Note that these're just being posted in the order that they're written.
Also, this is probably the fifth different version of this chapter and I'm still not happy with it. Still, here it is… let me know what you think.
(If you liked the season 17 openers you should check out my oneshot And So It Goes which looks into some of the father-daughter moments between Ziva and Gibbs throughout the series.)
3. Ima
This one's by far the most painful, mostly because she isn't around to hear him say it.
He never wanted kids, that was always the line he spouted and while it was true it probably wasn't for the reason most people assumed. Most people probably took one look at him and his lifestyle and assumed that it was because he was too immature, too life fast, die young, too interested in meaningless one-night stands and casual sex to bother himself with crying, screaming rugrats. That wasn't it. He didn't want kids simply because he didn't want to be responsible for screwing up someone's life; he wouldn't be a good father, he didn't know how to be a good father because while DiNozzo Senior may be a bit more present now, when Tony was a kid all he'd taught him was that being a father meant drinking too much, sleeping with any vaguely good looking woman that crossed your path, and abandoning your kid in hotels for days at a time or packing them off to boarding school at the first sign of any inconvenience. Not really the best frame of reference.
To say Tali comes as a surprise would be the biggest understatement since I think we need a bigger boat. He can't believe this is how he finds out that for the last two years he's technically been a father. He should be pissed at her - at Ziva - for keeping this from him and no doubt he will be, eventually, but now isn't the time for that. Now, he's gonna make sure his little girl's okay, make sure the fucking one eyed teabag ends up with at least one bullet, preferably more, in that shiny bald head of his (maybe shoot out his one working eye first for good measure, let him know that this is what happens when you go after someone Tony loves), and then he's gonna do what he's got to do - namely get some answers because there's no way that Ziva David died in a fucking mortar attack and then settle down somewhere not here to raise his kid in peace. Maybe Paris (Ziva loves Paris).
His chest twinges as he watches his little girl, their little girl, examine the Star of David around her neck with obvious fascination. (Come to think of it, it probably wasn't the greatest idea ever, giving a not-quite two-year-old a necklace with such sharp points on it.) She's been more interested with that damn necklace than she's been with any of the toys Jimmy had given him and it's not hard to see why. Necklace equals ima and ima equals home. He may be her father (oh God, he's a father, he's never gonna get used to that, is he?) but, no matter how much Ziva told her about him, he isn't home to her, he isn't safe, he isn't the person she'd instinctually run to. He's a stranger to her (goddammit, Ziva, why'd you have to play it this, huh?).
"Ima," she says again, tracing the star with her chubby finger and he's catapulted years into the past.
:&:
It started at the crappy new year's party neither of them really wanted to go to. He spent the majority of the night acting like the life of the party he was known to be, spinning stories that were only slightly exaggerated (such as the heroic tale of how he managed to dodge bullets using a move made famous by The Matrix; the reality being that he'd tripped over his own feet, narrowly avoiding having his head blown off and ultimately needing Ziva to bail him out) to try and impress their latest batch of baby agents – fresh faced, idealistic, goddamn kids who probably still thought that being a federal agent was exactly like The Bourne Identity or 24 (it really wasn't, there was a shit-ton more paperwork for starters).
At fifteen minutes to midnight he watched her place her untouched plate of greasy takeout down on the table before slipping silently out the room (he hadn't taken his eyes off her all night and he wasn't about to start). She hadn't said a single word since she got there, she wouldn't even be there if it wasn't for Vance downright ordering her to be ("If I have to put up with their brand of crazy, so do you, David," he'd said, cornering her in the squadroom early one morning, the fact that he'd been wearing light-up reindeer antlers at time had detracted from the statement slightly but there was no doubt it was an order nonetheless). As soon as she rounded the corner, he downed the remaining dregs of champagne from his red solo cup before apologising to the agents gathered around him and taking off after her.
He wasn't really sure where she'd go but he did know where he'd go and one of the things he'd noticed about them was that occasionally, great minds thought alike (when he'd mentioned that to her, she'd snorted and responded with a dry, "In that case, I obviously need to get my brain checked immediately, it must be terminal").
Sure enough, he found her sitting on the counter of the men's room (oh, the memories), swinging her legs back and forth and with the sort of blank expression on her face that he was becoming more and more accustomed to.
"Knew I'd find you here," he said from his position by the door, trying not to startle her. She'd been twitchy as all hell ever since they got her back and he wasn't sure how many knives she had on her person; what a way to kick off the new year that would be – a knife to the face courtesy of Ziva David.
"Why are you here?" She asked, not even bothering to look up at him.
(And fuck, that felt like she threw a very non-literal knife into his chest.
"Why are you here?"
Did she really have to use those words?)
"Technically, Miss David, I have more of a right to be in here than you do. This is the men's bathroom and, unless something major's changed since we went undercover four years ago, you're not a man."
"And you are?"
"I have the equipment to prove it, would you like a visual demonstration?"
He could see her fighting a smile. "I have seen it all before, DiNozzo, and I was far from impressed."
"The noises you were making say otherwise."
"You obviously can't tell when a woman is faking."
He grinned slightly tipsily as he wandered over to her, leaning his back against the sinks, his hip touching her swinging leg.
"You're gonna miss the fireworks," he said, watching her expression falter for a second. "Though somethin' tells me you don't really care."
"I don't see the point," she said with a listless wave of her hand (pretty much everything she'd done recently had been listless), "it is just a load of bright lights and loud noises. But you should go and enjoy them, it is part of the New Year tradition, isn't it?"
He shrugged. "Not really the New Year tradition I'm interested in."
"Ah, your kiss at midnight thing, yes?"
"I'll have you know that I haven't gone without it since I was twelve and I don't plan on breaking that streak now."
She rolled her eyes so hard he was surprised she didn't fall over. "Why are you here then? Shouldn't you be trying to find someone to fulfil this tradition with?"
"That your subtle way of shooting me down?" He nudged her leg with his hip. It was only after the words were out there that he realised he probably should have chosen them better considering that months ago she had almost literally shot him down.
Luckily for him, she seemed to move right over it, for once actually picking up on a figure of speech rather than taking it at face value. "I was not aware I needed to shoot you down."
Out of the corner of his eye he watched as her hand absently moved towards her throat before she realised what she was doing and the hand dropped back into her lap.
"You should get a new one," he said, "I know it wouldn't be the same but… new year, new beginnings, right?" She met his eyes for the first time that night as he offered up a one-armed shrug and added on a, "Looks wrong without it." He watched as she bit her lip, absently picking at a hangnail, and he couldn't help but think that he really didn't like those new tics of hers, they spoke to a nervousness that had never been there before.
The sound of first explosion, effectively cut off anything she might've said and he'd admit, that under the circumstances, he hated it (don't get him wrong, he loved the raise a beer, fourth of July fireworks, but standing in a bathroom with a skittish Ziva David and trying hard not to think about the past 365days on a night where thinking about the year gone by was pretty much the whole point… he thought he would much prefer silence). Tony winced in abject sympathy as she jumped so violently she almost slipped off her perch, her eyes wild and panicked, like a cornered animal. "Yeah, I figured you really didn't like 'em."
Her mouth opened and closed several times, clearly scrambling for an excuse, any excuse, before she seemed to give up, only managing a slightly weak, "Loud noises."
"I know," he assured, she bit her lip again looking so very, very close to tears as she nodded. Because he did. He did know that kind of thing about her. The things not very many people did know – her almost paralysing fear of spiders (during one of their movie nights he'd spotted one of the eight legged freaks on the living room ceiling and, upon him pointing it out to her, she'd bolted to the bedroom and locked herself in until he'd 'taken care of it'), her love of musicals (especially the Sound of Music, God those singing nuns and lonely goatherds made so many appearances in so many different nightmares; the most horrific of the lot being the one where Julie Andrews jumped right out of his TV screen to murder him with a few of her favourite things - cream coloured ponies and crisp apple strudels, doorbells and sleigh bells and schnitzel with noodles, were just a few of his least favourite things), her inability to keep a houseplant alive for more than a month or two (the woman managed to kill a cactus for fuck's sake, he didn't even know it was possible to kill a cactus), and that when allergy season rolled around her go-to remedy was tea with honey and lemon and, if she was feeling particularly shit and provided she didn't have to work, a dash of warm whisky ("Jesus, Ziva, it tastes like death," he'd coughed upon taking a gulp from the cup sitting innocently on her table, she'd done nothing but raise an eyebrow and take a challenging sip of her own with barely a twitch).
Yeah, he'd say he knew her.
"Happy New Year, Ziva," he whispered in her ear, just before he leant in to place a soft kiss to her cheek, lingering for a beat or two longer than he needed to. They'd always had a problem with personal space (it was basically non-existent, to be honest), but over the last few weeks he'd noticed a spike in the… physical moments between them. If he was Abby or McGee he would have compiled the data at hand, maybe tried to figure out what it all meant. But he was Tony DiNozzo and she was Ziva David, so he figured the best way to make the discovery was simply to let it play out – scene by scene, page by page – like one of his movies or one of her books except there was no skipping to the end to see what happened, no fast forwarding through and no rewinds either, no flipping back to re-read a chapter.
It was playing out entirely in real time and for once he was happy to go with it.
He pulled back an inch or two, pushed her hair back behind her ear and planted another kiss to her cheek, slightly closer to her lips. It wasn't romantic. It was actually one of the least romantic moments between them ever. No, it wasn't the sort of kiss that said I want you in my bed; it was the sort of kiss that said I'm here and I've got your six. It was the sort of kiss that said I'm glad you're home and I couldn't live without you and you're not replaceable. It was the sort of kiss that said I'm sorry and I hope you know that. It was the sort of kiss that said maybe someday.
It wasn't romantic but it was intimate - the close proximity, the hitching of her breath, the fact that up close like that he could see the tears sparkling in her dark eyes, the quivering of her lip - and he was sure that it meant a hell of a lot more than if he'd cheapened the moment by trying to hit on her (he was finally learning).
He took a deep breath, cleared his throat, and forced himself to pull away. "Buona notte," he said, his voice soft in the echoey room, as he turned to walk out, deciding the best course of action was to give her a moment to herself.
"Happy New Year, Tony," she called out as he got to the door, her legs swinging again but her face a little less haunted, she even offered up a slightly twisted smile. It wasn't much but he decided to take it.
He grinned and nodded, gave her a flagging wave, and left the room, content with the knowledge that she wouldn't be doing anything stupid within the next twelve hours.
The matter was resolved a week later when he walked into the squad room and saw the glittering of a new chain around her neck.
"You got a new one."
"New year, new beginnings, right?"
"I like it," he told her, flashing her a crooked smile, "looked wrong without it."
"Thank you, Tony," she said sincerely, her fingers toying with the silver star. "You were right."
He leaned back in his chair, swinging his feet up onto the desk. "I usually am."
:&:
"Yeah," he forces out, shaking his head clear, "that's Ima's so keep it safe because it's a very special necklace. Okay?" The girl nods her head with determination (the genetics are strong with this one, it's like he's looking at a mini-Ziva). "You want to hear a story about it?" Again, Tali merely nods. He's not sure if she's this quiet because she inherited Ziva's silent, brooding ninja gene or if it's because less than a few days ago her house was blown up, her mother killed along with it and now she's living with the man she knows is aba but other than that has no real connection to at all. (Yeah, now that he thinks about it, it's almost definitely the latter.) He's so out of his depth here.
"Once upon a time there was a princess, a really beautiful ninja princess, and around her neck she always wore a golden necklace, a lot like this one," he taps the star hanging from the chain. "This necklace… it meant everything to her…"
He goes on to tell her the tale of captured princesses, evil kings, and determined knights. He tells her about a princess who, while she was back with the knight, still wasn't free, the king had her trapped even from far, far away.
She lost her good luck charm.
He tells her that the princess decided she didn't want to be a princess anymore, she wanted to be something different, she wanted to help people and make the world a better place. He tells her that she didn't want to be a princess, she wanted to be a superhero instead and what did a superhero need?
She needed a shield. So, she bought one, a small star that would protect her for the rest of her life.
He tells her that the superhero did everything she could to make herself better again, turning her back on the evil king when he tried to take her away again because she found something much, much better - an actual family.
"And that superhero? That superhero's your Ima and she's out there, right now, saving the world."
Personally, he's really proud of his child friendly version of what happened post-Somalia. Tali… well… when he looks down to gauge her reaction he sees that she's fallen asleep, her head resting on his leg and he knows he'll do everything in his power to make sure no one ever, ever hurts her again (he can't even bring himself to be offended that she dozed off in the middle of his riveting story).
Ima and aba.
Ziva and Tony.
Whoulda thunk?
:&:
There are good days and bad days.
At the start it's mostly bad days.
Tali's a scared toddler who misses her mom and Tony's a terrified new father who also misses Tali's mom. When she cries he doesn't know how to calm her down in the way that Ziva no doubt did. She screams and yells, throws her toys at the wall and beats her small fists against Tony's knee (if there was any doubt about her parentage, it ends right there). And part of him wants to curl up and cry too, because he doesn't know how to handle this any better than she does. But he's the adult in this situation (in hindsight maybe packing up and moving to Paris all within a week and a half was a bit of a rash, spur of the moment thing, if he was still in DC he could at least call Gibbs or even Senior for help, they've got perspective and he so, so doesn't) so he has to pull himself together and take responsibility.
There are days, weeks, at a time where even getting out of bed is hard. He'd say he was depressed but he doesn't have the time to be depressed. He can't afford to be depressed. He won't let his daughter see him break down, not before she's old enough to understand why her aba's upset. No, instead he plasters a smile on his face, even through hours and hours of brightly coloured, smiley, happy, dance-y cartoons that would normally be enough to make him want to blow his own brains out. He takes Tali to the park, to get ice cream, he tells her a new story each night as he tucks her into bed, he takes Hebrew classes because Ziva would want Tali to grow up hearing both English and Hebrew and he's not going to let a little thing like him not speaking the language take that away (his accent may be terrible and his pronunciation even worse but he's learning and it's the thought that counts, right?), he teaches himself how to tie her hair into neat braids or ponytails (YouTube really is a godsend) and all the while, he hopes that he's doing Ziva proud.
It gets harder when the inevitable happens. Ziva once said nothing was inevitable. She was wrong. Because a little girl wanting to know when mommy's coming home… that's as fucking inevitable as it gets.
And here comes the anger (another inevitability) because thanks to Ziva he's the bad guy who has to tell her that he doesn't know but he does know that Ima loves her very, very much. Cases with kids were always the hardest. This is even harder; this isn't just any kid, this is his kid. His and Ziva's.
He wants to put his fist through the goddamn wall because what is he supposed to say?
"Ima's gone."
"Ima doesn't care enough to come home."
"Ima'll be home soon, I promise."
All of those would be lies and the one thing he swore he'd never do was lie to her. Ziva had grown up in a house where secrets and lies were the most frequent means of communication and it'd completely screwed up her life. He's not going to be the one to continue the pattern of father-child shittiness in their families.
"I don't know," he whispers into her hair, forcing himself to calm down, "I really don't know, bambina, but I'm sure Ima will be home as soon as she can be."
It's the one answer he can give her that isn't a lie; the rest of the world may be living under the impression that Ziva David is dead, but he knows better. Admittedly the answers he'd received during their short trip to Israel had been typically cryptic and vague but from what he could piece together based on his knowledge of spy-speak and his knowledge of Ziva, it sounded like someone out there wanted her dead (considering her line of business, there's probably a whole line of people out there wanting revenge, it could literally be anyone) so she'd used the attack as a means of faking her death and going underground.
The details may be sketchy but one thing he knows for sure is that she's still alive, and for whatever reason she wants the world to think she's dead; and, as much he hates it, it's something he has to learn to accept.
He's always understood her in a way very few others could and the message he's getting loud and clear here is simple: take care of Tali, she needs you.
So he will, he'll follow her wishes and every day he'll trust that Ziva, wherever she is, knows what the hell she's doing and he'll hope that one day she'll come home because he's not sure how much longer he can sit back and watch Tali miss her without doing something.
:&:
The first time he sees her, he's sure he's imagining things.
It happens on the day that he needs it the most. November the twelfth. Ziva's birthday.
Tony's not sure what stance Ziva took with Tali regarding religion - he's a very lapsed catholic who hasn't been to confession since his mom dragged him there when he was seven to try and seek forgiveness for stealing his cousin's baseball; and in all the time he knew Ziva, as far as he's aware, the only time she set foot in a synagogue was after Eli was killed (oh, how time flies) - but they light a candle together anyway. He's fairly sure it's something both religions have in common, though he's a little hazy on the actual meanings (he should really look that up).
"So," he claps his hands together and forces a smile as he watches the candle burn out, "ice cream or doughnuts?"
She looks at him and that expression right there is all Ziva, it's an expression that a two-and-a-half-year-old shouldn't have mastered, it's an expression that says isn't it obvious, DiNozzo? "Ice-cream."
"Andiamo, bambina," he says, "ice-cream it is. Go on, go get your shoes."
Of course, it's not that simple what with Tali being at the age where no shoe seems to come in a pair and socks are things to be worn anywhere except on your feet. He's been doing this long enough by now to know the best ways to corral, bait, and just plain wrestle his very hyperactive daughter into her clothes but even so, it still takes them twenty minutes to get out the door.
As all parents of toddlers will tell you they've got the amazing ability to be filled with energy at times when they should have no energy at all and have no energy at times where they should be bouncing off the walls. It's how Tali ends up on Tony's shoulders as they walk the now familiar route home from the place a few streets over. She eats her chocolate ice-cream as he walks and he knows she's probably dropping flakes of cone or drips of ice-cream into his hair but he can't bring himself to care.
He likes to think he's actually pretty good at the whole parenting thing; sure, he's permanently exhausted and he hasn't had time to shave in days and most of the time, when he goes outside, he does so wearing clothes that the old DiNozzo wouldn't even wear around the house (he's a far cry from the man who'd once boasted about his Ermenegildo Zegna suit, his Armani tie, his Dolce and Gabbana shirt, and his Gucci shoes).
It doesn't matter; he hasn't got anyone to look good for these days and he doubts his daughter, who's not even old enough to talk in proper sentences yet, minds too much about that coffee stain on his sleeve or the paint staining his jeans or the bits of food in his hair or the slight pen marks still visible on his face from when she got her sneaky little ninja hands on one of his permanent markers and decided that his face was the best thing to scribble all over after he made the mistake of falling asleep on the couch (at least she hadn't decided to go all Picasso on the freshly-painted walls, that would've been much harder to take).
She only cares that he's the guy who gives her piggy-back rides around the living room; that he's the guy who attaches the family portrait she paints to the fridge with a fridge magnet, proudly putting her work on display for all to see (he tries not to let it show that three clumsily painted stick figures - one blue, one red, and one yellow - standing next to each other brings a lump into his throat every time he sees it); and that he's the guy who kisses her scraped knee or scratched elbow better before magically healing it with a band-aid.
He's decidedly Very Special Agent no more, he's just a dad trying to do right by his kid. Instead of spending his weekend tracing phones or getting into fist fights with gang members (fist fights that he wasn't even responsible for starting nine times outta ten), he spends it busting out his best dorky dad dance moves and slowly introducing his daughter to the wonderful world of classic cinema (okay, so at this point the cinema in question might be things like Sesame Street and The Muppets but he's sure they'll get onto the real classics eventually). Instead of going out for drinks after work, he spends his evenings painting his daughter's room a shade of green that shares its name with Gibbs's dead daughter, a smooth jazz or classic rock record spinning on the turntable as he sings along. Hell, he doesn't drink at all anymore, and while his diet still may not be great, he's trying to make sure a heart attack doesn't get him before he turns fifty (he even bought quinoa the other week –big mistake, horrible texture, even worse taste, never again, but the point is that he tried).
When they pass the small children's playground, Tali seems to perk up, tugging insistently on a handful of his hair (fucking owww) with sticky, chocolate coated hands and pointing at the swings.
"Aba," she insists, "swing, aba, swing."
"Really? But I thought you were tired…"
"Aba," she whines, drawing the word out and bouncing up and down on his shoulders slightly (one of these days his back's finally going to just snap like a twig) and he knows he's powerless to resist, hell, she probably does too (he's not sure if got the ability to manipulate people like that from him or Ziva but either way, Tali's a kid who knows how to get what she wants).
"Okay, okay, you win," he sighs, though he doesn't mind at all. "As you wish, mi principessa."
:&:
"Higher, aba, higher," Tali urges, kicking her little legs, as he gives the swing a gentle push. He smiles as he pushes a little harder, the sound of Tali's shrieking laughter warming his chest. Okay, so he might not have Ziva, but he does have the next best thing and that's enough… for now.
"Higher?" Tony asks, already knowing the answer. The girl is Ziva's daughter, after all.
"Higher!"
"Hold on tight!"
That's when he sees her.
Standing by the entrance to the park, leaning against the metal fence in a way that seems casual but he suspects is the absolute opposite. He blinks once, twice, three times, but she's still standing there, clear as day – crazy curls, alert dark eyes that track everyone who walks by, and all.
Ziva.
Their eyes lock and he wonders if this is some sort of dream or hallucination. He opens his mouth, whether to call her name or to say something to the still-giggling Tali (something along the lines of, "look over there, there's ima, she's home"); it doesn't matter because before he can so much as squeak, she's shaking her head and putting a finger to her lips. Keep quiet, it's not safe.
He closes his mouth again and nods his head. He watches as her eyes move from him to the girl in the swing and he knows she's having to use all of her willpower to stop herself from sprinting over. The second she sees Tali, she seems to fold in on herself and he can see, even from all the way over here, that she's struggling to breathe (and now he's the one struggling not to sprint over to her). He sees her eyes close for a few beats as she breathes deeply and when they open again, they slide back from Tali to him.
She cocks her head in silent question, business as usual once more: how are you?
He nods once in return, as much of an assurance as he can give that we're both okay, I promise.
For the first time in his life, he really wishes he knew some form of sign language or semaphore or… shit, just some way of communicating with her because he knows what this is. This is as close as she's going to let herself get until whatever trouble she's gotten herself into this time is gone. This… this is her birthday present to herself, a brief thirty second look-in at what her life could be, should be like right now. (He wonders if this is actually the first time she's checked in on them since she 'died' or if it's just the first time she's let him see her.)
She raises her hand in a sad wave and when he next blinks, she's gone.
The greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing the world he doesn't exist.
And like that… he's gone.
Poof.
No trace she'd ever been standing there at all. He lets his eyes scan the street in both directions but it's a pointless move, he can't catch a glimpse of her anywhere.
Damn it…
:&:
That evening, after Tali's been put to bed, he pulls the dusty shoebox of photos out from underneath his bed. He resists the temptation to go for the bottle of bourbon Gibbs had given him as a goodbye gift (like he said, he's been a good boy recently). Instead, he plonks himself down on the couch, places the box on the coffee table and he just sits there, looking at it as if they're locked in a Mexican standoff; it's only after an hour of staring it down that he gathers up the courage to flip it open.
A lot of them are crap – spontaneous, candid snapshots that are blurry and poorly lit – and a higher percentage still are crime scene goof offs he could never quite bring himself to throw out.
The professional, Vogue style photo shoot involving him, McGee, and a giant stuffed bear from Ziva's first case on the team. The bear holding him in a headlock, the bear wearing his NCIS hat, him pretending to square up to the bear like it was the world's most one-sided boxing match ever (what weight class was a brown bear? Super-mega heavyweight?), and one of Ziva looking incredibly concerned, clearly wondering if it was too late to change her mind and go back to Israel.
The close-up shot of Ziva's ass he'd taken while she was tangled up with McGee across the front seats of Otto, a possibly murderous automated vehicle (it all makes sense in context, honestly… sort of).
A picture McGee had snapped of his own feet after he tripped over their victim's body (Tony may or may not have had something to do with that, he's still admitting to nothing).
The evidence of one of their little competitions - who could take the most pictures of Gibbs before he noticed - dozens and dozens of pictures of the generally scowling, occasionally full-on glaring, always coffee gulping Leroy Jethro Gibbs. The bet had ended with twin head smacks and Gibbs declaring McGee, the only one who hadn't taken part in the childishness, the winner, meaning Ziva and Tony had to pay for all his drinks that night. (The probie had more than taken advantage of their newfound generosity and racked up a bar tab that Tony would've found incredibly impressive if it wasn't for the fact that he was responsible for paying half. The guy was an award-winning writer, he didn't need his two cash-strapped colleagues buying his drinks for him.)
But there are definitely some of them worth looking at, worth putting in the empty picture frames he's got stored somewhere.
Ziva's last birthday with them in the squadroom when he and McGee had surprised her with streamers and a cake, both of them donning ridiculous party hats. A picture taken at the exact moment that Tony pushed Ziva's face right into the middle of a perfectly frosted, neatly iced, triple chocolate fudge cake, and another of the aftermath, Ziva hurling a chunk of cake at him, effectively starting an all-out food fight.
The picture he'd taken of Ziva a mere ten minutes away from here almost seven years ago (very French new wave). His favourite picture of their Paris vacation, the only one he'd taken with another person in it.
Them celebrating another closed case at their local bar –him, Ziva, McGee, and Abby all squashed together along one side the of booth, arms around each other as they raised their glasses to the camera. He hadn't noticed it at the time but Ziva's body was canted towards his, her eyes (bright, warm, and full of life) were locked on him, and the smile on her face was brighter than a camera flash. (Let friends get closer, his bucket list had said, he thinks it's one of the few things he's managed to tick off.)
A picture of her trying on the horribly kitsch bridesmaid's dress she never got to wear to Jimmy's wedding. As far as he's aware, she never found out he was in possession of this particularly incriminating photo; he'd turned on the charm as he asked Breena, Jimmy's remarkably down-to-earth and shockingly normal then-fiancée, to send one him and she'd surprised him by following through (who would've thought the autopsy gremlin could land a woman like that?). (He was pretty sure she'd been under the impression that he and Ziva were as together as she and Jimmy were and for some reason, he hadn't bothered to correct her.)
The old boarding school picture of him looking like a bible salesman that had spent the better part of a year cello-taped to Ziva's computer monitor.
He finds the picture he'd been looking for down near the bottom of the box.
Ziva proudly wearing a fake baby bump and a bright yellow shirt that read Bun in the Oven.
Did she smile like that when she found out? Did she find out what she was having beforehand, or did she wait to be surprised? (Ziva doesn't like surprises so he thinks it was probably the latter.) Did she ever think about calling him? (Oh, he knows what Orli told them, that Ziva apparently went all I am an independent woman and I don't need no man and decided to go it alone but he's still not sure he buys it.)
It's the sort of picture that has him imagining how things could've gone.
He imagines Ziva with just a hint of a bump, firmly claiming that I can still do my job, Tony, stop fussing. He imagines the morning sickness and the terror and the oh god, I'm so not ready for this. He imagines Ziva waking him up at three in the morning because she was craving something completely bizarre, some middle-eastern staple that was common enough to her but seemed so utterly foreign to him. He imagines himself trying and failing to assemble a crib, cursing the poor Swedish to English translation of the instructions and insisting that no don't call Gibbs, I swear I can manage, seriously, Ziva, stop laughing.
He imagines him cradling their newborn daughter, Ziva near sleep but still making sure to remind him to support her head, Tony because this isn't the doll he's been practising with for the last three months, this is their daughter, a living, breathing human being that they created together.
He imagines Ziva whispering to their daughter in melodic Hebrew (she would want to be able to talk to their child without him understanding because she's wonderfully evil like that). He imagines Ziva frantically calling Gibbs because he's like a father to both of them and how do you make this thing stop crying? Don't they ever get tired? He imagines himself teaching a slightly older Tali how to play baseball (it's every kid's dream, even McGee) and Ziva teaching her English idioms incorrectly as her revenge because no matter how hard he tries she still doesn't get how quintessentially American baseball is.
He runs his thumb over the picture, it's slightly faded now due to years of poor treatment but the smile on her face is still as bright as it was the day it was taken. He should hate it, it's a blatant taunt, it's everything he could've had; not to mention that, every time he sees it, he can't help but remember the calm before the storm – the few days of relative peace before things turned to shit.
"You looked good in that."
"Still would."
And:
"What is it with you and old photos lately?"
"Windows into our past."
"They were fitting me for the prosthetic, Tony. There's nothing embarrassing about it."
"Oh, not embarrassing; telling. You're smiling."
But most of all, it reminds him of what about my father? and aba! (it'd killed him to hear Ziva make a noise like that and holy shit, he hopes to God that he never, ever has to hear Tali scream like that), and who did this?
He can't help but love it anyway. It's a snapshot from the good old days (he never thought he'd come to think of agent afloat and secret war games and dead sisters and Ducky possibly being a war criminal and Michael Fucking Rivkin as the good old days but hey, c'est la vie (see, he's embracing his new life in sweet Par-ee)) and lately he's found himself missing the good old days more and more. He's getting nostalgic in his middle age, it seems (he'd take bursts of nostalgia over full-on midlife crisis any day). It's probably what makes him decide to stick the photograph onto the fridge, right next to Tali's family portrait because she may not be here but hopefully one day she will be and he's not going to let Tali forget who her mom is.
Happy birthday, Ziva.
He flips off the light.
Make a wish…