Chapter Three
I'd gone back to my quarters, since I'd been given the day off, to change out of my uniform and to try to regroup before I was supposed to meet the captain for lunch. He'd given me an hour, but it took twenty minutes to shower and change and then there was all that time left over. My stomach was roiling and I doubted very much that there would be any chance of my being able to eat anything. That is, if lunch were really on the agenda – oh, God. I sat down on the sofa in my dayroom and put my head in my hands.
What the hell had happened? How had a perfectly normal day ended up with my life being turned upside down? And what the hell was the matter with me, anyway? He was right, of course, as he always was, that I was perilously close to being unfit for duty. I wasn't sleeping. Oh, I could go to sleep all right. But then I'd wake up at two, or three, or sometimes even four, in the morning, with my heart pounding and my head throbbing as if I'd just run five miles or jumped out of an airlock. At first I thought maybe I was having nightmares about the Borg again. It had taken almost a year to recover from them, to let go of the nightmares and the anxiety attacks and my constant need to check on the captain to make sure he was okay. But I didn't have any memory of any dreams at all, least of all dreams of the Borg. I was just waking up in a full adrenalin surge.
And he was right, too, that the holodeck programs – there were three of them – were crazy. He hadn't given me any indication that he'd reported the content of them to anyone else, more specifically Beverly or, God help me, Deanna. I could just imagine Deanna's face when faced with the program – the truth was, I was making myself ill. Even now I was fighting the urge to go into the bathroom and puke. Just what the hell was the matter with me?
I had told the captain the truth. I had told him that I loved him. I'd known it for a while, certainly in those weeks after he'd come back to us from the Borg and he was so fragile. Maybe I'd been aware of it even before then, I don't know. But I'd put the knowledge and the feelings in the back of my head, in one of those deep file cabinets that everyone keeps, right, with all the knowledge that you don't want anyone – including yourself – to know. Especially if you have a certain chronically nosy half-Betazed onboard. So if I'd been hiding it from myself, how come he knew? And did that mean that Deanna knew? That everyone knew?
It was as if I were in a feedback loop. My head was starting to hurt, behind my eyes, the way it always did when I'd been crying.
And where had that thought come from? I'd shed a few tears in his ready room, surprising the shit out of me, but I hadn't been crying, had I? I haven't cried in years, except when Tasha died, and when I was forced to treat Data so badly in his trial. So why should I be having a sinus headache, and how on earth do I explain why any headache should be linked to the way I was feeling?
Except that he'd mentioned my father. Well, I wasn't going there.
It was almost time to leave. Did I really want to do this? After all, what was I going to do, really, besides have lunch with the captain?
Fuck. I was truly losing it.
It took me ten minutes to walk to his quarters, because I didn't want to be early, and I didn't want to look stupid. I pressed the door chime, and he told me,
"Come."
He'd called me brave, but it still took me a minute or so to walk through the door. He'd changed out of his uniform, too, and was wearing those loose-fitting trousers he always wore, with a light-coloured tunic. He had a glass of wine in his hand.
"I've a good wine here from my brother, Will," he said. "Or, if you prefer, there's some Irish whiskey in the cabinet over there."
"In the middle of the day, Jean-Luc?" I asked.
He grinned as if he were a naughty schoolboy. "What the hell, Number One," he said. "I've given us both the day off, after all."
I felt a little calmer, and I smiled back at him. "I'll take the whiskey, then," I said, "if you don't mind."
"Help yourself," he said.
I found the bottle and took the small glass he offered me. "Ice?" he asked.
"Neat," I said, and took a sip. There was the pleasant, smooth burn of good whiskey going down my throat. "When did you pick this up?" I asked.
"When I went home last," he said. "Robert had it for me, to take back to the ship, along with a case of our wine."
"It's good," I said.
He sat on the sofa, seemingly calm, or at least calmer than me. "Sit, Will," he said.
"Sir," I answered, and pulled the other chair over.
"Here," he said, "on the sofa. Next to me."
Oh, God. I sat.
"Having second thoughts?" he asked. "Or just nerves?"
"Second thoughts?" I echoed.
He gave a small smile and reached for my hand, and then took it in his, which was warm and surprisingly strong.
"I did invite you for luncheon," he said, "but I thought that a counselling session might be in order first."
"Counselling? Don't we have a ship's counsellor?" I asked.
"Yes, a very fine one," he answered, "and one who has some intimate knowledge of some of your issues. However – " he said, and he looked directly at me, "I think this is a job I ought to take on myself."
"My issues?"
"You're not sleeping, are you?"
This was the second time today that he'd totally lost me. Maybe I was stupid.
"No," I said. "How did you know that?"
He reached over with his other hand and touched underneath my eye. "Dark circles, Will," he said kindly. "No real magic, there. Just observation." He let his hand linger, and I felt myself begin to tremble. "It's all right," he said softly. "For this kind of counselling, Will, you just have to let go."
He pulled me in to him and kissed me, his lips dry and soft.
"Can you allow yourself this?" he asked. "If I offer you the kind of love and affection you seem to want, can you be brave enough to take it as it's offered?"
"It's a very unorthodox form of counselling, sir," I said, letting him kiss me again.
"True, Number One." He grinned. "It's one I'd thought would appeal to you, though."
I couldn't help it; I laughed.
"There we go," he said. He suddenly wrapped me in his arms, and brought my head against his shoulder, and I could feel him kissing me on the back of my neck. "That's the Will I'd like to have back, if I can."
I could feel his heart beating, and his hands were caressing my back, and his lips were brushing along my ear.
"That feels good," I said, and I could feel all of that anxiety just sort of drifting away.
"Mmmh," he murmured. "There's only one small problem, Will." His lips were right next to my ear.
"What's that, Jean-Luc?" I felt his hand slide down to my crotch, and he squeezed me gently.
"You're wearing too much," he said, and he was opening my trousers and then pushing me back onto the sofa.
He kissed me again, pressing into my mouth, and when we broke for air, I said, "I'm not sure that this is the type of counselling Starfleet had in mind, sir."
"I'll leave the details out of my report," he answered. Then he said, "This sofa's too damned small, Will," and he pulled me up and gently led me in towards his bed.
