Dec 7: Grinch

It started small. Tiny actually. It was only a half-inch tall. Gibbs watched Tony scoop up the tiny green creature and coo over the perfect copy of the immortal Grinch. Gibbs cringed. It was only Monday and already it was not looking like a great week. Tony spent a lot of time trying to track down his "Secret Grinch."

Tuesday, the tiny green monster was attached to the top of Tony's monitor. The tiny green monster's place of honor on his blotter was now filled by a keychain. A poseable Grinch keychain. This had elicited a squeal, which his senior agent denied. Apparently, it was rare. Off and on during the day, he caught Tony playing with the Grinch instead of working the case and scribbling names off a list of possible Grinch-givers.

Wednesday, Gibbs was ready to track down the giver. The seemingly innocent Christmas ornament had sung all day long. Every time he walked by Tony's desk, the thing would go off. By the end of day, he was grinding his teeth.

Thursday, Gibbs snuck in early determined to put a stop to the distractions. He wasn't sure why Abby was doing this. He planned to shock and confront her. It was the team leader who ended up shocked and confronted. By the time Tony arrived, his latest gift, a stuffed plush Grinch with a heart that lit up was on his desk and Gibbs had retreated to the coffee shop. It wasn't every day someone asked you for permission to date your senior agent; who was like a son to you. He did take a bit of comfort that Friday would be the big day; the gift, the identity of the giver and an end to the distractions.

Friday morning, Tony bounced in to the office to find a box on his desk. He was thrilled with the four- piece set of Grinch glasses. Impatiently, Gibbs waited for the big reveal. As he walked through the bullpen, he glared at the culprit to no avail. This campaign was a carefully laid out plot and no one, not even Gibbs, was going to interfere.

When Tony returned from lunch, a second gift had appeared. Opening it he found a set of hand painted, blown glass Grinch ornaments and an envelope with two tickets to "How the Grinch stole Christmas". Tony was blown away. The new 3D computer-animated Dr. Seuss' the Grinch was being released Monday. The theater near his home had a special pre-release showing Saturday evening. Tony had tried everything to get a ticket to no avail. He moped for three days until Gibbs' swatted him and told him to get over it. After all, it was only a two days difference.

"I can't believe this. How..." Tony was flabbergasted.

"My publisher knew someone." McGee had stepped to the side of Tony's desk as he was opening the gift. "When I saw how disappointed you were, I pulled a few strings. I thought we could go running tomorrow afternoon, then we could clean up and have dinner at that Italian place you like. I made reservations early enough that we can still make the show. After the show, we could stop for coffee."

"You, the keychain… the ornament… Tim, why?"

"According to Ducky, it is traditional to give small gifts during courtship."

"Courtship?"

"If you aren't interested, we can forget all this…"

"No!... I mean… Rule 12…" Tony froze and turned scared eyes in Gibbs' direction.

"I already talked to Gibbs. We're on probation to see if we can make this work. Kind of waiting here…"

"Yes!"

"Yes to…"

"To dinner, the movie, the courtship… Yes. Yes. Yes."

As the two men leaned towards one another, Gibbs was about to yell at the two about keeping it out of the office. But after seeing the looks on their faces, Gibbs bit back his reprimand and then averted his eyes. He may have given McGee permission to date his foster son but he didn't need to see their first kiss. If that made him a grinch…