The Ant and the Dove: An NCIS Fairytale
Chapter 3
Dove's last day in the hospital was spent with goodbyes. A limo would pick her and her parents up and take them to the airport for their private flight. She was already packed and dressed by the time people started to arrive. She had asked that only a few people come to visit and the rest send emails or cards. It would be too long and difficult to say good bye to all her friends. She was dressed in some comfortably loose low rider jeans that fell below her navel, and she wore a chemise with a warm Nantucket fishing sweater over it. It covered most of her body scars, and with her hair left down and hiding part of her face the rest were covered as well.
She said goodbyes to the doctors and nurses first, giving them large fruit baskets to enjoy. Then two of her girlfriends from Georgetown came by to say goodbye and leave her with some soothing music and bath salts and crèmes. Then Ziva, Gibbs, and Tony arrived. She saw them one at a time, starting with Ziva.
Ziva and Dove had become good friends given their common language of Hebrew and their shared affection of Tony. Ziva had also been through some terrible ordeals and could understand and share her pain. Ziva gave her a set of bookends made of stone and rosewood. One of the bookends was carved with a beautiful woman, and the other had the blessing of a woman of valor. The bookends were beautiful and held so much meaning between the two women they were a perfect gift. Ziva left her friend with tears in both their eyes but looked forward to being reunited in a few months.
Gibbs came in next. He was still in a state of shock and felt he should have protected her better. She had done her best to try to assuage his guilt, but it would be a long time before he would be able to give up his pain and guilt at what had happened to her. She tried to offer him up something that would give him a chance to heal.
"Gibbs, Jethro… I am going away and will come back whole and beautiful again. There is nothing about this you could have done anything about."
"I could have protected you better given the TRO, I could have…"
"JETHRO! Stop! Just Stop. What is done is done…the arrow of time only moves forward. We must stop the 'would of', 'should ofs,' could ofs. I want you to do me a favor, Jethro. Can you do that?"
"I can do whatever you want."
"I want you to build me a boat. A boat big enough we can take several people out in it. A boat you finish and don't burn. I want you to build me a boat with a mast and a staff and a rudder, and probably a motor so we don't get stuck out there on the Potomac with no wind. Build me a boat that will allow the wind to blow through my hair, and allow the bad memories and pains to blow away. Can you do that for me Jethro?"
He looked at her and smiled his little smile, knowing he would do exactly as she said. "Could take longer than six months."
"I bet you can find help if you want it. I love you Jethro. I want you to let go of this and let both of us move forward." Dove said softly.
Gibbs cleared his throat. "I have this for you. It was Kelly's after her first communion. I want you to have it." He handed her a velvet box which she opened carefully, surprised at the gift. It was a freshly polished silver rosary with ruby red crystals.
"Jethro, it's beautiful. But I can't take this. It was Kelly's, you should keep this."
"Dove, you are the closest thing I will ever have to a daughter and I want you to have it. You will need it as you go through the next several months. Never lose hope and never lose faith."
"Thank you, Jethro." Dove started to cry then and Gibbs held her until she stopped. "Thank you. Maybe you can come visit me?"
"There is someone else who wants to visit you much more and you have told him no which is breaking his heart."
"I know. I am just afraid for him to see me. There is no telling if this will work or not, or how terrible it will be while I am going through it. But Jethro, please keep him safe for me. I want to come back to him, if he will have me."
"He would have you now Dove if you would allow it. His heart really is breaking with you leaving for so long and not allowing him to join you."
"Well, perhaps that is not set in stone. We will just have to see where this all leads us. Just keep him and the rest of the team safe."
"I always do. I'm going to leave so Tony can come in. He's been climbing the walls all day, even brought his own car so we didn't have to wait for him."
"Thank you Jethro. You have always been my hero. I will see you soon."
"Bye, baby," and Gibbs kissed her on the forehead where she would permit others to touch her. They both had tears in their eyes as he left and Tony entered.
Tony was distressed and Dove could tell. She was too. She didn't want to leave him anymore than he wanted her to.
He put on his charm smile and walked towards her as she stood near the sofa. "Hey baby. Today's the big day. How are you feeling?"
"Scared, mostly. Sad. Excited."
"All pretty normal emotions given the circumstances. I got our letter stuff. This is your bag and this one is mine. Make sure I got it all right."
Dove laughed at his enthusiasm for this letter writing idea. She thought they both might really enjoy it, and they would be letters to savor over the course of a lifetime. She opened her bag and found a box of 100 sheets of beautiful crème colored vellum and matching envelopes. Then she found the rosewood box with the most beautiful fountain pen she had ever seen before. It was made from sapphire chips pressed and ground flat with a gold nip and trim. It must have been over $1000. Dove gasped in surprise.
"Tony, when I said fountain pen, I had no idea…"
"It's beautiful isn't it? It's almost the color of your eyes and I got ink to match. My pen is made from chips of onyx and malachite, but otherwise is identical. Check out your stamp." He sounded something like a little boy on Christmas morning who had the best surprise for someone else.
She dug around in the bag and found the small box with the wax candles and stamp. The stamp was a beautifully detailed winged dove in flight. The wax candles were blue. Tony must have searched far and wide to find this. "It is perfect Tony. Thank you so much."
"Look at my stamp." He pulled out black candles and a stamp with an ant on it.
Dove laughed joyfully. "Where in the world did you get an ant stamp?"
"I had to search for sure." Tony was grinning from ear to ear. He had temporarily forgotten she was leaving and the reason for the stamps in the first place.
Dove smiled happily at him. "Tony, I have something for you as well. I picked it out myself. The stuff was brought to me here at the hospital and I picked it out. I hope you like it. It is a gift from me to you for all you have given me of yourself, of your time, and of your hope while I have been here." She handed him a small velvet box.
Hesitantly, Tony opened the box and found a platinum pinky ring that held two round black diamonds, set side by side. It was his turn to gasp in surprise. "Dove, it is beautiful." He immediately took it out of the box and put it on. He knew from the weight of it that it was platinum, and that the stones were real diamonds. He also knew he wouldn't insult her about mentioning how expensive it was. He knew and she knew he knew.
The time for leaving was approaching and there was one more thing Dove wanted to do before she left.
"Tony, my folks will be coming for me soon. Can you do one more thing for me? I'll understand completely if you don't want to."
"I would do anything for you Dove. Ask away."
"Would you kiss me? I know I'm a bit of a mess, and maybe not as pretty as what you are used to, but I just want to see if I could ever do even that again, and…" Tony stopped her nervous talking with a soft finger to her lips.
"Shh. Of course I will kiss you. Are you sure you are ready for that? You haven't wanted to be touched before."
"I know. But before I leave, I want to try. I want to try with you." Dove's voice was so soft and so vulnerable he could hardly hear her.
He carefully moved towards her, placing his hands lightly on her hips. He felt her tightened and then released into his hold. He took one hand and lifted her chin up, pushing her hair away from her face that she kept constantly hidden. Again she stiffened, and again she relaxed. Tony green eyes looked deep into her cornflower blue eyes, both of them filled with tears of the moment. Tony leaned his head down, his lips approaching hers and finally touching, his soft lips lightly touching her soft lips in their first kiss. She responded with a little more pressure but their lips both stayed closed. For even such a small touch, their bodies responded with lightning bolts throughout. When they finally broke apart, they were both breathing heavily and neither moved to break the moment.
Tony whispered, "Wow…"
Dove smiled up at him, "Yeah." She got an impish look on her face and said, "Tony, you know you are a superb investigator and I'm a college professor. Perhaps we should run an experiment just to make sure that wasn't a onetime thing."
"Do you think so? It might be wise to just test the theory. You know, just in case…" Tony was enjoying this light banter.
They looked into each other's eyes again and moved forward, this time their bodies lightly touching. He reached into her long wavy hair pulling her face to his while she wrapped her hands and arms around his neck pulling him towards her. This time their lips met slightly open, their tongues just barely touching as they began to explore each other's kiss. Tony was afraid to spook Dove, and Dove was afraid of his rejection so they both moved slowly and tenderly, their tongues touching and retreating, touching and retreating, their bodies pressed softly but completely against each other. When they finally broke away after several minutes, Dove placed her forehead on Tony's hard chest and dropped her hands to his chest as well. He held her head to him with his hands buried in her hair, smelling the jasmine and lavender scent of her.
He felt Dove's tears soaking his shirt, but did not feel any sobs. He pulled her head gently back and looked at her questioningly. "What is it baby? Is something wrong?"
She looked at him and smiled through her tears. "No, Tony. That was perfect. Thank you. I can leave now knowing that I'll be able to have another man touch me, kiss me, even maybe make love to me at some point. That man might only be you, and maybe you really will wait for me and want the same thing."
"I told you I would wait and I will. I don't think I have ever had a kiss quite like that. I want more and more, and when you get back, that is what we will do, even if it is just kissing for the next year."
Dove laughed happily, still being held in his arms. "I'm pretty sure we won't be able to wait a whole year Tony. Not with kisses like that."
He pulled her close into an embrace as he heard the door open and close. He wanted to capture the scent of her one more time before he had to let her go. The Admiral cleared his throat, but was pleased to see his daughter in Tony's arms. She had resisted anyone but Tony and occasionally Gibbs touching her. Seeing her held there against Tony's body, relaxed and unafraid gave him hope for her future, for their future. She finally broke away from Tony, very reluctantly, wiping the tears away from her cheeks. Tony's eyes were filled with tears too, his heavy eyelashes with small drops of tears on them, but none fell.
The Admiral sighed, "Baby, it's time to go. The limo driver is here to take your bags. Your mom is in the car. The plane is waiting, wheels up in an hour. I'm sorry to cut your time short."
Tony nodded his head in acknowledgement to the Admiral, but had not removed his hand from Dove's hair. She looked at her father and back at Tony, torn now about leaving but knowing that she must. She needed to recover fully before she could give herself fully to Tony. He deserved nothing less. She wiped the few remaining tears away and moved nervously away from her safe contact with Tony to gather the last few remaining items as the driver was gathering her few bags from the room. The Admiral walked with the limo driver out, while Dove took one last look around and then took Tony's hand in hers. She held it tightly as she left the place she had been sequestered in for the last month, where she had privacy and did not have to face the world, only to leave it to fly half way around the world to finish her recovery, if it ever was finished. Tony grasped her hand in his and they walked through that door together, into the waiting elevator, to the limo. Tony held her one more time as she relaxed instantly into his arms and against his body taking in the scent of him to hold her for six months. It seemed an eternity to both of them. He finally let her go, kissing her on the forehead just as Gibbs had done, and helped her into the limo. He choked out a goodbye to her parents and to her and then closed the door.
Tony stood on the sidewalk of the hospital, both hands in his pants pockets, head dropped down and turned as he watched the limousine drive his love away for six months. He sadly twisted the ring she had given him, knowing that would quickly become a habit, reminding him constantly of her, as if he ever needed reminding.
TBC
A/N: I'd like to continue this story through one or two chapters of letters written between the two, and then one or two chapters of her return, a relatively short story. I have only had one review on it however, and am not sure how many are reading and enjoying it. I am doing research on another very popular story on True Blood and will put more effort into that and drop this story if no one is out there. Or perhaps it is so hooked in my mind I finish it anyway. It's easy to review, just click the button and let me know if I should continue the story or not. Thanks Renee
