Shepard leaned back in her chair, rubbing her eyes as she let her head rest against the cushioned back of the chair. She had just forced her way through an awkward conversation with Kaidan, and the atmosphere between them was going to be tense for the foreseeable future.
The Lieutenant hadn't kept his interest in her hidden, and Shepard had dreaded the conversation for weeks before it had finally happened. When Kaidan admitted his feelings, and expressed his hope that Shepard had similar feelings towards him, she had had to reject him as kindly as possible. She had never thought of the man that way, seeing him as only a friend and comrade. In fact, Kaidan had needed to make his feelings blatantly obvious before Shepard had caught on.
Leaning her chair forward, Shepard rested her chin in her hands while she stared at the wall. The possibility of a romantic entanglement hadn't crossed her mind in several months until just recently. She was busy, too busy to take notice of many people outside of Normandy's crew. They were the only group of individuals that she saw on a regular basis, and she had no desire to start a relationship with anyone that she might only be able to meet on the rare times that she visited the Citadel or some far-flung colony.
But within the crew… Yes, there was one particular member of her crew that had gotten her attention. Shepard let her thoughts drift to the Turian that was two floors below.
Garrus Vakarian. He had made his place in the Normandy's crew with relative ease, his intense demeanor and focused behavior apparent from the start. But Shepard had come to find that there was more to Garrus than what he showed on the surface, and the many conversations they had had since he boarded the ship were proof of that.
He was struggling with the morality of decisions he needed to make, and of ways that he had chosen to handle issues that arose in his life. Shepard could only try to be a voice of reason, and had found herself pulling him back from the brink more times than she had expected when she first met him.
But she had noticed, or perhaps her imagination only fabricated the impression, that lately Garrus had seemed more at peace. He had spoken only two days previously about his decision to rejoin C-Sec and reapply for Spectre training. He wanted to make a difference, and she knew that he could, once the missions they were involved in settled down.
And because Shepard didn't want to interfere just as he was getting his life back together, she was going to keep her feelings to herself. The admiration she held for Garrus, the way she felt her heart speed up –just a bit- when he looked her way for longer than seemed necessary.
The way she could, if she was honest with herself, get completely sidetracked from his words by focusing too much on how she enjoyed the sound of his voice.
Shepard would keep her infatuation to herself. She was a grown woman, nearing thirty, not a love-struck teenager. But she could hope that maybe, one day after this entire business with Saren was over and Garrus was settled at C-Sec, she would track him down and invite him out for drinks.
Standing up and pushing her chair back to its place, Shepard could feel a small smile tugging at her lips. Yes, that's what she could hope for during the difficult times that she knew were waiting for her. A future in which she could sit down and share a drink with the Turian she had started to care for as more than just a crewmate.
She would tell him one day.
When things settled down.