Dry Eyed Mice
One more chapter today, since this morning's was so short! Chapter 10 extends the scene in the bar with Ziva and Ducky from Angel of Death (4x24).
A/N For the first time, the chapter title is a quote from the episode that has nothing to do with the content of this story; it just makes me smile!
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"I have a funny feeling, Doctor," Ziva says softly.
Ducky glances over at her. Ziva, normally so composed, is indeed looking out of sorts. He raises an eyebrow at her and jokes about the tequila shooters she has been downing like lemonade.
Ziva doesn't take the bait; instead, she flips open her phone for the fourth time since Ducky sat down, and presses the call button.
"Straight to voice-mail, just like always when he's with her," she tells him.
Ducky studies her a moment before pointing out that she's monitoring Tony like a mother with a toddler...or a woman with a wayward lover.
Now Ziva is riled, and she turns to him, her words light and sarcastic but her face so adamant in its denial that Ducky knows he has struck a nerve. He pushes harder. "It's Friday night, Tony is with his girlfriend, and you're worried about him. What does that tell you?"
Ziva's face falls, and Ducky worries that he has gone too far, but her voice is steady. "He is my partner and my partner said he would be here and...and I have this, this not so good feeling."
Ziva excuses herself to the bathroom before he can say anything further on the subject.
In the women's room, Ziva locks the door and leans back against it with a sigh, wondering how she became this kind of woman. She was unbothered by how she tracked Tony when she thought he might be doing something secretive, but to still be doing it when he's confessed all his secrets is unprofessional, and she knows it. She's downright emotional right now.
She can't tell Ducky the truth, that Tony breaking plans with her now, after he's finally been honest with her about where he goes off to, could mean he'd really rather be with Jeanne. The signs are all there, and those she knows she's evaluating rationally. Earlier tonight, in the panic she's seen come over women who are not her before, she promised herself that when he showed up she'd get him drunk, take him home, remind him what they both wanted, what they're both waiting for. The knowledge that the night's plan is to end up in his arms has had her in a state of anticipation since they got here. But Tony's late, and Ziva's suddenly emotional brain is telling her that it might be too late.
She doesn't like thinking about her jealousy, but it's easier than the fear and pain that come when she lets herself dwell on the fact that the first man she has loved in her adult life is slipping away before she got a chance to hold him. That night she'd kissed him, her fantasy of their future was vague at best: pleasure, friendship, banter extending into the future. But now that that future might be endangered, it seems that every moment she sees some couple engaged in a moment she wants to have with Tony—heads bent together over the newspaper in a coffee shop, walking hand-in-hand down the street. She wants to be the one to find a house with him and sleep late with him on weekend mornings out of habit. There are still moments, even today, when she catches him watching her or when he stands just a hair closer in the lab than even Gibbs would, when she thinks that all those realities are still possible, will arrive just as soon as his mission is over. But his cellphone is off.
Just before introspection drives her insane, Ziva decides enough time has passed and heads back out to Ducky.
"So what do you toast to in Israel, my dear?" he asks.
She smiles, relieved that he isn't continuing his previous line of questioning. "Well, unless there's a particular event to toast, we say 'l'chaim!' which means 'to life!'"
Ducky raises his beer to toast her. "Well then, to life!"
*****
Later, when she knows where Tony was while she sat in the bar with Ducky, Ziva regrets her doubts about him. Not because they were invalid, but because if she'd trusted her own bad feeling more she might have traced him, might have showed up before Nick could give him a concussion with the butt of his gun, might have kept Tony from the limousine and La Grenouille. Later, when it's too late, she knows that being emotional nearly lost her everything.
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A/N I know that this episode is technically the last of season 4, but I'm going to have one more tag for Bury Your Dead (5x01) since it's the second half of this episode and the end of the Jeanne arc.