He smiled as Danielle held up a leaf excitedly waving it at him before scooping up an armful of them and throwing them into the air. His breath caught as she spun around and for the millionth time since she was born it struck him, she looked like his mother’s duplicate. Her eyes were completely Ziva, but her hair and many of her features was his mother.
The night Danielle had entered the world he held her for a long time and after she had drifted off of to sleep and Ziva followed along with her he slipped out of the room, tired and weary from the long hours of supporting Ziva through her labor, and made his way to the hospital’s chapel. Sitting in the pew he had clasped his hands together in the way his mother had taught him many years before and began to speak into the silence. He didn’t speak to God, but rather to his mother. He had told her what he already knew she knew, he was a father now and his little girl who rested with his wife down the hall looked so much like her Grandmother. He cried after that, the tears bittersweet. He asked his mother to guide him through the days ahead in whatever way she could from where she was. He didn’t want to fail his daughter, wife, or her. When he returned to Ziva’s room a short time later he pressed a kiss to her forehead as she slept and carefully eased Danielle out of her bassinet to hold her some more while she continued to sleep. Sort of a few missteps he felt that he had done a pretty good job with helping to raise his precious little girl.
“Daddy!” his little one’s voice rang in his ears, drawing him from his memories. “Look daddy! A birdy!” He finger stretched as she pointed to where she had spied the feathered creature.
Tony craned his neck in the direction that she was pointing to. “That’s a cardinal, Danielle,” he told her. “See all those red feathers?” he glanced at her as she nodded that she saw what he was speaking of. “That means that it’s a boy cardinal. If it was gray like your jacket it would be a girl cardinal. Oh, like the one on the branch right behind him,” he added when he spotted the other bird behind the male cardinal.
“Cool!” she cheered before returning to her beloved leaves, but keeping an eye on the birds in the branches above.
Tony went on watching her as memories of his mother drifted in and out of his mind. A soft smile was playing on his lips when he felt Ziva snuggle up to him on the bench. He wrapped an arm around her shoulders without a word.
“You are thinking that she looks like your mother,” she murmured. She had learned in the days after Danielle’s birth what the smile he was wearing now meant. She couldn’t fault him because even she had noticed it after having seen the picture of Tony’s mother over the years. Danielle even reminded her of a woman she never met, but wish she had just so she could thank her for bring Tony into this world.
Tony turned his head to kiss Ziva’s temple. “I still can’t get over it,” he whispered against her hair.
Danielle startled, leaves falling and clinging from her jacket as she clasped her hands together and a serious look crossed her face. The cardinals had flown off and she watched after them.
“Will you be disappointed if this baby does not look like your mother?” Ziva asked quietly as she ran a hand over her swollen stomach. It was something that had worried her from the moment she found out she was pregnant again, but couldn’t bring herself to voice until now.
“Of course I will!” Tony gasped, his hand joining hers on her belly. “This baby could come out with every crazy feature our family’s recessive genes can throw at it and I will still be thrilled and in love with him or her as I am with Danielle,” he went on.
Ziva let out a laugh. “I do not think this child will have any of our crazy genes, Tony.”
“I don’t think so either, Ziva. I’m just saying if it does I will still love it. We made this baby and I couldn’t be disappointed by anything created by our love.” He turned her face towards him and kissed her gently. “I swear.”
Danielle wandered up to them just then. She poked her face into the bags that sat around Ziva’s feet, “anything for me, ima?”
Ziva laughed again. “I do not know, have you been a good girl for daddy?” The little girl nodded her head eagerly. “Then I do believe there might be a new teddy bear in this bag,” she pointed to the one directly between her feet, “for you.”
“And you scold me for spoiling her,” Tony chuckled as Danielle squealed diving into the bag that her mother had pointed to.
“It is just a teddy bear, Tony,” she sighed knowing that his teasing had some truth. She had been spoiling Danielle more these days.
Tony scooped his daughter up into his lap after she had retrieved her new toy. “What are you going to name this one?”
Danielle thought for a moment before fixing a serious look on him. “What was Grandma’s name?”
Tony smiled, drawing her into a tight hug and whispering his mother’s name into her ear.
