AN: Oops, forgot to mention this previously: I don't own NCIS: Los Angeles or any characters you recognize and I'm not making any money doing this. Also in case you haven't figured it out yet, spoilers for the Season 10 premiere were referenced in the first chapter, but none really since then. Anything that's aired already in the US is fair game.

Thanks again for all of the faves and follows. An extra special thank-you to everyone who has reviewed. Your comments truly make my day! I hope you enjoy this little foray into day-to-day Densi as Deeks continues to recover. Next chapter should be expected mid-week.


Their first night home from the hospital was much like the night they'd spent in the motel in Mexico: tense. Kensi helped Deeks settle into bed before heading to the bathroom. Now he waited for her to finish and join him.

"Hey," she said from the doorway of the en suite.

"Hey," he said in the same guarded tone. While they were still in the hospital, things had been as close to normal as they'd been before their argument. Deeks supposed they'd been too focused on his needs and recovery to think much about the disquiet between them. But since arriving home this morning, their interactions had grown increasingly…strained.

"You, uh, want me to sleep in the other room? In case you need space to get comfortable…you know, with your foot?"

Deeks studied Kensi as best he could in the dim light of her nightstand lamp. Her own foot was trailing along the hardwood floor in an idle pattern that seemed to fascinate her, as it drew all her attention. She didn't meet his eyes, and looked impossibly young to him, despite the feeling that they'd both aged ten years in the past week.

He recalled how he'd foisted this same decision on Kensi in Mexico when she'd given him the option to sleep alone then too. She had admitted she didn't want to, which was a comfort to him. But it hadn't lessened the uneasiness between them, and they both had trouble falling asleep until she had somewhat cautiously curled up against him. Deeks' memory of how natural it was to have Kensi in his arms, how right it felt that night, prompted his answer. "No. No, I don't think you need to do that."

"Okay," she said and headed toward the bed.

Deeks heard the quiet sigh Kensi released and hoped it was from relief and not dread.

Kensi stopped at what had become "her" side, the left, as much as she hated to admit she slept better there. "Maybe we should switch sides? I wouldn't want to kick your ankle accidentally."

He smiled, "You'll do anything to get back on this side of the bed, won't you?"

She returned the grin, "No. I just don't want to hurt you, Deeks."

He looked down at his right foot, propped on a couple of pillows near the middle of the bed. Kensi was right; if she turned toward him during the night and ran her leg against his, which wasn't at all uncommon, she probably would jar his ankle.

Kensi must have recognized the instant he came to the same conclusion, since she reached under the covers and across the bed for the pillows supporting his foot. "Up," she said. When he lifted his leg, she pulled the cushions out and slid them to the other side of the bed. Looking at him expectantly she asked, "You think you can scoot over or do you need me to help you get up and come around the bed?"

"Neither, if you would put my crutches where I could get to them on my own," he grumbled, but there was no anger in his words. She'd done this all day; as soon as he settled down somewhere, the couch, the dining room table, the back yard, she moved them away from him.

Kensi walked around the bed and handed him the pair of crutches. "Deeks, if you have another seizure while you're using them, you could fall and hit your head. We can't risk that. You were very lucky that your TBI was mild. But you heard the doctor, head trauma is cumulative and any additional blows to your head right now could make your situation much worse."

"Yeah, I know. But he also said the chances of me having a seizure are low—" she followed him as Deeks made his way around the bed with the metal and rubber implements under his arms.

"And yet much higher for the next several weeks than had you not had the one in the helicopter." Kensi stood in front of him after he sat himself on the edge of the mattress, waiting for him to release his crutches to her. When he showed no sign of doing so, she said, "Please, Deeks. Don't fight me on this."

Seeing the fear in her eyes, he let them go and Kensi immediately took them with her as she moved to the other side of the room. He watched her prop them against the wall when a thought struck him. "You'd have had to leave them with me if I wanted to sleep alone tonight," he pointed out.

Watching her work through that as she laid down, Deeks turned off the lamp and settled himself under the covers as well. They kept inches between them again, unlike nearly every other night since they started sharing a bed, when one or both of them would reach out a hand or leg seeking the physical connection they both craved. He wondered if Kensi was simply ignoring him because she'd decided he was right, but then she spoke.

"I probably would have slept on the floor, then," she said.

"Kens…" he started, but didn't know what he wanted to say.

"I shouldn't have offered to go into the other room now that I think about it."

In the darkness, Deeks felt her body shift. Looking at her, he saw Kensi had turned onto her side toward him, her head propped up on her hand. It was on the tip of his tongue to make a joke about her wanting to keep him in bed, but he fought the impulse. They weren't there yet. "Oh?" was all he said instead.

"We need to know if you have a nocturnal seizure," she explained.

"What? Baby, you can't stay up all night!"

"It's not like I'll be able to sleep anyway, worried about you having another seizure or brain bleed, or that you'd trip and fall using your crutches in the dark."

"You planning to keep this up for the next few weeks? You have to sleep sometime, you know."

"That's already taken care of," she said in a tone that immediately made Deeks suspicious.

"I have a feeling I'm not going to like whatever you have in mind."

"You still trust me?" Kensi sounded slightly unsure.

"Of course," he said quickly.

"Then believe me when I say I'm going to do everything in my power to make sure you make a full recovery with no complications."

"Oh, I'm definitely not going to like this, am I?"

"Go to sleep Deeks. You need your rest," she said, not answering his question.

Quite some time later, he was still wide awake and certain Kensi was too. "Well this is awkward," Deeks said softly into the night.

"What? Do you need to pee? Are you in pain?" she responded immediately.

"No. I was talking about this," he used a hand to indicate the space, both literal and figurative, between them.

"Yeah," Kensi agreed sadly, turning to her side again. "I wish—" she stopped abruptly.

"Go ahead," Deeks encouraged.

"I wish we could just forget about what we said in the garage. Go back to the way things were."

He reached for the pillow under his foot and repositioned it so he could shift onto his side as well. Facing Kensi, he said, "Do you really think that's a good idea, even if it was possible?"

She sighed, "No, probably not."

"Kens, we need to have that talk, and we will once my brain is less of a ticking bomb."

She grimaced at his choice of words and ducked her head. Deeks moved a lock of her hair out of the way so he could see her again. He left his hand on the side of her neck and said, "But do we always have to be so uneasy with each other until then, especially in here?"

"What do you mean?"

"We can't ignore it or forget about what we said, or what we still need to figure out, but maybe we can just put it away for a little while when we come to bed? Kind of like not going to sleep angry."

"Except the whole point of not going to bed angry is to resolve the issue before it gets worse."

"Well, yeah. But we don't really have that option at the moment. And obviously we don't want it to get worse, and we're walking on eggshells around one another so it doesn't. And so far that's been okay. Not great, clearly, but we've managed so far. It's just that…I hate that we're laying here next to one another and we're not comfortable enough for a simple touch." He rubbed his thumb against her cheek.

"Me too," she said, placing her hand atop his.

"I don't want you to ask permission to curl up next to me when we both know we'll sleep better that way. I don't want to be afraid that if I reach for you in the middle of the night that you'll pull away because we don't think we should be touching each other. Can we maybe leave all the ambiguity and uncertainty and awkwardness on the other side of the door when we come to bed?"

Kensi's response was to slide over and burrow as close to Deeks as she could. She nuzzled her face into his chest, lightly kissing the skin just above the vee of his t-shirt. Deeks wound his arms around her and enjoyed the sensation. He breathed in the scent of her and breathed out the pain and stress of the past week.


"You know you don't need to use an actual timer, right?" Deeks said as Kensi approached him with an icepack.

She wrapped it around his ankle and set her phone to alert in twenty minutes. "Just following doctor's orders."

"I think they were more like suggestions, you know, to be used if needed. Not sure the intent was to be so militant about it."

"RICE is more than a suggestion Deeks. It's the best way to reduce the pain and inflammation and keep you from injuring it further. Good old rest, ice, compression, and elevation are the keys to an uncomplicated recovery," Kensi said as she switched out the pillow between his foot and the coffee table it was currently laying on. She crouched down to study the bruising, using the gentlest of touches to assess the swelling. Apparently satisfied, she sat on the couch on the other side of Monty.

"Kens, it's only a sprained ankle," he reminded her.

"Sprains can hurt just as much as fractures and breaks, and since you can't take Advil because of the increased risk of bleeding, we need to make sure you don't have any more pain than necessary."

"I've been taking Tylenol regularly. Correction, you've been bringing it to me every four hours on the dot and I've been swallowing it without complaint like the good patient that I am."

"We both know it hasn't been helping as much as Advil would, especially with the swelling." When Deeks opened his mouth to argue, Kensi warned, "Don't even try to tell me it doesn't still hurt."

He stayed silent. The truth was that his ankle throbbed when he tried to bear a little weight on it in the shower. Out of habit, Deeks ran his hand through his hair, still somewhat surprised to find the bald spots.

Kensi must have caught his unintentional frown, because she was off the couch and leaning over him checking his pupils before she was done asking, "Do you have a headache? Do you feel okay?"

"Relax, I'm fine—I'm good, sorry. No pain, no dizziness, no auras or funny tastes or smells. I'm good. Really. I just forgot about the new 'do for a second there." After being home for three days, Deeks was no longer surprised by this reaction any time he demonstrated anything remotely like something that could possibly be considered, in this reality or any other, a sign that he was about to have a seizure or that he was suffering from another brain bleed.

"Kens, I'm supposed to be keeping my blood pressure within normal limits," he reminded her gently and not for the first time. "You jumping in my face whenever I put a hand to my head, while understandable, and really, really sweet, is going to get old really, really fast. Can you try to…tone down the ninja act just a little bit?"

"Sorry," she said quickly, drawing back and removing her hands from his thighs as if she just remembered she didn't have the freedom to touch him any time she wanted. True to their agreement, Kensi and Deeks shed their discomfort when they fell into bed at night. That time together was the closest they came to "the way things were," and it felt wonderful. But they remained overly conciliatory in their daily waking interactions and the strain between them, while waxing and waning during the day, still hung heavy over them.

Deeks let out a sigh. "Please don't be," he held out his hand. Kensi took it and he guided her to return to her seat on the couch. Monty was still between them, so Deeks laid their joined hands on the dog. Their fur-baby shifted with a sigh of his own less than a minute later, causing their hands to separate. But when Kensi and Deeks began mindlessly stroking his flank, neither one seemed bothered when their hands would occasionally touch or slide over the other's.


"With all this time at home together, I guess you and Kensi will be just about done with the plans for the wedding when you go back to work," Roberta said as she put an omelet on the table in front of him.

Deeks smiled, but not in response to his mother's words. He'd just won a bet with Kensi. It took six days for Mama to finally break down and mention the wedding. Kensi was convinced his mother would be able to hold out for a full week, especially since she had emphasized to the woman that Deeks needed to remain calm during her visits and that wedding planning, given how inherently stressful it was, was not on the list of approved topics of conversation.

"Mama, I know Kensi told you we can't spend hours poring over those fantastic binders you prepared for us. We're both following a concussion protocol, which means we have to limit how much we read." They also had no intention of telling their mothers that the status of the wedding, as well as their relationship, was currently unknown.

"Have you at least settled on a honeymoon destination yet? Or finally picked the date?"

He shook his head as he finished chewing and swallowing a mouthful of eggs. "Need the computer for that, and screen time has to be minimal too."

"Well then what on earth do the two of you do all day?" she asked in a huff. Roberta's face lit up as she sat at the table with Deeks. "Oh! I know! You two are working on my first grandchild! So glad Kensi took it to heart when I reminded her there's nothing wrong with the baby coming before the wedding."

"Mom!" Deeks was proud of himself for not flinching like he'd been punched. The good thing about having his mother here was that she typically kept his mind off his troubles with stories of her day to day life and those of her many friends. Clearly his luck had run out today.

"What? You're a grown man and you live with your beautiful fiancée, you think I don't know you have sex?"

"That doesn't mean we have to talk about it."

"There's nothing to be embarrassed about, Martin. We're both adults. You know all about my relationship with Guy."

"Against my will. And those are pictures you put in my head that I will never be able to scrub out."

"Since when did you become such a prude?"

"Since I met my mother's latest boyfriend for the first time while he was wearing nothing but his boxers and had clearly just come out of the shower with said mother." Deeks put his head in his hand. "Another image I can never un-see, thank you very much."

When the doorbell rang, Deeks muttered, "Thank God," and stood to answer it.

"No, you stay right there, Kensi will have my head on a platter if I let you walk around."

"Even Kensi lets me walk to the door all by myself," he lied and walked away from the table with barely a limp. The truth was even though he was allowed to walk short distances without his crutches now, Kensi still didn't let him do anything as dangerous as walking to the curb to get the mail.

On the other side of the door he was surprised to find Kensi's mother. "Julia," he said when he opened it. He stepped back to allow her entry and gave her a kiss on the cheek. "What are you doing here?"

"Isn't today my day? I thought we were switching some of the days this week. I texted Kensi to let her know I was running late, she didn't respond to say I shouldn't come."

"Julia! It's good to see you." Roberta joined them and greeted her friend warmly. "Come sit, I'll whip you up a quick omelet."

"That would be lovely, Roberta. Thanks so much. No point in heading back right now, is there?"

"You should stay all morning if you have nowhere else to be. Maybe we can give this one," she jerked a thumb toward her son, "some advice on what not to do in a marriage."

"That sounds just fantastic," Deeks said to Roberta in a tone he hoped she caught. "Kensi's phone is on mute, I'm sure she didn't see your message," he explained to Julia. This had been Kensi's master plan; she stayed up all night keeping watch over him in case he had a seizure or needed anything, and their mothers took turns babysitting him for several hours every morning so she could sleep.

Returning to the table with Julia while his mother started on another serving of breakfast, Deeks tried to think of a polite way to get one of the ladies to leave. Each of them alone, while well-intentioned, could be a handful. Together, they were formidable, especially against one of him. He wasn't above pulling a Kensi and kicking them both out if worse came to worst, but if Kensi woke later to find him by himself, she'd have more than Deeks' head on a platter.

Considering he had gone to work the day he knew Kensi would be alone with both moms shortly after she'd come home from the VA, he figured he'd get no sympathy, or help, from her. In fact, he could hear her voice in his head now, her response quick when he was finished whining to her about this later: Payback's a bitch.

Deeks wondered if it would be worth it to try to fake a seizure.


"How is it that your father, action star Don Blye, who could do literally anything, taught you everything but how to cook?" Deeks said playfully as he followed a video tutorial on their tablet demonstrating the proper way to cut up a whole chicken.

Kensi, standing next to him at the kitchen island, continued chopping vegetables. "When we went camping he taught me how to hunt and trap small animals, prepare them, make a fire, and cook them over that fire. I'm sorry if my lessons didn't extend to haute cuisine."

"Basic herb-roasted chicken and vegetables is not what anyone would call haute anything," he pointed out.

"So why don't you already know how to cook, then? Only child of a single mother, how did Mama not teach you or why didn't you figure it out on your own?"

"The answer is in your question. Single moms don't have a lot of time to show their sons the difference between sautéing, roasting, and broiling."

"Which we now know, thanks to the internet. I can't believe you wouldn't have taught yourself though," Kensi said sincerely.

"Cooking was not on teenage Marty's short list of things to do on a daily basis. Not when there were waves to be ridden, girls to be kissed, and part-time jobs to be had."

"To make the money to buy your sex wax and impress the girls," Kensi added with a smile.

"You got that right," he confirmed. He placed the chicken parts on the already lined half-sheet pan and washed and dried his hands. "You want to," he checked another tab on the screen, "brush the chicken with olive oil or sprinkle the herbs?"

"By the time you finish with the oil I should be done with the veggies," Kensi said as she arranged them on another baking sheet. "I'll take care of the sprinkling on the chicken and then we can switch off for the vegetables?"

"I always did admire that brilliant mind of yours," Deeks said.

Kensi stuck her tongue out and he chuckled. Even though she hadn't been completely serious when she initially suggested they could work on their culinary skills, it was one of the more enjoyable ways they passed the time. Deeks shouldn't have been surprised by how well they worked together in the kitchen, easily learning and responding to each other's newfound strengths and weaknesses. They laughed a lot and connected in a different way. It strengthened Deeks' faith that they would ultimately work through the current issues in their relationship.

Their fun in the kitchen almost made up for the fact that Kensi's mother-hen act got even worse once Deeks was cleared to lose the crutches. Her sniper training served her well as she watched his every move and followed him everywhere, including the bathroom when he took a shower. With every passing day, Deeks' chances of having another seizure or a recurrence of the subdural hematoma decreased a little more, but he couldn't convince Kensi of that. She continued to be alert for the subtlest of signs or symptoms that might indicate something was going wrong in his brain. In the kitchen, though, Kensi could keep an eye on him while they each worked on their individual tasks, so it was the best of both worlds.

While he knew she was acting out of love and concern, it drove Deeks more than a little nutty. But he understood. He thought more than once while Kensi was in the VA that he was glad he wasn't there every time she tried something new in rehab. As much as he would have loved to have seen her take her first steps by herself, he could admit he would have been a nervous wreck and would have wanted to be as close as he could in case she started to falter.

If they hadn't been in this sometimes awkward, sometimes painful, sometimes difficult no-man's land in their relationship, Deeks would have teased her about trying to return the favor of all the help he provided when she was recovering from the helicopter crash. Or playfully accused her of trying to assuage her guilt for not getting them out of the way of an RPG fast enough. He tucked them away for later use, though.


Their time at the beach, where they went most evenings after dinner, was also among Deeks' favorite. They were sure to go to a different location each night and based the choice on which dessert truck would be nearby. Since Deeks wasn't allowed to surf, they typically sat for a while, walked together, and played fetch with Monty.

The first time they went, Deeks had thought they would have difficulty finding things to talk about or that the silence would be uncomfortable, but that wasn't the case. They made a game out of picking people from the groups of fellow beach-goers and guessing what they did for a living, sometimes coming up with convoluted and entertaining backstories for them, including what kind of crimes they might commit.

They would occasionally put their undercover skills to use and actually approach some of their targets to find out if either of them had been correct in their guesses about people's careers, at least.

By the second week, Kensi started relaxing enough to doze off while Deeks played with the dog. The hypnotizing sound of the rolling surf combined with her insufficient sleep since they returned home and the fact that Monty and plenty of other people were around and would certainly cause a fuss that would wake her if something happened to Deeks seemed to do the trick.

Soon after she woke from her nap tonight, Kensi went for dessert while Deeks scanned the beach for an unknowing participant in their little game. Returning with waffles on sticks that were slathered with Nutella and rolled in nuts, Kensi handed one off to Deeks and he gave her a pair of binoculars. He pointed out the subject to her and sat back to eat his dessert. He watched Kensi as she held the glasses to her eyes with one hand and kept the messy waffle going back and forth to her mouth with the other. Between bites, she occasionally spoke.

"Look at that skin tone. He definitely works inside," she said confidently after several seconds of studying the man Deeks had selected as he played frisbee with a boy of about ten. "And he doesn't come to the beach often. You can tell by the way he flinches every time he steps on something that isn't sand."

About a minute passed before Kensi looked at Deeks and declared, "Newly divorced, only gets the son every other weekend."

"And from what kind of job is his ex likely getting half his paycheck?" Deeks asked.

She squinted at the guy, unaided this time. "Some kind of manager, probably at a store. He doesn't have the physique of someone who sits all day, so nothing boring like a lawyer or an office drone," she said with a grin.

Deeks took the binoculars back and appraised the stranger again, "Um…nope. No bet, I think you're right."

"Ha! My turn," Kensi said as she began to peruse the shore for their next mark.

Admiring Kensi's beauty and competitiveness while she was distracted, Deeks knew this was the type of pastime, just like cooking, that could be a regular part of their lives post-NCIS. He hoped Kensi appreciated that their future could be full of moments like these.

Though the days still had their awkward moments, Deeks found himself grateful for this medically-imposed pause in their lives. Getting back to basics like this was a great way to spend their time until they could determine what their lives would look like going forward.

He and Kensi hadn't had a traditional beginning, had never really dated like most couples. The past few weeks seemed almost like they were getting to know each other for the first time; feeling each other out, looking for common interests, trying new things together. The fact that they could still, despite the restrictions on what they could do and discuss, enjoy each other's company and want to spend much of their days together, gave Deeks confidence that they would be able to figure things out when the time came.