A/N: Thanks again to anyone who's read/reviewed/alerted/favorited!

x

Jim lies down flat on his back on the bench. He has one knee up, foot flat on the lower section of the bleacher, and he lets his other leg dangle down between the slats. He's lying three steps down from the top, and Spock is sitting next to him, leaning with his elbows propped up on the bench behind him. Their Earth Science class was cancelled at the last minute, and now they have an unexpected hour free—all Jim wants to do with it is pull Spock into some janitor's closet somewhere and sweep his tongue across the inside of his mouth, but he's not really sure how to suggest it. So he lies, idly daydreaming instead, eyes closed and the sun on his face.

"I mentioned the change in our relationship to my mother yesterday," Spock informs him, then, and Jim feels his heart beat a little louder. He forces himself not to open his eyes.

"The…change?" he asks. He's trying to sound nonchalant, but it comes out more like wary.

Spock clears his throat. "Did I misspeak?"

Jim shrugs, and swings his leg back and forth stiffly, keenly aware now of every movement of his body and wondering what each one says. Does he seem at ease? Or nervous like Spock? Disapproving? "No," he says. "I mean, I don't think so." He cracks one eye open, and chances a look over at Spock. He hasn't moved. But he's watching Jim out of the corner of his eye. "So, um," he tries, "what did your mom say?"

"She appeared pleased with the development," Spock answers, and Jim releases a breath he didn't know he'd been holding. So he's the kind of guy an alien can take home to mother. It's kind of funny, in a way. "She suggested," Spock continues, lightly, "that you and I eat dinner together one evening."

"Like on a date?" Jim opens his eyes and watches Spock, unsure what is happening. Spock's eaten dinner at his house before, several times. But this would be different, what he might be suggesting, what Jim isn't quite sure he's suggesting.

"I believe that is the word she used, yes."

"Oh. Okay." He tries to picture a date with Spock. He'd have to take him somewhere nice, of course. Like, tablecloths on the tables, and candles or something. Or would that be too cliché? What do Vulcans do when they want to be formal? Probably wear lots of robes. Jim's not really sure he's comfortable with that.

"So, um, do you want to?" he asks, and when Spock doesn't answer right away, he sits up and plants his feet properly on the bleacher again. "Would you like to go out with me, Spock?"

Usually, when Jim asks people this question, they just laugh at him, but Spock looks at him with one of those frustrating Spock stares, like there's clearly something going on back there, but darned if any mere human will ever guess at that thought process. "Yes, Jim," he answers. "I would like that very much."

"Cool." It's not a very dashing thing to say but Spock doesn't complain. "So…Friday maybe? I'll ask my brother if I can borrow his car, and I'll pick you up at your house." The thought of asking Sam to borrow anything, and especially his precious car for a date with another guy, is hardly appealing, but he doesn't have a lot of transportation options, and he's certainly not going to ride a bus to a fancy restaurant, or wherever, so he'll manage somehow. Spock is amenable to the plan, and it isn't until later, hours later, when he's doing his Chemistry homework, that he realizes that he has an actual date, with actual Spock, and starts to panic. What are they going to do?

x

Spock doesn't know anything about human date conventions or stereotypes; Jim could have taken to the aquarium, or to a museum, and there would have been no questions asked. Actually, he's considering the possibility that he should have brought Spock to the latest exhibit on early human space travel at the Riverside Historical Museum, because he's been tense all evening and it's making Jim tense too. They're eating at an out of the way Andorian restaurant that Spock has never been to, at the same corner table Jim always requests when he goes because it's out of the way and sort of private, you know, he tells Spock, and the food is good and so is the company, but the conversation lags and breaks apart with large holes of silence. Jim spent about an hour wondering what he should wear and finally settled on his nicest shirt and nicest jeans, but Spock is wearing a tie. He keeps pulling at it. "My mother insisted," he explains, once, when he catches Jim staring.

Jim laughs a little.

After they order dessert, which Jim will take with coffee, and Spock with tea, he leans over the table and whispers, "Meet me in the bathroom in two minutes."

Spock's eyebrows lean together over his nose. "I do not think that is a good idea, Jim."

He just winks. "Trust me."

The bathroom is only one room, large and square, tiled with pink stone and with a large green fern in the corner; the sink is a long marble trough with three faucets. He doesn't count the seconds but he's sure Spock does, and in something that feels like two minutes, there's a small knock on the door and then the twisting of the doorknob. Spock is speaking even as he steps inside. "I do not think this is a good idea, Jim—"

"I know, I know, but we're not doing anything," Jim answers with a light wave of his hand. "Unless," and he knows this is what Spock has been assuming all along, "you think I just called you in here to jump you or something."

Spock's cheeks flush a light green and he says something about not understanding this Terran slang but Jim just laughs. "You have the dirtiest mind, Spock," he declares. "It's not anything like that. I just thought it would be inappropriate for me to reach across the table in plain sight of everyone and…do…this." As he speaks he steps up close and starts to unknot Spock's tie. He moves carefully and slowly. He's never been very good at untying ties and he doesn't want to mess it up or get it tangled. He knows how close he's standing; it's on purpose, teasing and flirting, trying, but it's affecting him as bad as it's affecting Spock, and worse, his breathing a little faster just as Spock's is, his heart pounding.

"There," he says, once the tie is off. "Better." He considers throwing the thing into the plant but Spock's mother would probably notice if he came home without an article of clothing, even such a minor one, and he doesn't want to be accused of doing anything Inappropriate with her son. Especially before anything Inappropriate actually happens. So he shoves it in Spock's pocket awkwardly.

He wouldn't have thought it would be this hard to just lean over and kiss someone, especially someone he'd kissed before, but he feels awkward and clumsy, bulky and angular instead of smooth. Spock is staring at him, wide eyed, as if waiting.

"I'm…I'm having a really good time with you tonight," Jim says nervously, and then he laughs because it's all so ridiculous. He's in a bathroom with his best friend, and they're on a date, of all things, on the suggestion of his mother, and he's still trying to seem cool in this situation when Spock knows well enough how very not cool he is, and seems fine with it—

"Is something funny?" Spock asks. Jim smiles and claps his shoulder and promises to explain once they're back at their table.

x

After dinner they take Sam's car to the movies. A new adventure movie's just come out and Jim's been dying to see it but he finds, sitting there in the theater with Spock right next to him, that he can't concentrate on a thing, even surrounded on all sides by the Mega Screen, even when there are explosions and starship chases across the galaxy and great big battle scenes. He used to never be able to get enough of those things.

Spock sits very still next to him, and he certainly looks like he's engrossed in the film, only his head moving slightly to the right or left to take in more of the scene. He keeps his hands on his lap or Jim might have tried to take one in his own, and later he might even have feigned naïveté when Spock reminded him what it means to touch a Vulcan's fingers. But Spock gives him no opportunities. Jim sits with his own fingers gripping his knees.

He's feeling pretty tense by the time the movie lets out. He couldn't have answered even the simplest questions about its plot or characters, and when Spock asks him if he enjoyed it, he says, "Yeah. It was good," and hopes Spock won't ask any follow up questions.

"I found it difficult to concentrate on the story, myself," Spock answers, and it takes Jim a minute to hear what he is really saying, what he is really admitting. Jim smiles. Spock isn't look at him or letting any emotion leak onto his face, but Jim knows, underneath that, what he meant.

They don't speak much on the way back to Spock's house but Jim can't keep that stupid grin off his face.

x

Jim walks Spock up to his front door and then waits, standing there next to him on his porch like some kind of cliché. His palms feel sweaty. He wonders if maybe he should just leave, but he's been standing too long to just turn away now and say, "Okay then see ya later, Spock," like they didn't just go on a date, or whatever this evening was. Spock is staring at him, not saying anything either.

Even though his mouth feels unnaturally dry, he manages, "So this was fun."

"Yes," Spock answers. "If my understanding of your Earth vocabulary is correct, this evening was, in fact, 'fun.'"

Jim smiles. "I'm glad you, uh…had fun." He could hit himself, he sounds so stupid. But Spock just tilts his head, perhaps a little confused, too polite to press. Jim tries for his best recovery, his coolest voice, his most confident body language; he considers putting up one arm to lean his hand against the front door, smooth and easy-going and in control, except that he's sure if he tried the door would just open of its own accord and he'd go falling into Spock's foyer and that sort of embarrassment is impossible to recover from. So he decides against it. "You know," he says, "on Earth we have this tradition. At the end of a date, the two people on that date kiss each other goodnight."

"A sensible tradition," Spock replies, and before Jim can say anything else totally smooth and confident and attractive, Spock leans in and kisses him. It is not a proper first date kiss at all but then, Spock's new to this particular Terran tradition. His lips are hot and his tongue insistent and almost desperate, pushing past Jim's lips, and he's gotten one arm around Jim's waist and the other in his hair. Jim holds Spock's hips. He has a half formed idea that he should push him back against the wall, hard, press his body against him, grind their hips together, but Spock's too strong for that, will only be moved if he wants to be moved, and what he wants, now, what he seems to want, is for them to writhe against each other, standing unanchored and in place, each one in his turn stepping sometimes back and sometimes forward. Everything he's felt all night comes up now, every moment of awkwardness, every repressed desire to touch or to kiss. Spock feels this too, he knows it, feels it somewhere deep and strong where some people don't think Vulcans even have feelings. The inside of Spock's mouth is so wet, and there is the hard shock of his teeth and there the sweet soft pink of his gums, a pink Jim can taste. He doesn't know how he'll ever let go; he doesn't know how he'll ever force himself back to that borrowed car to drive home alone through the dark Iowa night.

Then the door opens.

Spock's house is impossibly bright inside, and the sharp florescence of it spilling out onto the porch blinds Jim, at first. He doesn't know what is happening. He feels Spock disentangling their arms and pushing him, discreetly and carefully but definitely, unquestionably, away, until there is some decent distance between them again. He looks at Spock first, at the set of his mouth in its thin, expressionless line, his back so straight it looks painful, and then, he forces himself to look at the doorway instead.

He gulps.

"Ambassador Sarek," he says, and his voice is so gruff he has to clear his throat. "It's uh, nice to see you. Again. I mean. It's been a while. I'm sorry." He's not sure why he's apologizing but it seems the thing to do. He feels Spock's foot nudge against his and he looks down at it, as if this were what he was supposed to do, when really it's more like the last thing he should do and it makes him seem like a massive dork.

"Father," Spock is saying. "Jim has just driven me home."

"I heard the car," Spock's father answers. The Ambassador's eyes flick from his son to Jim, then back. Jim keeps on waiting him to say something more but he doesn't, and the moment seems to stretch forever in absolute infinite agony. He half expects Spock's father to start questioning him, asking him about intentions and using the phrase "my son" a lot, as in "what do you think you're doing with my son?" and just generally being so formidable and stern and authoritative through the whole thing that Jim would have no choice but to melt into a puddle of terrified, incoherent goo.

In retrospect, the whole encounter lasts about two minutes.

"We were saying goodnight," Spock says. His own voice sounds very stiff, and Jim's not sure if he's just turning up the volume on his Vulcan demeanor because he's back home or if he's actually annoyed and defensive that his father broke up his make out session.

"And I imagine that you have had ample time to say goodnight by now," his father finishes.

This would be a pretty perfect time for Jim to say "well goodnight, Spock," and make a mad dash back to Sam's car, but he can't leave Spock just standing there facing what might be, in Vulcan terms, for all Jim knows, his father's wrath, and also, his feet are pretty much cemented to the porch. Someday he'll be kicking ass and taking names in space and he knows he'll be ready for it because no Klingon could ever be as terrifying as Ambassador Sarek of Vulcan.

"I apologize if I kept Spock out too late—" he starts, but Spock cuts him off. He's not looking at Jim but at his father.

"We are not late," he says. "I said I would be home by ten o'clock and it is only five minutes until ten now." How he can know this without a watch is totally beyond Jim's understanding. But then he has other things he should be worrying about right now, like whether or not Spock's father is about to kill him.

He's looking at Jim now like he's trying to answer some essential question about him, and Jim feels so exposed in front of that stare that he can't help but look down to make sure he's still wearing clothes.

"Not quite ten, that's good," he says, his voice a bit creaky and a tiny bit too high. "I do always try to be punctual."

"A fine trait, Mr. Kirk," Spock's father answers, and then he turns back to his son and raises one eyebrow slightly. "Are you coming in, Spock?"

Spock, amazingly, actually hesitates, and he glances over at Jim as if he had any sort of clue here as to what to do. As if Jim would actually dare to defy a six foot tall Vulcan man with a death glare.

"So I'll see you in school on Monday?" he asks, and he thinks he actually sees Spock sigh.

"Yes, Jim," he answers. "I will see you on Monday."

There's not much either one can do now, and Jim hesitates; it seems like something like a peck on the cheek or a hug would be appropriate but Ambassador Sarek is still watching him, so all he can do is wave goodbye—wave goodbye on a date—and walk down the stairs half looking over his shoulder the whole way. It could only have been worse if he'd tripped. Just before he steps into his car he looks back again, and he sees that Spock and his father have disappeared into the house, but that the front curtains are parted, and Spock's face is looking out at him from the inside. He puts his hand up in his traditional salute and, even though Jim knows Spock can't see his face, he grins.

x

Spock is already at his locker when Jim gets to school, and he knows he has to play it cool when he comes up to him, because he didn't exactly make the most graceful exit the last time they saw each other. So he does his best to say, "Hey Spock, what's up?" in the most casual way possible. Yeah, he's unruffled. He's got it together.

Spock lifts an eyebrow, and then turns back to his locker to take the last of his school things out. He closes it with a light snap. "How was the rest of your weekend, Jim?"

"Mmmm," he considers, "would have been better spent with you." He punches in the code to his own locker and tries to sound nonchalant. "I would have called, but I thought if your father picked up, it might cause trouble."

"You should not have been concerned. My father was not angry."

Jim pauses with his PADD halfway between his locker and his bag, and swings on Spock with his best 'you're bullshitting me' look. "Could have fooled me."

Spock continues as if he did not notice any change in Jim's expression. "I know my father well, Jim. I assure you, he was not upset. If anything, he was…amused."

"Amused?" This time, it's Jim's turn to raise some eyebrows, though he lifts both of his because he never really got that one-eyebrow thing down. "Really?"

"Yes," Spock answers matter-of-factly.

Jim almost wants to laugh.