at the edges, he looked like the kind of man who had been working in the job for years and had never quite grown to love it.

Elijah happily pushed the shoe box up on the counter and waited while the man scanned the barcode.

"Forty one, sixty three." He spoke.

Elijah felt his heart stop. He didn't have enough. Regardless, he pulled out the rolled up bundle of money and tossed it on the counter as he began to dig his hands into his pockets. First he thrust them into his coat pockets; he found a quarter and two nickels. Then, his pants pockets, a penny, nothing more.

"You got it or not kid?" The cashier asked.

Elijah looked up at the man and shook his head.

The guy shook his head and with a sigh pulled the box from the counter and shoved it underneath his till.

"Wait, can you hang on to those for me? I'll come back with more money?" Elijah asked.

"We can't do that kid."

"But they're the last pair and I need them for my mom." Elijah pleaded.

"Store policy."

"But you don't understand," Elijah began.

"No, you don't understand. The store policy is that we don't hold items for customers, you either pay for them or they go back on sale. You don't have the money so you don't get the goods, that's the way it works." The man's voice was laced with anger and malice.

Elijah felt tears well in his eyes, this was Ziva's perfect gift, if he didn't get them now, they may not have them when he had the money; or worse yet, she might not be around to receive them if he had to wait until they got more in stock.

"Sir, please, I will go get the money now, I just need you to keep them for 2 hours at the most."

"Young man, listen to me… no." The man spoke more aggressively this time.

Elijah's shoulders sunk and he bowed his head as he turned away from the countertop, tears overflowing his eyes.

"Hey, hey, what's up little man?" The gentleman next in the line placed a hand on Elijah's shoulder. He knew he should shrug him away, he shouldn't talk to this man, he'd been raised better than that, but he was too upset to care right now.

"I don't have enough money." The boy sniffed. "I need to get those shoes but the guy won't hang on to them for me, it's the last pair and I need them for my mom."

"I'm sure you mom won't mind if you get her something else." The man explained.

Elijah looked up at him through his tear filled eyes and shook his head.

"These are perfect. My mom, she's sick, really sick, and my dad said she's not going to make it this time." He sighed. "I wanted to get her something amazing for Christmas, she used to dance, it used to make her happy and I like it when she's happy. When she smiles it makes her face glow, she looks so pretty, I want her to look pretty again before... but it doesn't matter, because I only have 33 dollars." Once again his head fell and he began to slink away.

"Wait, wait!" The man called after him. "Sir?" he spoke turning to the cashier. "How much short is he?"

"Eight sixty-seven." The cashier sighed.

The man reached into his pocket and pulled out a ten dollar bill and placed it on the counter. Elijah turned and looked at the man in wide eyed wonder.

"Everyone deserves to be happy on Christmas." He smiled. "Get her those shoes kid." The man winked.

"Really?"

He nodded with a smile.

Elijah wiped away the tears in his eyes and ran up to the gentleman wrapping his arms around his waist.

"My mom is gonna be so happy. Thank you mister, thank you so much!" He dug into his pocket and threw the rest of his money on the counter, pulled the box of shoes off the top, tucked them under his arm and ran out of the store with the biggest smile you could ever see on a child.

He careered down the street in the opposite direction of his house; it wasn't home he needed to go, not yet, there was some place else he had to stop first. He would know the streets if he had his eyes closed so he ran on autopilot to the block of apartments a little under 20 minutes from the main town centre. He didn't even bother to check the front buzzer for the right number before he smashed his fingers against the red button and listened to the loud buzzing sound that poured out of the speaker. Pacing from foot to foot he waited for his response.
"Yeah, who is-?"

"McGee its Elijah, buzz me in!" He spoke into the speaker. It took no more than hearing the name Elijah for the front door buzzer to sound and for Elijah to throw it open and begin to bound up the stairs two at a time.

The front door of McGee's apartment was already ajar when Elijah reached the floor of his apartment and he burst inside and slammed it closed behind him.

"Uncle McGee, check out what I got for mom for Christmas!" He panted excitedly. "I need you to keep it here until Christmas Eve, I don't have any place to hide it and I don't want mom or dad to see them." He was speaking a mile a minute as he tore off the lid of the box and lifted one of the shoes from the tissue paper lining the inside. "What do you think? They're perfect right? Dad said mom used to dance, he said it used to make her happy, and I saw these and I thought they would be perfect, you think she will like them?" He thrust the shoe towards McGee who was only barely following the conversation.

"Yeah Elijah, I think they're great, she'll love them, I know it." He watched the grin spread over Elijah's face.

"And I can keep them here?"

"Yeah, yeah that's fine." McGee smiled. "I think I have a bunch of spare Christmas paper if you want me to wrap them?" Elijah's eyes lit up.

"Would you?"

"Sure." McGee nodded.

"Thanks you're the best!" And with that Elijah bounded back out of the apartment, down the stairs and headed in the direction of home leaving McGee completely bemused and dumbfounded.

Christmas Eve was soon upon them and the festive season was beginning to feel ever more magical. The entire town was decorated in lights, decorations and wreaths, festive music and carols came from every store front, each house was boasting light displays and even larger trees, and even a thin dusting of snow was coating the ground leaving everyone guessing as to just how likely it was that they would get a real white Christmas.

Gibbs had told everyone not to bother coming in, if there was a case he would call them, but everyone had better places to be on Christmas and they should be wherever their family was. Tony stood in the kitchen fixing chocolate chip pancakes in shapes for himself, Elijah and Ziva should she want one, but she had barely eaten anything since Elijah gave her the cookie days ago. She had been drifting in and out of sleep for most parts of the days and as much as it pained him to think about it, he knew her time was growing short and he knew that he needed to think about what he wanted to say to her when the time came.

Elijah strolled into the kitchen dressed in a pair of jeans and white and blue striped polo shirt that Tony had bought for him; he looked smart.

"I got a stack of cactus shaped pancakes with your name on them." Tony smiled. "I mean they were supposed to be animals, a dog, a giraffe, maybe even a bat, but apparently cactus is my speciality…" he lifted a pancake with his spatula and held it out to show his boy. Elijah laughed but tore off a part and placed it into his mouth, chewing on the light fluffy texture while the creamy chocolate melted across his tongue.

"They're good." He smiled with a thumbs up.

"Excellent because I've got enough batter here for like five hundred so I thought instead of turkey this year we'd have pancakes."

Elijah shrugged.

"Fine by me." He laughed. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and went to stand beside his father at the stove top. "How is mom today?" he asked.

Tony sighed. "She's sleepy, but she's ok."

Elijah nodded. "You think you will have time later on to drive me over to Uncle McGee's place? I need to pick something up."

"I don't know, we'll see bud, I don't really want to leave your mom alone."

"But she's sleeping. She's always sleeping, she won't even notice." Elijah countered.

"I said we'll see and that is that." Tony spoke bluntly; he wasn't going to get into an argument on Christmas Eve.

"Fine." Elijah huffed picking up his plate of pancakes and taking them to his room, slamming the door behind him.

Tony flicked the last pancake out of the pan and onto his plate and sighed as he set down the spatula, these next few months were going to be nothing but difficult for the both of them, he had to expect moments like this to crop up, he just wasn't sure he was ready for them just yet.

A little over an hour later when Tony had long since finished his stack of cactus shaped pancakes and he had managed to get Ziva to at least take a bite of one, Elijah came out of his room with his empty plate in hand and his shoes on his feet.

"Going somewhere?" Tony asked, taking his plate and dropping it into the sink of soapy water.

"Uncle McGee's." Elijah stated matter-of-factly. "I have to pick something up."

Tony shook his head.

"You should be at home today bud, I think you need to spend some time with your mom." He tried to explain.

"I will, but I need to go get something first. I won't be long."

"I don't want you walking all that way when it gets dark so fast." Tony warned.

"So drive me over there." Elijah suggested as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.

"I'm not going to leave your mom alone. Whatever it is it will have to wait."

"No, I need to get it now!" Elijah raised his voice.

"And I said you need to wait, your mom,"

"Mom, mom, mom, that's all you care about now, I know she's sick, but she's been sick for a long time. You're not fun like you used to be, you never come and play soccer with me, you never take me places at the weekends, you don't even let people come around anymore. Just because she's sick! If it's going to be like this I wish she'd just die already!" The second the words came out of this mouth he wished he could take them back, he saw the way Tony's face contorted as he said them and it wasn't even how he felt, he was just mad.

Before Tony could have the chance to say something back to him he bolted to the door and ran as fast as he could down the street, knowing that Tony wouldn't come after him and leave Ziva on her own. Without so much as a second thought he just tore down the streets heading in the direction of the only place he could think of to go.

As he turned onto McGee's street someone was already coming out of the door, kicking up his pace a little more he managed to grab the door before it closed and he quickly began to bound his way up the staircase. Before he even had the chance to knock on McGee's front door, the wood swung open and Tim stood in the doorway with his cell pressed to his ear.

"Yeah Tony, he's here, and he's ok." He spoke, stepping aside so the boy could wander in. "I will, I will. Yes Tony, I know. Ok, alright. Sure." McGee hung up the phone and closed the door behind him.

Elijah stood in the hallway desperately panting for breath; he had run a long way without a single second of reprieve. McGee turned to him but before he could open his mouth to speak Elijah was interjecting with breathless gasps.

"I didn't mean it, Uncle McGee." He inhaled sharply. "I didn't mean what I said." McGee looked down at him with compassion in his eyes. "I don't want her to die; I never want her to die. I don't know why I said it, I was mad, I just… I didn't mean it!" McGee watched the tears slip down Elijah's face, thick and fast, the crystal drops were falling from his eyes faster than the panted breaths he was fighting against. With each new breath came a sob and McGee was unsure what he should do, he'd never been good with emotion, let alone children's emotion, so he did what he thought he would want if he were Elijah, and he pulled the boy into his arms and hugged him until he was all cried out.

Once he had stopped crying, when he had calmed down, McGee fetched a glass of water and sat down beside Elijah who was sitting leaning his back against the wall in the hallway.

"Thanks." Elijah smiled accepting the glass and taking a mouthful of the cool liquid, instantly seeming to rejuvenate his dry and coarse mouth.

"You're welcome." McGee replied. He took a deep breath before speaking again. "So your mom is really sick huh?" McGee had called around to the house just two days ago to say his goodbyes, and, like Abby and Gibbs he had been shocked by what he found, her frailty, her weakness, she was just a delicate shell now; he knew then it wouldn't be long before she gave in, but he hadn't quite wrapped his head around that yet; he hadn't considered that Ziva, strong, tough, resilient Ziva, was not going to get better from this.

Elijah nodded.

"Dad said there isn't much time left." He admitted. "I don't want her to die McGee."

"I know you don't."

"That's selfish though, right?" Elijah asked, looking up at McGee with those glossy eyes, the same eyes as his mother, the eyes that everyone who knew her were going to look at in the future and see only heartache reflected in them.

"Why is that selfish?" McGee asked a little confused. "Nobody wants her to die, everybody wants her back at work, wants her back to herself." He was trying to get across that what Elijah was feeling, he didn't feel alone.

"Because," the boy continued. "She's hurting, she's tired and she's had enough, she should have gone five years ago and she didn't, that's because of me. She hung on because of me and if I went back there and told her to stay, she would, because I asked her. But I can't make her do something if it makes her sad or hurt." This boy had a lot more empathy and understanding that McGee did at his age he considered. If he had been sitting here faced with the death of his mother, even at his age now, he wouldn't have been half as pulled together as Elijah, nor a fraction as wise. McGee was truly witnessing a glimpse of true, altruistic love.

"I've known your mom a long time," McGee spoke, and he saw the way Elijah turned to him, hungry for information. If he had all the time in the world he would never learn all there was to know about his mom and he had so much information he wanted to cram into his little mind while she was still here. "Your mom is one of the best people I know. She is strong and tough and determined, there is not a chance that anyone can make her do anything she doesn't want to. If your mom had wanted to give up five years ago, she would have. You didn't make her do anything she didn't want to, and you need to know, that even if she is hanging on for you, it's because she loves you more than anything else in the entire world." McGee let those words sink in as Elijah broke off eye contact and considered what he had been told. "When your mom found out she was having you, she was terrified." McGee explained. "She'd never say that, but she was, you could just see it on her face."

"What was she so afraid of?" Elijah asked confused.

"Everything." McGee smiled. "She was scared she wouldn't be able to take care of you like you needed, that you'd get hurt because she wasn't watching, that she couldn't show you the love that you needed and that you'd grow up to hate her."

Elijah opened his mouth to speak, but this time McGee was the one to cut him off.

"But she excelled at being a mother. I have never seen anyone as natural with a baby as your mom was. She brought you to work with her and showed you off to everyone, she was so proud. You are her single greatest achievement and she would do anything for you."

Elijah nodded, he had always known that his mother loved him, but perhaps he didn't know just how much.

"You still have the shoes right Uncle McGee?" Elijah asked.

McGee nodded.

"You think you could take me home with them?"

McGee smiled.

"Of course."