………….At NCIS…………..
"Tony, today you'll be Ducky's assistant. Kate will become Abby's assistant. If anything major happens then you can come back to the office. For the rest of the week you two will work with the statistics which needs to be completed this month. If I notice your relationship changes things around here one of you has to leave." Gibbs declared.
"Thank you." Kate told him.
"Yeah, thanks boss." Tony said to Gibbs.
"Now go. Your new bosses are waiting." Gibbs told them.
……….
Kate went to Abby.
"So what was his decision?" Abby asked Kate.
"Today I'm your assistant. Tony will be Ducky's assistant today. The rest of the week we're going to do paperwork." Kate explained.
"I'm glad he didn't fire or reassign you…I've always wanted an assistant." Abby told her.
"So what am I going to do?" Kate asked her.
"Do you mind doing some paperwork? I'm behind on that." Abby asked her.
"No. I'm here to help. Just still being at NCIS is enough no matter what I do." Kate told her happy.
………..
"Tony, what are you doing here?" Ducky asked him as he walked in.
"As my punishment I'm going to spend today with you. I'll be your assistant." Tony answered.
"Oh, yeah…I heard Gibbs wanted to punish you. I have this great story about when I was younger, I had just finished medical school and I did something wrong…" Ducky started. Tony knew he would have to be there the whole day and listen to many of Ducky's stories and he tried to be positive. At least he was still at NCIS.
………….Saturday the 17th of December………….
Kate and Tony were shopping last minute Christmas presents for their friends and family.
They slowly went down the street in the shopping mall. Tony saw a jewellery store and stopped outside the window.
"Tell me what you like? I want to know which taste in jewellery you have." Tony asked her.
"It's depends on what kind of jewellery it is. If this is for a present then I'll like whatever you give me."
"Women always say that." Tony told her.
"Let's get in and I'll show you." Kate told him. Tony smiled because he got her to do exactly what he wanted. Kate was a bit harder to trick than the other women he had dated but he loved the challenge. That was what he loved about her.
"So I like this necklace and this bracelet." Kate showed him.
"Don't forget the rings." Tony told her.
"Tony…" Kate said to him.
"I've just had the feeling you want to tell me something but you can't." Tony told her.
"I don't want to do what our mothers tell us to do. We're probably not ready." Kate replied.
"Maybe we both want to be ready. We haven't pressed the stop button. We have expressed our true feelings about everything else the past week except this." Tony told her.
"As incredible as it sounds like it doesn't seem stupid to get engaged with you." Kate told him. She had thought about the subject quite a lot lately.
"Exactly. I want to buy the rings now. We don't need to put them on but I want the uncertainty to go away. I hate living with it." Tony told her.
"I hate living with it too. I think we should follow your father's tradition and engrave the date in them. 12/9/05 but wait with putting them on until we now this will last. Let's just try to see if living together works." Kate told him.
"We want to buy some engagement rings and engrave them." Tony then told the sales clerk when it was their turn.
"Are you pregnant because I didn't think you could dump me one week and get engage with someone else the other?" Dan asked them.
"What are you doing here?" Kate asked surprised. Once again someone disturbed them in an important moment.
"Mind your own business." Tony told him.
"She was my business not so long ago. Do you know she dumped me while in bed with me? I don't think she is the marrying type." Dan told Tony.
"That's my decision to make not yours. You two are over." Tony said trying not to get mad.
"If she's pregnant then I want to make sure I'm not the father." Dan told them not believing they are in love because no one gets engaged that quickly.
"I'm not pregnant Dan. Just leave us alone."
"Let's hope so." Dan told Kate.
"Are you ready to choose rings?" the sales clerk wondered.
"We are." Kate told her ignoring Dan. Tony ignored him too.
……….At home……….
"I'm so sorry about Dan…Maybe he has some unresolved things. I'm sure he just got shocked and he will leave us alone. We were never serious. I only dated him for like two months." Kate explained to him.
"Longer than us…" Tony told her. His head had been filled with different thoughts since Dan reappeared in their lives.
"He's not competition. I'm sure you know all about competition since you've dated so many. I was never in to him and he's out of my life." Kate assured him. Tony thought about what she said. The competition he had before about women was in the past. He knew they had to have a talk about past relationships to be able to move on in this one.
"Ok. I understand. Just let's focus on other things." Tony told her. He knew that if Kate didn't care about Dan anymore this was only his problem. He had to deal with them possibly meeting Dan several times in the future since they live in the same city. Tony didn't like the guy but what could he do. As long as Kate was with him he knew he had no need to worry. Tony just felt he needed more time to be sure if Kate was the woman of his dreams.
Kate wanted Tony to gather his thoughts before she talked to him again. She knew he was jealous and both had still doubts about getting engaged so soon. The rings were bought but that was it. They hadn't decided on when they were going to put them on.
Kate and Tony then talked a bit more.
…………..An hour later……..
"Tony, why don't we go and visit your parents during New Year's since we have nothing better to do then?" Kate yelled from the living room. Tony had gone to the kitchen.
"I'm not sure." Tony yelled back.
"If you still want to go to Las Vegas it's ok!" Kate told him while picking up the things they had bought.
"I haven't decided yet. It's hard getting friends to come and I don't think Las Vegas is suitable for us…Maybe Boston…"Tony told her.
"I don't want you to do that for my sake. If you don't want to go to Las Vegas maybe we can do both Boston and Baltimore." Kate suggested.
"I have to think about it." Tony said while coming out from the kitchen. He had two glasses of juice in his hands.
"Thank you." Kate said when she saw her drink.
"I'm just wondering which message we're sending if we go visit them." Tony wondered.
"You'll decide." Kate told him.
"It'll be easier to decide if I know what you want." Tony continued.
"If we can't agree then we should visit both cities. We just have to deal with things as they come. Things will get a lot harder than today but we can deal if we want to." Kate told him wanting to know if he wanted to cope with her. Maybe it was too soon to ask this but she wanted to know before both got more invested in this relationship. Somehow they had semi-got engaged.
"We can take it one day at a time." Tony answered. It was the easiest way to answer her. He didn't want to argue with her while he tried to sort out his feelings. He loved picking out rings but he was scared about the future.
"Tony, what are you really thinking about?" Kate asked while looking at him. She saw the look in his eyes. He had so much more to say.
"Doesn't it feel scary when you want to face all the scary things with one person? Fearing if she is the right one to share everything with?" Tony asked before stopping. He felt he might have pushed her too hard by asking these questions. With Dan and picking out rings it might have been too early to ask her this. He wasn't a person who shared deep feelings with someone but he felt eager to do so with Kate. Everything with Kate felt scary and wonderful at the same time. He had tried having long relationships before but since he started at NCIS it had only been apart of his past. Now it was apart of his present and future and he wondered how he could be so sure about it being his present and future. He had so many questions which had already got answered but he didn't know how they got answered. Did they just get answered by Kate just being there?
"Fear of thinking that the guy you really love is the guy you think he is? Is he capable of having a long lasting relationship? Does he want to put so much effort in it as I want? Questions like that?" Kate told him.
"We do have a lot of questions don't we?" Tony asked her.
"I think we do. It's normal. Just tell me if you want to find out the answers with me. If you think us living together as we've done the past days without even slightly thinking about the consequences is a too big of a decision for you then so be it. Well I understand. Have you ever lived with a woman? Even considered being married to someone you've dated?" Kate asked him.
"I did once…Her name was Taylor Grace Monroe…First I thought she looked great and then I found out what her name was. I thought it was destiny. I was 22 and madly in love. So was she. We dated for two years and had lived together for three months when she one day told me she had different plans for her life and I wasn't included in them. I was devastated. I took it hard. Mom didn't recognise me when she came and visited me a few weeks after the break up. She has blamed herself for not telling me the right words back then because she thinks I didn't really come over it. I did come over Taylor. I did it a few months later. I dated and then I found another great woman to date but I ended the relationship when I felt we weren't headed the same way. She wanted to get married and I didn't. Right then I didn't want to commit. It's just scary how much better I feel about you than I did with them at the same stage in the relationship. Maybe it is life experience talking but that is how I feel. Most of all I just feel I can't put a ring on your finger right now. I will be ready but not just now." Tony explained to her. He felt he had said too little but he didn't just want to ramble without Kate understanding what he meant in the end.
"I can wait. Don't doubt that. I can wait a few years. I love you." Kate said to him while putting down her drink. Tony put down his too.
"Kate. I love you too." Tony said before kissing her.
…………….January the 1st 2006…………..
"Mom…Here is the woman I love the most. I know it took a long time but here she is. The woman I'll probably spend the rest of my life with." Tony said while looking at her grave. Kate held him tightly because she knew it was difficult for him. Even when Tony had been in the hospital he had never looked at vulnerable as now.
"Hi Mrs Dinozzo." Kate said to her.
"We went to Boston and met Kate's family and now we're here. I wanted you to meet her. She has seen so many pictures and videos of you. I think you would have loved her. I do." Tony continued. It was cold but they didn't care.
"Are you ok?" Kate asked after a while. She saw him stand there and just looking. He couldn't bare putting down the flowers he had bought for her.
"She's dead…Every important moment in my life she has been dead. Even now." Tony said while a few tears ran down his eyes.
"She will always be in your heart. If I die I'll always be in your heart. You'll always be in my heart if you die. I think Grace is very proud of you. I am. You're strong for being here." Kate told him while drying off his tears. Tony put down the flowers. They stood there for a little while longer. Then they slowly left the cemetery.
"I think we can go home now. You're the first girlfriend I brought to see her. You handled it so well." Tony said as they neared the car.
"I hope I did. When you cried I cried. It was a lot harder than I thought it would be. It must have been so hard for you when you were little." Kate told him.
"It was…It felt liberating just going now and I'm glad you came with me. Thank you." Tony told her while opening the door for her.
…………..14th of April 2006………
"So two days until your birthday! Are you prepared?" Abby asked her.
"You've asked me that every day now. I know everyone in the whole world thinks he will propose to me then but I don't know. It wasn't long ago he told me he wasn't ready. This is just going so well and I don't want him to feel pressured." Kate told her.
"Call me as soon as he does even if it'll be next year." Abby told her.
"I will." Kate told her. They hugged and Kate was ready to go home with Tony. It had been a long day at work and she was so tired. She needed to rest because she was sure Tony had planned something big for her birthday. She knew he had reserved a table at a restaurant.
……………At home…………
Tony opened the door. When Kate went in she got so surprised. The living room didn't look like this when they went to work this morning. Someone had made it look so wonderful that she couldn't describe it. She was so shocked and happy.
"How did you do this?" Kate asked him.
"I hired some people and they did this." Tony answered as one waiter appeared.
"Oh my…A waiter and a set table." Kate said stunned.
"You deserve it. So sit down and do nothing." Tony told her.
When she sat down Tony went up to her and bent down on one knee.
"Caitlin Todd, will you marry me?" Anthony Dinozzo asked.
"I do." Kate said being so shocked. She hadn't expected this.
Tony put on her ring and then his. Tears ran down both of their faces.
"I love you so much." Kate told him while kissing him.
"I love you too." Tony then said.
"I promised to call Abby, mom and your mom when you proposed." Kate said very happy.
"Then call because I want us to enjoy our dinner without you thinking about them." Tony told her.
……………
Two days later Kate got surprised again. Tony had arranged a surprise birthday party at the restaurant. Everyone was there and the couple was so happy.
…………………………………………………………………………………
Tomorrow I'm going to get my computer fixed so I don't know if I can continue this story. If it'll get fixed tomorrow or later in the week I'll probably continue. I just didn't want to leave without giving you a good ending.