Chapter 7
As Gibbs watched Tony’s chest rise and fall with the hiss of the ventilator, he decided to do something he hadn’t done since he’d lost his family. After experiencing that terrible loss, he’d lost his faith in any kind of deity. Seeing Shannon and Kelly again when he’d drowned had restored his faith, though. To him that was proof there was some kind of life after death, so he decided to pray to God and beg for a miracle. He refused to think seeing them had been nothing but a hallucination caused by oxygen deprivation.
He held Tony’s hand and spoke aloud, because he thought it would mean more that way. Usually, he was a man of few words and he hoped it was enough. “I know I’ve been a bastard for a lot of years and I probably don’t deserve anything from You, but if You ever give me anything, please give me this. Please make Tony well and whole again.”
Gibbs didn’t know what else to say, so he leaned over the bed and laid his head on Tony’s chest and fell into an exhausted asleep.
He woke up an hour or so later and there didn’t seem to be any change in Tony’s condition. Then he did something else he hadn’t done in a very long time; he cried.
Once his tears had dried up, Gibbs decided to try one last thing. “Shannon, do you have any pull up there? I know what I felt when I saw you was real; that you want me to quit marrying clones of you and find something real. Well, I found that with Tony. You know that losing you and Kelly damn near broke me. Tony has his whole life ahead of him. I couldn’t take it if I lost him, too. Please, can’t you do something?”
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Tony woke up slowly. The first thing he was aware of was sound. He could hear a rhythmic hiss and beeping. He was very confused. The last thing he remembered was gasping for air in the bedroom of his apartment. Then he was aware of a weight on his chest. He opened his eyes and saw that he was in a hospital room and Gibbs was sitting in a chair next to his bed sleeping with his head resting on the left side of Tony’s chest with one arm thrown over his waist.
He wondered why Gibbs was would be in the room, but then he thought back to what had happened before he’d collapsed in his bedroom and he recalled pulling Maddie and Gibbs from the water and giving them both mouth-to-mouth. Then he remembered the kiss.
He realized the hissing sound was a ventilator, which was forcing air into his lungs every five seconds or so, and the beeping was a heart monitor. He must have been pretty sick, because he hadn’t been hooked up to a ventilator even when he had the plague. Surprisingly, the tube down his throat wasn’t bothering him too much.
He took a good look at Gibbs. The older man looked exhausted. Tony didn’t know how long he’d been in the hospital, but Gibbs had dark circles under his eyes, and even in sleep he had lines of stress on his face. Tony thought about waking Gibbs, but he decided against it. He began to stroke Gibbs’ hair and contentedly waited for him to wake on his own.
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Gibbs awoke to the feeling of his hair being stroked. He didn’t even remember falling asleep. The last thing he remembered was begging Shannon to help Tony get well. Maybe it had been a dream.
He opened his eyes and looked up to the most beautiful site he’d seen in a long time. Tony was awake and watching him with his brilliant green eyes, and all thoughts that the conversation he’d had with Shannon being a dream were gone. There was life and intelligence in those beautiful eyes, and Gibbs knew in his gut that Tony was going to be fine. He stood up and cupped Tony’s face in his hands. He leaned down and kissed him on the cheek. Then he said frantically, “Thank God, Tony, you’re awake. How are you feeling? Why didn’t you wake me? Should I get the doctor? I think I should call the doctor.”
Tony rolled his eyes at Gibbs’ rapid fire questions; as if he could answer any of them with a tube down his throat.
Gibbs pushed the nurse call button. A nurse appeared at the door and Gibbs shouted at him, “Get the doctor! He’s awake!”
The nurse left, presumably to get the doctor, and Gibbs leaned over and gave Tony a hug, being careful of the breathing tube and IV.
Tony heard him whisper, “Thank you, Shannon.”
Gibbs pulled back and saw the puzzled look on Tony’s face. “I’ll tell you about it later.”
The younger man looked a little apprehensive at that and Gibbs assured him, “Don’t worry. It’s nothing bad.”
The doctor and a couple of nurses came into the room and began to examine Tony and Gibbs had to step back to give them room to work.
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A couple of hours after Tony woke up, Gibbs was speaking with Jenny on the phone at the nurses’ station, as he’d been kicked out of Tony’s ICU room while the doctor performed yet another test. “Yeah, he woke up a couple of hours ago… They took the tube out of his throat and he’s breathing fine… According to the doctor, he’s doin’ great… That’s right, no lasting effects, no brain damage… Yeah, it does sound like a miracle… The doctor doesn’t believe it either… Yeah, you can go ahead and tell the others… He’ll probably be released in another day or two… They just want to make sure… No, I don’t want ‘em to come here… Okay, we’ll see you tonight.” He hung up the phone in his usual abrupt manner and went to stand outside the door to Tony’s room to impatiently wait until he could get back in there where he belonged.
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The doctor and nurses finally left the ICU room and Gibbs was finally alone with Tony. He sat in his customary seat next to the bed and picked up Tony’s hand.
Tony found it hard to believe what the doctor had told him; that he’d been so close to death. When he found out the five-day limit had been almost up and no one had any hope that he’d wake up before then, he wondered how he’d gotten better all of sudden. The doctor could understand the pneumonia clearing up as they’d had him on IV antibiotics while he’d been comatose; what he couldn’t understand was the lack of brain damage.
After listening to Gibbs, the doctor and the nurses about what had occurred over the past five days, Tony didn’t really understand the lack of brain damage either; he was just damn grateful that he didn’t have any.
Tony picked up the cup of water from his bedside table and took a sip. Then he cleared his throat. It was still a little sore from the breathing tube. “So, Jethro, here we are, alone at last. You wanna have that talk now?”
Gibbs had been so worried over the last several days and now that Tony was awake, he was happier than he’d been in a long time, so he decided to play with him a little bit. He suppressed a smile. “Talk about what?”
“Hey, I’m the one who was supposed to have brain damage, not you. Remember the kiss when we were on the dock?”
“Oh, that. What’s to talk about?”
“Gibbs!”
“Tony, I don’t think we need to talk about it because as far as I’m concerned, we’re together and we just haven’t… consummated our relationship yet.”
“Just like that? One kiss and we’re practically married?”
Gibbs stood and gave Tony a quick kiss on the lips. “Make that two kisses. And why not? I love you and you love me. No need to make it more complicated than that.”
“You love me?”
Gibbs decided it was time to be serious. He looked Tony directly in the eyes and said, “Yeah, I do, and I have for a long time.”
“Why didn’t you ever say anything?”
“You know my track record, Tony. Our friendship was too important to me to risk losing it when it all went sour.”
“What’s so different now? What made you change your mind?”
“Something happened when I died that made me think it was worth the risk; that I had a chance for happiness that had been right in front of me for a long time, and I decided to take it.”
“Did you have one of those near death experiences like they talk about on all those paranormal shows? Did you see a bright light and all that?”
“It wasn’t like that, Tony. It was… different.”
“Well, can you tell me what did happen?”
Gibbs shifted uncomfortably. “Can we talk about that after you’re discharged? It was an intense experience and I don’t wanna get into it here where we can be interrupted.”
“Sure,” Tony said agreeably. If Gibbs said he’d tell him later, then he would. “What was that you said when you first woke up?”
“That’s connected to what I want to talk about later.”
“Okay. By the way, how do you know that I love you? You seem awfully sure of yourself.”
“Well, quite a while ago, I came into the office fairly late to check on a lead. You were on the phone with someone named… Alex, I think it was, and I overheard you. And given the fact that you never left NCIS, no matter how bad a bastard I was, I don’t think your feelings have changed since then.”
Tony remembered that conversation well. It had been the only time he’d called Alex from work. It had taken place after he’d been drugged and kidnapped by that psychotic waitress. Gibbs had cracked a tasteless joke when they’d come back to the office, and Tony had been a bit upset about it. A few days later, he’d called his former lover because he’d needed to talk to someone. They had remained friends after they parted ways, and Tony could talk to him about anything.
“Geez, Gibbs, that was like five years ago.”
“Yep.”
“You mean all this time-”
“No, Tony. If you’d have said anything to me back then, I probably would’ve decked you.”
“Yeah, you probably would have,” Tony said ruefully. “You were a real bastard back then.”
“Still am. Think you can handle it?”
“I’ve been handling you for years. What do you think?”
TBC
Chapter End Notes:
A/N: A little warning for supernatural in this chapter, if you don’t believe in miracles.
A/N 2: I’m leaving on a train trip early tomorrow, and I won’t be able to post on Tuesday, as the trip will last 30 hours. Therefore, I will post chapter 8 tonight. After that, I won’t be able to post chapter 9 until Wednesday afternoon. Thanks again for all the reviews, alerts and emails. They mean a lot to me.
A/N 2: I’m leaving on a train trip early tomorrow, and I won’t be able to post on Tuesday, as the trip will last 30 hours. Therefore, I will post chapter 8 tonight. After that, I won’t be able to post chapter 9 until Wednesday afternoon. Thanks again for all the reviews, alerts and emails. They mean a lot to me.