Thirty-Four
Three Months Later – Vulcan
Siranon wondered how long this wall between himself and his wife would last. A series of not very nice events happened right after their formal wedding. He knew they both shared the blame.
The moment they were married and returned from their post-marital trip, T'Pau recalled him to Vulcan. Shanna felt they needed time to get things into proper order first, but Siranon, eager to obey his clan mother and remove his wife from what he saw as several things that were detrimental to her, had been insistent that they leave as soon as possible. And off they were within three weeks.
In the wake of their leaving, he did not understand Shanna's grief over several things.
Leaving behind Telvin was one part of her grief. He knew the old Vulcan had been crotchety and troublesome to his wife at the beginning of her working with him, so he took it for granted that she would not mind leaving him behind.
The son of her ex-fiance had also found a way past some rigorous technological and security blockages and showed up on their doorstep mere days before they were to leave for Vulcan. Siranon also had not handled that well.
The door chimer sounded and she was ahead of him to answer it. As Siranon rounded the corner, all he saw was his wife sobbing and holding the young boy to her. And the boy clung to her in return. He could not tell his exact age, but the child looked to be somewhere between 5 and seven years. He very strongly resembled Shanna's ex and that was the thing that sparked Siranon's instant jealousy.
"Shanna?" Siranon asked, his voice colder than she had ever heard.
She startled and looked up at him. For some reason, he felt nothing but guilt pouring off of his wife. "Siranon, this is Lewis."
Siranon looked down at the boy and saw nothing but a miniature of his father. And the boy's eyes looked up and into his with accusation and anger. "Who's he?" asked Lewis as his face took on a darker cast.
"That's my husband," said Shanna. "Now you have to tell me, how did you get here? How did you get past security at the front gate?"
His face lightened up and he smiled as he looked up at Shanna. "I just went through dad's PADD and found the psychologist's notes to him. Everything was in there."
Shanna looked over at Siranon in horror and then back down at the boy. "You did what?"
"I saw it in the notes. Why did dad ask you not to see me again? Why?" he asked, his face confused.
Shanna shook her head as Siranon found himself interjecting, "By law we must inform the authorities he is here."
Shanna nodded, "I know."
"Don't!" Lewis said as the anger in his eyes toward Siranon turned to pleading. "Can I just… can I just stay with mom for a while?"
Siranon, not understanding where his hostility was coming from, found himself practically barking, "She is not your mother!"
"Yes, she is! You're a liar! Vulcans don't lie! Why are you lying?!"
Shanna was straining not to cry. "Lewis, sweetie, who told you I was your mother?"
He deflated as tears of frustration began running down his angry little face. "I know you're not my real mom, but you are mom. You're MOM and just— I just want to stay with you sometimes! Please?"
And then Siranon watched as his wife turned into somewhat of a diplomat herself. She sat down on the ground in their open doorway and placed the boy onto her lap. She put her arms around him and he leaned into her as if he'd waited so long to see her again. The boy who looked just like his father. "Sweetheart, do you understand laws, and court mandates, and things like the police?"
He was sobbing silently as he sat in her lap, but he nodded. "Yes."
"Well since I'm not your biological parent, your father… he is your biological parent. And the law says I don't have any rights to you at all."
"But don't you want me to stay?" he protested.
"Sweetheart, I never wanted to leave you," she admitted as she looked down into his big tear-stained eyes and shook her head. "Not ever. Not in a million years."
"So then you should get back with dad and then we can all be together again."
She shook her head as tears began to course down her cheeks. "You're a very smart boy. You know how things work. And you know that is not possible."
He nodded as he pushed his face into her chest and sobbed it out. He looked up into her face again. "I know I can't stay… But can you still be my mom? Just say you're my mom and it'll be okay, all right?"
Shanna smiled down into the boy's face that looked so much like his father and Siranon forced himself to keep his mouth shut as she said, "Of course. I will always be your mother. Maybe someday they will allow you to come and visit, right?"
"You would be okay with that?" he asked eagerly, as if that had never occurred to him.
"Sure! But you can't do that if you come back without permission, right?"
He sighed as he thought, "That would make them mad. You're right."
"So we'll call your father to come and get you all right?"
He sighed sadly. "All right."
Siranon was shocked as his wife stood and subtly pushed past him. "I'm bringing Lewis inside to have a snack. He has to be hungry. You can call his father and the authorities, now."
Siranon found himself standing outside the kitchen as he observed Lewis and Shanna from afar. The boy looked up at her eagerly as he spoke, seeking approval for everything. He told her about his grades in school, and his friends, and his new hobby of tracking down classic books of Earth. Shanna smiled down at him as she listened. It was one of the happiest he had seen her face. The only time she ever looked that happy was when she was with Henry and Ananda. He felt a dull ache of shame somewhere from deep within. She had obviously missed this boy terribly.
When Willem came to pick him up, Siranon found himself chafing on the inside. Shanna did not want Siranon to come out to hand the boy over with her.
So he watched from the window as the tall, handsome Willem regained his son and smiled down at Shanna's face. His insides grew angry because Shanna was smiling back up at him. And he saw the three of them standing together, the family that could have been. A part of him was aware of the devastation of the boy, but a more primal part of him wanted to go outside and take Shanna away from them and bring her back into their home with their children.
He squelched the urge to listen in on their conversation via their bond.
After some time and conversation, Shanna gave Lewis one last hug. Siranon felt his blood boil when Willem himself reached over and hugged Shanna. The Vulcan felt his jaw set firmly as both adults took the child into their hug and said some final words to him. The boy at last looked satisfied and happy and then Shanna walked away from her other family and re-entered their home.
Her smile turned into anger as she looked at Siranon. She didn't say a word at first.
His eyes squinted. "Did you have to touch the other male?"
"Oh shut up!" she shouted at him as she turned and walked away.
Siranon followed closely behind her as she began rapidly walking in the direction of their bedroom. But that was quite a distance from the front door and they had words the entire way.
"Is this the way you speak with he who is your husband?" he asked, becoming even more incensed.
"I do when he acts as if the emotional and psychological stability of a six your old boy is somehow a threat to him, personally!"
"I do believe his father allowed him to find where you lived in order to-"
"Do you hear yourself?!" she asked as they finally got to the stretch of hallway around the corner from their bedroom.
"So what was decided?" he asked stiffly.
"I'm to speak with Lewis every other month by subspace while I'm off-world."
He chafed on the inside once again that she would have such regular contact with either of them. "I suppose you would speak with Willem, as well, during these conversations?" he accused.
"If you don't 'get it' that that boy is hurting and needs a mother-"
"It does not have to be you," Siranon shouted, raising his voice.
"This discussion is over," she said, coldness in her eyes.
"It is," he agreed.
They turned and went their separate ways. The couple slept apart their last three days on Earth.
Siranon sat in his office there, on Vulcan, as he put down the documents he most certainly was not paying attention to. He and Shanna had come to somewhat of a truce on the matter of Lewis. He remembered a former promise he had made her concerning the child. He had not, however, been prepared for the child to resemble his father that strongly.
Once they'd arrived on Vulcan, a few other events had taken place that seemed to put he and his wife at odds. It seemed that so much had gone wrong since they had arrived. And he didn't know how to fix any of it.
CCCCCCCCCC
Shanna sat at home and grimaced in pain. The latest site where she injected the tri-ox compound in order to just be able to breathe on Vulcan was beginning to hurt again. She would have to switch up to a new site the next day, she saw. She had been meaning to figure out a plan to change up her sites of injection every two days or so, but she just didn't seem able to think clearly at all. Maybe, she surmised, the current state of things between herself and her husband was blocking her ability to think straight.
She had just seen both the children off to the two nannies that had accompanied them. She was feeling a little bit alone since they had arrived on Vulcan. Reianna had been unable to come with them yet. Shanna had granted her time off to go to Betazed and deal with a family emergency. She would arrive in about a week's time. But Shanna had never cultivated that closeness with T'Lera or Mrs. Tyler. She missed everyone back home. Lisa, Amanda, Maya… her mother.
Everyone had been as unemotional on Vulcan as Shanna had expected. That had not been a shock to her.
What had been somewhat of a shock was watching Siranon have that coldness seem to rub off onto him. Everything she did, everywhere she went, there was enquiry by the house staff there on Vulcan as to why she was doing whatever it was she was doing. They were nothing like their staff back on Earth.
The logicalness of every decision she made was questioned. That would not have angered her so much if Siranon had thought to back her up more often. But he seemed to go along with the speculation of what form of logic had driven her to order the children this piece of furniture or that type of clothing.
At least, she mused with a grim smile, no one could say she ever acted inappropriately in public. She began to wonder if maybe she should act inappropriately in public just to get some kind of reaction from her husband.
But she had most certainly acted inappropriately in private with him! She was ashamed of some of the things she had said and done. She was still seething from Siranon's reaction to Lewis, and then leaving behind Telvin…
Within three weeks of their leaving Earth, she'd gotten word of Telvin's death. She was somehow convinced that her leaving had affected the old man negatively. And in turn, she found herself blaming her husband. She knew that it was not a logical reaction. But it was almost as if she couldn't help herself as the angry words, "I don't know what we were thinking, doing this thing, whatever it is we're doing here!" fell off of her tongue.
He sighed as he said, "It would appear we are not doing well in the least."
That was all he'd had to say that day.
She went out onto their private terrace. What was the use, she wondered, of remaining here like this? Wasn't this the nightmare situation she had not wanted? She hadn't wanted to get married and regret it. And here she was, married and regretting it. An overwhelming sensation of being trapped seemed to dog her every thought these days. What the hell had gone wrong?
"My wife," came the words from behind her.
She startled and turned. "Siranon," she greeted.
He noticed that her mental walls were up. The two had barely communicated via their bond since the situation back on Earth right before they'd left.
He walked onto their large private balcony and approached her carefully. "My wife, may we speak candidly?"
"I think we've spoken quite candidly to one another for the past few weeks, don't you?"
"No. We have been careless," he said, his eyes open and searching hers.
She looked over at him and her eyes harbored anger and fear. "So?"
He sat down on an available backless bench. "Open your mind to me. Perhaps if-"
She turned from him sharply. "If you can't get to me with words first, I don't see any reason to trust you with my thoughts."
He sighed tiredly. "We shall do it your way, then."
She looked over at him, surprised. It was the most accommodating he had been to her since he had gotten the order for them to come here. So she went and sat down on the bench with him and waited. She sighed. "Okay."
He swallowed. "My wife, I do not wish for us to part ways."
She looked over at him, at his eyes. If she would just open her mind, she could know… She looked down. "I don't want things to be like this anymore," was all she could strain out.
"If we meld, we can discover why things have-"
"Do it your way! The Vulcan way! Everything is always done your way!" she found herself exploding.
Siranon found himself sitting there in shock as his wife spilled a new spate of angry words at him.
"I can't even make a grilled cheese sandwich on this planet without a Vulcan asking me why I would eat something so illogical! What time I wake up in the morning, how I do my hair, how I do Ananda's hair, what time I go to bed at night, the style in which I cut Henry's hair! The way I interact with Henry and Ananda! Everything is under a goddamned microscope from your staff in this house! This doesn't even feel like my house! Neither place we've lived has been mine! It's been yours! And no matter how much tri-ox I inject I can't breathe! And now you want to see directly into my mind!"
It occurred to Siranon then what half the problem might be. He reached across and grabbed Shanna's arm.
"What are you doing!"
He covered her mouth with one hand, but the fingers of his other hand was on her pulse point at her wrist. He was counting silently. He frowned and announced, "Your pulse is off…"
She watched with something like detached fascination as he shook his head rapidly. "I am calling the healer. Something is very wrong."
a/n The next chapter's already written. I'm just proofreading it. Returning to school has stressed me out to no end and as a result I must write for my sanity!