Every night was exactly the same.
Dinner: a good fifty-fifty between take out and home cooked, depending on how late the case had taken them and whether or not they had managed to get to the store. If they had and something was defrosted, Deeks managed to throw something together that both of them could stand, piling it onto plates when it was done and Kensi finished up with her shower. If they hadn't, well, their favorite Chinese place always knew what they got; they just had to call ahead as they left work and it would be ready for them for pick up by the time they had arrived.
But whichever one they chose, when things were done and over with, they settled down for dinner.
But never at the table. Tables were reserved for guests and parents, not for casual dining experiences after work. Instead, they settled down on the couch, food balanced on their laps or on top of the piles of paper that covered the side tables as they got comfortable. It would take a few minutes, a few minutes of shifting and squirming and almost knocking things over as they tried to find sitting positions that did aggravate whatever newest wounds they had managed to obtain while out in the field. But eventually they would find some configuration that worked and they would settle.
Which would lead to television.
They never watched anything with plot- it was too easy to get lost or fall behind, too easy for the characters and the storylines to get jumbled together into a mess too difficult to figure out. Plus, it took more mental ability than either of them had to keep focused, so plot was out. It had been 'America's Next Top Model,' before the show had been canceled- the worst possible decision the company ever could have made, in their opinion. But they made their nightly viewing work, between new reality shows that had just started up and the occasional episode of Survivor or The Amazing Race, and things worked.
They ate their food, watched the shows, and talked on the commercials, comparing work events when they were separated and old memories when they had spent the day together, just going through what they needed to say so later they could rest.
Sometimes they fought, arguing over everything and nothing at the same time, just trying to find something that would help to calm everything inside. And sometimes they didn't say anything, instead just curling into each other, holding onto each other when their food was eaten, watching the show without any kind of understanding of comprehension of what was going on on the screen.
And, eventually, they would talk again. Not about the past or the present, or the future. It was always about something little- what kind of dog they would get after Monty passed, where they would vacation for their twenty-fifth anniversary, little things that seemed so far off they would never be able to happen. Things that they could only hope for, if they managed to survive long enough with their current occupations. Things they wanted but, on some level, knew they could never have.
It was a bit twisted of a tradition, but it was their nightly one, giving them a little bit of hope that things could turn out the way they were hoping, even if, on some level, they never thought it would.