The first time Kensi stirs after surgery Deeks is alone with her. Her hand is twitching and she begins to whimper. He talks to her softly thinking she's afraid, but tears are rolling down her cheeks from closed eyes and he calls in the nurse. They ask him to step outside, and he does, never more than three feet from the door. Everyone waiting can see him from a distance, see his anxiety from down the hall and they are immediately tense.
Personnel comes in and out and the ten minutes it takes for the Doctor to speak to him feel like an hour. Deeks nods his head and goes to find Dave.
"Umm, they're having some pain management issues. They had to sedate her again. She'll be out for a while. They need her leg completely immobilized if they are going to save it, and they are worried that if the pain gets to be too much, she'll damage it unintentionally."
Dave nods.
"You should take your wife to get some rest. This can't be good for her. I'll be here. Kensi won't be alone."
Dave agrees, but more for Julie than anything else. If he let anything stress Julie out too much right now Kensi will kill him. He believes in Kensi's survival enough to fear her wrath. Dave clears out and reduces the guys on his team to a bare minimum.
The second time Kensi wakes up is many hours later. Deeks is holding her hand, and he feels it squeeze his. When he looks at her he sees her eyes start to flutter awake. He presses the call button immediately in case it goes like last time, and begins to speak to her, hoping to comfort and guide her through the disorientation. Her eyes dart around the room. When they meet his she stills.
"That's it. Nice and easy, Rambo," he tells her. "Doc will be here in a minute and he says you have to keep that leg very still for us, ok."
He listens to his own voice, and worries he sounds condescending.
"There are easier ways to get out of a dinner date with me, you know," he jokes.
She wants to talk but the tube in her throat won't allow it. It makes her panic.
"No – hey, whoa," he says stoking her cheek with the back of his fingers. "Everything is ok. You were shot, you had surgery, you're recovering, and you need to be still."
A nurse enters the room and starts to examine Kensi.
"Ms. Kensi, welcome back. I'm going to check things out a little, ok. Just need you to be still, and relax." She leans down and pretends to whisper to her. "Stare into those beautiful blue eyes of his if you need something to look at. I'll be done in a shake."
Kensi is still except for her hand on the uninjured arm. She is making shapes. The first one is a C, but Deeks is so lost in the moment it doesn't click. It's Nurse Amanda who gets it and translates the hand motions to letters for Deeks. C-A-L-L-E-N.
"Oh, Kens, Callen is fine. Not a scratch on him. Pissed at you for playing hero and putting yourself in the line of fire for him, but he'll be in here later and you can see with your own eyes."
Kensi nods, and her whole body relaxes. Her eyes flutter again, this time from open to closed, and Deeks is momentarily sad that there isn't anything between agitation and sleep.
After the third time she wakes up Deeks forces himself to stop counting. He lets himself have faith that her sleeping and waking up is a normal occurrence and not a miracle. This time when the doctors and nurses come in to check on her and ask him to leave he walks to the bathroom and splashes water on his face. He gets a cup of better-than-expected coffee. He texts Callen and the team, and Dave.
When he gets back to her room they have a Velcro sleeve of some kind around her leg, and the tube is out of her throat, the first ice cubes soothing the discomfort. She smiles when she sees him, and he feels like he's home.
Deeks convinced Dave to put Callen and Sam on the list at the gate so the team can come and go as they need to. Hetty's given Deeks leeway to spend as much time with Kensi as is needed unless there's an actual emergency elsewhere, and Callen and Sam hold down the fort at the mission with the team in Ops to give him time. Everyone wants to come, but they all know that while they want to be there, Deeks needs to be there for his own sanity.
Kensi's been in the hospital for two days when Callen make his first appearance in her room while she's been awake. His usual calm demeanor and nonchalant manner are nowhere to be found. He needs to see that she's alright for himself. He knocks gently and opens the door a crack to peek in, glad to see her eyes looking back at him. Deeks watches them stare at each other, and senses there is a conversation coming. He pats Kensi's hand gently and tells her he needs to hit the restroom. He claps Callen on the back as he walks by, and makes himself scarce.
It isn't until Deeks has left the room that Callen realizes he hasn't actually entered. He takes the tentative steps towards her, a mix of relief and guilt tinged with regret. He regoups enough to say the first thing he needs to say.
"Don't ever scare me like that again," he tells her.
He comes close and kisses her on the forehead.
"Oh and you're one to talk, danger boy," she jokes.
"Danger boy? Really? Is that the best you can do? You hit your head when you fell?"
"Well you seem way more likely to go rogue and get shot than me."
"All evidence to the contrary. Kens, really. What were you thinking?"
She knows it's his guilt talking. "Not a lot of thinking. I was there. I knew where the hostile was. I was in tac gear and you weren't. You wouldn't have survived if he got you in his sights. I just .. I don't know. I had to do something."
"I took five once and am still here to tell the tale." Then he's back to serious. "Watching you go down was one of the worst moments I've ever had. Never again."
"I hear you, and I'll try, but no promises."
After that the conversation gets easier. He explains why they were onsite at her location. She makes her joke about the AirBnB listing and if the bunker in front was listed as a feature. They talk a little about her new gig. Says she likes the simplicity of it - someone points, she goes. Says she misses the actual investigation part of the job - interrogation, using languages, undercover. He tells her it's clear what she means to her team.
She knows he's leading up to something. She is trying to hang on, but she yawns without being able to stop herself.
"I think I should let you get some rest. Sam will be by later. I'll be back tomorrow."
She nods, and he comes in close again. He knows he missed a moment months ago and can't let this one go without saying what he should have said then. He whispers despite there not being anyone else there. He just needs her to hear him.
"For my part in it, Kens, I'm sorry."
She knows he doesn't mean the shooting, that regret is already etched in his features. He's back to that moment four months ago when in the face of her anger and pain he met her with defiance.
"You knew how much it would hurt me," she tells him. It's different. There's a difference between being sorry you did something that ending up hurting someone and knowing it would hurt them and doing it anyway.
"I convinced myself it was the only way," he tells her, knowing how lame it sounds as it comes out.
"You hid behind Hetty," she says softly but with conviction.
He exhales. He didn't think she'd let him off easy, and he didn't think she'd handle him with kid gloves, but he didn't realize how hard this would be.
"I did. I thought that you and Deeks were so close that it was too much to ask for you to have to lie about him. And when you called me on it, I put it on Hetty to make myself feel better for what I'd done. I was wrong to begin with, and I doubled down."
He hugs her, gently folding his arms around her the best he can in her position. "I'm sorry," he says again. "I trust you. I've always trusted you. I trust you with my life. Clearly for good reason," he adds on at the end, trying to lighten the mood.
"Thanks, Callen," she whispers, her voice failing her. When they break she locks eyes with him and tries not cry until he's gone. In reality she knows that might be all it would've taken four months ago for it not to have eaten at her, gnawed at her until she broke ties.
Watching her almost big brother make his way out of the room it's hard to shake the feeling that her actions four months ago were impulsive, rash, maybe grounded in something that was ego or pride. There's an ache in her chest unrelated to her injuries. She loves the NCIS team so much, and with distance and time and perspective she is wondering how much of her heartache was done to her, and how much was self-inflicted.
She lets the exhaustion that accompanies this kind of healing take her, and Deeks finds her asleep with a tear meandering down her cheek.