Chapter 4: A bit about bending

When her alarm sounded at 06:00, she realized she already had a headache. She'd been so relieved that the conversation with Tom had gone well last night that she walked back to her quarters practically on a cloud.

Until she realized how much work she had to get through before she could call it a night. Some she would be able to put off, but some of it absolutely had to get done that night. She'd finally crawled into her bed around 03:00. Now, she replicated her first cup of coffee, and then began to get ready for the day. Going into the bathroom, she wished that she had time to take a bath. Unfortunately, she still had work to get through this morning and she only had time for a sonic shower. She bathed and dressed, combing her hair before pinning it back. It was now too long to be worn down on duty. She applied her makeup (all but her lipstick, which she would put on just before leaving). Dressed, she replicated her second cup of coffee and settled on the couch with a PADD in hand.

Half an hour into her reading, there was chime at her door. She wondered if it was Jean-Luc, wanting to chat before joining Tom on the bridge. She walked over to the door and manually keyed it open.

"Tom," she said, surprised. "What are you doing here?" She assumed he had business to discuss. He couldn't possibly be here socially given that she'd just left his quarters five hours earlier.

"Joining my favorite Admiral for breakfast" he said, striding into her quarters. It didn't seem to occur to him that she hadn't yet invited him in. He walked to the replicator.

"Not that I'm complaining, but I thought you would hit your fill of 'favorite Admiral' time after how late I kept you last night." He was typing in manual commands to the replicator, and she was getting curious as to exactly what he was doing.

She wasn't offended by his presumptuousness. He'd taken similar liberties on Voyager, though never inviting himself to her quarters. Still, she realized that they were on shaky ground. She'd wronged him, and the man Tom Paris was now knew his worth. She found it hard to believe he was acting so freely with her now when less than a day ago he'd been treating her like a distant relative who was visiting. Someone to be respected and shown some degree of affection, but someone you ultimately didn't know and kept at arms length.

"You would think so," he said, not looking at her. The replicator whirred. "But I was told last night that you wanted to catch up on time. And I decided I'm cashing some in this morning." When he turned around, he had two cups of coffee and a plate of croissants in his hands.

"I see," she said, coming into the dining room. "You know I'm not exactly a breakfast person, right?" She scratched her head.

"That's fine. But if you don't eat a croissant, you don't get to drink this coffee." He held up the mugs and the aroma found her. It smelled amazing; much better than the plain coffee she'd replicated herself earlier.

"I'm pretty sure this is blackmail," she said, crossing her arms in front of her. He set down the croissants, as well as the PADD he'd carried in with him.

"Well, if you really feel that way I can just take my coffee and leave." Again, he gestured with the mugs and the tantalizing aroma washed over her. She shook her head, joining him at the table.

"I'm sure I don't know how you learned to be so sneaky." She settled in a chair, putting a napkin in her lap. He sat down across from her.

"My last commanding officer." Before she could respond, he placed a coffee mug in front of her; thus, successfully distracting her. She took several drinks before saying anything.

"This is amazing. And it's not even the same blend you replicated in your ready room." She was looking into her coffee up, staring at the liquid with the kind of amazement with which one would regard a newly formed star. He regarded her over his PADD.

"Nope."

"Hmm." After a few minutes and another cup of coffee, she went to the couch to retrieve her own work before joining him at the table. She plucked a croissant from the plate and began to slowly eat as she read. After a few bites, she stopped and held up her croissant to Tom. "There's chocolate in my croissant." She said it as though she'd just found an intruder in her ready room.

"It's a traditional morning pastry." He kept his eyes on his reading. "You can eat around it if you don't like it. The chocolate's only in the center."

She took a small bite. The chocolate wasn't too sweet; its hard texture was a nice counterpoint to the flaky bread. She popped another piece in her mouth. When the small chocolate center was gone, she discarded the remnants of her bread and reached for a new pastry. Tom smirked, but said nothing.

They mostly sat in silence, but occasionally she asked him questions about the ship, his work. His responses were courteous, but half distracted. Half an hour later, Tom put down his reading and looked at her.

"I should be getting to the bridge soon. I have work to do."

"But you've been doing work here." She, of course, understood that it wasn't different work. More work. But she was teasing him.

"Well I would stay, but as you've gone through all the croissants, I'm concerned that you'd soon rip me apart, hoping to find a chocolate center." He gestured to the pile of hollowed out pastries that lay between them. She arched an eyebrow and considered kicking him under the table.

"Go. Go to your bridge and get out of my hair." He snorted.

"Glad to know your gratitude for bathtubs and coffee is short-lived." He got up and recycled his mug in the replicator.

"Guess you'll have to keep supplying me to stay in my good graces." She stayed seated, eyes returning to her reading.

"You know I would, but I don't think I can get away with anymore bathtubs. The bridge would look a little silly with one there." A croissant shell connected with his head as he bent to pick up his work from the table. He failed to acknowledge it, instead walking around the table. He planted a quick kiss on her forehead, just above the hairline, before walking past her to do the door.

The action took her completely by surprise and she'd almost fallen out of her chair.

"You're still my favorite Admiral. Even if you're cranky and throw pastry guts at me," he called over his shoulder as he walked out the door. "See you on the bridge."

By the time she thought to respond, the doors had already closed behind him. She sat staring, a dumbfounded expression on her face. She didn't know what to think. He certainly hadn't crossed a line. But he was treating her with a kind of affection that he'd rarely shown her on Voyager, and even then he hadn't physically expressed it given their positions.

Had he really forgiven her so quickly? Were they already passed everything after only one late night chat and a thermos of coffee? She found it hard to believe.

The silence that had grown between them the last two and half years had been planted even before they left Voyager. After the Monean incident and then the wedding, she didn't know how to treat him. An uncomfortable distance had developed, though neither seemed mad at the other. She still checked in on him, and when B'Elanna became pregnant she'd been so happy for them both. But he no longer pestered her to play pool with him, and she felt uncomfortable intruding on their growing family. Only once had they acknowledged the precarious status of their relationship, opening up to one another again.

It was after B'Elanna had tried to resequence their baby's genomes so that she would look less Klingon. She and Tom seemed to retreat into themselves, into their life. It hadn't been long before the unexpected return to the Alpha Quadrant.

. . . . .

It'd been a rough few days. They were low on supplies (weren't they always?), and they'd just completed a disappointing round of trade negotiations with the latest species they encountered. She was exhausted, but couldn't sleep. Feeling restless in her quarters, she'd gone to the mess hall and was sitting on a couch, starring at the passing stars. She hadn't even heard the mess hall doors open or Tom come in. She just suddenly noticed him standing behind her and almost jumped out of her skin. She hadn't had time to hide the emotions on her face; the disappointment, the worry; the loneliness and regret.

To his credit, he'd managed not to look concerned. If he had, she would have immediately pulled back into herself. She would have made polite small talk and then left. Instead, he stood looking at her pleasantly, as though he'd just run into her in the turbolift on the way to the bridge. Or anywhere else that wasn't the mess hall in the middle of the night.

"Hungry, captain?" he asked. He wasn't asking if she came here for a snack, thus giving her an out. He wasn't asking her if she was okay either. His approach was more finessed.

"Not really, Lieutenant. I'm fine with coffee." He nodded, moving to the replicator on the wall to the right of them. He manually keyed in something, and then returned to the couch with a massive bowl of ice cream. There were two spoons; one that he was holding and another that was resting on the side of the bowl, half stuck into the ice cream. He sat down next to her. Not close enough to be touching her, but close enough to invade her space.

She wondered if he'd learned that from her, as it was something she knew she did often. He didn't look at her, and didn't offer her the other spoon. Instead, he slowly began to eat the ice cream, staring straight ahead. After a few minutes, he began to talk softly.

"I don't think any relationships are easy, romantic or otherwise." She peeled her eyes away from the stars and looked at him. " I think you have to work at them. I think it takes sacrifice and compromise. I think you have to bend. And I think, in most situations, one person does more bending than the other."

She wasn't sure where this was going, but she didn't stop him. His face was honest and open, and he spoke with a seriousness that he rarely let anyone see.

"I'm not saying that's a bad thing," he said shaking his head, and putting his spoon down on the side of the bowl. "I think it's normal. I think, in most relationships, one person is willing or able to give a little bit more. And that's okay. Neither trust or love are balance sheets. And though it's possible for a person to bend too much or too little, for the whole thing to collapse in on itself, equality isn't the ultimate goal of relationships."

His words were eloquent but sincere, and she began to stare at him. She suddenly wished that it was Tom rather than the Doctor who was teaching Seven about people. She also began to worry about where this was heading. Was he trying to tell her that she gave too little? Was he implying that their friendship had collapsed in on itself because of her? She said nothing, willing him to continue.

"Life with a Klingon isn't easy," he said, picking up his spoon again. She looked surprised but he didn't acknowledge it. They'd spoken of many things over the years, but he never spoke this openly about his relationship with B'Elanna.

"Don't get me wrong, it's rewarding and it works. But easy it is not." He paused as he filled his mouth with ice cream. "I do a lot of the bending. But that's okay. Because I'm willing and able." He slid spoon around the side of the bowl, gathering the ice cream that had already begun to melt."But it isn't as though I'm the one to bend in all of my relationships." He looked at her for the first time since he'd sat down and she tried not to fidget nervously. "Take Harry, for example," he motioned with his empty spoon, "I can't remember the last time we did something together that wasn't what I wanted to do." She smiled slightly at this. "But Harry never minds though. He's just happy to spend time with his best friend."

He'd seemed to have forgotten the ice cream entirely, instead using his spoon to punctuate his words.

"And in a different way, I think Chakotay does more of the bending in our friendship, too." Tom and Chakotay had finally begun to understand each other toward the end of their journey. It had helped that Tom married one of Chakotay's best friends. "My humor is sarcastic and dark, and everything that Chakotay isn't." He smiled, but not at her. It was a smile that she knew was about Chakotay and his sometimes annoying ability to remain compassionate and steady through anything. "But he tolerates it, sometimes even pretends to enjoy it. And does so without complaint."

Here, Tom stopped talking, suddenly remembering his ice cream. The silence was companionable. Eventually, she picked up the second spoon, carefully gathering the ice cream before carefully moving it to her mouth. She realized that the ice cream was coffee flavored, and gently shook her head, her lips turning up at the corners.

"This week was awful." She hadn't meant to say it, exactly. She'd been thinking it all night, but now, between bites of ice cream, it just slipped out of her mouth like it had been pried loose by the spoon.

"I think that's the understatement of the year." He responded to her admission like it wasn't out of the ordinary; like they always stayed up late, eating ice cream out of the same bowl, as they confided in each other.

"We didn't get anything we really needed out of those damn trade talks." Her jaw was set in frustration.

"I don't think what the Plemian First Minister was after was on the menu." He scrunched his face in disapproval, but didn't look up to gauge her reaction. Instead, he regarded the ice cream that they were both finishing at a respectable rate. She considered reining him in here. The comment was clearly inappropriate. But what was the point? He was right, after all. The Minister had made his intentions known, and when his advances toward her had been rejected, he'd made negotiations nearly impossible on her. She shook her head in open frustration. And then she sighed heavily.

"You know, I considered comming Voyager and asking you to beam down to the negotiations." Her tone was serious, but something in her eyes told him he was being set up.

"Oh?" he said, looking at her with one eyebrow raised.

"Mm-hm," she mumbled, spooning more ice cream into her mouth, deliberately making him wait for her response.

"I'm not exactly an expert in diplomacy." He was baiting her, willing her to take the opening.

"True," she replied. "But I was relatively certain that if the Minister went far enough past the line, you would punch him in the nose. . . Or the gills, as it were." He looked at her in surprise. Eventually, both of their shoulders began to heave in silent laughter.

It wasn't lost on her that their whole conversation had been absurd. It didn't have a beginning, a middle, or and end. It was full of inappropriate statements. And now it was punctuated by the irony that she was joking about having him assault an alien dignitary after he'd just gotten his rank back for disregarding protocol and the chain of command. Neither of them seemed to care. When the ice cream was almost gone, she knew that the spell was about to end and she plucked up some courage.

"Tom?" she said, getting his attention. He didn't respond, just looked at her expectantly. "In our relationship. . . which of us bends more? Disregarding rank and the command structure, I mean." She'd managed to keep her voice even as she asked the question, but there was something in her eyes that very much resembled vulnerability. He didn't seem at all phased, but he considered his answer, staring intently at the bottom of the bowl as if the appropriate response were etched there.

"Everything considered. . ." he began, raising his eyes to meet hers. She felt irrationally nervous."I think you and I are one of the rare instances of two people meeting each other about halfway. We both bend, we both require bending, but ultimately neither one takes any more than we give." This wasn't she'd expected him to say, and it must have shown on her face. He smiled at her. Not his normal toothy grin, but a soft smile of understanding and affection. They'd finished the last of the ice cream in silence before each returning to their quarters.

The next week, she decided on a lark to stop by his quarters and invite him to play a game of pool. But Tom wasn't home, and B'Elanna had answered the door. Janeway hadn't even thought to ask the computer if he was in his quarters, and for some reason she was caught off guard by being greeted by her Chief Engineer. The younger woman had seemed surprised and, though polite, a little unhappy to find her captain outside of her door.

Janeway didn't drop by again, and though she could have just verbally invited Tom do something, she never did.

. . . . .

Now, sitting at the dining room table in her guest quarters, she considered Tom's actions minutes earlier. It wasn't all that more intimate than sharing a bowl of ice cream on a couch. Perhaps even less so given their respective positions at the time of that conversation three years ago. But she felt completely unprepared for it now. If she was honest with herself, she'd admit that she came to the Nighthawk with the chief objective of righting things with her former helmsman. She wanted Tom as a friend. But as much as she regretted the last two years, she wasn't entirely sure she was ready for the demands of friendship. Other than Chakotay, most of her friendships were work-based and came with clearly drawn lines. She had become unaccustomed to bending, and she knew it.

She closed her eyes and silently wondered what she'd gotten herself into.

She didn't have time to dwell long. Warning sirens began to drone, and the computer informed her without emotion that the ship was now on red alert. She felt the Nighthawk accelerate to high warp, and she scrambled to put on her shoes and grab her jacket. Jogging to the turbolift, it didn't dawn on her that this was not her ship and, as such, she wasn't required to rush to the bridge. She called her destination in a hurried voice, and waited impatiently as the turbolift sped to its destination. Beneath her concern brimmed something else. It was excitement. She had missed this.