[identity profile] jack-infinitude.livejournal.com posting in [community profile] kissmeprobie
Title: State of the Heart
Author: [livejournal.com profile] jack_infinitude
Fandom: NCIS
Characters: Anthony DiNozzo, Timothy McGee
Prompt: fading
Rating: PG
Warnings: Slash, character death.
Disclaimer: I don't own NCIS.
Summary: It is his life, everything he holds dear, memories and love alike.
A/N: AU story that takes place in of season seven. There are no spoilers. Xposted to [livejournal.com profile] 10_fics, [livejournal.com profile] kissmeprobie and my journal. ETA 9-9-09: made two changes to the text, and corrected a spelling error.




The T-shirt is faded blue, and has long strings of black, cracked kanji printed across the front. Tony takes good care of it in spite of its age; he has re-sewn the seams many times (enough so that he doubts that any of the original thread is still left) while the collar and hem are ripped and missing chunks of fabric from years of wear and tear. On the back, where a tag would be, are the worn initials T. M. that DiNozzo keeps rewriting with a laundry marker. There is also a black fabric square patched onto the shirt front, surrounded by washed out stains that might have once been scarlet and are now an ugly brown.

Tony tried to wash those stains away after he got the shirt. He had spent hours at his kitchen sink with various detergents, working himself nearly to tears trying to get them out. Nothing had worked, though, and he had finally given up. The faded blue shirt had then spent a year in his closet on a hanger as DiNozzo debated whether to throw it out or give it away.

Tony can’t read the kanji; he has only a vague idea of what the shirt says (though he has a feeling that it is a joke to do with cats and eternal love). The shirt is also just a little bit big on him, stretched out from its previous owner. But it wasn’t meant for him; he isn’t the one who wanted it, isn’t the one who patiently waited in line for an hour to buy it. He is simply the one who inherited it in a blast of blood and pain.

He wears it to work sometimes; usually when he’s overslept, and needs to throw something on. People remark on the black patch and foreign lettering but Tony pays them no mind. He has had possession of the faded blue shirt for going on three years now, and it is by far the oldest and most raggedy of his tops. It had been worn regularly for many years before becoming DiNozzo’s property, and had not been treated well prior.

But it is now one of Tony’s most prized belongings, cared for and constantly mended, as well as rescued twice from the give-away bag during Abby’s whirlwind cleanings of his apartment. Tony has kept this shirt when others have been thrown out or sold or given away, and as far as he cares, he’ll never let go of it when it means so much.

He doesn’t wear it when he sleeps. If he wears it when he sleeps then he will be visited by dreams of dead eyes and long hands limp in pools of blood; and those are the dreams that leave him broken when he wakes up, shivering and split open all the way to the outside. He would much rather remember grey eyes, small smiles, and sweet, savage kisses that he missed.

So Tony keeps it. He will keep it until he is so old and infirm that his life is drained simply by the breaths he takes, until the day he dies. The faded blue shirt is his life, everything he holds dear, memories and love alike.

(no subject)

Date: 2009-05-30 07:21 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] thedamaged.livejournal.com
This is really sad, but it still has a beautiful side too it, if that make's sense. I loved it.
:)

stunned.

Date: 2009-05-30 07:32 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] lil-jei.livejournal.com
God I've got tears flowing down my face right now...thanks alot...

No anger or anything just shock over how perfectly you could capture it...because you did ya know. My mom still has my dad's old tee shirts, the ones that he loved and wore alot. She can't wear them but she knows they're there. I still have some too...we had his favorite blanket for years til it fell apart and then we made it into a bunch of pillows we could keep with us.

So yeah for sure did you capture that kind of grief perfectly...god you did it so well.
(deleted comment)

(no subject)

Date: 2009-05-30 10:47 am (UTC)
From: [personal profile] samueljames
This was sad but sweet, such care given to the shirt. I'm sure if he explained to Abby she wouldn't keep trying to get rid of it.

(no subject)

Date: 2009-05-30 01:11 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] strongwriter.livejournal.com
*cries*

This was really beautiful, but at the same time sooo sad. You did an amazing job <3

Looking forward to reading more of your writing :)

(no subject)

Date: 2009-05-31 01:10 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] clumsyghost.livejournal.com
Awww, that was amazingly sweet. I read this a couple of hours ago and I'm STILL depressed. Very touching; thanks for sharing!

(no subject)

Date: 2009-06-01 05:51 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] annieb1955.livejournal.com
This is stunningly and beautifully sad. Blew me away. (And I don't usually read DiNozzo/McGee)

(no subject)

Date: 2009-06-07 05:41 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] annieb1955.livejournal.com
I passed it along to my sister who loves DiNozzo/McGee and she asked me to tell you she loved it too

(no subject)

Date: 2010-04-02 08:25 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] im-miss-barbara.livejournal.com
It is so sad and yet so perfect. I love it.

(no subject)

Date: 2011-05-01 10:42 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] taylorgibbs.livejournal.com
THis is so achingly sad and so beautifully done.

(no subject)

Date: 2011-05-03 03:30 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] ahavia.livejournal.com
OK, I am crying also. So short and so sweet, bitter sweet. Such a touching story.
I have my son's vest as well as other things. He died of AIDS at the age of 25 in 1991. His name is Hunter Muir. I am looking at a picture of him now. He was so beautiful, he worked as a model. He was a Gay activist and I am proud to be his mother.
Ahavia

(no subject)

Date: 2011-05-03 04:55 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] ahavia.livejournal.com
Yes, wonder. I am a birth mother, adopted mother and foster mother. And Hunter was a delight in my life. As are my other children. He was very bright, wrote film reviews for the local papers and for 2 NPR shows. He was a local promoter for Independent movies here in Phila. He was the head of the Gay Youth group here and I was the adult advisor. Amazing for one so young.

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