On Tony, also a big softie, learning that it's okay to feel his feelings
*the beginning is light on gifs because it's hard to find ones of specific old NCIS episodes*
*also another essay on how in-character the spinoff was*
Tony when he meets Ziva: the class clown, the playboy (in theory, anyway).
He's a lonely man. He doesn't let most people get to know him that well, least of all the women he dates. He has that single bed. He works; he goes home; he works some more.
He is funny, and a jokester. That part's true. (Funny dad.) He's also really kind, and thoughtful, and smart. (Serious dad.) He's really good at using the jokester persona to outsmart people (like Eli David in S6). Not everybody sees all of that in him, but his co-workers do, sometimes.
And Ziva does. Always. From very early on.
The joking and movie references are real. His personality. But they're also a defense mechanism. The way he disarms other people so they can't look at him too closely. Because his mom died when he was young, and his dad was an absent father, and he never really learned how to feel his own feelings. He's afraid of feelings. Feelings are dangerous. Feelings mean getting hurt.
Then, that starts to change. He goes through being the team leader, the undercover assignment with Jeanne, Director Sheppard dying, being reassigned as agent afloat...and he grows up a little.
And then there's this thing with Ziva. It scares the shit out of him. Because he knows, from very early on, that she's different. For one thing, she sees right through all of his defenses, and that is absolutely terrifying. He teases her and throws her off balance, and sometimes he learns little things about her, and what a high it is, to be someone who gets to know her. But the thing is, sometimes she isn't thrown off balance, and she learns things about him instead. And that's fucking terrifying. (But maybe also feels good? To be known? To feel things?)
He knows, I think, that if he lets himself be with her, it's going to be a Thing. A Big Thing. A thing that has the potential to really, really break him. So he lets them stay in that holding pattern. He doesn't want to hurt her, or himself, and for a long time it's enough to mess her hair, and make her smile, and chase her halfway across the world to make sure she's safe, and do what he can to make her happy. To feel the feelings, but not quite acknowledged. To tell each other things about things.
But the thing is, the more he feels, this paradoxical thing happens, where he wants to feel even more. So, he puts it all on the line. He tells her. Not perfectly, not at the right time, but he tells her. And she reciprocates enough for him to believe that she does love him.
He hopes - maybe she'll come back. Maybe, at least, she'll find a way to be happy without him, and at least she'll know.
But for him to discover, instead, that she was pregnant with their child, and never told him? For her to fake her death, and go on the run for years? That is a knife to his deepest insecurities.
The first insecurity is that the people he loves will always leave. She left when she moved away, and again by keeping Tali from him, and again when she faked her death, and again by being gone for so long. Could she really love him that much, and do all of that? Was it even real?
And the second insecurity is: he isn't good enough at loving people. Because what better explanation could there be for what she did than that she didn't think he'd be a good dad, a good partner; that she didn't want him there, and didn't want his help?
That episode where he's framed for murder and interrogates himself?He doesn't think he's that great. He doesn't always see what she sees in him. How painful it must be, to know that she knows about his childhood, and have her keep him from his daughter and fake her death anyway. Didn't she know how that it would break him? How painful it would be, to have lost this person, after he'd let her in, and when he'd thought she'd seen him clearly.
That whole situation teaches him - maybe it isn't good if he's too open. Maybe that's too dangerous. Maybe he should be careful. Not give away too much. Not let Tali see him crying over the photo of Ziva, because he doesn't want to scar her the way he was scarred.
By the time Ziva comes back, he's determined to do this right. It's been so long, and he loves her so much, and he just wants her, them, and he'll do anything to make it work.
He's grown up even more. He's a dad now. He feels a lot of his feelings. He's really good with Tali, being silly, and sweet, and protecting her. He wants so much for her to have a different childhood than his. Tali is safe. He's allowed to have feelings about Tali.
He still loves Ziva so much.
They're in a relationship for the first time in their lives, saying I love you, I'm sure, sleeping in the same bed. But with that mask down, in some ways, there are more other masks than there ever were at NCIS. They hide more from each other than they used to. It's even scarier. Now the real thing, their romantic relationship, is on the line.
What she did still hurts. He doesn't want it to hurt. He's afraid of his own anger, resentment, pain. He wants to ask Ziva to reassure him: that she did really see him, and know him; that she always loved him; that she knew he'd be a good dad; that she won't disappear again; that she believes him when he says that he loves her; that she's sorry. But he doesn't know how to ask for any of that. Feelings are terrifying. He doesn't want to get hurt. He doesn't want to hurt her. What if he asks for something, tries to tell her how she hurt him, and he breaks them?
Oh, but when she does reassure him - the way he melts. That scene by his door: he's all eagerness, trying to touch her everywhere, like she might disappear. And when she decides not to stop them, and kisses him, and drags him to bed, the way all of that frantic energy just leaves him? The way it soothes that part of him that thinks she might leave again...
So, he thinks, he can do this. He can pretend for her. Out of love for her, and terror for himself. The way she looks at him when he says she doesn't hurt him - he would walk over hot coals to make her look at him like that. He wants it to be true. He wants to be the guy who makes her happy. He wants to know that he's good at loving her.
The problem is, the feelings are still there, and they all come out sideways. Telling her he wanted her to have a stress-free day and that's why he didn't tell her Tali was missing? He knows her better than that. He was really afraid of breaking her, and afraid of how that would break him. He was angry with her for leaving him, and lying about Tali, but also, he was angry with her for making him angry, because he never wanted to be someone who hurt her.
There's something boyish about the way he looks at her by the pool. He really thought it would work. He really thought that maybe the way you protect the people you love is by protecting them from painful feelings.
It seems like in 2022-2024, he began to see what he'd done. He thought: she hurt me. But also he thought: I hurt her. I was mean. I hid things. I couldn't just forgive her.
He does what he'd done at NCIS. He concentrates on work (and Tali) and tries not to feel what he felt. He gets into relationships where he feels less, because he never wants to love someone as much as he loves Ziva, because that hurt too much. Because nobody's ever gonna be her.
He believes he's a good dad, but he still doesn't think he's a very good partner. What should it say about him, that he's the reason he isn't with the love of his life? Maybe he will always misjudge relationships. Maybe she didn't feel for him what he'd thought, or maybe he just didn't love her well enough, but either way, clearly he was wrong to think he could be happy like that, feel like that.
The way he flinches and grimaces and turns from her. He can't feel. He can't. It'll hurt too much.
But Ziva...Ziva snaps him out of it. Encourages him to feel again.
He finally sees her again. He realizes, it was never about her not thinking he'd be a good dad and partner, or about him not loving her well enough. It was about their pain. Both of them.
Maybe this isn't as broken as he'd thought. Maybe he didn't break them. Maybe it's okay for their past to hurt, and for them to love each other anyway. They can be them again, and tell each other things, but better.
That realization makes it pretty impossible not to want her. He tried to bottle up his feelings for her, and now they burst out.
Like her, he has wobbles. Wouldn't it be better to run away from these feelings? Then, no one gets hurt.
Despite that, though, he starts to let her in, just a little. He asks for what he needs. He lets her see when he's hurting, and comfort him. He makes the smallest gesture towards showing her that he still feels for her as much as he ever did, even though just saying "I appreciate you" makes his heart beat out of his chest.
She's able to reassure him, now. To touch him, and hold him, and take the reigns when he can't start the conversation about their feelings because it scares him too much. If their past was so much about him fighting for her, now she's fighting for him. Helping him get justice for Henry; comforting him when he's hurting. Reassuring him that she feels as much as he ever imagined for him, and that she feels his love for her in turn. And the thing is, he lets her.
And not reluctantly, or halfway, because once Tony is committed to something, he's all in, and he's the one to say those scary words first: I love you, and not even be that scared anymore.
He'll stumble, sometimes, and forget, and be scared; but in the end, he understands that it's okay for him to have needs and feelings. It's good for both of them, and for their daughter. He doesn't have to look away from his feelings, even the uncomfortable ones.
It's supposed to feel this good. Being loved. Having a family. It's supposed to be joking and laughter, but also tears and being held and needing reassurance. He isn't bad at this. He knows that from the way Tali grabs for him when she's upset and trusts him implicitly and laughs at his jokes. He knows because of the way Ziva looks at him and kisses him, and because he talked her out of that stupid martyr bullshit with Jonah not by being careful, but by being honest.
Now that he's allowing himself, he's actually okay at this feeling thing. Good, even, given the way Ziva's looking at him and melting into his arms. Feelings are scary. But they feel good, too. Really, really good.
