Title: Sleepless
Rating: K+
Spoilers: Umm...basically all of Season 1. More or less.
A/N: Hope you like the latest installment...this time we get to see Kate's side of it (which is naturally a good deal more verbose). By the way, I do apologize for reviewing Season 1 to such an extent. I simply couldn't let a whole season of Kibbs interaction go completely unnoticed. Besides, I thought a little background might be nice to sort of give the reader an idea of how far I've taken the attraction between them at this point. So...I hope you enjoy it, and please let me know what you think!!
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She can't get to sleep tonight.
She's tossed and turned for more hours than she cares to think about, curled and uncurled herself into a dozen equally uncomfortable positions, twisted the sheets and blankets into an unrecognizable mass of crumpled fabric at the end of her bed. Nothing seems to help. She's almost to the point of taking one of the little pills she has sitting in her bathroom cabinet, the ones left over from the time she had her wisdom teeth taken out. But she's not quite sure she'd be able to wake up in the morning, and she'd rather deal with the agony of a sleepless night than be late to work. Not with Gibbs there, anyway.
Gibbs. She wishes she hadn't thought of that name, wishes she hadn't unwittingly reminded herself of the reason she's lying flat on her back at 3:00 in the morning, staring sightlessly at her ceiling and memorizing the pattern of the wallpaper on the opposite side of the room. All of this is his fault, she tells herself crossly, frowning up at the unresponsive ceiling and trying to ignore the chill that's creeping up over her exposed skin. The little knot of tension in the pit of her stomach, the bunched-up muscles in her back and shoulders, the splitting headache that is constantly lurking at the edges of her consciousness—all of it is directly attributable to him. And she hasn't the slightest clue what the hell she's going to do about it.
He's been bothering her ever since he marched onto Air Force One and started ruining her crime scene, making demands and creating disturbances and generally being a pain in the ass until the whole thing culminated in her almost getting kicked off her own turf and having to bargain with him to stay on the plane. She told him that night that she thought she was destined to shoot him, and the experience of working for him for over a year hasn't changed that conviction in the slightest. In fact, if anything, it's only strengthened her resolve. One of these days she's simply going to snap, pull her service weapon out of the drawer where she always keeps it, and start firing wildly at the nearest filing cabinet. And if one of the bullets should happen to ricochet and catch him in the shoulder or something, well…so be it.
She sighs in the darkness, unable to keep the memories from flooding in and reminding her of all she's sworn to forget. She has an endless panorama of snapshots in her head, moments from the past year or so that seem to be indelibly burned into her brain. And all of them seem to have something to do with him.
She remembers her unwilling attraction to him on Air Force One, the hard flint of his eyes as he told her that Tim was dead, the rough comfort of his arms around her as shock and grief set in. She remembers the half-mocking timbre of his voice as he offered her a job, and her disbelieving stare following him as he turned and climbed in a silver car with a gorgeous redhead sitting behind the wheel. She remembers the brush of his fingers against hers as he handed her a shoebox with a pair of the ugliest boots she'd ever seen in her life. And so, investigating her first crime scene with NCIS, she climbed around in a muddy field in combat boots and a pencil skirt and felt happier than she had when she bought her first Prada knockoff .
She remembers his cool glances when she made a comment or a suggestion, his curt orders and the little tilt of his head when he was listening intently as one of them proposed a new theory or linked together fresh evidence. She remembers the ache under her breastbone when he looked straight at her, without pulling any punches, and told her she disappointed him. She hadn't felt that sick combination of regret and anger and impotent pain since high school. But she felt it that day.
She remembers that he wasn't always such a bastard. That he would push and prod and poke and probe until he got what he wanted out of the team, but that he never let himself forget that they were people. People he cared about. She remembers her frustration when he told her that she couldn't let personal motivations get in the way of a crime scene. She remembers how tired she was when it was all over, how a 19-year-old boy's suicide seemed to suddenly shatter the foundations of her world, how she kept seeing his mother's grief-stricken face superimposed over an unresponsive statue of the praying Virgin. But most of all she remembers the kindness in his eyes when he turned to her as they were leaving and asked if she was okay. She'd wanted to throw herself in his arms and weep out her grief and bewilderment and anger at the injustice of a world where belief could protect neither the innocent nor the damned. She'd held herself together, patched the broken places with a half-hearted attempt at a smile. But he'd known—she'd seen it in the barely perceptible flicker at the corner of his mouth. And simply knowing that he understood what she was thinking had been comfort enough for the night.
She remembers the breathless chemistry that she'd always felt around him, the sense of a restless energy that all-too-rarely was focused solely on her. She remembers the tingling excitement that seemed to spread from her hairline to her toes when he looked at her in just that way, when he would throw out one of those sly innuendoes that could mean anything or nothing at all. She remembers being thrown against him on a surfacing sub and for a heart-pounding moment feeling his broad chest beneath her cheek, his breath blowing softly through her hair. She remembers the feel of his big hands holding her shoulders, keeping her safely against him until they could finally stand upright. She relived that moment for weeks afterward, letting her senses recreate the feeling until she could barely tell what she actually remembered and what was merely a fantasy in the dark. But if there was one thing she was sure of, it was that he'd been affected too. And the knowledge gave her a sly sense of power that filled her with unreasoning delight.
She remembers laughing with him on the rare occasions when he wasn't stern and serious, remembers privately noting how his smile made the lines around his mouth and eyes a little softer, his face a little more open. She remembers joking with him about nerds and Robert Redford, and watching him watch her out of the corner of his eye as she licked slowly at a lollipop. She remembers him asking her why women always had to fix what didn't need fixing, and the dazzling smile that had spread across her face as she dared to banter with him on equal ground. She couldn't help it. She always smiled for no reason when he was around.
She remembers his hands smoothing down a borrowed uniform, his eyes taking her in with a mixture of pride and possession and just a touch of greed. She remembers her heart pounding under her mixed-up ribbons as he told her that she was "lookin' good," and how the off-hand compliment played itself incessantly in her head like a song on the radio that she just couldn't forget. She remembers the adrenaline that flooded her veins when a bullet splintered the glass not five feet away from his head, forming a star-shaped pattern as beautiful as it was deadly. And she remembers the pained reproach in his eyes and the tiny twitch of humor around his mouth as he berated her for leaving the office without her cover.
She remembers riding with him in the agency car on the way to a lab they would never reach, running her eyes over him clandestinely so she wouldn't miss a detail of how he looked in his stark black suit. She remembers feeling his eyes run over her in her simple black dress, and how the sensation made her forget for a moment that she was at a funeral for a man she'd worked with and grieved for. She remembers sitting silently with him in a tiny apartment on stakeout, torn between wishing that she could leave so she wouldn't be tempted to jump him where he sat and hoping that McGee and DiNozzo would never arrive so she could have just a little more time alone with him. She remembers the cold fury in his eyes and the shock in hers as he put a bullet in the head of a woman he'd never met before, and the nausea that twisted in her belly as she took in the ruthlessness of his face. She'd never been truly afraid of him before that moment, and it had been a sobering realization to discover that she was attracted to a man who was capable of murder in cold blood. But it made no difference then. Just as it makes no difference now.
She remembers the helplessness in the lines of his weathered face as he searched for a man he loved and respected, the hot determination as he stood between his friend and every agency that threatened to take him in. She remembers the grudging acceptance in his eyes when his team waylaid him on his way to the elevator and told him that all he had to do was ask for their help. And she remembers the grief she saw in his bowed head as he held the colonel in his arms, the older man's shaved head cupped in one callused palm as they relived the memories that they could never share with anyone else.
She remembers standing in a high-vaulted church, smiling at the retreating back of the priest, and turning to see him pull out his lighter and light two candles beside the altar at the front. He hadn't knelt, hadn't bowed his head in prayer or shown any of the other outward signs of devotion. But she had seen it in the weariness in his eyes when he turned around, the faint tightening of the muscles around his mouth. She'd known better than to ask who the gesture was for or why he'd made it. She'd done it anyway, because she couldn't walk silently away without letting him that she cared. He hadn't let her in, and she hadn't expected he would. But they had both known what she meant.
She remembers sitting at a wooden picnic table with blood on her lip and hatred in her eyes as she watched a terrorist manipulate walnut shells with slim, deft fingers and clever hands. She remembers the unwilling attraction she felt towards him, the anger and the fear as another woman's blood pooled cold on the ground. But most of all she remembers that when the team found her, Gibbs was the first one there, the first to take her by the shoulders and inspect her lip with fire in his gaze, the first to ask where she'd been and what had happened and how she'd been abducted by the man they'd been searching for over the long months of work and worry. And she remembers that as Ducky inspected her mouth and Tony and McGee examined the crime scene, he was there in the background—handling details, demanding explanations, doing all the things he did so well for a living. He was there. And just knowing he was present made the cold knot of fear in her stomach begin to slowly dissolve.
But reliving the memories of him, of all the crime scenes they've covered and all the cases they've solved, are hardly likely to help her get to sleep. And so she climbs slowly out of bed, groaning as she registers all the achy muscles she'll undoubtedly feel miserably in the morning, and pulls on a thin silk robe over her pajama bottoms and tank top. Nights are still chilly in D.C., even though it's already springtime, and she doesn't want to add a cold onto her laundry list of other worries. Rubbing her eyes crossly, she grabs a hair clip and bundles her dark mane on top of her head as she pads through the darkened hallway and into her kitchen, swearing as she stubs her toe sharply on the corner of a cabinet. Hopping on her uninjured foot, she switches on the little lamp she always keeps on her counter and swings open one of the cabinets above the sink.
Her fingers quickly grab what she's looking for and she sighs in relief as she pulls down the little black-and-yellow box with the elegant scripted label that says "Twinings" scrolled across the side. Setting it down, she rummages in her pantry and comes up with an electric kettle and a big blue mug with the Secret Service header printed on it neatly in big white capitals. And as she fills the kettle, opens the box and pulls out two tea bags, and settles down in one of her kitchen chairs to wait for the telltale steam to begin pouring from the spout, she can feel the worst of the tension seeping out of her neck and shoulders.
It's the best panacea for sleeplessness she knows—hot tea steeped in an oversized mug and made just a little too strong, maybe with a few cookies for good measure. It's what her mother used to do when she was little and couldn't fall asleep, from the time she was too small for her feet to touch the floor when she sat at the kitchen table through all the stresses of high school and even a few of college. Other kids' mothers made warm milk or Ovaltine, gave them a mug of cocoa and sent them off to bed. Her mom made hot tea with exactly 3 ½ spoons of sugar and sipped it with her over sugar cookies and snickerdoodles. Some of her favorite memories in the world are of late-night talks with her mother over cups of steaming tea, telling her about homework and boys, problems with her brothers and dreams of being a lawyer and someday falling in love. And all of a sudden she's gripped by an insane urge to pick up the phone and dial the number she knows better than the lines on her own palms, just so that she can hear her mother's voice over the phone as she sips strong tea and nibbles sugar-dusted cookies.
But even as she wishes it, she knows that her mother died three years ago and her father moved to a new house less full of memories and sadness, and that even if she calls that painfully familiar number all she'll get is the buzz of a dial tone or the emptiness of a stranger's voice. And so she steeps her tea and digs out a round tin of homemade snickerdoodles and begins to munch on one alone.
Besides, she tells herself wryly, what exactly would she tell her mother even if she could talk to her again? That she's contemplating walking into work next morning and shooting her boss in sheer frustration? That her hormones have been humming and her fantasy life has blossomed since she started working for a man with ice-blue eyes and more failed marriages than Billy Joel? That she, a nice little Catholic girl, is contemplating committing two or three of cardinal sins per night with a man nearly twenty years her senior? Or that no matter what she does, how emphatically she denies it or how desperately she wishes she could escape, she can't stop thinking about Leroy Jethro Gibbs?
Because that's really the trouble, she admits to herself as she stirs sugar into her tea and takes the first bracing sip. Certainly Gibbs can be a bastard at times. Certainly everyone on the team has fantasized at one time or another about following in the footsteps of one of his multiple ex-wives and taking a baseball bat to his head. But it's not really his bad temper or his stubbornness or even his lack of communication that's got her in such a mood tonight. It's that she can't help liking him in spite of it.
She really doesn't know what's wrong with her. Older men have never really been her type. Nor has she ever been particularly attracted to a boss. When she was in the Secret Service, she thought of Bauer as a mentor and later a friend, but she never caught herself daydreaming about him at work or wondering what he did at night. If she'd happened to brush against him in the elevator, she didn't feel a shiver race up and down her spine, didn't feel goosebumps tingle on her arms. If she'd had to deliver a report to him, she didn't find herself fighting the clench of nerves in the bottom of her stomach or struggling to keep her voice firm and clear. If she'd received one of his infrequent looks of disapproval, she hadn't felt like wilting into a little ball of disappointment in a corner until he looked away. And she can't figure out why she has all of those reactions with Gibbs.
Part of it is that he's good, she muses as she takes another long sip of tea and breaks off the corner of another cookie. He's really good—one of the best agents she's ever known, and she doesn't know whether it's because of his natural talent or his training or a strange combination of both. But either way, he's creative, clever, sharp, inventive, always one step ahead of the game, always one moment closer to finding the answer than everyone else. He has gathered together the best and the brightest to help him—and she feels privileged to be part of that group. They are unequalled within the agency, she knows—possibly one of the best teams in the entire field. And they owe a great deal of it to the man who sits at the desk beside her every day…his tenacity, his courage, his fortitude, his skill.
What she has never been able to understand is how a man who is so good at figuring out other people's motives can never seem to pick up on the emotions of those who care about him most. He's so often completely clueless, she thinks. Oh, he's perfectly well aware of all their office interactions. He knows when she and Tony are giving McGee a hard time, when Tony's giving her grief about some guy she's dating and when Abby's feeling blue. He can read Ducky like an open book and he can probably even figure out what's going on in Palmer's head…not that anyone would really want to in the first place. But she can't fathom how he could have remained blissfully unaware of her terrible attraction to him for the year or so she's been at NCIS.
She's glad he's so oblivious, though, she thinks with a wry little curve of her lips. It's more than a little humiliating for a strong-minded, focused, dedicated career woman of the 21st century to feel so…so what, she asks herself? So dizzy, so overwhelmed, so hopeless, so giddy, so excited, so depressed? So intrigued by a relationship she should never explore and a man she can never have. But if there's one thing her mother instilled in her, it was a sense of honesty—at least with herself, if no one else. And as Kate finishes her mug of tea and stares blankly at her quiet kitchen, the truth is no less apparent in the plain wooden doors of her cabinets than in the hustle of the bullpen or the enforced quiet of a stakeout. She's attracted to Gibbs, and there's really nothing she can do about it except bemoan her own unlucky fate.
Rising, she goes over to the sink and rinses out her cup and plate, leaves them in the bottom of the sink to be dealt with in the morning. For once, her mother's panacea didn't work, she muses sadly. Her head is clearer, her thoughts less jumbled. But she's still nowhere close to sleepy, and she knows she'll have dark circles and reddened eyes in the morning. Briefly she thinks of all the insinuations Tony will make about busy nights and exhausting activities, and decides she doesn't even want to go there tonight. Better to leave that to the morning along with the dirty dishes.
Sighing, she turns away from the sink and heads toward the living room, willing to try the dubious comfort of old black-and-white movies on cable at 4:00 AM. She plops down on the couch and flicks though a couple of channels until she finds Turner Classic Movies, which is currently showing Billy Wilder's Sabrina. It's one of her favorites, and she finds herself smiling despite her tiredness as Audrey Hepburn gradually beguiles a closed-off Humphrey Bogart, who somehow can't seem to resist her charms no matter how much he tries. Ruefully, she acknowledges the parallel to her own situation, tries to smile at the irony of it. Because however much she may tell herself that she doesn't believe in happily ever after and soulmates and the power of true love, she knows perfectly well that she's a romantic at heart…one of the women who always believed as a little girl that somewhere out there was a knight on a white charger waiting just for her. And in some well-hidden corner of her heart, she believes it still.
Gibbs isn't her knight in shining armor. He isn't even close. But at the moment, he's all she wants, all she needs, all she desires. Her problem seems to be that she simply can't wrap her mind around the fact that something so wrong can feel so right. She can't run away from the realization anymore, can't disregard it or push it to the back of her mind. She wants more than what she's got, and he's the only one who can give it to her. The great pity of it all is that as far as she can tell, he'll never let himself even try.
And so, as Hepburn and Bogart waltz gracefully through the lines of their story, unrequited love gleaming from every glance, she hugs her pillow and thinks of a silver-haired man sleeping under a boat in his basement. Her eyelids droop a little and she can feel a yawn building in the back of her throat. But she can't get that picture of him out of her head, and as long as it's there she knows she might as well give up on falling asleep. There's no use anyway, she muses. She was doomed from the first moment he entered her mind.
It looks like it's just going to be another sleepless night.