Author's Note: Ficlet for the LJ ff_friday challenge. June 5's challenge: trust. Length: 746 words. It took me a while to write this, and even now I'm not so sure about how good it is. SPOILERS FOR "HEART OF GOLD"!

dai ruo mu ji = dumb as a wooden chicken and baichi = idiot, all thanks to skripka's site

Rude Awakening

By Trisana McGraw

It completely came out of nowhere, or so she thought. Looking back, Inara wasn't sure if her reason for not noticing Mal and Nandi's interest in one another had simply been that she hadn't wanted to. She still tried to convince herself that there had been so much other activity at the Heart of Gold that the two of them talking alone hadn't been out of the ordinary. They were both the leaders of their respective groups, so it was logical for them to discuss battle plans for when they would have to face Rance Burgess.

She'd just never considered that they would spend time together because they took a liking to one another — enough of a liking to have sex, at least. The pretense of planning had been ripped away when she'd found Mal sneaking out of Nandi's room that morning. He'd made a lousy excuse, but it had been apparent what had gone on in there.

Of course she couldn't let him know how much he had hurt her, so she'd slipped the mask over her face; it had become as easy as breathing. She'd surprised him by dismissing the whole thing. Maybe for a moment she had enjoyed the knowledge that she had flustered him, not the other way around as so often happened.

But the moment she was out of his sight, her resolve broke, and she hurried away to a side room to do something she hadn't done in years: cry over a man.

What kind of man was Malcolm Reynolds, that he could make her feel this way? He'd been the first to actually make her the slightest bit ashamed of her work, and now she was jealous that he had bedded someone else.

Inara pressed the heels of her hands into her eyes, but the tears kept seeping past. Allowing herself to keep crying, she nonetheless bit her lip to keep any sound from escaping her mouth; she didn't want to wake Petaline, who lay in bed at the other end of the room.

Inara's hands curled into fists, and it took all of her control not to smash the small wooden table next to her. She couldn't believe that that baichi had betrayed her like this! They both knew there was an attraction between them, even if neither could resolve it. Then suddenly he'd decided to sleep with the next beautiful Companion he saw! She'd trusted him not to be with another woman.

For the first time, some logic found its way into her muddled emotions. She was a Companion; Mal had to endure that she had regular sex with strange men and women. She couldn't put the blame on him.

But he could have at least been faithful.

Faithful to what? she asked herself. I never told him I cared for him. I should have. The thought made her tears come again, and she didn't try to stop herself from sobbing.

A sound made lift her head; across the room, Petaline had begun to stir, woken up by contractions. Inara hurriedly wiped her cheeks and rushed to the young woman's bedside while calling for Simon. She shoved her worries to the back of her mind as the day of action began.

She almost forgot everything else when the activity intensified tenfold, when careful planning gave way to confused laserfire and death, including the loss of Nandi. For a short while, Inara let her anxieties go out to the whores who were in worse trouble than she, but after Nandi was in the earth and Serenity was in the air, the problem between her and Mal reared its head again.

He saw through her act and offered her a chance to be completely honest with one another. It was what she had wanted, and all she had to do was take the plunge.

Her heart was cheering her on, but, being a Companion, she ignored it. Instead of going along with the fairy-tale idea, her reply to his brutal honesty was "I'm leaving." Her training was so good that she was able to hold his stare for several moments before turning away. A voice inside her chanted, Idiot, coward, dai ruo mu ji, and she couldn't tell if it were her heart or mind, or maybe both. As she left Mal standing there, the tears started to well up in her eyes again. It hit her then: the person who couldn't be trusted in this relationship was she.