Chapter 8
By the time Natalie got to Abby that evening she was actually starting to get tired. Kate had been a breeze and she got all kinds of stories about Kate's time in the Secret Service and how things have changed for her with NCIS. It was clear to Natalie that Kate was a bit of a special case since she had access to mental health care through her sister where others didn't get that same opportunity. Nat wondered if things would be different for Kate if she didn't have her sister, would she be like others and actively avoid talking to councellors?
While Kate was easy, DiNozzo was energy. Even his stories had energy. He deflected with humor more times than not. And most of that humor was movie based. DiNozzo knew a lot of movies and it helped in cases for him in the past. When you got deeper Natalie imagined she would get to meet the real Tony.
Nat heard heavy metal music playing quietly when she got off the elevator at 5pm. She walked through the doors to forensics and saw Abby by one of her machines, "Hey Abby," she said to her before standing by her, "What are you working on?"
"Oh Hey! How was your day?" she asked, "I'm just finishing up something to go into my mass spec and then I'm free." Abby put down the dropper and picked up the small vial before putting into her machine and pressing a button. She pulled off her gloves and turned to face Nat. "Now what?" she asked very nervously.
"Well if you feel comfortable here we can talk here. If you feel like its tainting your space," Natalie shrugged, "We can always go some place else. Oh I have something for you though." Natalie reached into her bag and pulled out a little package wrapped in black paper and a deep purple bow.
"For me?" Abby asked retorically. She opened the package to find the little voodoo doll that Natalie thought she would like. "Oh My God, it's so cute!" Abby gushed.
"I usually have things with me to help people relax or divert their anxiety when talking about tough subjects. I thought you could have your own little thing. Somehow rubiks cubes and beads on string didn't seem appropriate for you." Natalie then showed her how the doll had a bag on its back that carried a few pins that looked like arrows. The doll had black hair and a red dress with a skull on it. Abby gushed some more before leading them over to her back room.
"I love it! Thank you, we can talk here I think, if you don't mind keeping the music on? I'll keep it really low." Abby went over to turn the music down some more when Natalie nodded. Nat started to pull out her things and handed her paperwork to Abby to look over. Soon enough the usual pleasantries were over and their interview had started. After hearing some more about what Abby did at NCIS it was time to dig a little deeper.
"How's your personal life? Why don't you tell me a bit about you and your family." Natalie was sure that Abby danced to a beat only she could hear and she was interested in getting a glimpse of that person.
"Well I have a younger brother who I'm pretty close to. I grew up in Louisiana." Abby was busy stabbing at her new doll, "This this is awesome by the way."
When Abby didn't talk for a bit Natalie gently put her arm on Abby's, "Abby its okay to be nervous. Want to hear a bit about me? Will that help?"
"I dunno, this whole thing just feels hinky to me. I always hated having to sit with teachers and talk about why I chose to do my speech on death. It's not my fault it was interesting to me" whined Abby.
"No, actually it can be very normal, it just has a very negative stigma attached to it. Same with people who embrace the dark side of life. A lot of those people are some of the happiest you'll ever meet," Natalie told her. "Well, that's been my experience at least."
Abby nodded her head and looked glumly at her doll. They sat in silence for a bit while Natalie tried to think of a good way to get Abby talking.
"Why don't we play a game we used to do in college…" Natalie pushed aside her notebook and pen and moved the recorder over. She pulled out a deck of cards.
Abby smirked, "Poker?"
Natalie laughed, "No, its like poker and 20 questions had a baby." She dealt the cards evenly between them. "So this is how it works, we each draw 3 cards from the top of our stack and place them face up like this…" Nat laid out the 5 of clubs, king of diamonds and 2 of spades. Abby pulled a 10 of hearts, 5 of hearts, and 7 of spades. "So, whoever had the highest card gets to ask a question. The other two cards show what the question can be about. Hearts are love related, so relationships, friendships, family, even dreams. Diamonds are money related, so future hopes and dreams, 'if you had a million dollars' type things. Clubs are violence related, so questions like that 'fuck, marry kill' game umm….people who've wronged you, stuff like that. And Spades are kinda like death so the really dark twisted questions can come out."
Abby nodded her head, "It's like all the really good drinking games rolled into one, only no drinking."
Laughing Nat said, "Well you could add alcohol to it I'm sure, we just never played like that."
"It's a neat concept, how did you think of it?" Abby asked.
"A bunch of psych majors were studying one night and we realized it was too hard for us to evaluate each other for our assignments because we could just make up stories to fit the diagnoses and that's not how real like works. This was we could get to know each other better and challenged ourselves to be better diagnosticians."
"Cool, so you have the high card. And if I got this right you get to ask a violence and a death question?" Abby looked at her skeptically.
"Yep and when we played anyone else with a 'court' card could ask questions that round too. So a 10 or higher, aces as highest, get to ask questions." That meant Natalie would be answering questions about love and death. Yippy, she thought.
"Alright, this is kinda neat."
Natalie smiled at Abby's remark. Go easy, she thought to herself. "Who's one person in your whole life that you wish you could just punch?" she asked.
"Oh easy, I already did!" Abby exclaimed. "See back in high school my boyfriend Jet, isn't that a stupid name! Anyway, I found out he was cheating on me with a cheerleader of all people. So at a party one night he snuck away with her at one point and I found them. Kicked his ass all the way down Frankie Geroux's lane way. Only punched him once," she explained, "I literally kicked him in the butt down to the proverbial curb."
Nat laughed at the mental image of a young Abby doing just that, "Good on ya! No person deserves to be cheated on. Period." They both chuckled for a bit before Natalie asked her next question, "Were you always interested in goth?"
"Oh yeah. In Louisiana funerals are this big procession and music and it started there I think. I always loved black. And while it can be very freaky at times to a normal person to me I just find it interesting. Everything about it. You can meet really sad goths or sexually kinky goths or…"
"Happy-go-lucky Goths?" Natalie asked with a sly smile.
"Yes!" Abby said hugging Natalie. "It's so inclusive and I love that!" Abby shrugged, "I guess the darkness and creep-factor is kinda cool to me too." Abby looked suddenly scared, "That doesn't mean I'm fucked up does it?"
"Oh God No!" Natalie exclaimed. "You are very healthy. People who don't understand people and only see stereotypes and stigmas would probably think like that, but those are the same types of people who display racism, sexism and all the other isms" Natalie explained to her. "Never feel like I'm going to see someone other than a brilliant, smart, happy young woman. Because regardless of all the other things, that is who and what you are." Natalie smiled at her and Abby smiled back giving her a quick nod.
"So love… Have you ever been in love?" Abby asked. "I mean I know you're pretty young, and like genius level smart, just wondering if you got to experience a normal growing up love life?"
"I always hated the normal word. Typical is better. Each persons normal is different but what everyone views as one way to do it and how it 'should' be done is more like the word typical." Natalie looked down in shame, "Sorry if that seemed like a lecture. It's just.." she paused trying to think of the words, "to me, my life is normal. It's the life I've got, it's how I grew up and each and every day seemed normal. But to others, no my life was beyond normal and I didn't get to liking boys at the same time as everyone else. I'm very socially awkward with guys. As for in love?" Natalie took a bit to think about it. "No. I had a boyfriend, only one, and while I like him and he was like a best friend to me. I loved him, but not in love. I think that's why everything was okay between us when he moved to the west coast for medical school."
"I'm sorry. Did I make you sad?" Abby asked.
Natalie smiled, "No just deep in thought. Memories."
"I'm glad. You're really pretty when you smile." Abby paused to think for a bit and Natalie took much needed sip of water. She wasn't anticipating feeling this emotional talking with Abby. "Have you ever lost anyone? You can totally not answer and I know it's really persona-"
"It's okay Abbs," interrupted Nat, "If I want you to feel like you can by open with me I want to be open with you. I like you Abby. And more than this being about a study… to me its about making a friend."
"Awww, I will totally be your friend," Abby said while grabbing her into a hug.
"My mom" whispered Natalie in answer to Abby's questions. Abby's hug got tighter. They just sat like that for a while. When they pulled back Natalie told Abby about that night. She hadn't spoken of it since explaining the situation to her grandpa. And besides him, the only other people she told her story to where the NYPD and her grief counsellor. It felt good to talk to Abby about it. She was understanding and oddly positive.
"See you gotta remember, if that hadn't have happened you wouldn't be here and we can all be family for you. NCIS is like a big family." Abby explained and it made Natalie smile.
They re-dealt cards and only Abby got to ask questions. One on love and one on money. "If you had a million dollars and could do anything you wanted, what would you do?" asked Abby.
Natalie tilted and pursed her lips when she thought about it, "It's weird, but I'd buy myself a place in DC and I would love to keep working at NCIS. It's so different here and I think I could really change the way mental health is treated here. I hate that you get sort of ordered into therapy if you've dealt with something heavy and you have to go to their office and what not. It's not an easy thing for alphas to do and then expect them to open up in a finite amount of time is ridiculous. There has to be a better way and I hope I can find it."
"I'll help you." Abby was adamate that they would be able to put their heads together and that made Natalie feel good. "Okay, who all have you met here, male wise?" Abby asked misheiviously.
"Umm my grandpa, Ducky, and Gerald. Um… a couple security people I don't remember names of." She thought of which agents she actually knew as well, "Agents Pacci, Gibbs and DiNozzo."
Abby bounced up from her seat, "Perfect" she said while clapping her hands. She went and grabbed a piece of computer paper and a marker. "Okay, so on a scale of 1-10 we are going to rate them. We just need some categories…" Abby was writing the name of each guy, minus her grandpa, down the short side of the page. Two lines were drawn separating the top from the side and across the top Abby wrote, "Looks, Brains, Friendliness, Sex Appeal, aaaaand, Dateable." Natalie started laughing.
"What are you doing Abby this is silly" she told her.
"No Way! You didn't get to have a typical teenage years and this is totally something teenage girls do. They rate their classmates, only we don't have classmates." Abby assured her this would be fun. "Okay, Ducky…"
Natalie thought about it, "Honestly?"
"Of Course! And it stays between us, I'll tell you what I think too!" Abby was clearly very excited so Natalie decided it was kinda fun. Like a secret and it made her feel closer to Abby.
"I think Ducky was probably quite the head turner when he was younger as he's still good looking. Lets give him a 7?" she told Abby. Abby dutifully wrote it down, grinned at Natalie making her feel self concious at first until she saw what Abby wrote beside it, an 8. It made Nat giggle.
"What?" asked Abby, "Duck man has his own good lookingness, like old movie star."
"What's next?" asked Natalie suppressing her grin.
"Brains, which Ducky is super smart so I gotta give him a 10" Abby told her.
She agreed, "10 for sure." Natalie stopped a moment, "And a 10 for friendliness."
"Totally!" Abby marked it down. "Sex appeal?"
Natalie thought about it, "If I were older maybe. I'm thinking a 6."
"9 for me," Abby said waggling her eyebrows, "I dunno what it is but I would totally bang Ducky if I didn't think it would ruin our relationship."
Natalie silently chuckled, "What's the oldest you've gone?"
"My Biology professor, he was in his 60's."
"Abby!" Natalie couldn't stop laughing. She loved Abby, she was so liberated and free and really didn't let things like social norms stand in her way. "I'm actually really proud of you for that," Nat told her.
By the time they were done their chart looked like this:
LBFSAD? Y/N
DuckyN-7 A-810!!!10N-6 A-9Maybe
GeraldN-6 A-910!N-9 A-10N-4 A-7Yes
PacciN-4 A-5N-7 A-7N-7 A-8N-4 A-2No
TonyN-8 A-8N-6 A-710N-6 A-5Maybe
GibbsN-8 A-7N-9 A-8N-6 A-10N-10 A-1Yes/No
"Gibbs is like an uncle to me," said Abby, "But he's really nice so I'm surprised you only rated him a 6."
"I haven't talked with him much." Natalie was embarrassed, now Abby knew that Nat found Gibbs, compelling. She couldn't explained it when asked, "I dunno Abbs, he makes me more nervous that I've ever felt. I actually forget to speak."
Abby giggled, "You totally have a crush, and Gibbs is totally crush worthy."
Natalie was still blushing almost as bright and Abby's voodoo doll's dress. "Abby please don't make a big deal out of this?" begged Natalie.
"Oh sweetie, I'd never." Abby pulled her into a hug. They had shut off the recorder when they started their mini game and it was a good thing because in walked Gibbs. Abby reached for the paper and it fell right in front of Gibbs. He handed it to her with barely a glance and Abby quickly shoved it under some files to discard later. "Hey Gibbs what's up?"
"Just running some paperwork down for you" he said nodding at the file on the table in the other room, "its an old case." They walked over to it, "Mostly ledgers, just need to know if there's a pattern to be found and there's computer bits in there too."
"Harddrives Gibbs." Abby admonished him. "And they don't bite you know" she teased him further. "Want me to start on it tonight? I can get a program running on the ledgers?"
"Yeah but don't stay all night." He then looked to Nat, "Sorry to cut your interview short."
"Oh Gibbs we were almost done anyway," Abby said for Natalie.
Natalie thanked Abby, "I'm going to grab my things and call a cab."
"You need a ride?" Gibbs asked her. Her stomach started doing flip flops again. It was everything she could do not to blush horribly but still her cheeks went pink.
"I don't drive." Dear Lord Girl! Her inner monologue started in on her, is that all you can say, 'I don't drive', and in such a monotone. "Um, what I mean is…" she started explaining, "I never learned and didn't expect to be commuting this much."
"Alright," Gibbs said taking her bag for her, "I'll give you a ride." And with that he placed his hand on her lower back and lead her out of Abby's lab.