TAP 4
The FBI and NCIS agents were just wrapping up a joint case, when Tobias' cell rang. Tobias had dismissed his team already, back to the Hoover building, while he observed the last of the interrogations and waited for the final forensics report.
This was a case where Tim had ended up taking the lead, as it relied heavily on the science and the computer forensics to solve the case. Gibbs had hovered over him, questioning him at every turn, which had immensely irked Tobias. At first, he had let it lie, because it wasn't his place to interfere in his friend's career. But Tobias had been forced to step in and remind Gibbs that as team leader, you can't give the lead to a junior agent and then undermine him in front of the team, when it escalated too far. Especially to a geek like McGee.
He mentally chastising himself for using the word geek, even though Tim quite often used that word himself. Tobias wasn't a fan of the term, he felt it was belittling to the person. After all, to be considered a geek, you were considered to have above average intelligence and a certain level of education usually accompanied that intellect. "Yeah, Fornell." He sighed into the phone line, seeing that the caller was Diane. He winced at that. He watched as both Gibbs and McGee winced at the sound of Diane screeching down the phone line at him, but he was grateful that DiNozzo hadn't witnessed it. He wasn't sure he could handle the crude comments that the Italian Lothario wouldn't resist making.
"She did what?!" Tobias seethed, unable to believe his ears. He listened as Diane repeated herself, still screeching and seething down the phone line. He was sure her voice was echoing through and his two friends could hear what his ex wife was saying.
"I'll take care of it." Tobias told her, giving into his ex-wife's demands. At this point in the day, he would do anything, just to shut her up.
"Diane, I said I will take care of it and I will." Tobias reiterated to the red haired, volatile menace. Gibbs couldn't help himself but smirk with glee, at Tobias' situation. Glad that it wasn't him facing their mutual ex-wife's ranting for once.
Tim very smartly schooled his features immediately. He didn't want to incur Tobias' wrath, anymore than he wanted to incur Diane's or Gibbs'. It was Wednesday night and he and Tobias were clutching at straws, knowing the paperwork had to get done before either man could leave. Tim had been on point, having the lead in the case, so the extra team leader paperwork would fall to him. It was only the third time that Gibbs had given Tim point before, so Tim had to take extra precautions to make sure that he had all the paperwork correct before he submitted it and left for the night.
Luckily for Tim, Tobias understood and when they had been on their way back to the bullpen, Gibbs continuing on to autopsy, to see Ducky about something not case related. They were alone in the elevator. "Late dinner?" Tobias had asked the younger man, as they headed back up to the squad room. Tobias had accompanied Tim and Gibbs to the lab, wanting to hear the verbal forensics report for himself.
"For sure." Tim told him firmly. It had been a day and he was grateful that he and Abby had nothing but a cordial working relationship.
"You have to save me." Tim announced as he took his seat at dinner the following week. This was only the fifth or sixth time that the two of them had met for dinner, beforehand. "I'm thinking of doing really something stupid and I need you to talk me out of it."
"Whatever it is, don't do it." Tobias said in a faux huff with a chuckle. When his new friend didn't chuckle along with him, he paused. He took in the man's demeanour. He was distressed, clearly upset. Whatever the issue was, it was serious to Tim. "What's the matter?"
"You know how I feel about her." Tim said, hopelessly his voice almost in a sigh. "We have this amazing connection, it was instantaneous, ya know? But after one date she said she couldn't do serious, we cooled it. I really thought that was the end of it, but I can't get her out of my head. I am crazy about her."
"Tim, relax!" Tobias advised his friend, before ordering himself a scotch and his friend a glass of wine for his friend. "This is just like target fixation. You're fixated on her. You need a distraction to get your mind off Abby. You said it yourself, you're not that kind of guy. You were raised to respect women. You can't do that to her or to yourself, pretend to want the same as her. It's not fair to her. It's not fair to you, nor is it being true to who you really are."
"Some women don't want to be respected, ya know? They want ... Well, this is too nice of a place and I'm too much of a gentleman to say what some women really want, right here." Tim argued and Tobias couldn't help but want to help the young man find his feet. Want to guide him. The few details he had learnt of the young man's family life, so far, had left a bad taste in Tobias' mouth. To the older agent, it seemed like the younger man needed some life training. As well as some life guidance, in additional to the professional training and guidance that he desperately needed. It was clear that his parents were in serious remiss of the young man. Tobias knew he couldn't blame his mother for that. She had died when the man was just a small boy, that wasn't her fault. No; the blame for this failing, fell squarely on Admiral John McGee's shoulders.
"You're not that kind of gentleman," Tobias said, as their drinks arrived. "Tim, I have no doubt that you will have the greatest love story of all time. One of those ones for the ages. The ones that your grand kids will idolise. But it's not going to be with Abby. One thing I do know is, women don't change their minds. Once they say something, their minds are made up. She doesn't want what you want or what you're offering her. You shouldn't sacrifice your heart to be with someone who doesn't have the same life goals as yourself. Can you see Abby wanting marriage? Kids and a house in the suburbs? Science camp on Saturdays, Sunday brunches, family movie nights and weekend farmer's markets? That's not her and it isn't the right thing to push her into that, for your wants. It's OK to want that, Tim. There's nothing wrong with wanting that in life, it's just not for her. It's only going to lead you to a broken heart and her to resent you." Tobias chastised his friend. He had been very careful not to reveal his true personal opinion or the hard truth, the hard truth that his young friend was denying. She's not the one for Tim, she's all wrong for him.
"But?" Tim began, but Tobias wanted to drive the point home without hurting his friend, further.
"But nothing, Tim." he told McGee. "That's the way it is. Now, you need a distraction. What's your choice hobby, pleasure or skill?"
"Skill." Tim said after a brief pause. Tobias had been grateful. He hadn't wanted the man to say pleasure. He didn't know the man that well and wasn't comfortable enough, playing wing-man. "I'd love to improve my aim with my weapon. My score is good, but I would like to better it, to be better."
"Paintballing?" Tobias offered. He knew it was beginning to get popular, but the FBI had used it as additional training for years, already. Before that, they used beanbag guns. But someone discovered that filling the beanbags with paint was much more fun. "We use it at the FBI for improved skills. Sharpshooting training, tactical training and analysis. Similar to the gauntlet at FLETC."
"Paintballing?" Tim asked, in an amused tone. "As in you shoot things with a gun that uses balls of paint as ammunition?" To Tim, it sounded kind of fun. A fun way to learn a new skill. He thought it would be an excellent distraction from his thoughts and feelings on Abby."
"Well yeah." Tobias replied. "We'll register you as a consultant agent from NCIS and we can use the FBI grounds, just outside of Quantico. In addition to sharpshooting, I am going to run you through some some sniper training as well. We should also get you out on our gun range to see where you sit and how you can improve there. How's that sound to you? Sound like a good enough distraction for you?"
"Sounds like it might work." Tim answered him, as the waitress came to take their dinner orders.
"Don't be fooled." Tobias told his friend, sternly. He didn't want Tim to think that this was going to be a walk in the park. Far from it. "It is going to be hard work. I am not going to go easy on you, but I am going to help you. It will be fun, but you will learn new skills and you will improve your skills."
"Thank you." Tim told his friend, graciously. The two men placed their dinner orders and proceeded to make plans to get Tim onto the FBI range and into their paintballing gauntlet to improve his skills.
As soon as Tobias was clear of the Hoover Building that evening, He grabbed his cell and called Tim, double checking if he was still free for dinner. Hearing that Tim was just pulling up at their favourite restaurant in their weekly dinner rotation, he made a beeline for Tim's location while Tim disconnected the call and told his older friend that he would secure the two of them a table.
"Sorry I'm late." Tobias said apologetically, as he hurriedly took his seat opposite Tim. Tim had been distracted on his phone and waved him off. Tobias had learnt that when Tim did that, it was because he either needed to get that thought down so he didn't lose it, or he was chastising his kid sister for something and wanted to finish doing so, so he could focus all of his attention on his surrounds.
"Sorry about that, Sarah was asking to loan some money." Tim explained, as he locked his phone and gave his dinner companion one hundred percent of his undivided attention.
"You going to give it to her?" Tobias asked, as he glanced at the menu despite the fact that both he and Tim order the exact same meal every time they come here, in their rotation of dinner venues.
"Penny gave her money last week and I know that the Admiral is generous with incidentals." Tim said, before looking his friend over. His friend looked stressed. Not work related stressed and not Diane stressed, both looks he knew well. This kind of stress looked like a new kind. "Claims she needs it for food. I offered to buy the food for her and deliver it to the university, instead. She hasn't replied to me yet."
"Can't be too hungry, then. Unlike me, I am starving." Tobias retorted and looked his friend over. Even though they'd spent the bulk of this case on different angles and he had followed Tim's lead without question. Despite all of Tobias' time at the Navy Yard, they felt like they barely saw one another. "It's been one of those weeks, especially today."
"I've ordered you a scotch and some of those flatbread and dips, that you usually enjoy so much." Tim informed Tobias, just as the waitress arrived with the appetisers and drinks. "How'd the paperwork go?"
"It's in your inbox, you'll see it in the morning." Tobias grumbled, as they placed the order for their mains with their usual waitress.
"OK, out with it." Tim said directly, taking the hard line with his friend. He had done this a few times in their friendship before and Tobias always ended up spilling about whatever was on his mind.
"Actually, you're closer to Emily's generation that I am." Tobias announced, realising that he was a unique position, in comparison to Diane. He had a friend, in the middle. Directly between his age and his daughter's age. He had a small, dry internal chuckle when he realised that he was actually old enough to be Timothy McGee's father. Then realised that was a sobering thought, indeed. "So Diane is all up in arms because the school because Emily was caught with a boy underneath the bleachers. Apparently, they were kissing."
"Isn't she not yet eleven?!" Tim asked, shocked. He knew that she wasn't yet eleven because her eleventh birthday party was next month. He had bought her a birthday gift and planned to drop it at Tobias' house before the party. So that when she went to her Dad's for visitation afterwards, it was waiting for her. "OK, did Diane say what kind of kissing they were doing?"
"Yes, that's my point. The boy is a year older than her, too." Tobias seethed. "Of course, Diane tried to make it all my fault. But I wasn't wearing that one. I had to explicitly remind her that she's is the one in a serious relationship and that I am not. I also reminded her that she has custody of Emily, that I don't exhibit that kind of behaviour around Emily."
"Did you talk to Emily about it?" Tim asked, remembering his first experience kissing a girl. "I mean is it like a first crush? Puppy love?"
"I tried, but honestly, Diane and Victor were butting every two seconds and wouldn't allow her to answer me." Tobias sighed, as his filet mignon arrived and Tim's cordon blue arrived. "I just don't know what to do. Any ideas, you were that age and not too long ago?"
"First off, girls aren't that different from boys at that age. They will talk, but only if they feel like it. Honestly, when Sarah was that age, she wouldn't talk to me about boys, anymore than she would talk about them with our father." Tim began to explain, as he took a long drink and the two of them heartily dug into their meal. Tobias automatically cut his filet mignon in half and Tim did the same to his cordon blue, as they exchanged halves. Something they started doing around the two year mark of their friendship. "I think your best course of action would be to reinforce that while she did break the school rules, she didn't break your rules. Be sure to keep calm and speak in even tones. Be genuine. Next ask her to suggest some rules about boys that can be implemented, before suggesting a few of your own. Next you need to reassure her that where ever you are is a safe space. That she can always come to you and talk to you. That teaching her to come to you a good thing. That while you might not agree with what she has done and you might get mad, you won't yell. Yelling scares girls. Next you need to listen and I mean really listen to girls. Remind her to trust you and that more importantly, you trust her."
"Tell me Obi Wan, how do you know so much about women, but don't have one of your own?" Tobias teased his friend, half curious. Tim's advice had made a lot of sense and was practical. He knew Tim had read women's magazines in the past
He had told Tobias (and DiNozzo) that it made him understand women better. Well given the advice Tim had just given his friend, it worked.
"Penny." Tim supplied and to the FBI agent, that made much more sense than it would to most people, including Tim's colleagues at NCIS. "Watching Penny with Sarah. Penny also had this deal with myself and later on with Sarah too, that I think might work well for Emily. Its called Call me. If she ever gets in trouble and needs a ride or some help, she can call or text you and you will come. She doesn't have to tell you what's wrong, but with the trust between the two of you in place, you hope that she will confide in you. Sarah also had the grounded deal, if she was ever being peer pressured and needed an excuse to leave she would secretly text an x to myself or Penny. We would call, demanding Sarah come home because she was grounded. Same reason if her friends invited her somewhere and she didn't want to go."
"They're good strategies, Tim." Tobias praised him. Watching Tim's face light up at the praise, Tobias remembered that he had suspected that Tim's father had never praised him as a child. He made a mental note to praise the young man more often. Which of course, prompted Tobias to remember that they hadn't yet discussed the case that they had just wrapped up, either and he did want to discuss that with his friend. "That was a really good work that you did on that case, taking the lead, like you did. Really good work. Plus, I loved seeing you put Gibbs back in his spot and making him dumpster dive through the trash for the third victim's cell phone. I bet that felt really satisfying, after the way they always treat you."
"You have no idea." Tim gleefully said to him. It had felt really good, not as good as making Tony scoop up the vomit for Abby to analyse, but it was up there. "Just got to be on the lookout for retribution now because there will be payback. You can count on it."
"Tim, you shouldn't be spending your days looking over your shoulder, waiting to see if one of them are going to retaliate." Tobias told him factually. "You were the team leader on the case and you delegated a task to a team member. They would of, and have done the same thing, when they're team lead. It's not right, the way they ride and ridicule you. I wish you would really consider coming and working with me at the FBI. We could definitely use a guy like you, with your skills and talents."
"I might actually be taking you up on that offer, soon." Tim quipped and Tobias thought that his jaw might hit the floor in shock. Usually, in the past, McGee just brushed him off or ignored him.
At Tobias' questioning look, Tim explained the whole sordid detail of why he was getting fed up with the MCRT and everything that had happened with Tony breaking into his apartment and Tim confronting Gibbs about his behaviour. Tobias' blood boiled as he sat there and listened to his friend tell him all the reasons why he no longer felt safe working for the MCRT. He listened as Tim finally concluded the topic with his pièces de résistance. "I got offered a new Gemcity contract for Deep Six. Another four books in the series to total five books and Deep Six to be sold, worldwide. In every major book store in the world. With the second novel almost complete, I am very excited about this."
Tobias was ecstatic for his friend and immediately, the two of them made plans to celebrate his young friend's achievement. The way he liked to celebrate. A bottle of good whisky or scotch, some of the fancy take-out that the young man liked and a sci-fi movie marathon.
Entering into his apartment after dinner, he knew someone had been in his apartment. As soon as the tumblers fell away from the barrel of the lock. They fell too easy. Easy after years of constantly being picked by DiNozzo. So, Tim did what he always did. He cleared the apartment room by room, turned on his laptop and cued it up to when he left for work that morning. Seeing that it was indeed Tony, who had broken into his apartment. Tim did what he usually did he saved each individual video, combined the videos and saved it to one file. He watched Tony's movements throughout his apartment, watched him rifle through Tim's belongings, eat his cereal, rifle through Tim's study, attempt to crack the safe code that held his prized Gemcity works and observed Tony watch a movie on his sofa, on his TV. Before Tony DiNozzo gave up and left, leaving his trail for Tim to clean up.
Next; he called his friend Tobias. He asked his friend to get the job offer put in writing for him and emailed to him, as he began typing up a resignation letter from NCIS, saving it for safekeeping. He knew it would take time for the job offer to the FBI to come through, but he would bide it. Next and perhaps most importantly, Tim pulled up his favourite search engine and began looking at apartments for lease. He had to move. He wanted to be settled in his new place before he resigned from NCIS. He also made a decision, he wouldn't be listing his new address on his 201 file until he left NCIS.
Armed with a shortlist of five apartments to look at, Tim enlisted Tobias' help to look through them, much like he had when he moved from Norfolk to Silver Spring. His apartment in Silver Spring wasn't too bad, a bit cramped and ideally he'd like to have a bit more space for a dedicated office. He didn't even mind the commute, it was much closer to Tobias and when the two of them hung out, it was good because they were less likely to bump into DiNozzo or Gibbs. Even though Ducky and Ziva lived in the area, Tim had never bumped into either of them out and about. Sure, when either Ziva or Tim were going to be away, they'd help each other out, but that was as far as it went.
"Were you serious about wanting to help out? When you mentioned it at dinner the other night?" Tim asked the FBI agent into the phone line, as he taped up yet another box ready for the moving truck.
"Of course I was." Tobias answered, almost offended, as he chopped the onions and tomatoes for his spaghetti sauce. Emily was in her room, hopefully finishing her reading assignment. He hadn't expected to have Emily in the middle of the week, but Diane had been called out of town, unexpectedly, on business with the IRS. "Why? What's up?"
"The apartment I was due to move into tomorrow in Forrest Glen, it had a small fire in it yesterday and my lease in Norfolk expires at the end of the week." Tim explained, as he taped the bottom of yet another box, to start boxing up the last of his belongings. His spare computer parts. "I found another apartment and I took the virtual tour. It looks perfect, but the agent wants me to look at it in person tomorrow morning at 8. I have to be on Norfolk to meet the movers at 10. Obviously, that's impossible. She said I could send someone to look at it on my behalf."
"Relax Tim!" Tobias grinned into the phone line as he added his onion and tomatoes in to the [a with a pinch of salt and a teaspoon of sugar. "I have to run Emily to school in the morning, so I am taking the morning off. Where is this apartment?"
"Over in Silver Spring, I will text you the address." Tim said graciously. The relief evident in the young man's voice. "Your are literally saving my life. I can't start my new post, with no where to live. Or worse, living in a hotel, I'd never hear the end of it."
"No need to thank me, Tim." Tobias replied, as he added the noodles into the oil and salted boiling water. "That's what friends are for."
"Call me if it's good and I'll transfer the security deposit and the first months rent immediately." Tim instructed his friend. Tobias could hear that by agreeing to help the young man out, he had helped taking the weight of the world off his shoulders. "Be sure to remind the agent, that I can sign the lease electronically and authorise you to collect the keys on my behalf, if need be."
"Yes, I'll do that. Tim, I need you to do something for me, too." Tobias answered and he could hear the younger man starting to get stressed out again. "I need you to breathe. In and out. That's it. It will all be OK, I don't need you stressing. I know it's a big move and a big change for you, but you're going to be OK. I want you to repeat that to me."
"I am going to be OK." Tim said softly.
"Good, now every time you feel yourself getting overwhelmed with what's going on. I want you to repeat my words to yourself." Tobias instructed the man, as he stirred his noodles. "You're going to be OK."
"Thanks Tobias." Tim smiled, as he wrapped the final spare computer part in newspaper and stowed it in the box. It was GeForce4 Ti graphics card, that he had salvaged from a junk computer that had been fried. He had painfully restored it and was about to test it, when the transfer came about. Instead, he had stored it with the rest of his spare parts, ready to be packed for his new home. "Talk to you, tomorrow?"
"You got it!" He exclaimed as he disconnected the frantic call from his friend. Checking dinner once more, and seeing it was almost ready, he called out to Emily that it was time to wash up for dinner.