Prompt 37: "Can I kiss you?" (Johnson/OC)

Episode: Pre-"Hunters"

/

The bike path that cut between Ash and Maple Streets was one of Carla Meissner's favourite places in the world. It was so sheltered between tall fences and even taller trees that, if you didn't know the neighborhood, you might not notice it was there. In spring and summer, it was shady, and in winter, it was safe from the wind. In autumn, fallen leaves made a bright, rustling carpet to walk on, and on an evening like this, when night fell early and the street lamps came on, it looked like you were walking over fragments of pure gold.

"It's like something out of C.S. Lewis, isn't it?" asked Dr. Johnson.

"The Wood Between The Worlds." She smiled. "Exactly."

And that was the real reason why she loved this path, because of all the times they'd walked it together.

Once she'd finished her Master's and gotten a teaching position in her own right, she'd been resigned to seeing him less, but that was not the case; if anything, she saw him more. It helped that they lived in the same neighborhood, and that their dogs, his Molly and her Waldo, were mother and son. The tiny puppy she'd chosen was now a lively adolescent, and the two of them could spend hours chasing each other around the neighborhood dog park. Dr. Johnson took his dog owner's responsibilities very seriously. He wasn't one of those who called their pets "fur babies", dressed them up or took endless holos of them, but he did care that Molly was happy. And it was only polite for him to chat with Molly's son's owner while they walked.

Sometimes Carla thought – hoped, rather – there might be more to it, but what if it was only wishful thinking on her part?

She watched him from the corner of her eye, tall and elegant in his black pea coat, his silver hair ruffled by the wind. He was a decade older than her chronologically and even older in spirit, but she didn't mind that, quite the opposite. He knew who he was and what he wanted. He led his life the same way he led Molly, with confidence, but without too tight a grip on the leash. Carla admired that so much. She admired him.

"Watch out." He caught a low-hanging branch just before it could hit her in the face.

"Whoa! Thanks."

"Where were you just now?" he teased gently. "In Narnia?"

"Uh … something like that." She looked away, embarrassed, focusing on the dogs' plumy tails waving a few steps ahead in an effort to distract herself. "What do you think they'd say if they could talk?"

"Well, I think Waldo might be a little annoyed with you for not letting him roll in that puddle earlier."

"I know. He's growing so fast, isn't he? I can't believe I actually stopped him!"

She'd thought she was prepared for the physical effort of training a dog – that was why she'd wanted one in the first place; academic life risked turning her into a couch potato if she wasn't careful – but experiencing it was another matter. Her arms still ached from holding Waldo back when he pulled on the leash, and so did her throat from calling orders. She was a shy woman and authority did not come naturally to her, but she was learning. It was quite an adrenaline rush when the dog actually listened.

"I think you're doing great," said Dr. Johnson.

"Really?"

"Sure. Molly was just the same when she was his age, and look at her now," said Dr. Johnson, nodding to the sedate figure walking alongside her bouncy overgrown pup. "I remember … "

"Yes?"

But the professor's face turned stern and unreadable, as suddenly as the shadows falling between patches of lamplight. Carla had no idea what he was remembering, but she had the feeling it wasn't about Molly anymore.

The bike path ended they stepped out onto Maple Street, where Carla lived. The sun had gone down, the treetops black against the indigo sky. Early Christmas lights were flickering on around the pines and along the housetops; some families even had inflatable Santas or snowmen in the yard. Carla flipped up the faux-fur hood of her jacket against the cold and switched Waldo's leash to her left hand, so she could warm up the right one in her pocket.

"Well … here's me," she said awkwardly, stopping by the cottage she shared with her parents, with its blue shingles and overgrown spruce hedge. Dr. Johnson already knew where she lived, of course, but she needed to break the silence somehow. "Same time next week?"

"Absolutely."

She glanced over her shoulder at the living room window. Dad would be absorbed in his padd right now, following the news, reading out dire reports from the Cardassian border that would make Mom shake her head and ask what the galaxy was coming to, fretting helplessly over things they couldn't change. She loved them, but it drove her crazy. This was why she preferred studying the nineteenth century rather than living in the twenty-fourth. It might be cowardly of her, but she couldn't help it.

She lingered in front of the driveway, putting off goodbye as long as possible. Waldo stood beside her, panting happily, his tail still wagging like a metronome, as they faced Dr. Johnson and Molly. Their breath steamed in the icy air.

"I had a really great time tonight, sir."

"Me too … but please, call me Mark. You're not my student anymore, remember?"

"Mark. Right."

She blushed. It felt too intimate to call her former thesis supervisor by his given name, as if she might give herself away. But he smiled back at her so warmly, as if he liked to hear it, that she felt a little braver. After all, if she could train Waldo, couldn't she learn to control her own insecurities as well?

"Good night … Mark."

"Good night, Carla. I'll see you on Monday."

Be brave, she told herself. Keeping hold of the leash with one hand, she reached up with the other one to touch Mark's face. She stood on tiptoe in her boots, leaned forward, closed her eyes …

And met a rush of freezing, empty air as he backed away.

"Wha - "

"I'm sorry," he said. "I can't … "

"No, I'm sorry," she choked out, blood rushing to her cheeks and tears to her eyes with enough force to make her dizzy. "I should go."

She bolted down the driveway and through the front door so fast that, for once, Waldo yelped in protest because he could hardly keep up.

Of course Dr. Johnson wasn't interested in her. Of course she was too young and naïve for someone like him. What in the name of the galaxy had she been thinking?

/

By Monday, the edge of her humiliation had worn off a little – she was thirty years old, after all, this wasn't the first time she'd been rejected – but just barely. She could nod to him in the hallway and sit next to him during a meeting, but not manage any actual conversation. Besides, it still took most of her emotional energy to stand in front of a classroom and conduct lectures, even on Transcendentalism, her specialty. By the time she dropped into an armchair in the faculty lounge with a cup of hot chocolate at 5:30 p.m., she was absolutely done with this day. One last sugar hit and she was ready to go home, ruffle Waldo's ears, and take him for a long walk as far from her usual routes as possible.

Footsteps behind her kicked her heart rate into warp. She knew that step, quiet and steady in his thick-soled, practical shoes. She peered around the edge of the armchair to make sure – and, childishly, ducked out of sight again.

"Carla?"

"Dr. Johnson." Damn. "I, um … I was just leaving. You can have the room if you like." There, that sounded a little more mature, didn't it? Not at all like a silly schoolgirl disappointed in her crush. She stood up, picked up her briefcase, and headed for the coat hanger, trying for a dignified exit, praying he wouldn't see that she was red in the face again.

"You're leaving? But, uh … you haven't finished your drink yet."

So much for a dignified exit. She turned around, prepared for a hidden or even an open smile of condescension. What she saw in his face, however, couldn't be further from that.

He was blushing too, twisting the ends of his long scarf around and around his fingers, looking – in spite of his forty years – not much older than she was.

"I was looking for you," he said. "I'm glad you didn't leave yet. I … I think I owe you an explanation after what happened on Saturday night."

"No, you don't!" she squeaked. "I mean, I understand. We're colleagues. It was inappropriate, wasn't it?"

"It's not that." He cleared his throat. "It's only … how much do you know about the U.S.S. Voyager?

"What?" Her head spun. Hearing him refer to a news item from three years ago was a complete non sequitur. She did remember it, though; her father had been fascinated by the tragedy of the missing ship, spinning all kinds of conspiracy theories, while her mother had worried for days about the recklessness of Starfleet and the grieving families. Carla had been so unnerved by the idea of 150 people disappearing that she'd tried to block it out altogether. Unsuccessfully, as it turned out.

"The ship that went missing? What about it?"

"The captain of that ship was my fiancée."

Captain Janeway. There had been recordings of her in the media, a charming, confident woman with auburn hair and a voice like a jazz singer's, as well as a long list of accomplishments as a soldier and a scientist. She was – or had been – a war hero, for God's sake; what ordinary woman could ever measure up?

Then Carla immediately felt selfish and stupid, because this was Mark's life he was talking about, his love and his grief. She couldn't imagine what he must have been through. Petty jealousy had no place in that.

"My God, I - I'm so sorry," she stammered. "I had no idea … "

"She's legally dead, you know – they all are – but no one's ever found them. If I could just know, one way or the other … "

"Of course."

Maybe she could imagine how he felt after all, at least on a small scale. Uncertainty was wearing on her too, even if it was nowhere near as terrible as his.

"For years, I've held out hope that she was still out there. In some ways, I'm still engaged to her, do you know what I mean? But I can't live like this. My friends, my counselor, everyone's telling me to move on, but I never thought that was possible, until … until I got to know you."

"M-me?"

"Yes." He took a step closer. "You're more than a colleague to me, Carla, and more than a friend. I backed off that night because I thought you deserved better – someone younger, someone whole – but it's not my place to make that decision alone, is it?"

"Absolutely not!" Carla never knew where she found the confidence to answer him like that, but she did. Being a dog owner must be doing her some good after all "I don't want someone younger, and what do you even mean by 'someone whole'? You're not broken, for God's sake, you're grieving."

"That's more or less what my counselor said." He smiled at her for the first time that day, tentatively, like the lamps along the bike path flickering on in the dark.

"That's good to know."

"So … " He glanced around the faculty lounge with its plain gray armchairs, all empty, the humming replicator, and the window with its curtains drawn. He shut the door, and once they were as private as they could be, turned back towards her. His eyes were as bright as she'd ever seen them, smiling at her during their walks; her wishful thinking had been telling her the truth about that look after all.

"Having established that," he said, sounding so much like her professor that she had to swallow a giggle, "There's, ah … something I'd like to try, and I promise to take a better shot at it than on Saturday night. After all, people aren't meant to stay in the Wood Between The Worlds forever, are they? We need to choose one."

She thought of the bike path and the Narnian nickname they'd given it, liminal space that it was, belonging neither to the houses nor to the streets. She thought she understood, but just in case: "What do you mean?"

"Can I … may I kiss you?"

"Yes, Mark," said Carla, holding out her arms. "You can and you may."