Chapter 3-Call of Duty
At 6:30 am Gibbs stood at his kitchen, staring out the window, waiting for his coffee to boil.
"Morning Dad" Sophie greeted sleepily.
"Oh hey, I didn't expect you up this early." He said spinning around to face her. "Feel like some breakfast?" he questioned "What would you like, there really isn't that much on offer." He said shrugging his shoulders.
"Do you have any bread?"
"Ah yeah there should be some in the freezer"
"Do you have a toaster?"
"Yeah, in the cupboard on the far right."
"Sweet" she said as she made her way to collect the bread and the toaster. She put the bread in the toaster. She then hurried away off to her room.
"What are you doing?"
"Getting a little something to put on the toast."
"What exactly, some special topping you have secretly brewed just for toast."
"Well not exactly, it goes great on a sanger with cheese."
"On what? What goes well on what?"
"Vegemite… On a sanger." She replied like it was the most obviously thing in the world.
"A what? What on earth is a sanger?"
"A sandwich!"
"Oh okay, a sanger now I get it." He said unsure scratching his ear.
'Alright you are honestly trying to tell me you married an Australian and you nothing about Australian slang?"
"Well I thought I did, but obviously I don't."
"Okay then lets bring you up to scratch on some okkaism with some Vegemite toast."
He didn't even have to say anything Soph could see that he was confused. "Let's make you aware of Australian culture."
"Okay hit me with some Vegemite toast." He said as he made his way to grab the toast out of the toaster and spread the margarine on the toast and then stuck his knife into the jar of the thick brown consistency known as Vegemite. He got a whole knife full and spread it over the toast, coating it heavily.
"Ah dad you might want to take it easy Vegemite is quite strong." she warned.
"I can handle it"
"Okay but don't say I didn't warn you.
Gibbs took the toast and brought the slice to his mouth taking a large bite, instantly his mouth was hit with a taste that he couldn't place, it was sour, bitter and sweet all in one. He began to chew as his face dropped and he swallowed the toast with a look of distaste on his face. He instantly turned around and took a big gulp of coffee.
"I warned you" she teased still laughing.
"Well obviously I didn't remember just how foul the taste of Vegemite is."
"You gotta take it slow, Vegemite is an acquired taste, generally less is more when dealing with Vegemite."
"Well you Aussies can have that I'll stick to coffee."
"Okay, okay, wimp, what are we doing today?"
"I am not a wimp I just don't like it, as I told you before to each their own."
"Bravo" she said clapping slowly, "I give you and A for the delivery but a D for the excuse, you gotta do a lot better than that if you want to convince me."
"Okay I will learn that for future situations. Well to your original question I though we could go to the Smithsonian museum."
"Okay cool, I'll go have a shower and get ready" she said, finishing her toast and putting the plate in the dishwasher.
Back in Gibbs car, Sophie slipped another CD into the drive. This time although the music didn't completely destroy Gibbs' eardrums, the music was soft and folky. He was ashamed to admit it, but Gibbs had found a common link between him and Sophie's taste in music, something he had never expected possible.
Sophie glanced over at her father and saw him profiling the CD drive. "Do you want me to turn it off?"
"Actually no, leave it on."
"Wow, dad I think we may have actually established an area in your mind for both modern culture and okkaism. Wow that's two hits in one." She said surprised.
"Haha, very funny smart arse. Who is it anyway?"
"Its Missy Higgins. Are you sure you actually like it? It just doesn't seem like your type of music."
"Really then what would you say would be my type of music?"
"Um…well how about…no. Um I don't know, I just didn't know you would like Missy Higgins."
"Well it seems that there is a lot you don't know about me." He said raising his eyebrows.
"Seems so" she turned away and looked out the window watching the traditional American homes fly by, she seemed to find that a common house colour was classic white… 'What the hell did he mean by that, "There seems a lot you don't know about me"?' he was the one that was too busy at work to look after me.
He interrupted her thoughts "I know what you're thinking. It wasn't just me that wanted the divorce, you mother wanted it too." He soothed
"Yeah but she wanted me to live with her, you didn't!" how the hell did he know what I was thinking?
"What? Of course I wanted you to live with me, it was your decision to go and live in Australia with your mom!" the pronunciation of the word 'mum' got her blood boiling.
"God, that's the reason, that's the reason, is it? I made the decision did I? I was four! How could I make the decision?"
"You said you wanted to live with your mother. You made the decision!"
"It didn't help, that you didn't want me did it!"
"What the hell do you mean by that, of course I wanted you! You're my daughter!" he yelled now as angry as her.
"You were too busy with work to raise a child on your own, you couldn't handle the responsibility. That was the reason for the divorce, you had a new job, you had expectations to fill and the only way to do that was to work 18 hour days. And nothing would stop you from making it to the top, especially something as small as your family!" she was now screaming at him, she knew he never wanted her, if he had to make a decision between his job and her, he would chose his job in an instant, without the slightest bit of hesitation.
"Who told you that, was it you mom, what lies is she filling your head with in my abse…'
"Its MUM! With a u, she told me the truth, and then she told me about the others!"
"What others?"
"The hussy's you married after mum!"
"It was three years after our divorce, we had both moved on."
"You said you would always be there for me, mum always has, she hasn't even dated since you pissed off. You know, raising a child as a single parent can be hard. Oh wait you wouldn't no anything about that, would you?" she said sarcastically.
"That's a bit rough don't you think, I gave her money to help with looking after you, I gave her everything you could have ever needed."
"Oh really? How about a father, I don't seem to recall having one of those for most of my life." She snarled at him.
"What did you want me to do, pack up and come running after you? Or remain celibate in decency to your mother, who no longer loved me? Seems like a set of choices that only benefit your mother, she got you! What did I get?"
"More than you think, you got freedom, a chance to move on, you got a fresh start!"
He was stunned by the harshness of her words, he could not think of a way to reply with something that wouldn't sound like a cop out. He opened his mouth to answer,
"I…" although he was interrupted by the ringing of his cell, he checked the caller ID, it was Morrow. 'Dammit' he thought just what he needed, to give her more ammunition to hate him.
"I've got to take this."
'Oh really who is it? Work? Yeah of course its work who else would call you? Especially on you fancy mobile phone, that they probably gave you at work for being the boss. Or maybe its one of you hussy wives? Oh no I heard those marriages didn't work either. What happened did you nock those bitches up and then tell them that you couldn't deal with the stress of a kid and work? And then send them halfway around the world and give them some hush money, which you thought would make them happy and keep the divorce amicable?" she paused leaving time for the words to take effect "Come on who is it?"
He ignored her and answered his phone.
"Gibbs"
"Really…"
"What's the address…?"
"Be there in 40."
"No, can't be sooner, got something to take care of."
"Alright I'll be there in 40." With that he turned the car around in the opposite direction to take Sophie back to his place where she could wait for him until he finished processing the crime scene.
"Something to take care of? I'm something to take care of? How about you just call me a piece of rubbish that you have to chuck out the window? Wouldn't that sound better?"
"That's not what I meant, you know that, how would you think my colleagues would react to the news that I have a daughter?" he winced at his choice of words.
"What? Would it tarnish your reputation? We wouldn't want to do that now would we?
"They don't know anything about me, I like to keep my personal life personal!"
"You didn't tell them about me, is that your way of pretending that I never happened?"
"I didn't tell them about you because I don't tell my colleagues anything, all they know about me was I was in the Marines. I don't want to them anything about me, I like my privacy! I thought my relationship with the people I work with would be better if they didn't know everything about me."
"Well it's a little late for that, one of them already knows your dirtiest little secret, for someone who you keep out the loop, she seems to know an awful lot about you! What is she another one of your bed buddies? How long have you been screwing her?"
"Who the hell are you talking about? Oh, Kate…"the word 'Kate' was almost inaudible.
"Oh Kate indeed, she rang last night, got quite a shock when another woman answered the phone, jealous in fact. Now why would a 'colleague' as you call her be so worried about another woman answering your phone?"
"You don't know anything about her? What right do you have to question me and my interactions. I am your father and you have no right to question me like that!" his rage returning.
"Correction, you were my father, but that's gone, a father is someone who loves his child and helps to guide them through the first stage of their life. As I said before phone calls and letters just don't quite cut it. Your not a father, you're a arsehole who thinks he gods gift to women and get away with treating them like crap and then abandon them once you get bored. You are a arsehole, you are a arsehole who I could never call my father." If Gibbs was angry, he was a little ray of sunshine compared to Sophie, she was spiting mad. The heat could almost be felt radiating off her and the stings from her sharp tongue could be felt leaving their cuts on his heart.
They pulled up at Gibbs driveway a mixture of emotions were rolling around inside him, he was mad as hell, he was hurt by what she had said, but he was also scared of her, she was red hot mad and something about her had told Gibbs not to mess with her. Another trait she had inherited from her father.
"Get out" there was the anger.
"Oh is that what you said to mum? Is that what you told her when you dumped her at the airport with a packed suitcase in one hand and a four year old in the other. Although it was nice of you to pay for the airfare!. One nice thing she can't hold against you!" You cold hearted bastard.
He had been called a bastard many times but it had never stung like that. He just stared blankly at her. "Get out"
"Oh believe me! I am, you don't have to tell me again."
With that she rose from the seat opened the door stepped onto the street, ripped the house keys from his outstretched hand, slammed the door in his face and stormed towards the house.
He sat there for a minute replaying the whole series of events that had just occurred, what she had said what had she meant by it, did she really have those feelings?
The music of the CD, brought him out of his train of thought,
The character I've always played helped me to forget my name, but now I know.
So get out of my way!
Cos I'm not gonna be with one more casualty
Its been too long since I've looked after me
I'm not gonna be with one more casualty
Cos all you're giving me is pain
I'm not gonna be with one more casualty
Cos' all you see is a human bandage
I'm not gonna be with one more casualty
Cos' all you seem to do is give me pain
I'm not gonna be with one more casualty