Gretchen Janeway grabbed two thermoses of coffee and carried them over to the table set for ten. The oblong space was laden with dishes of all kinds, some of them leftovers from the previous night's party. Apart from the Janeway sisters and their respective partners, Danny and Belinda, who'd been staying at Gretchen's house, as well as Danny's parents had followed the invitation for a family Sunday brunch to round out the weekend. An inevitable last addition to the crowd was Aunt Erica.
"I'm still so very embarrassed about having missed most of Gretchen's wonderful party," Erica's booming voice sounded from the back porch when Kathryn and Chakotay followed her mother into the dining room carrying tea and juices. "Horace really should have kept a better eye on the time. I hardly had a chance to catch up with anyone before people started leaving."
"Oh, come now, Erica," Gretchen's brother Brian responded, his tone clearly amused. "Mabel and I left around 2 am, and as I recall you and Julia were just finishing off the last of the brownies. So it's not like the party broke up right after you arrived."
"But some I didn't see all night," Erica kept complaining. "Kathryn, for example; it felt as if she wasn't there at all. I can't wait to meet her new beau, Julia said he's devastatingly handsome!"
Chakotay coughed, hoping that he wouldn't blush.
Gretchen looked up. "Don't let Erica make you uncomfortable," she warned. "She's not intentionally rude, but sometimes her propensity for gossip can make her a bit... overbearing." She threw a quick glance at Kathryn who seemed completely engrossed in folding a stack of napkins and distributing them around the table. "That goes for both of you."
"We'll be okay," Chakotay assured her, but Kathryn still didn't reply. Catching Gretchen's worried look, he smiled encouragingly. She acknowledged him with a nod and then left the room. Chakotay immediately circled around the table and wrapped his arms around Kathryn from behind, placing his chin on her shoulder and keeping his voice low. "Are you sure you feel up to this? It's not too late to leave."
She let go of the napkins and leaned into him, letting her head fall back onto his shoulder. Chakotay took this as an invitation to lightly nibble on her earlobe.
"I really want to stay," Kathryn sighed. "I so rarely see my family that I don't want to allow anyone to spoil the occasion, for any of us. And Erica is part of the family, too. But still I can't help feeling... apprehensive."
"Just relax," he soothed her. "And don't feel obliged to answer any questions if you don't want to."
She turned in his arms, slipping hers around his neck. "You really think that'll work?"
He shrugged. "It's worth a try."
"Okay." She sighed again, then leaned up to kiss him. Their lips had barely touched when a loud voice sounded from behind Kathryn.
"Ah, young love!" Aunt Erica clapped her hands in delight as she stepped into the room, Brian following behind her.
At the sound, Kathryn broke from Chakotay's embrace and turned quickly. "Hello, Erica."
Chakotay couldn't see Kathryn's face, but when she spoke he was struck by the change in her voice. Instead of softness and vulnerability, there was an edge he'd never heard from her before. Still, the tension in her shoulders told him that she was only putting on a brave front, and that the facade could crumble under too much pressure.
For her part, Erica seemed oblivious to the tension her presence caused. She grabbed Kathryn by her upper arms and placed a resounding kiss on either of her niece's cheeks. "Kathryn, my dear, it's so good to see you again! And how well you look today – being in love obviously agrees with you!" Still holding fast to her arms, she peered around her. "And this is your new man? Why don't you introduce us!"
Kathryn took a step back out of her aunt's grasp and cleared her throat. "Erica, this is Chakotay. Chakotay, meet my Aunt Erica."
"I'm very pleased to meet you, Ma'am," Chakotay smiled, extending his hand.
"Oh, don't you dare call me 'Ma'am'!" the older woman exclaimed, disregarding Chakotay's outstretched hand and throwing her arms around him in a quick but crushing hug. "We don't stand on ceremony in this family, don't we, Kathryn dear?" she added over her shoulder.
Before Kathryn could reply, Phoebe and Leo entered the room, followed closely by the rest of the family. "Time to eat!" Gretchen announced, placing one last plate with various cheeses onto the already overflowing table.
With obvious reluctance, Erica released Chakotay to greet the other guests while everyone found places to sit.
There was no set seating order. Of course Gretchen's place was at the head of the table, and her brother took the seat at the other end. Erica quickly secured the place to the left of Chakotay. Kathryn shot him a sympathetic look as she sat down across from him, with Phoebe to her right and Belinda to her left. The rest of the family slid into the remaining spots, and soon there were plates being passed round and drinks being poured, while snippets of conversation criss-crossed the table.
After loading her plate with two croissants, a small stack of pancakes, a generous amount of maple syrup and a handful of strawberries, Erica turned to Chakotay, and he braced himself for her onslaught of questions.
"Where's your family from, dear?" she began her inquisition, and for the next hour Chakotay found himself answering all sorts of inquiries about his family, life on Dorvan V, and how and why he'd entered Starfleet. Some of his replies he gave willingly and in detail, others he kept intentionally vague, but whatever he said was swallowed up eagerly by the elderly woman. He also found himself deflecting the occasional comment about Kathryn's career and her plans for the future, deciding to either overhear them or change the topic.
From time to time, he glanced over at Kathryn and noticed that she kept her attention closely focused on Belinda and her daughter. Baby Fiona had taken an instant liking to her the day before, and now she cooed happily as Kathryn played with her and fed her the occasional morsel of food.
"Gretchen said you're a teacher at Starfleet Academy now," Erica opened a new area of questions. "Isn't that terribly dull compared with the excitement of space exploration?"
Chakotay dutifully assured her that his current job wasn't dull at all and that educating a new generation of Starfleet officers was both interesting and rewarding. As an afterthought, he added that during his fifteen years of active starship duty, he'd had his share of exciting yet often dangerous missions and that it was a nice change not to constantly have to worry about running into trouble.
His words seemed to be just the kind of statement Erica had been waiting for all along. "Oh, this family knows all about the dangers of space exploration!" she exclaimed. "My brother Edward, Kathryn's father, was an admiral. Surely you've heard of him?"
"Yes," Chakotay started to reply, but she was already talking on.
"His death was such a tragedy! And poor Kathryn... to lose her father on their first joint mission!"
Stunned, Chakotay looked up, but Kathryn's place was empty. He quickly glanced around the room, but neither she nor Fiona were in sight, which thankfully meant that they were also out of earshot.
"I always said there should be regulations against sending family members out together," Erica droned on, "but with the new Galaxy-class ships, it seems Starfleet is of the opposite opinion. I mean, what if anything happens? These are not cruise ships after all." She took a quick gulp of tea and set the cup back down forcefully, making the saucer jingle. "Despite all the new safety regulations, Starfleet is still a dangerous place to be. Just look at Kathryn! Her nerves are still jittery from her latest mission. You do know what happened, don't you?" She fixed Chakotay with her beady eyes, eagerly awaiting his reply.
He was utterly repulsed by her attempt at wheedling sensitive information out of him and coolly replied, "I'm sorry, but I don't see how that's any of your business."
A hush fell over the table, and Chakotay belatedly realized that he'd spoken louder than intended.
Oblivious to the fact that all eyes were staring at them, Erica took on an offended expression. "I am merely concerned about how Starfleet will ensure my niece's continued safety and health. And I don't like your tone, young man!"
"Enough." Everyone jumped at the quiet voice laced with steel. Gretchen's eyes were cold as ice. "There will be no further mention of Starfleet at this table today. Is that understood?"
Before anyone could react, the door opened and Kathryn entered the room, Fiona in her arms. She was making funny faces, causing the girl to giggle and pat her on the cheeks with her chubby little hands.
Belinda rose quickly. "Thank you for changing her diaper. I'll take her now so you can eat something."
"Oh, that's okay," Kathryn replied, rubbing her nose against the baby's. "We had a lot of fun together, didn't we, sweetie?" Fiona gurgled in delight.
When the conversations around him started up again, Chakotay breathed a sigh of relief. Kathryn didn't seem to have noticed the strained atmosphere she'd walked in on and handed Fiona off to her mother. As she retook her seat, she smiled at Chakotay. "Did I miss anything?"
"Nothing of importance," he smiled back.
"Good," she replied and let her eyes roam the table in search of the best leftovers.
Chakotay chanced a quick look to his left, but Erica had turned her back on him and was now conversing with Leo and Phoebe. Relieved that he was off the hook for the time being, he helped himself to some strawberries and cream and just listened to Kathryn's talk with her uncle Brian about his plans for repainting his house and the difficulty of agreeing on a color with his wife.
The more he relaxed, the more Chakotay realized how wound up he'd been all morning. Kathryn had been tense from the moment she'd woken, and although she'd tried to downplay her apprehensions, they'd influenced him more than he'd expected.
Even though he had anticipated many of Aunt Erica's questions – after all, he'd answered the same queries numerous times over the past two days – he'd still been surprised by how closely she'd focused on him, to the point of disregarding her oldest niece almost entirely. What he hadn't expected was her attempt to mine him for information about Kathryn, particularly her most recent assignment.
That Gretchen had been the one to put an end to the inquisition confirmed Chakotay's suspicions of the night before. Whether Kathryn believed it or not, her mother obviously had perceived much more of her troubles than she let on openly.
The meal gradually wound down, and the conversation turned to the week ahead. Kathryn eagerly shared her plans of spending another couple of days in San Francisco to rediscover the city, which led to a quick but heated discussion between her, Belinda and Chakotay about past and present favorite cadet hangouts. Aunt Erica wisely refrained from commenting.
Soon afterwards, Danny, Belinda and Fiona prepared to leave. Kathryn took the baby on a farewell tour of the garden while the other adults helped to retrieve toys and miniature socks from unlikely parts of the house. Then everyone waved goodbye as the small family got into the ground car that would take them to the transport station.
Danny's parents took their leave about an hour later. For a short moment, Chakotay feared that the removal of half the crowd would encourage her nosy aunt to try and get at Kathryn again, but then Brian suggested that they give Erica a ride home since they would be passing by her village anyway. Indecision was plain on the woman's face, illustrating her inner battle between passing up another chance at talking to her niece and the prospect of sharing all sorts of family-related news during the two-hour ride with the elderly couple. In the end, the need to gossip won out, and she made herself comfortable in the vehicle's back seat while Gretchen, her daughters, Chakotay and Leo gathered on the front porch to wave good-bye.
"Finally," Gretchen exclaimed when the van had vanished around a corner and they all stepped back into the house. "Not that the party wasn't fun, but after a week of falling over people left and right, I'm really looking forward to having the house to myself again."
"Thanks a lot, Mother," Phoebe replied with mock indignation. "Maybe we should get going, too."
"Oh no, you're always welcome, and you know it." Gretchen pulled both her daughters close and dropped kisses on their heads. Then she smiled at Leo and Chakotay who looked on with amusement. "The same goes for you two."
With all five adults working in sync, clearing the table and straightening the kitchen was quick work. When every counter was spotless, Gretchen announced that she intended to spend the afternoon doing nothing except lie in the shade of the old elm tree in the back garden, sipping a cold drink and maybe reading a couple of pages in one of the books she'd received for her birthday. Phoebe reminded her fiancé that he'd promised to build a raised bed for her mother's herb garden, the materials for which were already gathering dust in the shed. Leo dutifully agreed to devote the afternoon to the task. Kathryn and Chakotay offered to help, but Gretchen quickly put an end to the discussion by pointing out that Chakotay hadn't seen much of the surroundings yet and practically ordered her oldest daughter to take him on an extended walk.
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