December 12, 2006

It's been almost 36 hours since I nearly killed one of my best friends.

I know technically it would have been Pike who was really responsible. But I would have been to blame too, because I wasn't paying attention. And if Gibbs hadn't come in when he did...

You know, there's still a part of me that starts shaking when I think about it. I can't imagine an NCIS without Abby, and the thought that I'd be the reason for no more Abby makes me feel sick inside.

Abby's just special. We all feel like that—me, Ducky, Gibbs, Tony, Ziva. Things took a while between them but I know she feels the same way as the rest of us. I even think the Director has a soft spot for Abby, although I don't know if she'd admit it. It's like this quote Sarah read to my Mom when we were home for Thanksgiving (Sarah's on a Lawana Blackwell kick lately—they're all books set in Victorian times.) Apparently in one of them one character says to the heroine, "You're like the little sister we all want to protect." I don't know that we think of Abby as a little sister—I mean, maybe Ziva and Tony, but I know for Ducky she's more of a daughter and for me...Well, according to Sarah's book my feelings are probably more like that speaker's ended up being. But we all want to protect her. And I should have protected her more than I did yesterday.

Speaking of not being able to protect someone, Jamie's really been struggling. We were talking while he was helping us put OTTO back together and he said he'd thought about offering to go with Roni the morning of the test drive, but didn't say anything. The look on his face when we were arresting Pike—there was some relief but I think it was also worse in some ways too. He said to me afterwards, "At least Roni didn't know." I honestly didn't know what to say. I did tell him after that although I couldn't speak for how Roni would have felt about Abby and I, from everything Jamie had told us we'd have really liked her. He seemed really touched by that.

It's true, too. I could see her and Abby becoming close if she'd lived, and all four of us becoming good friends. Who knows, maybe if Abby and I got back together we'd have gone on double dates. We do plan on staying in touch with Jamie and are going with him to Roni's funeral on Thursday.

You know, writing all this got me thinking. Abby's usually up late. Maybe I should give her a call.