"Is your seatbelt on?" (P/T)

(Author's Note: This episode takes place after the episode "Vis-a-vis".

/

"Is your seatbelt on?"

"Seriously?"

"What?" Tom held up his hands in exaggerated innocence. "This baby doesn't come with inertial dampers, you know."

It was a harmless question and B'Elanna knew it, but that didn't stop her from feeling on edge. They were both pretending to be on an ordinary date, that Tom's gesture of inviting her into the Grease Monkey program was just his odd way of being romantic, but there was more than that beneath the surface. They'd been kissing just fine a few moments ago, but when he suddenly leaned over and fastened her seatbelt for her, the click of the lock and the close contact inside the cramped Chevy Camaro made her freeze.

"B'Elanna?" He let go. "What's wrong?"

What's wrong? said a bitter voice inside her mind. How can he not know?

What was wrong was that an alien identity thief had worn Tom's body for three days and she'd never noticed. Not even when "Tom" had turned cruel with a suddenness that would have made anyone suspicious. Now that he was back, being so very much the Tom Paris she loved, she could hardly believe it. She felt like a traitor almost as much as she'd been the one betrayed.

"It's just … " she began in a small voice. "The other guy wouldn't have done that. With the seatbelt, I mean."

"Son of a bitch." Tom's face clouded over. "I hope he rots in jail for the rest of his life."

"Me too." But there wasn't much conviction in her voice. She was too numb to be angry, and that was never a good sign.

He stepped on the gas and drove out onto the open holographic road, accelerating with an abruptness that made B'Elanna grateful for the seatbelt. Riding in a twentieth-century groundcar was a visceral experience; she could feel every bump in the road, every shift in speed and direction, every vibration of the engine under her seat. No wonder Tom enjoyed this so much; on any other day, she'd probably enjoy it as well.

"Doesn't say much for my behavior the last few weeks, huh?" His tone was as casual as ever, even as he raised his voice to be heard over the purring motor, but his eyes were still dark as he stared at the road. "That a selfish bastard took over my life and no one noticed because I was acting like one anyway?"

"Don't say that." She couldn't take his hand because they were both on the steering wheel, but she put a firm hand on his knee. "It was never your fault."

"The last thing I said to you before he got me was to call you histrionic. Every time I go over that conversation, all I can hear is you doing your damnedest to stay calm and talk to me like a grown-up. I was the histrionic one. I swore if I ever got my face back, I'd tell you I was sorry. Because I am."

B'Elanna leaned back into the car seat, her eyes watering from the speed as she watched the holographic prairie blur past under a deep blue sky. Something about sitting side by side without looking at each other made it easier to open up. Apparently when he;d promised to let her in, he'd really meant it.

"It's okay, Tom." It wasn't - not completely - but she meant the words as an olive branch, and she could feel his entire body relax as she accepted it. "It's just … I know it's hard to talk about things like this, but … if you're having doubts about this relationship, you can tell me. I'm a big girl. I can take it."

"Wait … what?"

Tom stepped on the brake, coming to a stop in the middle of the road. On a real American highway, this would have been an outrageous thing to do, but on the holodeck, they were literally the only people on this road. The silence, broken only by the sighing of the wind outside, was clear enough that she could hear perfectly how vulnerable he sounded when he asked: "Is that what you thought? That I was having doubts about us?"

"Weren't you?"

Another silence. He bowed his head over the steering wheel, struggling for words. The longer it went on, the more she began to dread his answer. She could have just let him take her for a fun drive, but no, she never could leave well enough alone. She might be a big girl, but not big enough to take a broken heart with equanimity yet.

"I must've started working on this car … what, a couple of months ago?" he murmured. "Wasn't long after the Hirogen. Those damn simulations of theirs freaked me out."

"You and everyone else on board," said B'Elanna. "What's that got to do with … ? Oh."

Her hand went involuntarily to her belly. She remembered Tom's shocked face when he'd caught sight of her with her holographic baby bump, and suddenly his avoidance of her and his retreats into the garage made a lot more sense. She, too, needed a place to hide whenever she remembered how easy it had been to believe she was Brigitte and carrying an enemy soldier's child.

"Did I ever ask you to get me pregnant?" she inquired acerbically.

"No, of course not. I just felt like ten kinds of idiot for getting jealous of a fictional Nazi officer. I was like, what if that baby was real? What if it was ours? So … " He let out a rueful sound halfway between a sigh and a laugh. "No, I wasn't having doubts about us. More like the opposite. And that scares the hell out of me."

"Oh." B'Elanna smoothed her lab coat, half touched and half alarmed by the confession. Trust Tom to be unpredictable even after four years.

"It scares me too, something as permanent as that. I mean, you know what my parents were like. For what it's worth, though … if I did have a baby, I'd want to raise it with the kind of guy who checks the seat belt no matter how fast he's driving."

She glanced over to see his reaction. He was smiling - not the Casanova grin that the body thief had copied so perfectly, but a soft, genuine smile that reached his eyes until they were bluer than the prairie sky above them.

"I dunno about you," he said, "But I've got a lot to learn about being a partner first before I even think about anything else. If we're gonna do this, let's do it the way this car is built. No shortcuts. One step at a time."

"Sounds like a plan," said B'Elanna, smiling back at him with relief, as well as more love than she could even begin to express out loud.

He reached over to undo her seat belt, slowly, with a silent glance asking her permission. She did not hesitate even a moment this time as he pulled her close for a kiss.