[] I know, incredibly long time since an update. But it is now here. With a very depressed Tony and an ending that ... well you shall see.

Copper. Element number … something another on the table thing. The two letter abbreviation was something he'd had to know in high school and maybe college. He wasn't sure. And he was even less sure about what the two letter abbreviation was which kind of sucked because he was pretty sure that 'what is the two letter abbreviation for copper' would be a great trivia question. Not that he knew of anytime that he would be participating in a trivia contest anytime soon. But still. It was the principle of the thing. And the fact that for some reason he was thinking about copper while he was sitting at a bar getting as piss-ass drunk as he possibly could, might have been funny at some point, but it sure as hell wasn't tonight.

Not that he'd think much was funny tonight. Everything just kind of sucked currently. The beer going down his throat, and it didn't burn any longer which was kind of disappointing because feeling the burn sounded like a good idea, the bartender that had taken his keys and was now refusing to give them back, the fact that he didn't even feel like flirting with the hot chick, he wasn't even really sure he thought she was hot anymore, he would have thought she was hot at some point in the past though, it all sucked. Sucky, sucking, suckage. And why was he thinking about copper again? Oh. The blood. Blood tasted like copper. Or that's what everyone always said, he'd never actually tasted copper and couldn't really compare the two.

He was bleeding. His finger was dripping little droppy, drippy, dropping, dribbling drops onto the table. And he couldn't really remember how he'd actually hurt it. A bottle he'd broken maybe? Yah that seemed right. He'd toppled one of his empty bottles at some point and shards and glittery stuff that had made the lights look all fragmented and funny. Sparkly. Lots of sparkles. He had a napkin somewhere, but he couldn't really feel the blood and he liked looking at it. Red against the scared wood. Red against his white shirt. Red against the skin of his hands and the white of his nails. Red like the sweater she'd worn today. Red like her lips and tongue and nope. Not getting on that train of thought. Going on that train. Getting off. Going down. He couldn't remember what the real phrase was. Huh. Maybe he was a little bit drunk. Maybe that was why the bartending guy had taken his keys and wouldn't give them back.

Didn't matter. He didn't want to go home. Tony jerked his arm sideways when someone touched him. It took him a long time to look away from the blood drops and up at whoever was trying to get his attention. Blond. Boobs. Butt. Busty. Blond. Beautiful. No that B word didn't fit. This chick wasn't beautiful. She was hot, sure. But he was starting to like more than hot. God he was getting old when he started realizing there was a difference between beautiful and hot. And he was getting even older when he realized that he knew that he was realizing that. When exactly had that happened again? Oh yeah. Ziva. Desert. Sleeping. Hiding. Screaming. Nightmares. Paris. Pianos. But before that too. Phone sex. Knives. Guns. Partners. Undercover. Swimsuits. Ships. Cocktail dresses. Maybe just Ziva was enough of an explanation.

She'd once said something about girls and men and him after all. Something that his mind didn't quite want to remember and why was he thinking about this anyways? The blond. Right. Blond. He met her eyes and she smiled. He coughed. Bad smile.

"You drinking alone?"

"Yep," no use wasting words on blonds.

"Someone must have canceled on you. You don't look like the kind of guy that usually drinks alone." The line was delivered with a look he would have once found incredibly interesting. It just made him shift in his seat tonight. Or this morning. The time wasn't something he had been paying any attention to.

"No date."

"Really? How many women did you make cry to arrange that?" A wink from her sparkly pink eyelid.

"None." She leaned in and pressed her breasts against his shoulder. He moved farther backwards.

"Can I buy you a drink then? Us singles have to stick together."

"Not tonight."

"Is that a proposition for another night?" It took him way too long to figure out what proposition meant. He shook his head as his brain worked at it.

"Too subtle," he mumbled to himself. "I meant not tonight or any other night. As in not interested." The blond yanked herself and her cleavage back as though she had been burned.

"Fine." It took her ten seconds to stomp across the room and find another target. Jeeze. Way to get rid of a really nice prospect for a one night stand Dinozzo. Could the chick have been anymore obvious? She would have been great, a good pity fuck and done. He wouldn't have had to remember her name. Hell, she probably wouldn't have even cared if he mumbled someone else's name while he was inside her with his eyes closed imagining someone else's face altogether. No awkward morning after. No flowers. No jewelry. No nice dinners. No dates. No time or talking. And at one point that would have been great. Ideal. Just exactly what he wanted. But damn it not anymore. He wanted to spend the time. That was terrifying. And so stupid because he didn't do that. Except apparently he did now.

He dropped his head into his hands and missed the first two times he tried. When his forehead finally did hit his palms he jerked it right back up because closing his eyes made everything spin and tilt and do all sorts of funny things with gravity. Eyes open. Good plan. The clock on the wall said twelve. He'd been here for close to three hours. Drank god-knew how many beers after the really great shots he'd started out with, and still hadn't quite worked out the whole damn reason he was drinking alone on a Friday night. Who would have thought he'd have girl problems. No he didn't have girl problems because he didn't actually have the girl. He just had problems in general. Lots of problems that he really didn't know how to figure out.

His phone vibrated in his pocket and he nearly fell off the stool. It took some tugging to get himself sitting in the chair right. He dropped his phone on the counter twice before he got it open and the right way up so that he was talking into the right end.

"'Ello?" Silence. Tick tock, clock is moving. More blood from his finger, he wiped it on his jeans this time and stared at the smear as though it really was super interesting. Maybe it was. He wasn't really sure. More silence. He needed to get Abby to trace the hang ups and make them stop. Or McGee. He wasn't sure who did that sort of stuff at this hour and with this much bubbly stuff floating around inside of him. He felt liquidy. All liquidy. Funny word. Wasn't a word, but still, funny word.

"Are you drunk?" Oh God. No freaking way. Did he really deserve this? He hadn't figured all this out yet. He didn't need to- "Tony?" Apparently he was going to.

"No."

"No what?" Ziva sounded only a little bit ticked and a tiny part of his brain was trying to figure out what she was doing up so late.

"Not drunk."

"You are." And that definitely sounded accusatory.

"Nuh-uh." The bartender raised his eyebrows when he walked past and saw the blood on the counter. Tony raised his hand and the guy just shook his head. Well yeah. He was the one bleeding. He wasn't going to start any bar fights with his bad back, his sore knee and Gibbs the person listed as his emergency contact. Old. Old. Old.

"Yes."

"Nope."

"Ye- Tony. I am not going to argue with you." He couldn't care less currently.

"Right." More silence. He thought about copper and blood again and sucked on his finger just to see. It really did taste funky. Sweet and sour. Sour patch kids. Chicken at that Chinese place Ziva really liked.

"Where are you?" Change the line of questioning. It took his brain way too long to catch up to the new concepts. Except they weren't concepts at all. He sniffed and rubbed his hand across his nose. Running. Probably from the whole crying bit. The tequila had been really strong. That was why there had been tears. Least that's what he was telling everyone.

"Bar."

"Yes Tony. Which one." Demanding tone. He needed to just answer. 'Cept he didn't really remember which bar it was.

"Uh- I'm at-"

"Donovan's." The bartender muttered and Tony blew him a kiss that got an eyeroll.

"Thanks. Donovan's."

"For what?"

"Huh?"

"What are you thanking me for?"

"Not you. Bartender. Bart. Bart the Bartender. Like Big Bird with an 'A' instead of an 'E'."

"What?"

"Kids show. Sesame Street. Cookie Monster. Grouch in his trashcan. Ernie and someone another. And Big Bird. Or not Big Bird. Was Big Bird named Burt? Or was that the other guy with Ernie? And was it an 'E'? Maybe an 'U' now that I think 'bout it. Yeah, U. Buuurt. Bart. Beert. U. Burt. Sounds right."

"Tony."

"Mmm."

"Tony."

"Isn't here right now. Leave a message at the beep. Beeep."

"Tony."

"What the hell do you want Ziva?" Long pause. Way longer than the last pauses. And oh so terrifically awkward and charged and he didn't know if electricity could pass through the telephone lines or not but he was definitely feeling her eyes boring into him. And more pausing, more silence. No words. He hiccupped and heard her sigh.

"I am coming to get you."

"No. Don't. I don't want-" But she'd already hung up and all he was listening to was crackly silence now. Great. Just who he wanted to see. Ziva. Actually he did want to see her. He really wanted to see her. Really, really wanted to see her but more importantly wanted her to want to see him. Wanted her to need to see him. Back to the whole damn reason he was so drunk. Need. Want. He wasn't used to using those words or thinking about those words or saying them or wanting to say them or anything even associated with those words.

Okay want might have been used once or twice. But not in the context he was using it now. No, definitely not in the way he was thinking about it now. He had wanted sex with the blond. Now he just wanted Ziva to want him around. God he was getting mushy and had about five seconds to figure out what to do about the whole Ziva-issue before Ziva herself got here. Maybe three with the way she drove. Two and a half cause it took him a really really long time to blink right now. Options. Options. Think Dinozzo. He had driven. So. Keys. Not in his pocket. No because they were with the bartender. Was his name Bart? Actually he had no idea.

"Hey," Bart the Bartender turned to look at him. "Hey could you hand me my keys?" He did his best impression of sober, a really hard one to pull off at the moment and the guy walked away from the red head he had been chatting up and over to him.

"You kidding me man? No way in hell. You need to get someone to come pick your drunk ass up."

"Yah, she's on her way."

"Sound happier. She that'll come get you when you're drunk sounds like a good thing." Tony didn't comment on that. Plan A was apparently out. Plan B consisted of hiding in the men's bathroom and he knew from experience that she didn't mind coming into men's bathrooms. Plan C was the women's bathroom and that didn't even sound smart in his head. Plan D was … well a taxi he supposed but she would freaking kill him if he did that and didn't tell her about it and if he told her about it he'd have to call her and talk to her and he definitely did not want to do that. Wait. Maybe he did. He did want to talk to her. He really did. He liked talking to her.

God this was confusing. Ziva. Ziva. Ziva. Ziva.

"Ziva."

"This is not your usual hangup Tony." Red sweater. His brain stopped right there. Red sweater and tight jeans and boots and her hair down and curly and she looked so good he wanted to just curl up and whimper. What? Whimper? What the hell was wrong with him, he was mad at her. Wasn't he? He didn't have a clue really. Not a clue. Oh well.

"Tony," she sharply said and he snapped his head up. He hadn't even realized he'd been elevator eyeing her. But could she really blame him? She slipped her jacket off and slid onto the stool beside him. The jacket got folded in her lap and her hands went to the beer he'd been working at, on, for, something. She took a sip and handed it back, nose wrinkling. Kinda cute.

"This is disgusting."

"Can't taste it," he mumbled and pressed the bottle to his lips. Some part of him recognized that her lips had been there just a few seconds ago, but he brushed that aside because he didn't need to be thinking about Ziva's lips while he was drunk.

"Then you have definitely had enough." The bottle was taken away and replaced with a glass of water. If he wasn't concentrating so hard on the fact that he could almost see down her sweater if he sat up really, really tall he might have found the magic trick kind of cool.

"Stop staring Tony. You will not see anything."

"But it's definitely worth dying over. I don't know if I ever told you that. But definitely. Definitely. Definitely." He saw her sigh and almost wished he could take the words back, but then she sat up taller and gestured to his water glass.

"Drink. I will take you home."

"Don't want to go home."

"Have you paid your tab?" He ignored her but sipped the water just the same because it was making his head feel just a little bit better. And his head actually hurt now that he thought about it.

"He's good. Want his keys?" Bart the Bartender had betrayed him and suddenly Ziva was leaning forwards and smiling and he was having to tamp down the urge to smack the damn guy. Forget keeping him totally filled up on alcohol all night, the man was now only a couple feet from touching his Ziva. And she wasn't even his. But he so wanted her to be.

"I'd love them." She waited until the guy handed over the keys before she leaned back, turned off the seduction eyes and turned right back to him. And that made him feel so much better about his status in life that he downed the rest of the water and pushed off the barstool.

"Ready." The look she gave him was either exasperated or endearing, he couldn't figure out which. When she led him to his car and opened the passenger door on his car for him, and then buckled the seatbelt in his car for him he turned his head sideways.

"How'd you get here?"

"I took a cab."

"At this hour?" Her eyebrows went really really high up. So high he started wondering if eyebrows could push up his convertible top. Maybe not so much. Though it was Ziva. He wasn't sure there was anything Ziva couldn't do.

"You honestly think I couldn't handle a cab driver? Tony they are tragically obese."

"Morbidly," he corrected automatically even though it was kind of funny. She frowned and started his car. "Go easy on it."

"But it is tragic that they are so fat. And I promise to ride … it easy." He closed his eyes and let his head loll back. She chuckled at her own joke even as he focused on inhaling and exhaling properly because for some reason when she made jokes like that he had a hard time doing anything other than staring, gaping, gasping, and undressing her with his eyes. Lots of the undressing with the eyes. Lots and lots and the red sweater and the jeans and the boots and the hair and he really wanted to press his lips into her neck all of a sudden. The car swerved and he hit the doorframe. Effectively cutting off the image of her skin beneath his lips and his hands in her hair.

"Watch it there."

"Sorry."

"You're apologizing for your driving?" She gave him a small smile.

"I do not want you losing your cookies in your car." And that was 0 out of 3 on the Americanisms for the night.

"Did you get your piano in?"

"Of course." The rest of the car ride was in silence as he thought about why exactly he'd brought up the whole piano thing. Really Dinozzo? So smart, bring up the one topic that made him sore, had gotten him into this whole mess and was the reason he had gotten himself so terrifically drunk. He needed … sleep. Sleep, lots of sleep would be good.

"Let's go Tony." Ziva half drug him up to his apartment, and eventually even allowed him to drape his arm around her shoulders on the pretense of drunkenly staggering down the hall. Or maybe he really was drunkenly staggering down the hall and the pretense was that he was pretending to drunkenly stagger so that he could drape his arm around her shoulders and oh now she was reaching to wrap her arm around his waste so that she could help hold him up and maybe that was a pretense too and he was now so confused on what was and was not pretense and what was and was not real that he was just really really lost.

She deposited him on his couch and took off down his hall and he thought nothing of it. His head was killing him now though, and the room was spinning lots. Tony toed his shoes off and watched them roll underneath the coffee table. Spinning. Spinning. Lots of spinning.

"Lean back." The command was accompanied by a shove to his shoulder that made him lean back whether he wanted to or not. Then something cold started touching his face along with something hot and it took him a good ten seconds to figure out that hot was her hand and cold was a washcloth.

"What're you doing?"

"You have blood on your face."

"Oh."

"Should I be worried?" Her thumb brushed across his cheekbone and he sighed happily. Nope. No worrying. Totally happy.

"Just my hand. Cut it. On a beer bottle."

"You should be more careful." There was something wrong with that and if she'd just quit touching his face he might be able to figure out what it was. Breath. Concentrate on how bad his head hurts. Not on how good her fingers feel on his face.

"Why do you care?" Her hands moved from his face as though she had been burned or found out that his face was radioactive or something.

"I do not want to lose you Tony." He blinked and turned to stare at her. She was looking at him, a frown above her brow, her whole face confused. Even her posture. He swallowed and closed his eyes again.

"Tony, what is wrong?"

"Nothing."

"You do not get drunk because of nothing." He grunted and she moved. To his coffee table. And sat on top of his TV Guide with her legs crossed. That did nothing for his concentration whatsoever.

"I just kind of got used to you … you know having me around."

"What?"

"God Ziva. I mean we're all movie nights and sleeping in the same bed and calling each other and talking and then all of a sudden you don't need me anymore. And I really liked being needed by you. I got used to you wanting me around. And it hurts like hell that you don't anymore. So yah, I needed a drink. Lots of drinks. Because I don't have a clue how to-" He pressed his fingers to his temples and groaned. "I didn't mean to tell you that. Any of it."

Ziva turned her head sideways and propped her chin up on her palm.

"Perhaps … perhaps I am not used to wanting someone around." He blinked. Slowly, because that was the only speed he was moving at currently and she was still sitting there staring at him.

"What?"

"Since you will most likely not remember this in the morning-"

"-I will too."

"As I said Tony. I am not … it is odd … I do not usually want people around." And those words definitely sounded like they were being forced from her mouth by some ancient Mossad torture technique that he didn't even want to think about.

"And you think I'm used to wanting people to want me around?" She chuckled and he couldn't help but grin.

"No. No I suppose not. You should go to bed."

"It isn't that late." Ziva shifted forwards and he half thought she was going to touch him, but then she drew back and crossed her arms and he tried not to feel disappointed. Because that really was silly.

"You will feel even more terrible in the morning if you do not sleep."

"Do I at least get a goodnight kiss?" Tony said it in jest, with his elbows on his knees and his eyes half closed because he was actually really tired, but when she half gasped and jerked just a little too abruptly he choked on his own saliva. Good God, she was actually considering it. And before he'd gotten that through his brain she was pushing off his coffee table and coming to stand in front of him.

And then she was leaning over him just a little bit and looking at him with something that looked a lot like true fondness.

"I didn-" Her lips were on his in his next breath, effectively stopping any words he might have wanted to say. Soft. Warm. And then she pulled back. It had been no more than a brush, not even a real kiss, a kiss he'd give a sister or an elderly aunt but he was pretty sure the earth had shifted. Fallen apart. Something catastrophic had definitely happened. His fingers went to his lips on their own and like an idiot he sat there touching his lips trying to make sure she'd actually kissed him. By the time he realized what he was doing and jerked his hand down it was too late and she was already smiling just a little bit. Idiot. Idiot. Like a kid in high school. Puberty and college and idiot.

"Goodnight Tony," Ziva whispered, still close to his face. She gave him a hard pat, or a soft slap he'd never really been able to figure out which, to his cheek and then left, firmly closing the door on her way out. He blinked. She'd kissed him. If he could count it as that. And it certainly hadn't been anything like the kisses when they'd been undercover, or selling a cover, or covering, or anything having to do with covers at all.

An actual Ziva-kiss. So much better than any of those other kisses. Bed. She'd said to go to bed. He'd do that. Yep. Bed sounded good. In the morning he'd call her. And ask her if he could listen to her play her piano. Though why he felt better about the need, want mess tonight wasn't something he wanted to dwell on for too long. Probably the alcohol. It was always the alcohol. But a Ziva-kiss. God a Ziva-kiss. He peeled his shirt off and fell into bed with his pants still on. He'd wake up in the morning and go for coffee. Only to find a sticky note on the top telling him that 'Coffee tastes horrible the second time, water will help your headache much more. If that isn't enough motive … I have planted a bomb in your coffee. Open the lid and it goes off. Water Tony. Water.' He grinned even as he ran to the toilet to lose his cookies.