8 I have murder in my heart but I'd rather die in bed
Ziva reaches the office and then begins to fume when she realizes that, if Tony isn't in the office by now, he has again failed to get Becks to school on time. What is wrong with the man? Does that ridiculously expensive watch on his wrist not work? Why won't he make Becks do the simplest thing? Oh, it is so much easier to be the fun parent, who makes silly faces over perfectly good food and lets you use that special encrypted phone to play Tetris and buys plastic shoes that will probably cause toes to fall off or ankles to break. The older Becks gets the younger Tony gets, and soon, she thinks, she will have two dreadful ten-year-olds on her hands, breaking windows and riding skateboards in the house and sneaking cigarettes and resenting her every attempt at discipline.
Then her phone rings, showing the school's number, and she is forming an apology when she learns that her world had ended while she was sitting at her desk cursing her husband and child.
She goes to the base hospital. A few terrible moments, all these people pushing about and shouting, and Tony pale and dead looking but still breathing. Afterwards, though, all she can really remember is that his hands are bloody and there's a scrape on his cheek. He should not have a scrape on his cheek. He should always be clean-shaven and tan and smiling. But then there is Ducky, talking slowly and softly, comforting. Tactfully taking the bag of bloody clothing out of her hand, walking her back to the office. "Stay here, my dear, and I'll keep watch for you. Stay busy. The best thing, really."
And for the rest of the day she doesn't know what to do, whether to wind her butt or scratch her watch. (A Tonyism, but from what movie? Chick flicks are his weakness, and she's sure it's a chick flick, for all its crudeness. Oh, why does it matter? If she can remember, will Tony appear, tan and clean-shaven and smiling, apologizing for his lateness? What would she give to be sitting through another campfire?) She is wild to go to the scene, certain that it will speak to her, tell her where her child is and how to fix her husband. But she receives a call from Leon Vance himself, with direct orders to stay in the office and man the phones, or go to the hospital to be with her husband. "I don't want you messing this up," Vance says.
But she wants to mess it up. She doesn't want a nice investigation, all tidied up and suitable for prosecution. She wants people dead. She wants to make them dead herself. She wants to use the knife that has been used on Tony and to use it in the worst ways she knows, and she knows many terrible ways to use a knife. She has killed before but has never known such killing rage.
But even more than she wants to kill, she wants to rewind. Why hadn't she said: I'll take her to school. Or better yet: It's just kindergarten. Spend the day with Ducky. Enjoy yourselves, have a nice walk, play cards on the terrace and listen to Ducky's stories, eat ice cream for lunch and cake for dinner and candy for dessert and we will come home tonight and take off those awful pink shoes you so love and tuck you in with Bunny and we will go sleep in our rumpled bed until the sun comes through the windows again.
Stay busy. She calls Ducky every five minutes, desperate for news, to be told each time, with as much patience as if it were the first time, that it's far too soon to worry, delicate operation, no news good news. What fool had come up with the phrase "no news is good news"? No news is no news. She wants news more than she wants food or air.
Then it occurs to her that she ought not to be using her phone: what if a ransom call goes to voicemail while she's listening to Ducky say the same thing for the tenth time?
The only thing she can cling to, besides Ducky's shopworn reassurances, is Gibbs. Gibbs is on the way. Gibbs will look at her in that no-nonsense way and stop her pacing, stop her teeth from chattering, stop her recriminations and point her in the right direction. Gibbs will find Rebecca. Perhaps the movie will even end with one of those chick-flick scenes that Tony loves, with the extended family reunited and reconciled, laughing at silent jokes as the credits roll.
When Tony is out of surgery she goes back to the hospital. Tony is a trained investigator. There is nothing that Tony won't have noticed, from the brand of the perp's shoes to his watch. He will know where the perp gets his hair cut. He will locate the perp by guessing which movie he rented last week. Tony is out of surgery but not awake. He is still pale and dead looking with a scrape on his cheek and his own blood still on his hands. His eyes do not open. He does not take her into his arms and tell her that everything will be all right. He has no news.
And it is past time for Gibbs to have arrived, but he doesn't come. Abby comes, looking not herself in a yellow dress, but even her hug cannot help. Ziva watches as Abby does her grim business of scraping under Tony's nails. The day is dying away, this day that had started so well. There is no one to tell her that things will be all right that she can believe. Bad things have happened, and they have not stopped happening. She knows she has more to lose than she's already lost today.