A/N: Thanks for the reviews! :)
Real Fallouts
When Gibbs' mind slowly swam into consciousness the next morning, he realized three things at once. First, he hadn't once woken up all night which had to be a first in years. Second, he was oddly rested despite what had happened the night before. And third, and most important, he felt trapped.
In a good way.
When he opened his eyes he was greeted with a tuft of hair belonging to Tony as the younger man's head was lying on his chest. Apparently they had moved closer together when the night had progressed and while Gibbs couldn't explain how he hadn't woken up by the movement, he couldn't say he didn't like it. Tony's left hand was draped around Gibbs' torso and their legs were tangled. Slightly smiling to himself, Gibbs brought his hand towards Tony's head and softly stroked his hair. He felt good, felt like he was exactly where he was supposed to be.
While still stroking Tony's hair, Gibbs let the last couple of days pass in front of his inner eye. While the days had been stressful and overwhelming, he also realized that he did feel kind of happy, too. He was sure that Tony couldn't see it that way just yet, but he'd feel happier with people knowing, too. His days of hiding were probably over and Gibbs couldn't imagine how relieving it must have felt.
With a sinking heart he noticed another thing, though. He was doing the same thing. Hiding. He had been hiding his true feelings from Tony and even worse from himself all this time and now that he had finally come around, he couldn't help but see that he hadn't been entirely honest about all of it yet. There were still so many secrets between them that it suddenly made his heart ache. He still hadn't told him about Kelly and there was still the problem of Tony living in LA. How had he overlooked these things? How had he told Tony that they could become a thing when in reality they couldn't? Was he really that much of a bastard?
He let out a soft sigh without thinking and then winced when he felt Tony move. For a moment the younger man snuggled into him before he drew away quickly as he apparently realized what he had been doing. Despite himself, Gibbs held him close, an arm coming around the other man to keep him pressed up against him.
"Morning," Tony mumbled into his chest. "What time is it?"
"A little after nine."
"Can we stay here for a little while longer?"
"Yeah," Gibbs just answered, inhaling Tony's scent once more.
"Feels nice," Tony continued after a while. "Like nothing can ever happen here."
"Trust me, there's a lot happening in here."
Tony let out a laugh and then turned his head to look at him.
"Was that an innuendo?" he grinned. "That's the first coming from you. I'm so proud."
"You don't know me at all," Gibbs grinned back.
"Can't wait to do," Tony replied as he replaced the grin with a broad smile.
Gibbs felt his lips twitch but couldn't bring himself to smile back for some reason. Maybe he had been able to fool himself into believing that this could work, but apparently he couldn't fool Tony because he was sitting up now, fixing him with a speculative look.
"What's wrong? Was I being too forward?"
"No," Gibbs shook his head as he stared up the ceiling, wondering why he couldn't have let the guy have a normal morning after everything that had happened. "I'm… I don't know."
He could feel Tony's eyes on him, but he refused to look at him. He didn't know how he was to break it to him, especially now that Tony had maybe lost a lot by outing himself.
"I thought you wanted this," Tony said his voice barely above a whisper. "You told me you wanted this."
"I thought I did," Gibbs replied vehemently, his eyes still glued to the ceiling. "I thought I did."
"But you don't really," Tony continued, his voice having grown icy and it made Gibbs' heart heavier. "What's wrong?"
Gibbs let out a sigh, then rubbed his arm over his face before he sat up and finally looked at the younger man next to him. Tony had become pale and Gibbs hated himself for saying anything.
"I… I can't do this."
"Why?" Tony asked incredulously. "Why all of a sudden? You were fine just a few minutes ago."
"I know, I'm sorry," Gibbs broke one of his rules. "I mean, I want it. But I can't do it. There's still… you still live in LA. How can this work, Tony?"
"We'll make it work, Gibbs," Tony replied so quietly that Gibbs intuitively moved closer ever so slightly. "I know we can."
Gibbs just shook his head and it almost broke his heart seeing Tony blink rapidly as if he was holding back tears. The green eyes had gotten a bit brighter and for a split of a second, Gibbs had the fleeting urge to grab the guy and just hug the life right out of him. But he simply couldn't bring himself to do it. Wasn't it better if they ended it now instead of letting it go on just to realize that it wouldn't work when too many feeling were already involved?
When he looked at Tony, though, he realized that it was probably already too late. The younger man looked exactly like he felt – devastated.
"Listen, Tony," Gibbs finally started to explain and he hated that his voice was on the verge of breaking now. "I like you. And I like you like that, too. And that's why I can't do this. I know my timing sucks, but I only just realized. I can't do this long-distance thing. I already told you that, too. And while my… feelings have taken control over me these last couple of days, I needed to think about this. And I can't do it. And it's not just the distance thing. I mean, you just… came out and all the hiding is done now. But if we actually got together… I can't promise you that you won't have to hide. I can't just tell everybody just yet. It's too soon for me. I can't do that to you. I'm sorry."
"No, you're not," Tony spit out, slowly getting out of bed. "You're not sorry. You're a liar."
"What?" Gibbs asked, drawing back his head as he hadn't expected Tony to be so pissed about it.
"I said you're a liar and a damn bad one at that."
Tony was already dressed and ready to leave when Gibbs finally found his words, unable to string together more than one coherent thought. What had he done?
"Tony, I'm not lying. It's just how I feel."
"No, it's not," Tony shook his head, anger finally having faded from his voice, only to be replaced by chagrin. "You like me. You like me a whole lot. You're just afraid. I don't know of what exactly. But you're afraid. This doesn't have anything to do with LA or with hiding… it's something else. Something else you won't tell me about. I don't know what you could possibly tell me that would freak me out but that is what you think."
Gibbs blinked a couple of times, thinking about Kelly and how he could never tell him. He just couldn't bring himself to do it and at the same time he didn't want a relationship if he couldn't tell the other person everything. And he simply couldn't tell him. He didn't even know why but just thinking about her made him ache from deep within and he simply couldn't re-open that wound. Not again, not ever. There was nothing that would ever make it better, would ever make him miss her less and he didn't want to burden Tony with it. Not Tony of all people who had a hard enough life already as it was without Gibbs being in it. It was just better keeping certain things buried, even if it would kill him.
Tony's eyes were shining bright with unshed tears now and Gibbs hated himself, despised himself for having it let go on like that for so long. When he still hadn't said anything, Tony finally turned around and slowly walked out the bedroom.
"Tony," Gibbs whispered but Tony must have heard him anyway because he stopped walking. He didn't turn around and just waited for Gibbs to continue. "I'm sorry."
"Will you ever tell me, Jethro?" Tony asked, still not looking at him. "This thing you're so afraid of?"
Gibbs felt his insides clench and his heart beat faster at Tony's use of his first name. He'd never called him Jethro before and he suddenly realized that maybe insisting on being called Gibbs had just been his own way of keeping a safe distance between them without even realizing. He looked at Tony more closely and saw him standing there, his head bowed, his arms hanging loosely at his sides, just as if every fight had suddenly gone out inside of him.
"No," Gibbs finally said and he could see Tony somehow losing even more tension in his body.
"Okay," Tony nodded. "Okay."
With that he got moving again, leaving Gibbs sitting there in his bed, half naked, staring at the place Tony had just disappeared from and wondering if he could ever forgive himself.
#
"You okay, Gibbs?" Abby asked a long couple of hours later when Gibbs walked into her lab, nursing his, what seemed like, tenth cup of coffee of the day.
After Tony had left, he had gone down into the basement, hoping that a bit alone time with the boat and a couple of glasses of bourbon would help him forget. Of course, it hadn't helped. He could still see Tony leaving every time he closed his eyes. The only thing it had achieved was getting him to a point of almost being drunk in the middle of the afternoon when Dispatch had called. He'd taken a cab to work, not sure if he was really fit to drive and since then had tried to starve off the looming hangover with coffee after coffee.
"I'm fine, Abs," he answered, fixing his glance at the screen in front of him which was displaying the bullet that Ducky had retrieved from the corpse of their latest victim. "What have you got?"
"You don't look fine," Abby observed, not being deterred the slightest. "Did something happen?"
"No," Gibbs replied, looking at her to make a point. "Nothing happened. I'm fine."
"Everything okay with Tony?" the Goth went on and Gibbs felt regret hit him at full speed at the mere mention of his name.
"Yeah, why shouldn't he be?"
"Oh, I don't know," Abby replied sarcastically. "He just accidentally outed himself to the whole world and you seemed like you were about to have a heart attack when you watched the interview."
"I did not," Gibbs replied indignantly, fervently promising to himself that he would keep his emotions better at bay around Abby.
"Fine," Abby held up her hands. "You won't tell me. That's fine. You're still not okay, though."
"I'm fine, Abby," Gibbs said, trying to keep his voice calm and even. "I promise, okay?"
"Okay," Abby nodded, still not quite sounding convinced but she let the topic drop for the moment and began to present her findings to him.
#
Over the next days, Gibbs successfully avoided seeing Abby alone and he was subsequently able to avoid her questions. He knew that she knew that he was avoiding her but he couldn't bring himself to talk to her, not when he was barely functioning these days. He was fine at work but whenever he just thought of going home to his empty house, his stomach gave a jolt and he suddenly felt sick. He hated feeling like that. He had always dreaded going home to his wives in the late days of his marriages but he hadn't felt so anxious to walk into the house since the days when Shannon and Kelly's death had been fresh. He felt like he was missing a limb, but at the same time he knew that he could do nothing about it. It could have never worked and the aching of his heart would disappear over time.
He hadn't looked at a paper since Tony had left and he hadn't googled him either, knowing that he didn't want to know what the world thought about his outing. He had caught a few glimpses of it when he had overheard Kate and Abby gossiping about it, but they hadn't said anything specific, so Gibbs didn't know if Tony was fine.
#
It had been ten days since Tony had left him and Gibbs still hadn't managed to get back to normal. He still knew that he had done the right thing for Tony, but he wasn't quite so sure about himself. The more he thought about it, the heavier his heart got. He didn't feel alright, felt the need to drink more than he had in years and yet he was still sure that he'd done both of them a favor. Tony probably couldn't see it just yet but it was better this way: letting it end before it even got a chance to become something.
He still couldn't forget the way Tony had stood in the doorway that morning though. The way his shoulders had sagged when Gibbs had told him 'no' would probably haunt him in his dreams forever and the way his head had been bowed made Gibbs still queasy inside. Maybe it had meant more to Tony than it had to him after all.
Subtly shaking his head about how his thoughts were always straying towards Tony whenever he got more than a second to himself, Gibbs exited the elevator and went into Abby's lab, slightly surprised that not only the Goth was down there, but Kate, too. They were huddled in front of the screen, obviously watching some sort of talk show. They hadn't noticed him enter, so Gibbs was already about to plot his attack when he heard a familiar voice. Only now did Gibbs take a closer look at the TV and realized that it was Tony sitting there, talking to a blonde woman, who, according to the name of the show, had to be Ellen.
He seemed much more relaxed than the last time Gibbs had seen him and he was actually smiling at the host this time and not in a forced kind of way, either. Gibbs grimly smiled to himself. Tony was apparently already over it. Good.
His attention was stolen by the host as she leaned in, faking a conspiracy, as she stage whispered.
"So how were the days since you outed yourself?"
Tony grinned at her and then sat back, running a hand through his hair and only now did Gibbs notice that he wasn't as relaxed as he seemed. His shoulders seemed tense.
"Well, most of the people were really great about it," Tony answered, smiling again. "The press was very forgiving with me for once, too. I mean there were a couple of people who wanted me to pray and to stop sinning but those were few and in between."
"There always are," Ellen replied, nodding sagely. "They won't go away either, but you'll see that the supportive ones are the important ones."
"I hope so," Tony said and then smiled again and Gibbs was sure that it was a real one this time.
"So, what led to your decision to out yourself?"
"I didn't exactly plan it," Tony laughed self-deprecatingly. "The host asked a couple of very good questions I wasn't entirely prepared for. I haven't regretted it, but I can't say it was planned. Not all of us have a sitcom to speak for them."
Gibbs guessed that it was a reference to something he just didn't know about. The host did know, however, because she smiled at him broadly and it was in that moment that Gibbs decided to like her.
"It sometimes happens that way," she said, grinning. "So, there is no one in your life right now to have triggered enforcing your coming out?"
For a moment Tony's expression clouded and Gibbs felt his stomach constrict as the camera zoomed in closer to his face and he was able to see the beautiful green eyes. They, however, looked haunted. When Tony finally answered, his voice was calm and controlled, but Gibbs could tell that he wasn't quite as relaxed as it seemed.
"I thought that maybe there was someone," he answered truthfully. "But that was just wishful thinking. So, no, there's nobody at the moment."
Gibbs blinked and he suddenly felt tears well up inside of him and he had no idea why that was. He hadn't cried in ages, had long accepted that he would be fine without Tony. Why was this simple statement tugging at him like that?
He didn't hear the host's answer, didn't hear anything besides his own heartbeat in his ears. It was like someone had turned his surroundings to mute. Something wasn't right. All he could think about was to get out of there and hide away in his basement. But when he was finally able to move again, he was faced with Abby and Kate standing right in front of him, both wearing a worried expression on their faces. It was as if they had hurried to his side to catch him, as if he looked like he was about to faint. But maybe he was, he realized. He felt light-headed, felt like he wasn't really there anymore.
"Gibbs?" he heard Abby ask as if from far away while in reality she stood right in front of him. "Gibbs?"
"I'm fine," he answered, his voice sounding surer than he felt. "I'll uh… just go now."
With that he finally managed to turn around and nearly fled the lab, not caring what Kate or Abby thought about him. He could have sworn though that just before the doors of the elevators closed, he had heard Abby whisper.
"What have you done, Gibbs?"