A/N: Thanks very much, reviewers! Sorry that this part is so short…it's actually my least favorite of the six, if I can admit that. Anyway, part three is longer and better, I promise.
x
After Spock leaves, Jim makes Sam promise not to tell mom about any of it, and even though he does, on his honor and everything, Jim stopped feeling any confidence in Sam's word around the time he turned fourteen. When his mother gets back from her trip he watches her carefully. He waits for her to make some sort of completely embarrassing comment, and goes over possible nonchalant answers that he could give to keep her from being yet more embarrassing than she usually is when she runs into Spock again. But she stays quiet. Jim even invites Spock over to dinner, on a night when Frank is working the late shift at his job. He doesn't use the word 'boyfriend,' or kiss him hello or goodbye, and of course Spock himself is as calm and undemonstrative as ever, but they do manage a satisfying game of footsie underneath the table, which Jim takes as a personal victory.
"Come over tomorrow," he says quietly, after they've eaten, and while he and Spock are helping his mother clear the dishes off the table. Winona is in the kitchen. He leans in quick, ready to jump back if she returns unexpectedly. "Frank's visiting his brother in Des Moines, and Mom's got this meeting thing…she'll be out all afternoon. We can…be alone."
He sounds pretty dorky to his own ears but Spock seems convinced enough by his attempt at sounding seductive. Or so Jim interprets the light green blush that seeps up to his ears. He starts to accept the invitation but doesn't get very far before Winona invades the dining room again. Jim bites back a groan, and slides quickly, but subtly, away from Spock again.
"You really don't have to help clean up, Spock," Winona says, as she takes a pile of dishes from him. She's pulled her hair back from her face in a messy ponytail. Her face and hands are tan from the harsh sun of the last planet she visited, and she looks tired.
"I wish to help, Mrs. Kirk," Spock answers politely, and when Jim's mother smiles at him in response he knows, he just knows, she'll like him. That is, she does like him, and she'd like him even if she knew about the two of them. That doesn't mean he's in a hurry to tell her. But he knows he's found a good one, finally. And he's glad.
x
The moment the door to Jim's room closes behind them, Spock leans in. Jim isn't expecting such a movement; the resulting kiss is short and awkward. It lands half on his mouth, half on his cheek. Jim laughs a little as Spock pulls back, he just finds the gesture so unbearably cute, but Spock blushes and ducks his head and steps away. "I apologize," he mutters.
"What for?" Jim laughs brightly in answer, and takes Spock's wrists in his hands. "Come on."
He drags Spock back, and back, and back, and Spock looks down more at their shoes than Jim's face, and Jim just looks at the shiny black of Spock's hair, and in a moment they hit up against the bed. Then Spock looks up. "I would like to try again," he says, and takes his wrists from Jim's grip. He pulls him forward with a hand to each cheek. This kiss lands where it is intended. It rather takes Jim's breath away—which is something else that he thought only happened in books.
"Oh boy," he says, when they break apart again, and can't stop the ridiculous grin that keeps breaking out over his face. "We need to do that again."
"I am in complete agreement, Jim," Spock answers, and though he isn't grinning, isn't even smiling, he still manages to look quite content. He sits down on the edge of Jim's bed, and though his expression is confident, and so is the movement with which he pulls Jim down next to him by the wrist, his posture is as stiff and uncomfortable as ever, and Jim knows he's just hiding his nervousness. He would make some sort of comment but before he can even start, Spock leans in once more, and presses his lips against Jim's.
This kiss is desperate from the beginning. Spock wraps one around Jim's waist to pull him close, and the other, he rests palm-flat over Jim's heart, the smallest of barriers between them. Jim wraps an arm around Spock in return, and then parts his lips to Spock's hot tongue. He keeps on thinking I missed you, frantically and brightly, even though just a moment before he hadn't been thinking anything of the sort, and it doesn't even make sense, really; Spock hasn't gone anywhere, and neither has he. Right now, though, it's the only thing he can think. The words seem to mean everything at once.
This time, he lets Spock push him back onto the bed. Spock is heavy on top of him, and Jim wriggles to adjust their positions, spreading his legs to either side of Spock and pressing his hips up. Spock makes low, indistinct, noises every time they part for air. Jim runs his hands up into his hair, mussing the perfect arrangement of it, curling the strands in his fingers and keeping Spock close. He doesn't care about anything, can't think about anything, except keeping Spock close.
He isn't expecting Spock to kiss his chin, or his cheek, or his jaw, but he does, and then he works his way down to Jim's neck. The touch of Spock's lips is gentle and light—he's holding back and Jim knows it, but he won't push, not yet. He shuts his eyes tight and just lets himself feel, enjoying the way Spock is mouthing at his collarbone or lightly touching his tongue to the skin over Jim's throat. He whispers Spock's name without quite meaning to whisper anything at all.
Spock doesn't say anything, at least nothing coherent, in return, but then his mouth is busy, kissing now up the side of Jim's neck and behind his ear. Jim arches back, eyes shut tight and neck strained to let Spock reach as much skin as he can, and his hands slip down Spock's back and grip at his hips. Spock is heavy and Jim knows that he is balancing carefully to keep Jim from feeling his whole weight, but still he tries to pull Spock closer against him. He grinds his hips up into Spock's. He pushes up Spock's two layers of shirts and allows himself the feel of that smooth, hot, skin beneath his fingers, and he moans out something that might be "Mmm, yes, Spock," or that might be nothing but utter, incomprehensible gibberish, he really doesn't know or care which.
He can feel Spock's breath at his ear and his teeth, gentle at first, giving the slightest tug to his earlobe, and he's thinking, damn, he is one lucky son of a—
"Jim, you didn't tell me you were having a friend over today."
Spock's off him in a moment, all the way on the other end of the bed as if he'd flown there, while Jim can't even get himself together enough to sit up properly. He just flails around on the bed and tries to say, "Mom, what are you doing here? I told you to knock before you came into my room!" It comes out something like, "Mom! What! KNOCK!"
"What? I just came to bring up your laundry!" She holds up a basket of neatly folded clothes as evidence. "I didn't mean to interrupt anything."
Why is my life always fucked over by laundry? he groans to himself, and then lets his head fall back on the pillow again. He covers his face with his hands and tries to become invisible.
"Well, you did," he mutters. Then he forces himself to drop his hands and actually look at her. "I thought you were busy this afternoon."
"My plans changed," his mother answers, and if before she sounded slightly amused, her voice has now taken on a terse and faintly annoyed quality. She sets the basket on the floor and crosses her arms. "And don't take that tone with me, James Tiberius. This is still my house, young man, and I can come into your room if I choose."
"Who's saying you can't? I'm just asking for, you know, some warning."
"And I would like some warning when you bring…special friends up to your room."
"Don't use words like 'special friend,' Mom. That's not…no one says that!"
"No one except your mother," she corrects, not a hint of amusement in her voice now, though Jim's sure she didn't mean to sound as cold as she does. Not in front of company. She turns stiffly to Spock and forces a smile. "Are you staying for dinner?" she asks.
"I regret that I cannot, Mrs. Kirk, but thank you for the offer," Spock answers politely, and again Jim's afraid to look at him, afraid to see if he's blushing green or if his hair is incriminatingly tousled.
"Another time, then," she says, her manner still stiff, awkward, trying to force an easiness that will not come. She turns back to Jim. "Next time, Jim, some warning if you're having guests."
"Next time, mom, some warning if you're opening closed doors," he snaps back, and then as soon as she's gone he pulls a pillow over his face.
"I find I rarely understand this joking manner that humans often seem to adopt among themselves," Spock says, after a long, tense moment of silence has passed between them. His tone is the light one of inconsequential observation, or idle wondering. Jim throws the pillow off the bed.
"That wasn't joking," he answers. "That was my mother trying not to yell at me in front of guests. She doesn't want anyone to know how fucked up we are. It would ruin her image as famous-widow-slash-important-Starfleet-official-slash-famous-mother. Sometimes I think Sam and I are just showpieces to her. I don't want to talk about it."
"Your mother has always appeared to be a quite agreeable woman," Spock says. His words sound hollow. Jim looks at him, and sees that he's sitting trapped in the same stiff posture he'd taken on when he jumped up at the sound of the door, staring more at Jim's bookcase than at Jim himself.
"Appears," Jim answers. "That's just it."
There isn't much more to say about it, so for a while, they're silent. Jim stares up at the ceiling. He's more rattled than he cares to admit.
"I'm sorry about that, by the way," he says finally.
"No apology is necessary," Spock answers. Then he reaches out, gaze still averted, and grabs Jim's hand with his own, no grace to the gesture but only a confused tangling of fingers forming a link between them. Jim closes his eyes. He knows they have to leave, knows Spock has to leave, but all he wants to do is lie right where he is, concentrating on the light sweep of Spock's thumb across his palm and the sensation of calm that it brings.
