Amanda's Story: Third Interlude
Fireside/Amanda's POV
A/N: Tah-dah! All moved from Grandfather's House. Your reward is below: a new chapter! Thank you for your patience, dear readers.
"I regret, Sarek, if I've told too much." Grace apologizes. While she had left off Amanda's story at leaving the house for the garden, tagging on only Amanda's comment about feeling she'd died and gone to heaven when she'd kissed Sarek for the first time, she wanted to make sure she wasn't offending Sarek.
"Kai'idth." Sarek replies quietly. "Another point of fact: I was not innocent regarding kissing. Such behavior falls within the Vulcan repertoire of intimate expression. Rather, I had never before performed the activity outside my species and outside of being bonded."
"I never saw you practice it." Spock says coolly.
"Such activities are private among…" Sarek hesitates as he studies his son, "among most Vulcans. A Vulcan husband is honor bound to attend to his wife's contentment. In your mother's case…the success of our marriage required we both move beyond our cultural expectations and biases."
"I witnessed little evidence of compromise on your part."
Uhura reaches up and just touches Spock's face and he turns to her. She gives a shake of her head. "Don't. Not now."
Sarek stares into the fire. "Spock is correct. As time passed I became neglectful, reverting to Vulcan habits." Sarek leans forward, his elbows on his thighs, steepling his hands and staring into the space between his fingers. Regret, as illogical as it might be, was plain on his face.
Robert, from his chair beside Sarek and without turning, reaches out and touches Sarek's arm. "My daughter always felt loved, Sarek. She had no regrets."
"It was never easy. From the beginning we constantly struggled to find balance." He sighs softly. "She was very determined, very strong." His voice softens even more. "Very committed."
Although the initiation of their courtship had begun precipitously, abruptly, their courtship had not rushed forward. He had returned to his work at the Embassy, as she had returned to the University and her friendships there. That summer Amanda had returned, as usual, to her internship at the Embassy.
With one difference: on her arrival, her first day or work the following summer, he had waited for her on the Embassy's front steps. She had smiled in surprise as she looked up at him.
"Hey, there."
"Follow my lead." He had said softly to her, extending two fingers to her, and she touched her own to his, curious and more than a little embarrassed to be making such a show.
"Attend." He straightened, and with his fierce Vulcan dignity fully in place, had escorted her—fingers still touching-into the Embassy. He had not had to repeat the performance. His staff had gotten his point.
Without another word from him they had revised Amanda's schedule: adding more detailed training on Embassy protocol and policies, and sessions with their Healers on aspects of Vulcan physiology not normally shared with off-worlders.
She had stormed into his office after one particular session.
"Seven years? Years?!" Her eyes had flashed with disbelief. "No. No, I can't do that." She had slashed with her hand. "I'm young. I'm healthy. You can't do this to me. This is a game changer. You surely can't expect me-I'm not that kind of a person! No!"
He had risen from his desk, then secured the door to his office and had her in his arms before her last 'no' had finished echoing down the corridor.
"Amanda. Calm yourself. What Vulcans must do…does not limit what we can do."
"Oh, yeah? Prove it."
"As you wish."
They had both left his office that day…rather disheveled. It had taken some time for the scandalized looks and the quiet gossip of his staff to settle down. But his point had been made; her uncertainty eliminated.
She was quite inclined to laugh at odd times.
Addictive indeed.
This memory he chose to cherish privately.
She had also gotten the promised ride on his hover bike that summer. This story perhaps he could field.
"Did she speak to you of our first hover-bike ride, Grace?"
Grace leans forward, resting her chin on her hand. "I think you could tell that story better than I, Sarek."
"There is little to tell. I honored a commitment." He considered the memory from his perspective and Amanda's, then begins:
Amanda leans back in her chair at the end of a very long day. She is accustomed to long days and hard work at the Embassy, but for some reason this year it seems more intense than ever. And the staff's attitude toward her has shifted noticeably: from tolerance or amusement to deferential. She wasn't sure she liked it. It made her feel more mischievous than ever.
"You are restless."
She looks up to see Sarek standing at the entrance to her cubicle, studying her. She wonders if her lack of productivity at her work station had somehow caused a notification to be sent to him.
"Sorry. I guess so. It's just…you know, it's summer."
"I am at a loss as to the meaning of your inference."
Amanda rolls her eyes. "I'd rather be outside playing!"
"Ah." He looks down at his clasped hands, thinking, then back at her. "Be at my office in one hour."
That he had just extended her work day frustrated Amanda, but she turned back to her monitor with a growl. "Yes, sir."
Fully expecting to be chewed out in a logical and patient way for her loss of efficiency, she arrives at Sarek's office in precisely one hour.
Sarek stands and holds his hand out toward the chair facing his desk. "For you. I had this delivered."
Puzzled, Amanda stepped forward and opened the shopping bag waiting there. "Riding gear?" She pulled the expensive, protective cat suit from the shopping bag and held it up. "Oh, Sarek…this is top of the line."
"Do you find it satisfactory?"
"It's gorgeous!" She holds it up to herself, measuring it against her limbs and sliding the slick fabric sensuously through her hands. It is difficult for Sarek to suppress his pleasure at her delight.
"My hover-bike is in the Embassy garage. I have spent the last hour ensuring its safe operation, should you care to—"
Amanda strides to Sarek, putting her hands on his chest to balance as she rises onto the tips of her toes. She kisses him on the cheek and steps back. "Yeah. I'm that happy. Let's go."
He lowers his hand from his cheek, from where she had kissed him, startled…and yet, pleased.
Evening was not the safest time for operating a hover-bike, Sarek was aware of this, but the trade-off was anonymity. They slip away from Sarek's security detail and quickly merged onto the interstate system, heading toward the low coastal mountains to the south.
Amanda tightens her grip around Sarek's waist, leaning into him. He had always found riding his hover-bike most satisfactory. The warm press of Amanda's body against his…only served to enhance the experience.
It was not yet dark, the dusk was deep and the low coastal clouds on the western horizon hovered low and purple in the burnt orange glow of the late twilight sky. Behind them the bay area cities flung their gyre of light around the glossy dark finger of the bay.
For a while she thinks he might be taking her to Salinas, but soon they are winding through the streets of Santa Cruz. Sarek pulls to a stop by the historic boardwalk. The summer evening is still and warm, and gentle waves rush up the wide sandy beach.
Amanda dismounts. When she removes her helmet and look up at Sarek, he is staring down at her with undisguised possessiveness.
"I thought this location might meet with your approval."
"Indeed it does." Amanda smiles. "Shall we walk?"
And they did, in their sleek black biking gear, along the shore, side by side into the darkness.
Uhura laughs a little. "Into the darkness. That sounds a little foreboding."
"As it should." Grace adds quickly.
"I don't understand."
Robbie and Chris exchange a look.
Chris adds quietly, "Do you recall the 'Remembering Surak' Historic Arts crisis?"
"Years ago, sure. The Federation almost went to war with Andor over it. Ironically enough, it was part of a peace program exchange, wasn't it?"
"Yes," Grace nods. "The collection disappeared en route."
"Wasn't the exhibit stolen by Orion pirates or something?"
"Indeed." Sarek nods.
"Well, not long after that hover-bike ride, Amanda played a key role in its repatriation."