Finite Space
by Liz
chapter 2
in which our heroine remembers darker times, and tries something else for the first time
First of Five, if you're still out there, then this chapter is for you. You once told me to include my bizarre night in a New York City youth hostel in a story sometime... Here it finally is.
O
It wasn't long after their accidental collision that Amanda and Aaron became what she supposed was a couple-two people who often spent time together and called each other only to talk. Their mutual enthusiasm for dining out was tempered by their mutual lack of a large income, so they found themselves sneaking into the local baseball stadium after the fifth inning, when the groundlings could enter without paying admission, or borrowing credits to transport to places like Yosemite where they would spend the day hiking. It reminded Amanda a little of the on-foot treks she would take with the Maquis when they would transport outside a shielded zone and walk for two days just to steal supplies, then haul them back out.
She would sometimes catch herself nearly racing down the trail. Aaron could easily keep up, but he kidded her about missing the scenery. "What do humans say? Stop and smell the tulips?"
"Roses," she would admit grudgingly.
"To hell with the roses," he said. "The mountains are nice, though."
Aaron's face became familiar to her, and so did his voice. The sight of her message light blinking when she came home now made her happy-a change for her-because it might possibly be Aaron who called.
Their second date had been a few nights after the affair at Tolla's Bistro. They met in the Mission for some old-fashioned tapas, and at times during the meal Amanda even forgot that she had ever been nervous. Aaron had a relaxed, calm manner, and he seemed to enjoy her bursts of sarcasm. He walked her home from the nearest bus stop, this time offering a peck on the lips as a goodnight gift. It was her first kiss since she was sixteen.
Walking beside him, or waiting for him to show up (usually five minutes late), she felt like she had escaped something undefined. In all those years on Voyager, she had been a prisoner to what everyone thought of her-they all were. She'd had no room to grow up or to become something else. Thinking of it set her cheeks burning and her fingers itching.
But then, with Aaron, she was meeting someone new, and he was meeting her. No one else in her former life knew about him-well, save Tom Paris, and Amanda shoved that to the back of her mind whenever it came up. With Aaron, she was free in a way that returning to Earth had never freed her. She was getting to know herself in a new way as she learned more about him.
Aaron was actually a student at the small Bajoran seminary in Berkeley, studying to be a vedik. Amanda was surprised by this. He hadn't even bothered to mention it until their second date when she thought to ask him what he did for a living. It wasn't that his faith wasn't important to him-but it was so well integrated into his life that he felt no need to wear it on his sleeve.
He also took care to assuage her concerns about what he would think of her own nonexistent spiritual life. "We all find our way to the Prophets somehow, if we try," he explained. "The branch of study that I follow says that each individual must find his or her own way. It's the search that matters. More or less."
Gradually, Amanda began telling him more about herself-leaving out some parts more than others. After Voyager had returned, as she recounted to him, she'd been assigned a small apartment at Starfleet Headquarters for the first three months, and she had watched as nearly everyone else on the crew gradually slipped away into the arms of friends and family. Amanda didn't have anyone to give her a place to stay, so after a traumatic three-week search for a place to live (perhaps the most enduring of all San Francisco traditions), she had found her Tender-Nob studio. Fortunately, in the eternal boom-bust cycle of San Francisco, work wasn't very scarce these days, so ends met without too much of a struggle. The rest was history.
She avoided telling Aaron much about the Maquis, or about her life before the Maquis. How many years had Amanda hidden the real stories without touching them? She knew that she would have to tell Aaron eventually. But not just now, not yet. Time with him was like aloe on sun-scalded skin-and dredging up the past would be like taking a bristle to the burn.
O
Almost three months to the day that she had met Aaron, she turned in her application to Starfleet Academy. To celebrate, he invited her to his apartment and cooked dinner for them both-a mild Italian concoction requiring no special enzymes to digest.
Amanda had only twice before visited Aaron's flat, tucked away on the side of Potrero Hill. He lived in one of San Francisco's countless Victorian buildings, the kind that had been renovated so many times over the centuries that almost nothing of the original remained except the spirit. He kept it mostly neat, with maybe a handful of Bajoran symbols and artwork set about the place, including a discreet shrine in the back room.
Aaron refused her help in the kitchen. "You were up all night finishing the application," he reminded her. "I don't want you dozing off and losing a finger in the pasta."
Amanda almost protested, but decided that she did feel like sitting down. She went into his sitting room and relaxed, content to watch the view of people strolling past in the late autumn dusk. What a strange year this had become, she reflected. Just when she'd given up all hope of doing anything with her life beyond slaving away as a mere crewman on a lost starship, she found herself dropped unceremoniously into what seemed like a normal life. Ironically, while she was in far less danger here in San Francisco, she found her day-to-day life far more difficult to navigate.
Amanda spied a young couple outside with their daughter as they finished up an evening stroll together, the little girl's blonde pigtails bouncing with each step and a golden retriever trotting behind and around them without a leash. Was it possible for someone to grow up on this planet and live her entire life in peace, with the sunshine and security that a place like San Francisco could offer? Amanda's stomach turned with jealousy. It wasn't fair that fate had placed her in a society like this one at birth, only to demolish all hope of a peaceful life when she was only sixteen. And it caused her to wonder what made this world so secure, and whether the people here ever considered the possibility that they, too, might lose everything in less than a minute.
These were morbid thoughts for a calm evening, but Amanda couldn't help herself. Perhaps it was the lack of sleep, or perhaps it was turning in her application to the Academy, of making a decision and taking a risk. It made her nervous and reminded her just how unconventional her life had been until now.
She leaned back on Aaron's sofa, studying the ceiling. A few tiny cracks had been caused by last year's 7.9 quake-something that would have wrecked the city had it not been for the massive shock absorbers installed in the last century. Instead, the cracks were simply lines meandering through the blank space, never meeting. It reminded her of her bedroom ceiling when she was a girl.
How funny that she would be able to remember the cracks on her bedroom ceiling and not her mother's face. All of her photographs and family records had been lost with the colony when Amanda was only sixteen.
It happened one summer evening when her brother Nathan was home from university. They had celebrated his birthday only the night before. Amanda was in the middle of bickering with her father, who insisted that she stay in and study that night instead of visiting her friend Angie, who lived across town.
"Dad, I aced math all semester, you know that!" she pointed out to her father. "And it's my last exam of the year. Angie's just got history, day after tomorrow. That's it!"
"Sweetie, all we're saying is, don't take your talent for granted," he told her from the dinner table as she stood up to leave in a huff. She could never sit still for long, especially not when perturbed.
"Dad, I can take care of myself, okay? You're acting like some kind of drill sergeant."
She didn't hear his response because she'd already gone into the kitchen to retrieve a piece of leftover birthday cake. She was about to ask him to repeat himself when there was a loud banging on the front door.
Amanda paused to listen with the cake knife in her hand. They weren't expecting anyone. Oh, hell, it wouldn't be any of her school friends, would it-showing up without calling first? Her parents wouldn't let her out of the house for the next year. Through the door she saw her father exchange a glance with her mother, then go to the front door and open it.
She didn't understand what was being said, but there were several voices. It wasn't her friends; these were adult voices, angry ones. They were angry, and getting louder. This wasn't something about the recent city council meeting, was it? She hadn't been there, but Nathan had told her that there had been shouting.
"Come outside now," ordered one of the strangers.
Amanda stood, frozen in place. Just go away, she thought fervently. Just go away.
Her father's voice echoed through the house. "Get the hell off my property!" she heard him shout.
Then came the blast, louder than anything she was expecting. It sounded like a phaser, but it couldn't be. Not here.
Time stretched out into impossible lengths. Dishes clattered to the floor and shattered. Footsteps rushed to the front of the house. Her mother screamed, crying her father's name.
Another blast.
The screams were cut off.
Amanda just stood there, her hand holding the knife's wooden handle. Her brother dashed into the kitchen, his brown eyes wide with terror. "Get out!" he shouted at her. "Go, the window! Now!" Heavy footsteps were following him.
Something instinctive inside Amanda followed his command as the rest of her shut off. She jumped onto the counter and pushed open the window above the sink. It was winter on their colony, and the cold, wicked air entered and stung her face. There was a two meter drop to the ground below.
She looked over her shoulder. "Get out," Nathan told her, pushing her forward with his hands. He swung his long, lanky legs onto the counter behind her and made as if to shield her with his body.
Amanda jumped, still holding the kitchen knife. She landed on the cold, hard ground with a thud and rolled to the side. Her knees and ankles buzzed from the impact. Voices rose from the alleys and paths between the houses.
"What was that?" called someone across the alley, in the darkness. A male voice, not one she recognized. A young man, who was as scared of the dark as she was.
"Shine the light on the blue house," ordered a second voice. Amanda began to hear phaser shots echoing against the walls of the other houses, and other screams of other families inside as a searchlight slowly honed in on the window from which she had jumped.
It alighted on the window just as Nathan's form appeared, ready to jump, too. He looked down at her desperately. "Run," he said; she could barely hear him. His nose had begun to bleed, but that didn't mean anything. Nathan had always gotten nosebleeds as a boy.
He jumped to the ground as she climbed to her feet and began running. "Stop right there!" a voice shouted behind her, but she ignored it. She just ran. The last sound she heard was a phaser shot and Nathan's painful grunt as his body was dashed against the wall of their house. She never looked back.
Amanda ran, dodging through narrow alleyways and dark side streets that only a native to the town would know about. It was only a few hundred meters to the edge of town. Her cross-country workouts with the other girls on her team had taken her along through the streets countless times before, heading into the countryside. There she could escape into the forest at the edge of town and wait until help would come. She knew the forest well; settlers went there all time. Amanda's classmates would meet there at night to make out under the trees... She'd only been once.
She knew the paths and she knew the hiding places. The trees, she thought. Just get to the forest. Nathan will come later. He'll come.
She was almost there-less than fifty meters from the edge of town-when a searchlight scoured the ground immediately before her. Without time to stop or change direction, she ran right into the light. The searchlight followed her. Tall, dark shapes ran to block her path across the street from her. Amanda skidded to a halt and turned at the last moment and dodged into another alley, but the two soldiers saw her and followed. She didn't know where she was now, and in the darkness she couldn't see the ground. Amanda stumbled over her own feet and crashed onto the pavement.
She stood up just as the first soldier reached her. He seized her by the shoulder to inspect her face. His face was pale, bony, white. Skeletal ridges surrounded his eyes and made a curious teardrop shape in his forehead. He wasn't sneering or angry as he beheld her; he was simply curious.
Amanda's right hand still held the kitchen knife. She jammed it as far as it would go into the Cardassian's exposed underarm. His eyes registered pain and surprise, and the impact rattled Amanda's arm painfully. The soldier let go and collapsed to the ground with only a loud exhalation of hot air and blood.
His companion was directly behind him, though. The only thought that crossed her mind when the Cardassian raised his phaser to shoot her was, Why haven't I screamed yet?
Out of nowhere, another body crashed into the Cardassian from behind, sending the phaser blast into the wall. Amanda stood trembling as her rescuer dispatched the soldier efficiently. He rose to his feet and looked at her. She couldn't make out his face, but he was tall and broad-shouldered.
"Nathan?" she said, terrified. Her arms were shaking from the cold.
"No," said the voice. He approached her carefully. In the dim light, she could make out bronze skin, a square jaw, and a tattoo over one eye. "My name is Chakotay," he said. "Come with me. I promise, you'll be safe." He reached out his hand to her.
O
Amanda woke up gasping. She didn't know where she was. Shadows had shrouded the room and stolen its familiarity. She looked around desperately, but in the darkness, all she saw were ghostly images of violent deaths and the faceless memories of her family. Amanda cried out in frustration. The nightmares would never disappear, would they?
Aaron appeared in the room and triggered the lights. She squinted in the sudden brightness as he sat down by her side. "You okay?" he said.
Amanda couldn't speak. She was shaking like a baby.
"It was a nightmare, okay?" he said, resting a soothing hand on her back. "You're fine. Come back to the real world." Amanda didn't say anything yet; she just tried to breathe and to get the nightmare out of her head as quickly as she could.
"Do you want to talk about it?" Aaron offered. "Might help."
"No," she said, more strongly than she meant to.
He took his hands off her. "Okay, you don't have to."
Amanda looked at Aaron. In this light, it was all too easy to imagine blood running from his face, too. She felt herself begin to cry. "I'm so sorry," she said, then said it again. She was a wreck, an unstable, pitiful wreck of a human being with no chance of ever achieving a normal, stable life.
"Don't apologize," Aaron said. He frowned. "I just want to make sure you're okay. I thought we were celebrating."
"We are," she said. She drew a deep breath; talking was at least helping the images of the nightmare to fade. Maybe she should just tell him.
"Look, I was watching your neighbors walk by together, outside, and then I started thinking about my own family... And I guess I dozed off..."
Slowly, haltingly, she told him what happened to her colony. It was difficult, and she included just the basic story-none of the gore she had just relived.
Amanda also told him what happened after. There were only a few survivors from thousands of first and second generation colonists on her world, people who had forged a society from a planet devoid of sentient life. Such was the efficiency of the Cardassian military. The ones who lived found themselves split up and swept away by the Maquis. Some of them, like Amanda, ended up fighting with the Maquis, as she had learned years later. Others were set adrift to rebuild their lives elsewhere. All in all, there were only twenty or thirty people; no one kept track of the exact numbers.
Chakotay more or less kept his promise of safety to her. His cell adopted her. In retrospect, if he'd wanted to make sure of her safety, he would have abandoned her at the first Federation outpost they found. That is, if the cell hadn't been so busy sabotaging them. Instead, Amanda had learned how to aim and fire several kinds of phasers. She learned how to throw sonic grenades that, if positioned correctly, would destroy her enemies' internal organs and leave her unscathed. She could cook a meal over a fire from the most meager of rations.
Most importantly, she learned not to cry or to speak about her past. That lesson came very soon. The second night she was with the Maquis, Chakotay came to check on her in the corner of the ship's mess hall, where she had curled herself into a ball, unable to eat. He pushed a bowl of slop in her face.
"You have to eat," he said, not unkindly. She didn't say anything, didn't move.
He sat down. "Listen, everyone here knows what you're going through. We've all suffered some kind of loss."
She looked at him, still unsure whether or not to trust him.
He seemed to recognize her fear. "It's Andrea, isn't it?" he asked.
"Amanda. Amanda Jackson." She'd already memorized the names of everyone on the ship.
"Amanda, if anyone--and I mean anyone--gives you any trouble, come and talk to me about it. If I'm not around, talk to B'Elanna Torres or Mike Ayala. I'll tell them to watch out for you."
"You don't have to do that."
Chakotay smiled at her gently. "I had a feeling you were a tough kid when I saw you with that Cardassian hanging from your kitchen knife. Did you know you punctured his dorsal respiratory sac?" She didn't say anything. He nodded. "Well, Miss Jackson, I'll be watching out for you all the same. Just be careful you don't turn down too many offers for help, okay? They're not as plentiful as they should be out here."
He reached across the table and gently squeezed her upper arm before leaving the table. On his way out, he stopped at another table near the door, where a few of the higher-ranking Maquis were sitting together. Chakotay leaned over the shoulder of B'Elanna Torres, the half-Klingon woman, and said something quietly. Amanda watched, humiliated, as B'Elanna nodded and glanced in her direction.
It was the first time they had made eye contact. Torres seemed like one of those sonic grenades; she had as much power packed into as small a package as possible. Amanda could tell that from the way she moved. Right now, Torres was looking at her, evaluating her.
Pitying her.
B'Elanna Torres didn't smile, but she didn't frown, either. She said something quietly to Chakotay. The exchange seemed to alter the tone of the entire room, and Amanda became conscious of more eyes being turned on her. There was Seska, the disguised Cardassian, sitting by B'Elanna. At the next table, Chell peered curiously through the shadows.
Amanda didn't wait to see what would happen next; she just grabbed her food and hurried out of the mess hall, to the tiny bunk that was now her entire home.
Several months passed. Amanda threw away the clothes she was wearing the night of the attack after they were ruined in a narrow scrape on Gelvis Prime. Most days, she wore the same shirt, vest, and pair of men's pants, the ones with the leather around the knees--better for living rough. Her belongings consisted of one spare outfit, a phase rifle, a pistol, and the kitchen knife with which she'd arrived--the one souvenir from her childhood. Amanda grew used to the crowded accommodations, numbed by the lack of sleep and continual food rationing. Now it was nothing to her when Lon Suder woke up the whole cabin with another of his night terrors, spewing nonsense at top volume until someone hit him hard enough that he shut up and went back to sleep.
Jor, one of the Bajoran women, helped her figure out the basics of the weapons systems so she'd have a job to do, and a reason to stay with the Maquis. Jor was a dark-haired, slender Bajoran woman whose honest face and friendly tone belied her violent past: a two-year veteran Maquis, she'd seen nearly as much action as Chakotay. Amanda didn't know the particulars of her background, but she'd overheard rumors of a young husband killed during an illicit Cardassian operation. Jor said nothing about that--none of the Maquis did--but Amanda once caught her crying desperately by herself when Tabor, her lover, was late for a rendezvous. Amanda tried to see if Jor was all right, but Jor seemed paralyzed with fear. Not knowing what else to do, Amanda left her alone.
These were the Maquis: the damaged people who would carry Amanda through the years when other girls had first kisses and learned to fly a shuttlepod. They were her family now.
And then the world changed again. Their encounter with the Caretaker was like a razor blade that sliced all of their lives into yet another shard. Amanda felt she could remember each moment of that adventure--the damage to the ship, the casualties, their sudden transport to what they later learned was the Array... Within the holographic simulation, the Maquis wasted almost no time before rising up, holding the citizens of that cheerful world hostage until answers came in the form of sedatives. Amanda had protested, wanting to talk first, but no one listened to her.
But what the Maquis remembered most was Chakotay's snap decision to scuttle the Liberty. The first few weeks on Voyager were a time when not only Janeway's but Chakotay's authority also hung in the balance, when a group of lost, angry, and wounded people found themselves trapped, forced to face their demons or find another way to avoid them.
Amanda chose to hide.
O
Aaron stayed sitting by her quietly as she told him the story. He waited a while to respond. At last, he spoke.
"You've survived a lot in your life. It must be very hard for you."
She nodded, wiping away the last of the tears.
"Did I ever tell you about the time I got beat up by six kids in the refugee camp so they could steal my dinner rations?"
"No."
"That's good, because it pales in comparison."
Amanda tried to go along with his attempts to lighten things up, but a weight was still hanging from her heart. "Oh, hell, Aaron. I'm nothing but damaged goods."
"Welcome to the party. You think I'd want to be with a woman who'd never faced anything worse than a hangnail the first twenty years of her life? Okay, unbeknownst to me, you've had some rather epic hangnails, but guess what."
"Aaron..."
"No, really. I've watched you, and I've seen the corner of your closet where you've stashed things you're planning to give away to charity. I know how many hours a week you've been devoting to the immigrant resource center, helping people out for free. Like you say, shit happens. And to quote the Prophets, what you do with the shit is what changes your life."
"Huh?" Amanda said.
"I'm a little loose with the translation."
"I don't get it."
"Exactly." Aaron leaned over and kissed her. "Wow. I know this will sound like a big lie, but in a way I'm glad you told me all this tonight. I was planning to seduce you to the point of consummation, but this was much more important."
Amanda froze.
Aaron looked over at the wall clock. "I don't mean to be rude," he said, carefully extracting his hand from hers, "but I think the pasta's getting cold."
"Can I help?" she said, drying her tears and trying to avoid his eyes.
"Hell, no," he told her. "How can I be sure you won't drown yourself in marinara while I'm not looking? You're not a picture of stability."
"Oh, come on. I'm not crazy."
"Yes, you are." He kissed her on the lips. "Now get into the dining room before I do something drastic."
"Like what?"
"Serve you dessert before the meal," he said, wiggling an eyebrow.
He left the room. Oh, shit. Amanda had been utterly, irrationally avoiding the very thought of this moment until now out of sheer ignorance. Sure, she'd thought he'd want sex sooner or later, and she'd already had dreams with Aaron in a starring role, but... here it was. Unless she misread his insinuation...
But he didn't sound like he was talking about any old chocolate soufflé.
Maybe he already knew! After all, she'd told him about Voyager. She didn't have the best social life then, and she'd never had a boyfriend. So how could she be anything other than a virgin?
Okay, easy answer. But she was in fact terrified. Never mind she'd not said anything about it. Didn't Aaron realize this!
He served the pasta--a glorious concoction of garlic, rosemary, marinara, and a few non-Terran items, too. The meal was grand and the wine was excellent. He held her hand as he walked her to the table, and he talked about his day, asked her about hers. He'd set some quiet music in the background-something Betazoid? Amanda was too twitchy to hear it.
Halfway through the meal, Aaron sighed. "Are you okay?" he asked kindly.
"Yes! Why?"
"You seem a little... high-strung at the moment."
"I'm not high-strung!"
"Okay, you're not high-strung," he allowed. "You've already snapped. Look, I'm really sorry about what I said right before dinner, Amanda. I didn't mean to rush you."
"What?"
"That's what this is about, isn't it?" he said. "I promise, I didn't say I wanted to have sex because you told me that whole horrible story about the Maquis. No disaster fetish or anything. I've been thinking about it for weeks, and I hoped we could maybe give it a shot tonight, to celebrate, you know? But if you're not ready to make love yet, then by the Prophets, we don't have to."
"Ummm."
"Amanda."
"Yes?"
Aaron had set his fork down. "Please talk to me. I don't read minds."
She looked, her face red as could be. "Aaron," she said haltingly, "I have a confession."
His eyes narrowed. "Another one?" he said. "If this goes on, you'll have to write a novel."
"You're the one who's talking non-stop!"
"Okay!" He sat back in his chair. "Your turn."
My turn, she thought. God, she had to be the one and only twenty-five-year-old virgin in the entire history of San Francisco. How humiliating.
"You're going to think I'm really stupid," she said, "but I've never, um." She lost her nerve and stared down at her pasta again.
"You mean you're a virgin?" he said. The surprise was crammed into his voice.
Amanda folded her hands in her lap, like a little child who'd forgotten to clean up her room.
"Hey, that's okay!" he exclaimed.
It was? Amanda looked up. Aaron was smiling. "I'm not laughing at you, I promise," he said. "It's just that I thought you were going to tell me you'd mated a Klingon last week and forgot to tell me. In which case I'd rather you tell me so I don't get the business end of a bat'leth. But Prophets, Amanda! It's okay, really it is."
"You're sure?" she eked out.
He rolled his eyes. "Of course it is. I mean, I guess it makes sense, seeing where you've been the last ten years, right?"
"Seven."
"Whatever."
"You're sure it's okay?"
"Amanda. What am I going to say? 'I wish you'd banged two dozen men so I could benefit from the experience.' No way! Anyway, it's not like you've missed the train. It tends to leave only when you're ready."
Amanda giggled, although she was still really embarrassed. "It's just that I'm so old for this."
"No time like the present," Aaron pronounced. "Of course, we don't have to if you're not ready, but I'm interested."
"I've kind of heard that sex with virgins isn't, you know. Good."
"Never tried it. Maybe it isn't. I haven't had sex with a human before, either, if that matters. But... wow, Amanda. If you want to give yourself--I mean, if you really want to share yourself with me, then I don't care. It's you I want to be with. We'll make it work."
"Oh," she said.
"Yeah. Oh." He smiled and reached across the table to push a lock of hair out of her face. "What do you want to do?"
Bang, back to decision time.
Aaron sat back and twirled some fettuccini around his fork and stuffed it in his mouth. "Look, you want to hear something really embarrassing?" he said. "You know how old I was when I got laid for the first time?"
"How old?"
"Guess."
She rolled her eyes. "I don't know. Sixteen."
"Close. Seventeen. That's if you think it counts."
"If what counts?"
Aaron winced. "Does losing your virginity to a hologram count as legitimate?"
"You did what?" she said.
"Oh, yeah. One of my friends gave me the program. You know how teenage boys are. What losers."
"Oh my goodness."
"You don't have to look quite that shocked." He laughed. "The really awful part is that I kind of got into the program in a big way. I would visit as often as I could, you know? My self-esteem tripled, all because I was boning a matrix. But after a couple months, my sister came after me, because she was curious, right?"
"Oh, no!" Amanda covered her mouth.
"That's right. Only thing worse than your big sister finding out that you've got yourself a holographic lover is having her discover you with a holographic lover."
Amanda could only imagine how mortified he must have felt. "Do you still...?"
"What, visit the hologram?" he said. "No. Bajoran vediks can be pretty liberal, but we have our limits. The official line is that you should do that 'only under extreme duress.'"
"Wow," Amanda said.
"Do you feel better now?" he asked. "Or do I have to tell you about the time I was with this crazy redhead from--"
"Aaron," she started, the hesitated.
"Yes?"
"I just... well..."
"Look, I said we don't have to, all right?" He began eating again. She could tell he was a little embarrassed now from the way he began shoveling the food into his mouth. "I mean," he said, talking while chewing, "I really like you, and I want to do what's best for us. It wouldn't help either one of us if we rushed it and you hated me for coercing you. Prophets, I couldn't live with myself if I ever made you feel like that. And if you want, I mean, we can-"
"Aaron!" she said. She'd gotten used to him talking a lot, but every so often, she had to shut him up.
"Yes?"
"Look, I... Yes. I want to."
He was definitely taken by surprise. "You do? Are you sure? I don't want to if you're not totally sure that you want to. Because otherwise--"
"Aaron, shut up!" she said. "I know what I want, damn it."
Aaron grinned a little, with just one corner of his mouth. He looked at his plate. "You know, the pasta's not so good after all."
She almost disagreed, but then caught his drift. "You're right," she said. "Terrible."
He stood up and came to her side. Offering her a chivalrous hand, he brought her to her feet and kissed her.
"You taste like garlic," she said with a nervous giggle.
"So do you," he said, and led her to his bedroom--a place she'd only seen from the doorway.
"You're sure?" he said one last time.
"Stop asking me that," Amanda told him, and kissed him.
She closed her eyes as Aaron caressed her face. The anticipation shot up and down her spine; she could feel herself getting warm inside--like there was a secret, dormant spring that suddenly began coming to life. Her heart pounded, from nerves and from anticipation.
Aaron pulled away from her and went to light a couple candles from his drawers. He set the candles on either side of a smallish tapestry that hung on the wall opposite from his bed--his very, very big bed. Then he turned out the lights.
Aaron took her hand again. "Bajorans who are religious sometimes say a prayer before they make love," he whispered.
"What, for luck?"
He laughed. "Maybe. But for me, it's to invite the Prophets into our--well, our union."
"You want the Prophets here!"
"Anywhere there is love, so should be grace." It sounded like a quote...
"Love?" she asked.
"I didn't bring you in here just for sex," he said.
"Wow," she said. "What's the prayer?"
He smiled, eager as a little boy. "Come stand with me by the candles." She did, her hands shaking from nerves--and from eagerness. "Now hold my hands." She did.
He closed his eyes and raised his face to the ceiling; he smiled. "Heavenly Prophets, show me the way to love this woman well. Through her joy I give you honor."
A chill ran down her spine.
Aaron opened his eyes. "Now you say the same thing for me."
"Heavenly Prophets," she said awkwardly. "Show me the way to love... this man well. Through his joy I give you honor."
He leaned forward and kissed her. "And you've already honored them a hundred times over." Aaron backed toward the bed and pulled her with him.
"That's it?" she said. "Is there more?"
He laughed. "If the prayer was any longer, nobody would ever say it!"
She giggled. "And this from the religion that brought you thirty-hour vigils."
"The prayer might be short," he said, sitting down on the edge of the bed. "But there are other things that take up a lot more time."
Aaron reached around her waist and unfastened the ties that held her shirt. She shivered as the cool, evening air touched her collarbone, sternum, ribs, stomach, waist...
A smile spread slowly across his face, as he regarded her, moving his warm hands gently across her back. No one had ever looked upon her like this. She laid her hands on his shoulders, not sure what to do.
He moved her hands behind his neck and eased himself back, further onto the bed--and her forward, onto him. "Kiss me," he told her. She did, tasting garlic, tasting wine--tasting him. It was beautiful.
She felt his hands slipping into her waistband, then nudging her pants lower. She gasped, frightened despite herself. But she moved her hands so she could help him.
"No, stop," he said. "I'll do it. I'll be gentle. Just trust me."
She did, and he was. He removed her clothing, piece by piece, then let her remove his--and she loved it. A student, but not one who stayed seated in a library all day long, Aaron had broad shoulders and narrow hips. Lean, but with enough muscle to feel very much like... a man. A very real, very present, and absolute male. The simple differences between their bodies warmed her up, from the inside out.
Even in the candlelight, she could tell he had goosebumps all over his torso. She felt for his heart with her palm.
He moved her hand a bit lower. "The Bajoran heart is here," he said. "Feel it?"
She nodded. He patiently waited as she grew comfortable with her nakedness, and his bare chest. Amanda kissed him again, and she thought she'd try kissing his chest, too.
It seemed to be the right thing to do. He gasped and gently held her head in his hands as she ran her tongue over his muscles, his heart, and a little lower. She took his fly and opened it: it was now or never.
"Whoa," she said, temporarily stunned.
Aaron shook with laughter. "Tell me that's a good sign."
She looked up at him, a little worried. "Is that..."
He laughed again. "It's basically the same as a human penis. Don't worry, it's not about to go off on you, not yet."
Amanda was simply not a judge of male proportion, but what she saw before her seemed kind of long. And it was definitely curved in an upward direction. "Can I, um..."
"Yes, touch it. I'll tell you what feels good." He seemed to be enjoying himself!
Well... So was she. With the lights off, her embarrassment was fading, and as he showed her how to handle him, she began to feel bolder. Seven years of voyaging through a foreign quandrant, but this another kind of exploration altogether.
After a minute of what Amanda thought were remarkable vocalizations from the man she held before her, Aaron interrupted her adventures. "My turn," he insisted, and rolled her slowly onto her back, and pulled down the bedsheets underneath them both, an awkward exercise that left her giggling again, and him, too.
He pulled the sheets over them so that they were cocooned in even more privacy, and he could wrap his arms around her in warmth. She felt his hand graze her breasts, her stomach, her buttocks, and then around front, and below, to the place she really knew nothing about. She gasped as he gently began to explore her.
Aaron kissed her on the neck. "It's okay," he whispered. "You're safe with me."
She didn't have to force herself to relax--his handiwork was doing the job all of its own accord. Amanda grabbed his shoulders, arching her either to get away or to come even closer. She wasn't sure which.
"Come to me," she said.
Aaron nodded, breathless, and he shifted his weight so his face was above hers, his weight resting on his elbows on either side of her. He nudged her legs farther apart with his knees.
"Open up to me," he told her. "I'll come in now."
Amanda did not look back.
O
They lay awake together for a long time, her curled into him, him wrapping himself around her. They talked quietly about this and that; Amanda felt like she suddenly had the freedom to ask things she'd never dared to speak out loud to anyone. What was good? What wasn't? What kinds of things turned him on? What didn't?
"Not real crazy," he told her, as if he were apologizing. "I like the basics pretty well."
She giggled. "That's fine. We can start there and work up if we want, right?"
"Good plan."
A thought struck her--very belatedly, she realized. "Aaron?"
"Hmm?"
"Should we worry about, you know. Contraceptives?"
"Mmm. Nope, checked." His post-coital speech was reduced to monosyllables which she found hilarious, not least because he tended to talk so much at other times.
"Huh?"
"I checked," he elaborated. "Humans and Bajorans can reproduce, but you need some medical help to make the DNA play nice. Can't happen by accident. Love it. No need for anything."
"No diseases?"
"Told you. Checked. I'm clean--went to the doc few weeks back. Was gonna ask you, but."
She giggled. "When?"
"At dinner."
"No, I mean, when did you check? About humans and Bajorans."
He ran a hand up and down her arm. "You got me. After our first date. I wanted a game plan."
"After our first date? But that was a disaster!"
"Remember how I told you I'd had worse?" He patted her naked bottom. "I really liked you. Crying and all."
"Wow."
"Yeah."
"I liked you, too."
"Good."
Silence. Then, "Aaron?"
"Hmm?"
"Was it good?"
Now he stirred, turning her over so he could see her face. "Amanda," he said seriously. "If that was only the first time, then I am crazy with the thought of how good it can be."
She smiled. "Okay."
"Yeah, you'll learn some stuff, but I'm telling you, it's always better when you're with someone you love."
"How often have you... been with someone you love?"
He laid back on the pillow. "Before tonight, I would have said... Well, it doesn't matter. Because, as of tonight? Just once. Only once."
After an hour or so of dozing and light chatter, Aaron suddenly seemed to spring to life again. Amanda could practically feel the change in herself, too. He stretched, took a deep breath, and got up, walking to the bathroom with a spring in his step. The toilet flushed, and when he came back after a minute, Amanda was looking at him with frank surprise.
"What happened to you?" she said.
He grinned. "Bajoran men take about an hour, some a little longer, to come back to life after orgasm," he told her, curling up beside her and wrapping her in his arms. "I've heard it's maybe a little more pronounced than your basic humanoid."
"I'll say."
"My sister's a biologist; she says Bajoran primates are the same way. Evolutionary advantages."
"Like what?"
"For one thing, sex is that much more fun, because it's a great feeling to lie there in your lover's arms," he said. "For another... well, it means you have to be nice to the ladies, because we're pretty vulnerable immediately after."
"But some rival could come and do you in."
"Possibly. Do I have any rivals here?" He craned his neck to look around the bedroom. "It's not total paralysis. More like... bliss."
"Wow." She thought. "Must frustrate the women, though--'All he ever does is turn over and go to sleep.'" They laughed.
Another question occurred to her. "How do human females compare to Bajoran females?"
Aaron grinned. "You're the only human female I've ever seen up close."
"Still!"
"Okay. Just like with men, it's pretty close. But there are some differences in, ah, placement. You're a little harder to find."
Amanda blushed. "You did okay."
"Thanks. I researched."
"You did what?"
"Oop," Aaron said. That was the noise he made when he regretted saying something. "Okay. Yes, I researched."
"How?" She wasn't upset, but she was incredibly curious.
"It's great what you can find at libraries these days."
"You didn't."
"It wasn't porn! They were for reference, promise." He shrugged, bouncing her head gently on his shoulder. "There were pictures. It helped."
Amanda thought about that. What would have seemed awkward and embarrassing to her before tonight now felt rather natural to discuss--maybe because they were naked together, and maybe because it was dark with only the low candles. Then again, she knew already that she trusted this man so completely.
Her mind reeled just a bit. Despite her incredibly long-lasting virginity, she'd never been one to subscribe to the notion that you needed to wait until marriage to be with a man. In her life, she'd lost so much that was so very much more important to her--her family, for starters--that a little ceremonial technicality paled in importance. And yet, for all that, she felt like she'd suddenly begun to fly with no net beneath her.
And, oddly... she decided that she liked that feeling, for once in her life. Very much.
O
In the morning, the sun was shining. The weather was beautiful in a different way than it usually was in San Francisco--there were no clouds, and everything seemed brighter and more vivid in the slowness of a Saturday morning.
Amanda moved gingerly, expecting to be sore from the night's triple adventure into the joys of flesh--but was pleasantly surprised to find herself only a little stiff. There was tenderness between her legs, but it didn't hurt. It just... called attention to itself. And the memory wasn't bad at all.
"How are you?" Aaron was awake and watching her.
"Did I wake you?"
"No. I was watching you sleep."
"I didn't snore, did I?"
"Little bit."
She gasped, appalled. "Why didn't you wake me?"
"Because you sounded so sweet. What were you dreaming about?"
"You." She smiled. "Aaron?"
"Yes?" he said patiently.
"I love you, too."