Disclaimer: Voyager belongs to Paramount Pictures. No infringement intended.
The first time I saw Kathryn was in this house. It was a shock because although I'd been with her every day for the previous seven years, until that moment I didn't know that I'd never seen the real Kathryn. We worked side by side, became friends and later lovers but a part of her was always hidden from me.
We made it back to the Alpha Quadrant and once the formalities with Starfleet were over we headed to Indiana to spend some time with Kathryn's mother. As we walked up the path the front door flew open to reveal a short, grey-haired woman with Kathryn's blue eyes. It was at that moment that the captain vanished and in her place was Kathryn, the daughter and the child. A radiant smile split Kathryn's face even as tears sprang to her eyes. She dropped the bag that she had been carrying, wrenched her hand from my grasp, ran up the path and fell into her mother's arms.
And in those arms she found love and acceptance, safety and peace. In her mother's arms she found everything that I had been trying to give her for seven years, everything that the captain had been unable to take from me. The woman who returned to my side was not the same one who had left moments before. This Kathryn had nothing to prove, she was free to be herself without protocol or regulations to restrict her actions and choke her laughter. I took one look at the smiling lips and glowing eyes and fell in love all over again.
The short visit turned into weeks, then months and finally became permanent when Gretchen begged us to stay in Indiana and share her home. After a separation of seven years Gretchen needed to know that her elder daughter was happy and safe and Kathryn needed her mother's love. I was happy to agree and in Gretchen I found a friend and an ally. Together we were able to guard Kathryn from the attentions of the media and from her own impulsive actions, to comfort her in times of sadness and celebrate with her in times of joy.
While in the Delta quadrant we thought of Voyager as our home, but in truth Kathryn's home was and always will be, this house - the place where she grew up and which is so indelibly stamped with her memories. There have been changes in the house since we returned - there is a replicator in the kitchen and my medicine wheel hangs on the wall of the bedroom that we share - but the mementoes of her childhood remain. The photographs on the mantelpiece show Kathryn in her tennis whites, racket in hand; Kathryn and Phoebe smiling from a tent opening on a family camping trip; and, in pride of place, Kathryn in cadet's uniform standing at attention beside her father.
I stand at the office door and watch Kathryn working at the old oak desk. The grandfather clock that travelled through the Delta Quadrant with us is now restored to its place in the room where it marked the hours and days of her childhood. As it did then its ticking blends with the beep of padds, and once again a child crouches in the kneehole of the desk waiting for the time when it will be safe to emerge and delight in the company of a beloved parent. I watch my wife and my daughter and I know that Kathryn is not the only one who has come home.