Chapter 251: Baseball
“Jethro?” Not that Tim isn’t pleased to see Gibbs in his
living room, but it’s 2:00 on a Wednesday.
“Closed the case. Now it’s a paperwork day. Tony’s got it.”
Tim nods at that, thinking that by Tony’s got it, Gibbs
means that Draga and Ziva are filling out massive reams of paper, and Tony’s
making sure they’ve got a steady stream of wisecracks and coffee to go with it.
“You mean Tony’s keeping them in coffee while Ziva and Draga
fill out the forms?”
“Draga doesn’t drink coffee.”
Tim’s eyes go wide. “That’s not gonna last long.”
“He’s got these little silver cans… Goes through like ten of
them a day.”
“You mean Red Bull?” Tim’s looking horrified at that.
“Something like that.”
Tim whistles softly. “He might like Caf-Pow then.”
Gibbs nods, filing that away for possible later use, then he
asked, “So, did you mean it when you said you liked baseball?”
“Yeah.” Tim nods, trying to remember when he’d said he liked
baseball, but he does, so… Oh, yeah, that maniac with the bomb and Ziva going
undercover as Ziva.
“Not just spinning a line to keep Tony off your back?”
“I like baseball.”
“Good. Which team?”
“Whoever’s on. Never hooked into a particular team.”
Gibbs grinned. “Even better. Would have hated to hear you’re
a Yankees fan.”
Tim’s still feeling like this is a pretty surreal
conversation. He was sitting on the sofa, checking his email while Kelly hung
out in his lap, (Abby’s getting a nap) and then Gibbs wandered in, snagged
Kelly out of his lap, and now it’s the middle of a work day and Gibbs is asking
him about baseball while cuddling his daughter. “Why?”
“Pirates are playing the Mets. It’s on in ten. You, me,
baseball, sleepy little girl, sound like a plan?”
“Uh… Sure… let me see what I can do.”
“Do? You turn the TV on. Should be on ESPN.”
“We don’t have cable.”
“Huh?” Gibbs looks stupefied at that. Even he has cable. (Mainly so he can see ZNN
and ESPN.)
“Got rid of it when we moved to the place before this one.
Just wasn’t worth it. Watch everything on streaming.”
“How does that work?”
For a second Tim’s tempted to explain how it actually works,
but he realizes Gibbs isn’t asking him to explain streaming video but is asking
how it’s working out. “Just fine, everything we want to see is on streaming,
and it costs a whole lot less. It’s great, as long as you don’t want to see
live sports.”
Gibbs is squinting at him. “How can you like baseball and
not watch it?”
“I like playing it. I mean, I’m not good at it or anything,
not like Tony, but I liked to play.”
“Oh.”
Gibbs nodded, he remembered that. Once the boys got over the
shock that Ziva did know baseball, and that she had played as a kid, they
grabbed gloves and joined in. Tim first, he found one, called out to Ziva, and
she fired the ball off to him, and he sent it back to Gibbs, little wide, but
not horrible. A minute after that, Tony hopped in, perfect form, very accurate
aim, and they got to hear some of his stories about how he played in high
school and college before he got his knee ripped out.
“You gonna be a little league coach?”
Tim smirked at that, then headed to his computer to see what
he could do. Maybe ESPN offered daily passes or something…
“I think it’s softball when girls play.”
“Softball coach then.”
“Maybe. Let’s get her up and walking and talking before
planning out her sports career.”
Gibbs stares at Tim for a second, and suddenly realizes that
in addition to a glorious Navy career his dad probably did have a sports plan
set for him from the day he was born, and he probably took a lot of crap for
not being good at sports.
And it occurs to Gibbs that Tim probably wasn’t terrible at
baseball. He was probably okay at it, especially if he worked hard enough at it
to get on a team, but he was probably second string, dependable but not
fabulous, and that wouldn’t have been good enough for The Admiral.
“You play in high school?”
“Nah.” He doesn’t look up from the computer as he answers. “Little
league. Did that for a few years, then we moved again, and I never picked it
back up. Didn’t exactly have a baseball build as a kid. Football for one year
of junior high, then we moved again, and I couldn’t make the new team. Wrestled
for a year in high school, but didn’t like what I and the rest of the team
needed to do to make weight. Not healthy, at all. Moved one last time sophomore
year, and was on the intermural football team as a Junior and Senior.” He fiddled with his computer a little more.
Okay, so… this wasn’t going to be technically legal, but… one game… They do
this more often; he can get cable. “Got it. So, are we rooting for the Pirates
or the Mets?”
“The Mets?” The look on Gibbs’
face is saying are you really asking me
this? “Bite your tongue, Tim. Pirates.”
Okay, that makes a certain level of sense. Stillwater was
about an hour and a half north of Pittsburgh, so… yeah, he can see that.
“You play as a kid?” He asks Gibbs as he connects the TV to
his computer so they can see the game on the big screen.
“Born in ’59. We all played. And watched. And listened to
games on the radio. And once, twice a year, LJ, my Dad, and I would head down
to Pittsburgh to watch a game. You ever been to Pittsburgh?”
 |
| Pittsburgh Skyline |
“Just as a layover, or break points the few times I was up
in Stillwater.”
“It was a steel town, then, pretty grungy, but… You go in for a night game, and Three Rivers
Stadium’s down on the point…”
He sees that Tim doesn’t know enough about Pittsburgh to get
what that means.
“Three rivers come together, shaped like a Y. So the city’s
the shape of a slice of pie. The tip of the pie is where the business district
is. All the high rises, and also where the stadium was. And that part of
Pennsylvania is mountains and hills. Pittsburgh’s down low, because it’s
between the rivers. To get there from the north you’ve got to go through a
mountain, the Tunnel they call it, and almost immediately after that, you’ve
got one of the rivers, so through the Tunnel, over the river on a huge
suspension bridge, and if you go in at night, it’s dark in the Tunnel, and you
come out on the bridge with the whole city lit up and sparkling in front of
you.”
Tim smiles at that, liking the image of Jackson, maybe eight
year old Jethro, and LJ, all in the front seat of… knowing Jackson, it was a
truck, probably a Ford, and Jethro’s eyes going wide at the first sight of the
city.
 |
| Pittsburgh at night. |
Gibbs nods. “Pittsburgh during the day was gray, and covered
in soot, and ugly as sin. It was a steel town, and the sky was smoke all the
time. At least then. But at night…” He’s been holding Kelly this whole time,
and she’s been quietly chilling out, enjoying voices and her pacifier. He
shifts his hold so he can look her in the face, “Maybe one of these days, you,
me, and your Dad’ll go up to Pittsburgh, and I’ll show you the view out of the
Tunnel, and we’ll catch a game.”
Tim flipped on the TV. “Let’s see if this works.”
It did. Not the highest definition ever, but probably better
than what Jethro has at home. Definitely bigger, and the sound is good.
They watched for about ten minutes. Sitting quietly on his
sofa, but every minute or so, Tim looks over to see how sleepy Kelly is, and
now her eyes are starting to droop, and the pacifier sucking is getting slower.
“Jethro?”
“Mmmm…” He’s lounging on the sofa, very sleepy baby on his
chest, beer in hand, game on in front of him; he’s looking really content.
“Gotta put her in her crib. Otherwise she’ll be a bear about
sleeping on her own for the next two days.”
“Okay.” Gibbs handed Tim his beer, and reluctantly headed up
to Kelly’s nursery. She startled a little when he stood up, and fussed a bit as
he headed up, also not thrilled with the idea of her nice, warm, Pop-bed going
away. But she’s being sung to, (Suspicious Minds) and patted gently, and
carefully laid on her back, and she is really sleepy, and…
A minute later, Tim’s handing Gibbs his beer again, and
Gibbs said, “Did I miss anything?”
“Mets scored three runs.”
For a second Gibbs’ eyes went wide, then Tim smirked, and
Jethro shoved his shoulder. “Smart ass.”
Tim quirked his head, smiled a little, took a drink, and
settled back to watch a game with his dad.
No comments:
Post a Comment