Chapter 14
"All right, Kathryn," Joan said, settling down into her chair and getting comfortable. "You've been recording your desires for several weeks now. Let's talk about the results. Why don't you start with anything on your list that concerns Mark."
Kathryn scrolled through the PADD she had been carrying with her all that time, and began to read entries to her counselor.
She wanted Mark to have what he had always dreamed of: someone to come home to every night. Someone who could argue philosophy with him until the sun went down. To have his lifelong wish to be a father fulfilled. To see him free from pain and grief. To see him with his friends and family, smiling and wholly himself again.
"What these all seem to boil down to," Kathryn concluded when she had read them all, "is that I just want him to be happy."
Joan nodded thoughtfully. ""Very good. All right then, let's hear what you had to say about Chakotay."
Kathryn took a deep breath and began to read the entries for Chakotay.
An urge to take away his pain. A desire to help him relax by massaging his hands. An absurd, fleeting wish to go back in time to the day the two of them had searched for Captain Braxton in Santa Monica, walking on the boardwalk bathed by golden sunshine while they laughed at the eccentrically-dressed Californians of the 20th century. A deep and somewhat puzzling curiosity over what it would be like to see Chakotay undergoing purification in an incense-filled temazcal. And over and over again, many variations on the same theme: "I want to make him happy."
"Now that's interesting," Joan broke in suddenly.
"That I want to make him happy?" Kathryn frowned. "But it's the exact same thing I said about Mark."
Joan pursed her lips slightly. "Is it?"
A short silence fell. Finally, Kathryn gestured impatiently at the PADD on the coffee table. "Joan, do my lists actually tell us anything helpful? I already knew that I wanted both of them to be happy. I'm sorry to say this exercise may have been a waste of time. What do you think?"
Joan allowed herself a small smile. "I think you know more about what you want than you think you do," she said. "Kathryn, here's your new assignment: take this PADD back home, study it carefully, and see if you can come to a conclusion. I'm sure I don't need to remind you that you have only a week left before you owe Chakotay an answer. Did you have any more entries to read?"
"There's only one more," Kathryn said. "It's…" She trailed off, looking at the last item and feeling a little embarrassed about it. "I wrote that I wanted to play. Just have fun with Chakotay and not let myself worry about anything else for a few hours." She looked up apologetically. "It's a little childish, isn't it?"
"Did you do it?" Joan asked.
"I haven't had a chance to decide. I only wrote it last night, after I said goodbye to him in Lancashire." Her eyes grew distant, thinking about it. Chakotay had been so different yesterday. He had been almost... carefree, an attitude she would not have expected from a man with a trial hanging over his head and a personal tragedy to work through. It reminded her of how Chakotay had been on New Earth: living fully in the moment, with no responsibilities for the future resting on his shoulders, and no compulsion to relive the past. She had always envied him for that. She had wasted the only true rest she could have enjoyed in the Delta Quadrant with obsessing about collecting insects and studying their disease, while Chakotay had focused on making their rudimentary shelter into a home. Their own personal little paradise.
"I can't sacrifice the present waiting for a future that may never happen," he'd said then.
He had been more right than she had been willing to admit. Why couldn't she have listened to him? When would she ever learn to let go of her fears and just... be?
Chakotay finished the entry in his PADD and leaned back on the couch with a sigh. The fabric of the blanket his mother had woven felt rough under his neck. It had accompanied him to every place he had stayed since her death, this blanket - usually draped over the back of a chair, the diamond pattern now as familiar to him as the back of his hand.
He glanced down at the PADD, feeling a certain sense of satisfaction. He had been lax in his personal log-keeping since returning to Earth, but this morning he had woken up thinking of the old man in Huatabampo who was working so diligently to preserve the history of the Rubber Tree People through these years of upheaval, and had been struck by a sudden urge to do his part. The urgency had stuck with him even through today's debriefings, and he had dived into the project as soon as he got back to his San Francisco apartment.
What he really wanted was to be at Huatabampo, working on the teak tree behind Sekaya's house, but the fact of the matter was, he had gone as far as he could with the project until he figured out exactly what he was going to make with all that wood. Sekaya had all the furniture she needed now, and nothing handmade would look right in this sleek and modern apartment provided by Starfleet.
And so he was keeping himself occupied with PADD work, trying not to wonder if Kathryn was ever going to be within his reach. Still another week to go before her self-imposed deadline. Chakotay considered himself a patient man, but after all those years in which the command structure stood between them, he was done with waiting. What he ached for was no-holds-barred passion.
Kathryn had always been so carefully controlled around him when it came to their quasi-romance that if he hadn't known any better, he might have feared she wasn't capable of giving him the passion he needed. But he sensed on a gut level that was wrong. Kathryn had an intensity to her that was tailor-made to his tastes, an intensity tempered only by her sense of duty - first to the crew, and now to Mark. Her loyalty and willingness to sacrifice her desires for the needs of others was exactly what made her so lovable to Chakotay, even though it sometimes meant a sacrifice on his part, too. But he was anxious to see Kathryn get her dues at last. She had earned the right to pursue her own happiness now.
And, if Chakotay was honest, he felt he had earned the right to a little happiness, too.
As much as Kathryn's obvious concern for Mark bothered Chakotay at times, it was also comforting. If she could be that dedicated to Mark, she could be that dedicated to him. Chakotay couldn't shake the conviction that Kathryn would be one hell of a catch, once he managed to actually catch her.
A beep drew him out of his thoughts, indicating that a call was coming through to his computer in the other room. Grateful for the diversion, Chakotay dropped the PADD and went to answer it.
It was Kathryn. Chakotay had to suppress a smile; his grandfather had always insisted that thinking about someone would make them think about you. An old superstition, of course, and yet...
"Did you get the ticket I sent you?" Kathryn asked.
"I did." Chakotay had been surprised to find it waiting in his personal database when he got home: a seat at the world boxing championship match in Paraguay next week, an event that had long ago been sold out. "How did you get it?"
Kathryn shrugged casually. "I know someone who knows someone who knows someone."
Chakotay smiled. "Well, why didn't you get two tickets while you were at it, so you could come with me?"
"Don't think I didn't try," Kathryn said. "I was lucky to get even one. You go, and enjoy yourself. You deserve a break."
And here Chakotay had been worried that Kathryn might be upset with him after the way he'd asserted his independence in Lancaster the other day. Apparently that wasn't the case. There wasn't the smallest hint of constraint in her mannerism now.
"What are you doing tonight?" Kathryn asked.
He briefly toyed with the thought of making up something impressive-sounding, but Kathryn knew him too well and he doubted he would get away with it. "Not much. Date with a replicator."
"You should come over."
"I don't want to intrude. I'm sure you have plans."
"Yes, I do, but you won't intrude on them," Kathryn assured him. "I have an old friend coming over, one of my Academy roommates. I want you to come and meet her."
"I wouldn't want to be a third wheel."
"You won't be. Her husband is coming too."
"Ah, so you want me to rescue you from being the third wheel?" Chakotay quipped.
She smiled wryly. "Well, that wasn't why I asked you, but by all means, come and rescue me."
Chakotay took the turbolift up to Kathryn's floor, and stepped out into the courtyard ringed with doors to various apartments. There was a man dressed in blue jeans and an untucked button-up shirt sitting at one of the little tables near Kathryn's door. He stood up when he saw Chakotay coming.
"You Chakotay?" he asked.
"I am."
"I'm Carl." He stuck out a hand to shake.
"Nice to meet you."
Carl nodded and made no move to go in Kathryn's quarters, but stood there with one fist shoved in his pocket, bobbing up and down on his toes as he looked around the courtyard.
"So you're married to one of Kathryn's Academy roommates?" Chakotay asked.
"Yep."
"And where do you two live?"
"We're in California."
A silence fell.
"Where in California?" Chakotay prompted him.
"Arroyo Grande Valley."
"And what do you do there?"
"I work in agriculture." For the first time Carl seemed to perk up and take interest in the conversation. "I test genetic modifications made to crops, to tailor them for terraforming projects. That's how I met Lettie. She was assigned to the Hood for the terraforming of Browder IV, and they brought me and some of our researchers aboard to consult."
"You're not Starfleet?"
Carl shook his head. "Spending half my life cooped up on a ship with hundreds of other people packed in like sardines? No thank you. In California my nearest neighbor is a mile away. That suits me better."
Chakotay nodded in understanding. "Solitude can be a good thing. Not everyone's a people person."
"I like people just fine." Carl looked at Chakotay with a hint of a twinkle in his eye. "But only in small doses, you understand. Speaking of which-" Carl jerked his thumb at the apartment. "-you, uh, might be sorry you came."
"Why is that?"
"Those two are getting downright giddy. My wife and your Kathryn. I came out here so I could hear myself think for a minute. But I guess we'd better go in now, or Lettie will think I got lost accidentally on purpose."
"Does that happen often?" Chakotay asked.
"Tolerably often."
Carl opened the door to Kathryn's apartment. Immediately Chakotay could hear laughter coming from the living room: a high-pitched giggle that was definitely not Kathryn's.
They walked in, and there was Kathryn sitting on the couch next to a blond woman. They were laughing loudly over something together. As a matter of fact, Chakotay could not remember ever seeing Kathryn laugh that hard. Her cheeks were bright pink and when she saw Chakotay she couldn't immediately speak, but waved her hand helplessly in front of her face as though she were trying to get air. She was wearing gray leggings and a blue frock jacket and she looked far happier than Chakotay remembered seeing in a long time.
"My wife, Lettie," Carl said to Chakotay.
The blond woman stopped giggling - mostly - and stood to shake hands with Chakotay. She had a very white, very pretty smile, and her well-tanned, long legs were showing to perfection against the white of her sundress. Carl was a lucky guy.
Did she ever have a high-pitched giggle, though. Lettie had hardly sat down when she caught Kathryn's eyes, and suddenly they were both laughing hysterically again even though no one had said anything. Carl sat heavily down in an armchair and gave Chakotay a long-suffering look.
"Want to go back out to the courtyard?" he muttered under his breath.
Chakotay shook his head ruefully and sat in the other armchair. Kathryn threw her arms around Lettie's shoulders and shook her affectionately.
"Oh, Lettie," she gasped. "Never, never, never change. Oh! Tell Chakotay - he missed it - tell Chakotay about the Vulcan bartender. He'll like that one."
"Oh, this is a good one!" Lettie said eagerly, scooting to sit on the edge of the couch and rubbing her hands in anticipation. "Okay, so, once when I was on a mission to Caitia I got some leave time and I wound up at this bar that had a Vulcan bartender. And while I was sitting there some Andorians came up and asked him where he was from. And he said Vulcan, of course..."
"There's no 'of course,'" Kathryn objected, tapping imperiously on Lettie's arm. "Vulcan has colonies, you know."
"Shhh!" Lettie slapped her hand away. "I'm telling it!"
"Sorry."
They laughed like children.
"Anyway," Lettie said at last, trying to calm down. "Where was I?"
"The Andorians were asking-" Kathryn started.
"Right, right, right. So then the Andorians asked the bartender where on Vulcan he was born. I guess they'd been there for some conference or something... or maybe it was for a vacation, although I don't know why anyone would go to Vulcan for a vacation-"
Kathryn looked offended. "Lettie, I went to Vulcan for a vacation once, and it was very nice."
Lettie gave her a weird look. "What did you do there? Meditate? Bake yourself in the middle of a desert?"
"I helped Tuvok shop for meditation lamps."
"Well, that sounds just... I don't know..."
"Fascinating?" Kathryn suggested.
"I was thinking more like, boring beyond belief."
They both howled with laughter.
"You'll never hear the end of the story," Carl predicted in an undertone, leaning toward Chakotay.
Chakotay was beginning to wonder about that himself. He had just noticed there were several glasses of dark red liquid on the coffee table. In fact, Kathryn and Lettie were both taking swigs from their glasses now. Chakotay couldn't help but feel a smile beginning to tug at his lips. So that explained the giggling, then. He had never seen Kathryn drink more than one glass of wine at a time. Her discipline had always impressed him, actually. Eight years in a high-stress environment and as far as he knew she had never once gotten drunk. Apparently she held herself to a different standard at home. Chakotay couldn't be sorry he came, now, if only to see Kathryn like this.
"So where on Vulcan was the bartender born?" he asked patiently when the women had calmed down somewhat.
"Oh, yes." Lettie took a deep breath. "He told the Andorians he was born in the Kir District. And they said-" She giggled and wheezed helplessly.
"And they said, 'What part?'" Kathryn supplied.
"I'm telling it!" Lettie slapped Kathryn's knee scoldingly.
"Sorry."
"The Andorians said, 'What part?'" Lettie's voice had gotten so high in her hysterics that she sounded like she'd been sucking helium. "And the bartender said... he said..."
"All of me," Carl cut in.
Lettie threw a cushion at Carl.
"I was telling it!" she cried.
Chakotay thought about it for a long moment, and hesitantly chuckled.
"You didn't miss the point of the joke," Carl said, looking at Chakotay knowingly. "It just isn't that funny."
Kathryn put her forehead on Lettie's shoulder and laughed helplessly. Lettie patted her hair and giggled some more.
"I'm going to go pour you a drink," Carl said to Chakotay, starting to get up.
"I guess if I can't beat them, I might as well join them," Chakotay said.
"No, no, no," Kathryn said hastily. "You're a guest, Carl. I'll go get it. I was actually just going to get up and get some game or something for us to play, anyway." She picked up her own glass and slid past Lettie and padded toward the kitchen in her bare feet.
Chakotay followed her to the kitchen and watched as she retrieved a carafe filled with deep red liquid, and filled a glass for Chakotay and then refilled her own.
"Are you sure that's a good idea?" Chakotay asked, picking up his glass and trying not to look alarmed at how full she had just filled hers.
Kathryn looked at him in surprise. "Why wouldn't it be?"
Chakotay was having trouble suppressing a grin. "Well, as I'm just now discovering, you're charming when you're drunk, but if you have another glass, you're going to end up falling asleep."
"What?" she said, putting her glass down and turning to face him with hand on hip. "I am not drunk!"
"If you say so. How many glasses have you had?"
She looked away and sighed in exasperation, and then looked back with a little smile touching her lips. "If you must know, Lettie and Carl live next door to a vineyard, and this is grape juice that their neighbor hand-crushed yesterday. This is what they give to their children to drink."
"Oh." He took a taste. Sure enough, no bitter hint of alcohol or synthehol, just sweet, fresh goodness straight from the vine. "Color me surprised. This is delicious."
She took a sip and laughed at him, long and low. "You really thought I was drunk? I must have let my hair down more than I thought."
He shrugged a little sheepishly. "I guess I've never seen you with a girl friend before."
"Haven't you?" She thought a moment. "I guess you haven't." She shook her head. "Well, in that case you should be glad I cancelled what I was supposed to be doing tonight, and invited you and Lettie over instead. Otherwise, you wouldn't have had the privilege of seeing me act like a drunken fool."
"Why, what were you supposed to be doing tonight?"
"I was supposed to have my Aunt Martha over."
Chakotay frowned. "The Aunt Martha who was so proud of your ancestor Shannon O'Donnell?"
"That's the one. I was going to tell her the - ahem - the truth about Shannon tonight. I wasn't really looking forward to it. She would have been crushed."
Chakotay was mildly scandalized. "And you canceled on her at the last minute? Kathryn!"
"Well..." she said defensively. "It wasn't so much that I was afraid to tell her. It's just that I was more in the mood to have fun tonight, and my counselor gave me a really dangerous piece of advice-"
Lettie walked into the kitchen. "Kathryn, can we replicate some snacks or something? Something sweet and horribly unhealthy. I'm feeling reckless."
"Help yourself," Kathryn said, waving toward the replicator.
"What are you in the mood for?" Lettie called over her shoulder.
"Oh... I'm thinking tiramisu. Chakotay, what do you want?"
They batted around several dessert ideas for a minute, until Lettie got impatient and said: "Let's just replicate some of everything," and promptly did exactly that.
"So what was the advice?" Chakotay asked Kathryn as they followed Lettie into the living room, laden with dishes.
"Advice?"
"You said Joan gave you dangerous advice."
"Oh, yes. She told me to put some serious thought into doing what I want, for a change." She smiled impishly. "I'm finding it very liberating."
They put the food down on the coffee table, and Chakotay returned to his armchair. Kathryn stood there for a moment, brow creased slightly, and then said: "I'm going to go find a game for us to play. Lettie, will you come give me a hand?"
Lettie had just settled back into the couch, but she got up willingly enough and the two of them disappeared into the other room.
Chakotay glanced over at Carl. "Did I hear Kathryn say you have kids?"
Carl nodded. "Three of them."
"How old?"
"They're 7, 5 and 3."
Chakotay whistled between his teeth. "So how does that work out when Lettie's out in space? Do you take time off from your terraforming projects, or do you have a family member who helps out?"
"Oh, Lettie doesn't go into space anymore," Carl said. "She retired from Starfleet when we got married, and she does research with me now. It's easier for us to arrange schedules that way, so one of us can always be with the kids." He shrugged. "And we take them out into the fields with us sometimes, anyway. They're old enough to be able to help with a few things, and our oldest is even learning how to use some of the equipment. She loves it. Thinks it's more fun than playing with toys."
Lettie came back in, walked over to Chakotay, and touched his shoulder. "Is it all right if I trade you seats?" she asked. "So I can sit by Carl?"
"Sure." He got up and moved over to the couch, just as Kathryn showed up with a deck of cards in her hand and came over to the couch too.
Chakotay scooted over to make room for Kathryn. She sat down and then scooted over so that she was sitting right next to him, with their knees nearly touching. He gave her a slightly puzzled look, and she readily returned his gaze and held the eye contact for a few seconds longer than was strictly necessary, with the barest hint of a smile on her face. Chakotay had never seen quite that expression on Kathryn's face before, and he tried to work out what it could mean. It looked something like the gleam in a tiger's eye moments before it sprang on some poor unsuspecting prey. What was Kathryn up to?
"So, who's dealing?" Lettie asked.
Finally, Kathryn dropped her gaze.
"Youngest first," she said, and tossed the deck to Lettie. "Deal them out, seven each."
"Why couldn't we play poker?" Lettie said plaintively, beginning to shuffle the cards nonetheless. "Something I'm actually good at."
"Lettie used to do a little acting on the side, back at the Academy," Kathryn explained to Chakotay.
"So as you can imagine, she's a terror at the poker table," Carl put in. "The more you try to read her face, the more confused you get. "
"She does this thing," Kathryn said, "where if she gets a good hand, she lets you see her get excited. Only you know that the last time she had a good hand, she acted grumpy. So you second-guess yourself. Is she acting this time, or not? And you never guess right. At least I never did."
Lettie smiled smugly as she began dealing out cards. "Which is why you don't play poker with me anymore," she said. "Coward."
"It's more a question of choosing my battles wisely," Kathryn said coolly, taking a bite of tiramisu.
They started to play. The game went slowly for the first round, as Lettie, Carl and Chakotay worked to learn the rules, but by the second round they started to get the hang of it and the play moved more quickly.
It came around to Kathryn's turn. She frowned at her cards for several seconds, and then turned to Chakotay.
"Do you have a draw-two?" she asked.
Chakotay shot her an amused look. "I'm not sure you understand the rules of your own game, Kathryn. This isn't Go Fish. You don't get to know what I have in my hand."
"No, no, I'm trying to help you out," she said. "If you have a draw-two, then I can play mine now, and you can put yours on top, and then Lettie will get slammed with both of them."
Lettie scoffed loudly. "What did I ever do to you?"
"Nothing, except I'm a little alarmed by the fact that you have only one card left in your hand," Kathryn shot back. "So, do you?" she added, looking back at Chakotay. "Have a draw-two?"
He narrowed his eyes at her. "If I say no, then you're going to slam me with your draw-two, and if I say yes, you're going to hit me with a draw-four or something worse, aren't you?"
"Ouch, that hurts. After all these years, you don't trust me?"
Chakotay studied her face carefully. "Not when it comes to a competition, I don't."
She looked offended. "I'm not playing against you."
"Sorry," Chakotay said. "Not buying it. Play your card already."
She gave him that strange tiny smile again, the tiger-on-the-prowl look, and without warning her hand darted out, grabbed him by the wrist, and dragged his handful of cards toward herself. Chakotay pulled his hand back, but it was too late, she had already seen his cards.
"Ah, so you do have a draw-two!" Kathryn said triumphantly, and threw a draw-two of her own down on the pile.
Chakotay looked at it and smiled. "I stand corrected. I should have trusted you."
"Yes, you should have," Kathryn agreed.
Chakotay laid his draw-two on top of hers. Lettie's mouth dropped open.
"Draw four, Lettie," Kathryn said.
"I'm not drawing anything!" she objected strenuously. "You two are cheating!"
"There's nothing in the rules that says you can't work with someone else if you want to," Carl said placidly.
"Don't you take their side!" Lettie said, swatting Carl's knee. "This is not a team game!"
"Sorry, we don't play any way but as a team," Kathryn said, grinning at Chakotay.
"We tried to play against each other once or twice," Chakotay agreed. "It never seemed to work out."
Lettie pouted theatrically. "I was about to win!"
"Exactly!" Kathryn and Chakotay said at the same moment, and then exchanged glances and laughed.
Lettie sighed heavily, but she drew four cards. "Carl, if you have a draw-two, now's the time to make them pay."
Carl laid down a blue 3.
"Seriously?" Lettie complained.
"What? I don't have anything better!"
It was back to Kathryn. She helpfully scooted even closer to Chakotay and held up her cards so he could see. She silently pointed to one of her cards and then to one of his and looked at him questioningly. He nodded his head, and she played the card she had indicated. Then he laid down a reverse, sending the play back to Kathryn, and she changed the color to one that suited Chakotay's hand better.
"Yellow?" Carl said. "Come on. I've got nothing." He drew a new card, but it wasn't yellow either. "Pass."
Lettie had to draw too, and growled when she didn't get a yellow, either. Chakotay smiled broadly and put down one of his yellows.
"You guys are big fat cheaters," Lettie complained. She got up and scooted her armchair right up against Carl's and held up her cards so that he could see. "Well, honey, if we can't beat them..."
They played for the rest of the game like that, two against two, but in the end Chakotay was the first to get rid of all his cards.
"Nice work," Kathryn told him, patting his knee, as Lettie threw down her remaining cards with a playful growl. Carl started gathering up all the cards for reshuffling.
"I couldn't have done it without you," Chakotay said.
Kathryn smiled at him sweetly, and fiddled with her earring. "You owe me big time, mister."
It was the first time Chakotay had noticed that Kathryn was wearing earrings tonight. Suddenly he found himself fixated on them. He had seen her wear earrings on occasion during her off-hours on Voyager, but they had always been studs or tiny hoops. These were neither. It looked like they were a more dangly kind, with drop-shaped pearls at the ends. Chakotay found himself fighting an almost irresistible urge to tuck Kathryn's hair back behind her ear so he could see them better.
Better not. Carl and Lettie might get the wrong idea about them if he did. Can't have that. Definitely can't have that.
Chakotay realized he was still staring at Kathryn. He cleared his throat and quickly looked away. When he glanced back, Kathryn was still looking at him, smiling a little from their victory, her blue eyes unusually bright. Had she done something different with her makeup? He tried to look without looking. Eventually he decided not. The makeup looked the same, it was Kathryn herself who was different tonight. It was as though she were more... here than she usually was, if that made any sense.
"Here we go," Carl said, starting to deal out cards again.
"No teaming up this time," Lettie said, looking at Chakotay and Kathryn significantly, "or you're going to be responsible for giving me gray hairs. More of them. Look at this!" She pointed significantly at her hair. "I started finding gray hairs about a year ago. Me! And I'm still in my forties!"
"I can't even see them," Kathryn said soothingly.
"Well, I can," Lettie said. "And look at Carl! He hasn't had a single one, not one gray hair, and he's five years older than me! It isn't fair! At least men can look good with gray hair, but women never do."
"I disagree," Chakotay said. "My mother went gray early. She looked beautiful. Especially when she took it out of a braid at the end of the day and it was long and wavy."
Lettie smiled and inclined her head graciously. "I stand corrected, then. Looks like you didn't inherit her genes, though."
Suddenly Chakotay had to be very careful not to look in Kathryn's direction. "That's right, I've never had anything but completely black hair. No gray hairs at all."
"Nope, not one," Kathryn confirmed straight-faced.
"Not since I started coloring it," Chakotay added.
"Wait, what?" Lettie burst out laughing.
"Chakotay had the salt-and-pepper look when I first met him," Kathryn said, looking at him sidelong with a mischievous smile. "Very sexy."
"Okay, here we go," Carl said, tossing a card on the last pile. "You first, Kathryn."
They started playing the next round, but Chakotay's head was reeling so fast he could hardly see his cards. Had Kathryn really just called him sexy? Right in front of her friends? She had never said such a thing to him even when they were alone. He eyed the glass of juice in front of Kathryn and had to remind himself that it wasn't wine. All right, so Kathryn wasn't drunk, but something about her had been different the whole night. Maybe in the excitement of reuniting with Lettie, and inspired by her friend's carefree attitude, Kathryn had accidentally blurted something out that she hadn't meant to say.
But it didn't seem like it had been an accident. Judging by the sidelong glance she had given Chakotay as she spoke, it seemed more like she was hoping to provoke a response from him. He risked a glance back over at Kathryn. Sure enough, she was watching him with that stalking-tiger look. Chakotay found himself getting completely flustered. Why was she doing this? What had brought it on? Did she mean anything by it, or was she just playing with him?
She had never played with him quite like that before.
"Ha!" Lettie burst out, wrenching his attention away from Kathryn. "It's payback time!" She plucked a card from her hand and slapped it down on the table. "A big, fat, beautiful draw-four for Chakotay. Oh, revenge is sweet!"
They went on playing the game for several more rounds, with Lettie getting more and more animated as time went on, until even Carl was infected by her high spirits. After a while, Chakotay gave up trying to figure out why Kathryn was being so playful, and just enjoyed it. It had been much too long since he had been in an atmosphere like this. It felt as though a knot in his chest had been loosened, and he could breathe again.
Finally, as the night wore on, it seemed like Lettie was coming down from her sugar high, and she and Carl starting saying, reluctantly, that they had better go back home and relieve their babysitter. They put the cards away and Lettie and Carl carried the glasses into the kitchen. In the suddenly quiet living room, Chakotay helped Kathryn gather up the dirty plates.
"I'll go recycle these," Chakotay said, picking up the stack.
He started to go around the corner into the kitchen, but then he almost immediately turned around and came right back into the living room, plates still in hand.
"What's wrong?" Kathryn asked.
Chakotay put the plates back down on the coffee table and sat next to Kathryn on the couch again with a strange expression on his face.
"What?" she asked again.
He cleared his throat. "Lettie and Carl were... having a moment in your kitchen. I don't think my presence would have enhanced it in any way."
Kathryn laughed, quickly tried to silence herself lest Carl and Lettie hear, and immediately choked on another burst of laughter, her eyes squeezing shut from mirth. With heroic effort she stopped at last, but then had the misfortune of catching Chakotay's eyes to see that he was trying not to chuckle, too. They spent the next minute violently suppressing their laughter.
"I can't believe they're still in there," Chakotay whispered when they at last managed to calm down.
"They're acting like a couple of newlyweds," Kathryn whispered back.
"They're going to get chapped lips."
Kathryn tipped her head back against the couch cushion, one hand pressed to her forehead, and laughed long and low. Her hair tumbled back and Chakotay almost got a good look at her earrings. Just one strand of hair in the way. Without even thinking, he lifted his hand and brushed it back. She turned her head and gave him a startled look.
"Sorry," he said quickly. "I just... like your earrings. I haven't seen these before."
"My father gave them to me," she said. "For my 18th birthday. I found them in storage this week and thought it would be good to wear them again."
"They're nice."
She studied him quietly for a moment. "I'm so glad you came over," she said.
"Am I better company than your Aunt Martha, then?"
"Just..." She held her forefinger and thumb very close together to show him how much better, while her eyes twinkled at him. "Don't tell her, all right?"
Chakotay studied her for a moment. "Did you really like my hair back when it was gray?" he asked suddenly.
"Mmm. Very distinguished."
"Can I tell you a secret?" Chakotay asked.
"Please do."
"I liked it back when your hair was long. When you let it fall down all around your shoulders." His voice dropped down to a near-whisper. "Very sexy."
He wasn't quite sure how she'd react to that, but to his relief Kathryn just smiled, with a faint hint of pink stealing across her cheeks.
"I'm glad you came," she said again.
"Me too. I didn't really know what to expect."
Kathryn frowned slightly. "Why not?"
"I never do. I've never been sure, on any given day, whether I'm going to encounter Kathryn or Captain Janeway," he said.
Her smile faded a little, and there was a long pause. "And which one were you hoping for?" she asked, unexpectedly serious.
"You know, it's funny," he said slowly. "One or the other's never enough. I like it best when you're both at the same time. Like tonight." He paused, and looked down at his glass. "Are you sure this isn't alcoholic? I don't think I'm making an ounce of sense."
She was looking at him wonderingly. "Actually," she said, "you're making more sense than you know."
He chuckled, but he could feel himself beginning to come down from his giddy high and was starting to feel slightly foolish. "That's only because you've had as much of this grape juice as I have. I better get home to bed before my hangover strikes."
Kathryn followed Chakotay slowly to the door. "I'll see you at work tomorrow?" she asked.
"If I don't call in sick," he quipped.
"I'm not going to face the debriefing on the Malons without you," Kathryn said. "If you call in sick, then so will I."
"Because that wouldn't look suspicious at all, both of us absent the same day."
"You think people would talk?"
Chakotay raised his eyebrows. "Considering how much our crew loves gossip? I know they would."
Kathryn smiled slowly. "What would they say?"
Chakotay took a deep breath. "Probably that…"
"What?"
He tried to shrug casually. "Probably that we'd gone off on another moonlit sail on Lake George, just like the last time we went on the lam together during a work shift."
"You do owe me another one of those," Kathryn pointed out.
"I hadn't forgotten."
"Good, because I intend to hold you to it. And I want the real Lake George this time," Kathryn said firmly. "No holodeck simulations."
"Your wish is my command. New York is just a transporter ride away."
Kathryn smiled, and then sighed. "I suppose we'd better be responsible and not miss work tomorrow, though. Save it for another time."
"If you think telling Admiral Hayes all about the Malon sounds like more fun than going for a sail with me, Kathryn, just say so."
Kathryn made an exasperated sound. "You know very well which one I'd prefer. Don't tempt me."
"I wish I'd known it was this easy to tempt you. I might have tried it a long time ago."
"Yes, and then I'd end up facing seven court martials instead of six. Go home, Chakotay. You're a bad influence on me."
"Yes, ma'am."
She suddenly laughed. "Don't say that to me."
"You used to like it when I 'yes ma'am'-ed you."
"That was then. Now you're a strong and independent man who doesn't listen to me anymore."
"I've been listening to you all night," Chakotay objected.
"I'll put you in for a commendation," Kathryn said dryly. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I have two lovebirds in my kitchen who need to be broken up so I can get some sleep tonight. I'll see you in the morning."
Chakotay stepped out into the courtyard. "If I decide to show up."
"If you don't, I'm revoking the commendation." Kathryn pushed the door control and it slid shut on him with finality.
TO BE CONTINUED
Author's note: Thank you to Wileret, Alycia Coyle, lynnki and bevfan for your reviews! I had a LOT of fun writing this chapter, and I hope everyone enjoyed reading it. Let me know what you thought!