Prompt: Deeks gives Kensi her knife back.
It was one o'clock in the morning when Deeks walked back into the Mission. A nagging feeling in the back of his mind kept him from falling asleep. That same nagging forced him to get out of bed and made him drive to his empty workplace in his pajamas. He never needed to know what was in the damned box Kensi had given him before now; now, he needed to know how she felt before they gave in to their desires, before she was ripped away from him, and before she had to face her painful past in the desert.
Whatever feelings she had were disrupted by the events of the last 5 months. They had finally sat down and talked, really talked, about their 'thing', but their status was still undecided. They acknowledged that feelings were there; but when all was said and done, feelings were all that there still was between them. Deeks was sure the lingering stares in their direction from Hetty and Granger all day hadn't helped the situation. One wrong move again, and who knew where Kensi might get shipped off to next time.
Deeks shuffled past his desk, flip flops dragging across the old floor loudly. He snatched the box down off the shelf, placed it on his desk, pulled Kensi's knife out of his pocket, and…hesitated. Again. The contents of this box could either give him hope or crush his spirit. Before now, he was okay with the mystery. But now, he needed to know for himself whether or not their thing was worth all the trouble it had caused in the past, and would certainly cause again in the future.
Exhaling rapidly with three loud puffs, Deeks cut through the tape and opened the box to find…bubble wrap. "The hell?" The box was filled to the brim with sheets of bubble wrap. He started yanking it out and throwing it on the floor in disgust. "Oh you have got to be freaking kidding me!" Thankfully there was no one around to hear or see his full body spasm as he destroyed the contents of the box that had been taunting him for a year. He would be sure to apologize to whoever reviewed the security footage for his outburst in the morning.
At least this settled his inner turmoil. The box, and probably their pseudo-relationship, was nothing but a joke to her. And like any of Kensi's other jokes, he didn't find it funny. He pulled the last sheet of bubble wrap from the box and threw it on the ground, stomping on it. The loud pop rattled his ears for a second. He shook his head instinctively to clear his ears, and a piece of paper on the floor caught his eye. Still angry, he grunted and bent down to pick up the paper, discovering it was actually a hand-written note.
In Kensi's handwriting, it said, "The box is what you make it. Tell me what you want, and it's yours. K."
Deeks stared at the paper, dumbfounded. "I'll be damned," he muttered to himself, breathing a sigh of relief. The box wasn't a total joke after all; and maybe their relationship wasn't either. He proceeded to pick up all the bubble wrap and place it back into the box, folding the top tabs in on themselves to close it up again so he could return it to it's usual spot on the shelf.
He knew what he wanted, and unlike when she wrote that note, she knew what he wanted too. The only evidence that remained of his rage against the box was Kensi's knife still sitting on his desk. He hadn't offered to return it to her yet, and she hasn't asked for it either. But he was ready to give it back now; it was a reminder of his time without her, of a time when they didn't know where they stood with each other.
Deeks grabbed a pen and a rubber band from his desk drawer and turned her note over. He bit down on his bottom lip, choosing his words carefully. Speaking aloud as he wrote, he scrolled on the paper: "I want you. When you're ready to give, I'll be ready to receive." Rolling the paper around her knife, he wrapped the rubber band around it and set it on her desk. There were no more mysteries or secrets between them anymore; and he still had hope for the future.