AN: Thanks so much to all the kind reviewers who've encouraged a new writer to continue!

Don't know if I should change the rating for two minor swear words, both from the script. K+? Please let me know if I should have done – I'm still learning.

BODY LANGUAGE

Chapter 3: Coltrane and Confrontations

The floor of his room was hard, even with the carpet, but Josh was happier sitting there where he could rest his head against the side of his bed whenever it got too heavy to hold up. The glossy magazine in his hand could have been toilet paper for all the sense he could make of his attempts to read it. The warm, chocolate-brown velvet notes of a virtuoso jazz man hardly got past his eardrums, let alone as far as his brain.

He'd left his door open in case his mom or Claire wanted to come in, although he didn't think they would.

He sighed deeply. He hadn't meant to make his mom cry again, and now Claire wasn't speaking to him either.

"You don't care about us," she'd screamed at him, with almost-teenage vehemence. "You just want to go off and get yourself killed, and leave us with nobody!" The slam of her bedroom door must have been heard down the street.

His mother was gentler, but the sentiments were the same. "You can't turn your back on everything you've worked for, Josh. Not for a snap decision that you're making in anger. Son, you know how good you've got to be to even get into Princeton. What would – "

"If you're going to ask me what Dad would say, just… just don't. None of it matters any more! He's gone, and I'm going to take his place." He couldn't really believe he'd said that, it sounded so melodramatic, but he was caught in his own spiralling misery, and couldn't stop. "Don't cry, Mom, please don't cry…." He couldn't bear to look at the tears on her cheeks. "Nothing matters now except getting the ones who killed him."

Her sad, soft voice had followed him as he fled from the room. "It won't bring him back, Josh."

Night was draping the world outside the window in its black satin, muting sound and activity, ending this awful day and bringing peace everywhere but in the Cooper household. Josh sat by his bed in a pool of pain, guilt and resentment, until a soft knock at his door broke into his thoughts. He almost snapped, "For heaven's sake, Claire, it's open," but he'd cooled down at least enough not to be needlessly unkind.

He looked up, just as a quiet voice said, "Shouldn't you be packing?"

Josh looked away again, to cover his embarrassment. For that matter, he didn't want the big man standing casually in the doorway to see his guilt or his confusion either.

If there was one person in the world he wanted to see just then it was Tony DiNozzo. If there was one person he absolutely didn't want to see…. it was Tony DiNozzo. The one person who could lift him and give him strength, who wouldn't judge him like he was judging himself for how he'd spoken to Mom and Claire, was also the person who'd tried already once today to discourage him from what he very clearly thought was a bad idea.

Josh groaned inwardly. He didn't want to be told, by someone whose opinion he'd come to respect, (how was that anyway?) that he was behaving like a child. He was quite sure he wasn't; his plan may have been a complete about face from everything his life had been up to this point, but wasn't that what today had been? How could anything ever be the same?

He wouldn't turn to face his visitor, but glanced over his shoulder. His voice, when he found it, came out harsh and grudging. "My mom called you, didn't she?" When Tony simply smiled and pulled a wry face, obviously not wanting to tell any tales, Josh looked at him properly for a moment. "What did she tell you?"

He braced himself and prepared for a lecture, prepared to fight his corner, but wondering how he could against someone as subtle and unpredictable as Special Agent DiNozzo.

All Tony said, still in that soft, level voice, was, "That you're not going to Princeton."

"She's right," Josh said shortly. He turned away again, his body language yelling "Go away," and pointedly started pretending to read again.

It didn't happen, of course, and he was aware of the agent taking a couple of steps into the room, and he waited tensely, while only the purring notes of the saxophone filled the air.

"Coltrane…." Tony drawled appreciatively. "Wouldn't have figured you for a jazz man…." the tiniest pause, then inviting him to respond, "….Josh."

Well, he'd said the guy was subtle. The dam broke, and he found himself explaining about Sundays, his dad's deployment, and playing the albums to be close to him in his absence. He saw Tony studying the photo of his father in uniform as he spoke, then he gave Josh a long, understanding look that the younger man couldn't bear to hold. He turned his head away, eyes unfocussed and full of pain.

After a while he went on. "Next thing I knew he was home, and we were listening together." His eyes were once again full of tears that he wouldn't shed.

Tony said, "I know this must be a pretty difficult time for you…"

It was the sort of platitude they'd sparked over earlier in the day, when Tony's clowning had told him that banalities are fine if they help – but now Josh was having none of it. He exploded to his feet and across to the record player, snapping the music off with a vicious twist of his wrist, then strode as far away from the agent as the room would allow.

"If you're here to talk me out of joining the marines – "

Tony stepped in smoothly. "I would never talk anyone out of joining the corps – it's an honour to serve your country."

Josh folded his arms and glared. "Good. Glad that's settled." He might have known it wasn't. The next question was delivered with wide-eyed innocence, as if Tony didn't actually know the answer.

"I would ask one question though – what's the big rush?"

As soon as Josh began to speak he realised he'd fallen for the trick again; he'd have admired how Special Agent Tony - (Aaaagh, he's back) kept on making him open up, if he hadn't felt so mad. He knew he'd been played, but he didn't try to stop.

"You know what? You're probably right. I should wait a little longer. What's a few more dead colonels?"

"I understand that you're pissed off."

"Pissed off?" He was in Tony's face, and Tony was taking it. "They killed my Dad! How would you feel?"

The tall agent remained unruffled. "I would want justice – but you're looking for revenge?" He ended on a questioning note; and Josh suddenly realised he was being asked to consider his motives carefully. Even as he began to waver, he asserted confidently, "You're damn right! An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth…."

He was wondering if he actually believed that himself when Tony took the wind out of his sails completely. "Which just leaves you with a bunch of toothless blind people…"

The goofball comedian from that afternoon was back, but Josh wasn't quite prepared to go along with it just yet. He sneered, " So you'd just make a joke and do nothing."

There was a sudden shift in the atmosphere in the room; tiny, elusive, huge.

The goofball was gone as if he'd never existed; Special Agent Anthony DiNozzo's hazel eyes held Josh transfixed for a moment. "I would do whatever it takes," he said. The barest stress on "do", and the slightest pause after, but Josh was looking at a different being; a dangerous creature with a power and a will to spend itself for good such as he'd never imagined. Josh's mouth opened slightly, and his breath caught in his throat. And then it was simply Tony; the agent was turning to leave, as if aware that he'd shown more of himself than he'd intended. "But there is a right time, a right place," he said, "And this is not the time – not for you."

He disappeared, and left Josh to slump down on his bed, staring unseeingly at the wall.