The images were indistinct—blurry around the edges and full of anachronisms. Her breasts were exquisite and impossibly soft, but the harder he tried to appreciate them, the fuzzier they became. He turned his mouth to the tiny hollow bowl at the base of her throat, showering her with kisses and taking delight in the vibrations of her moans.

"Strontium compounds?" she asked.

Sarek shook his head. What did strontium have to do with this? He pushed himself up to observe her face, but all he could see was her wave of rich brown hair.

"Clarify," he insisted, trying to keep his voice steady.

She didn't. She grabbed at his hips and drew him closer to her body, then ran her hands along his flanks, tracing her thumbs over his hip bones. How he burned for her!

He returned to the business of pleasure, this time meeting his lips to hers and readying his hands to make contact with her face and join their minds together.

"So they're all alkali metals?" He jerked away. Her face was pleasant and inquisitive.

"What are?"

"Colors that burn red. Strontium and lithium are alkali metals, right?" A sly smile crept onto her mouth. "Don't you want me?"

"Yes, or that is to say, yes they are alkali metals. And I—I am—"

She shuffled on her back to get out from underneath him, sat up, placed his hand between her legs, and whispered in his ear, "It's been a while since I looked at the periodic table."

"I fail to see how the periodic table is relevant to—"

"Electron configurations. Don't you want to be with me?" she asked, reaching a hand toward his genitals.

He tried to gauge the expression on her face but found it difficult to discern any features at all. He whimpered, "Do you have any interest in being with me?"

The laugh she emitted was piercing and harsh. When he opened his eyes, he found himself alone and staring at the dark ceiling of his bedroom. His pulse was accelerated and he felt supremely agitated.

It was the fourth time that week he'd experienced such vivid dreams featuring Amanda Grayson. Last night, the dream world Amanda been asking about uniform circular motion any time he attempted to initiate intimate contact. The night before that, she'd kept insisting that gravity was a constant acceleration, which of course he already knew.

He sighed and closed his eyes. His memory brought him back to the moment when her hand accidentally touched his during the fireworks display, and how dumbfounded he'd felt by the powerful sensation it elicited. Touching hands with anyone other than a mate was a thing most Vulcans avoided at all costs because of innate telepathic abilities common among his species. But Amanda was human.

He had unintentionally touched hands with acquaintances and strangers at different times in his life and never felt anything other than a mild sense of embarrassment at such a blunder. How could such a casual touch from a member of a different species provoke the same physical response that he had only previously experienced with T'Rea?

As he had done the past three nights, he began to consider what might be lurking within his subconscious. Perhaps his bond with T'Rea wasn't fully severed and he still wanted to experience the pleasure of mating, but because T'Rea was gone, he'd turned his focus to the only other non-related female with whom he felt comfortable out of practicality rather than out of genuine affection.

Or perhaps he was experiencing an aberrant pon farr cycle. He was not due to face that most regrettable condition for approximately four more years but he wondered if living on Earth was altering some poorly understood facet of Vulcan physiology. Or perhaps his subconscious was reminding him that unless he wanted to either abandon logic entirely or undergo the kolinahr, pon farr would come for him eventually and so he could not remain a bachelor for the remainder of his life.

There was another option but it was one he preferred not to seriously consider, which was that his subconscious legitimately desired Amanda Grayson. She was aesthetically pleasing enough and he found her company tolerable, but she would make a most illogical mate.

He reached his hand under the light blanket and gingerly touched himself, wincing at the intensity of his prolonged erection. He exhaled slowly and rolled onto his back, but he could neither relax his mind nor quell his arousal. Desperate for any form of release, his hand wandered back to that most sensitive area, but almost immediately the thought of Amanda's breasts reemerged and he stopped. Thinking of her that way at all was enough of a violation, let alone thinking of her that way during such a private act.

He tried to force himself to think of T'Rea, but focusing was difficult and he ceased his efforts after twenty minutes. He flung the covers from his body, paced the room, and then did what decades of training demanded. He sunk to his knees, adopted the necessary posture, and meditated until the morning sun peeked through the drapes and it was time to prepare for work.

His ruminations had been helpful but hardly curative. If he let his mind become idle, Amanda would immediately occupy the space. Was he losing his logic? Just as he began considering whether it would be beneficial to reduce or even eliminate his interactions with her, at least until he could get his scattered mind under control, his PADD vibrated with a message. He glanced down and upon seeing it was from her, quickly opened the message.

Grayson, Amanda
Stardate 2229.34; Time 1120
Can you tutor me on Saturday?

His fingers moved as if on instinct and less than five seconds later, he sent his reply.

Sarek
Stardate 2229.34; Time 1120
Yes.

Then he recollected that Saturday was tomorrow and was also an important date for her. Without waiting for her reply, he sent a second message.

Sarek
Stardate 2229.34; Time 1121
Is Saturday not your birthday? I was informed birth anniversaries are significant occasions for humans.

Grayson, Amanda
Stardate 2229.34; Time 1122
It is, but I don't have any plans. Ordinarily Mara would demand to take me out, but she's been pretty distracted lately. Haha.

Initially, he couldn't figure out how to interpret the last word but upon saying it aloud, suspected it might be a written form of laughter. How odd that she felt compelled to indicate laughter via text.

Grayson, Amanda
Stardate 2229.34; Time 1123
Can you meet me at my dorm at noon?

Sarek
Stardate 2229.34; Time 1123
I await our meeting.

He felt less agitated for the rest of the day but noticed his tendency toward distraction had increased. At the end of his shift, he began the short walk back to his apartment with the full intention of spending the evening in intensive meditation but hesitated once he reached his doorstep.

Petra had said it was necessary to get her a gift to honor the day of her birth. Had she meant that it was appropriate to get his girlfriend a gift, or that humans generally expected gifts from all their acquaintances? She had recommended jewelry and flowers, but she had endorsed that option under the assumption that Amanda was his legitimate girlfriend. Would Amanda be offended if he failed to present her with a gift?

He stepped down from the front step of his building and set off down the sidewalk. He walked for nearly half an hour, enjoying the warm feel of the late afternoon sun on his face as he waited to encounter a shop that dispensed plants. Soon he found himself in an area where many of the signs had familiar Vulcan text below the Standard words and the majority of passersby shared his Vulcan heritage.

Many people dressed and carried themselves as traditional followers of Surak, but just as many others were dressed similarly to Vedek and would have easily blended in to the Terran landscape if not for their pointed ears and upswept eyebrows. A few of the more conventional Vulcans offered Sarek the customary salute and greeted him in their native tongue and when he readily delivered his reply, the sound of the lyrical Vuhlkansu rolling from his tongue filled him with longing.

How strange it was to see two opposing cultures merged together in this way, to hear Vuhlkansu mingled among the laughter of people sitting on patios of Vulcan restaurants and to see the juxtaposition of things like a boisterous nightclub situated across the street from a temple to Surak. It had clearly been illogical to assume the population in the so-called Vulcan Village would consist almost exclusively of V'tosh Ka'tur dissidents.

Most surprising of all, everyone appeared indifferent to the jarring display of diversity and seemed generally tolerant of each other. Such profuse public expression of emotion on his home world wasn't illegal, but it would certainly be met with widespread disapproval and suspicion and repeat offenders were typically ostracized. His earliest memories were of his parents and caregivers training him to suppress his feelings, warning that logic must be vigilantly safeguarded and asserting that a Vulcan society that permitted even small displays of emotion with any regularity was under persistent threat of collapse.

What would it be like to live without logic as Vedek did? As Amanda did? As so many of the inhabitants of Vulcan Village did? They all seemed content. For the first time in his life, Sarek felt curious about embracing emotion and this realization stopped him in his tracks.

It dawned on Sarek that until that very moment, he'd always expected his sabbatical on Earth would be temporary and that one day he would return to Vulcan. Whether he would ever speak to his father again was unclear, but Sarek was Vulcan, and Vulcans belonged on Vulcan. Didn't they? He looked around and was no longer certain.

Someone slammed into him from behind, disrupting his reflections and causing him to stagger forward. A hand clutched his bicep and he instinctively pivoted to keep both himself and the stranger upright. She was a Vulcan woman with glossy auburn hair that he suspected was the result of chemicals rather than genetics. Her genetic makeup had also bestowed upon her a short stature, but she artificially made herself taller with a pair of towering shoes.

"So sorry!" she squeaked, laughing as she tried to steady herself.

When she caught sight of Sarek, he detected a healthy green flush beginning on her round cheeks. She was unnaturally beautiful but strange to behold, with a face layered in human makeup and a body barely covered in a glittering gold dress.

"Wow, T'Reka!" giggled another woman behind him.

The auburn-haired woman swallowed and repeated her apology in a crisp and somber Shi'Kahran accent. "Ni'droi'ik nar'tor."

"It is I who should apologize," he insisted, choosing to speak in Standard since it was the language the woman had used first. "It was illogical of me to stop in the middle of the walkway and hinder foot traffic."

Another woman joined her. She was clad similarly but was far taller and plainer than her auburn-haired friend. She smiled at Sarek and said, "Excuse T'Reka, she's not the best at watching where she's going."

"I believe we are both to blame," Sarek replied.

"We should get going," said the woman called T'Reka, whose cheeks were growing greener by the second.

"I have no wish to detain you further," Sarek agreed.

As the two women scurried off, his ears made out the beginning of their conversation.

"He looks so familiar!"

"He's not bad. You should have asked him to come with us."

"I didn't even get his name and besides, with a haircut like that, it's not like he'd come."

Their next words were drowned out by the muted music coming from the nightclub and ten seconds later, they joined the queue of people forming outside it. Rather than encounter the stares of the women a second time, he crossed the street and found himself outside the temple. How long had it been since he'd visited a formal place of reflection?

The urge to enter was countered by the apprehension of what he would find there. Would it be a true sanctuary of logic or another unconventional hybrid of classic Vulcan culture warped to fit on an illogical Earth?

"You hesitate, brother." They spoke in Vuhlkansu. The tenor of the voice was serious yet welcoming.

He glanced in the direction of the speaker and his eyes met a priestess in traditional white robes standing in the temple's open doorway.

"It has been some time since I have been to a temple," he admitted.

"The present time is appropriate, if you wish to cleanse your katra. Any time is appropriate."

He noticed her steal a glance at the rowdy club across the street. What did she think of her raucous neighbors? Sarek wasn't even sure what he thought of them.

"I prefer private meditation."

"As do most people," she admitted with a nod. "Yet sometimes it is helpful to seek solace in the familiar, especially when one is far from home."

He resisted the desire to confess his many recent offenses against logic to her. "I regret I must decline. I do not feel fit to enter a temple."

"Do you wish to seek the serenity of logic?"

"I have always preferred the serenity of logic over the burden of emotion," he automatically answered, even though he was newly mired in doubt.

"Then you are always fit to enter a temple," she replied. "We will soon honor the season of Silkar with a traditional Shi'Kahran festival. Perhaps you may be tempted to visit us then."

"Perhaps," he agreed, suspecting she deduced his place of origin from his accent. He raised his right hand in the ta'al and they parted ways.

He wandered further into the Vulcan district, his mind riddled with conflict. Was logic really serene, or had he deluded himself for his entire adult life? His logic dueled with his growing sense of disillusionment. When he happened upon a nursery preparing to shutter its doors for the evening, he welcomed the mental distraction of admiring the display of budding favinit plants on the sidewalk.

His mother favored this species and grew hundreds of them in the family garden and kept dozens more in pots throughout the house. In turn, they rewarded her handsomely for her devotion, delighting her with fragrant blooms of every color each spring.

He left the shop with two of them in hand, one so purple in color it was nearly black, and another that was bright red. Petra had said flowers were an appropriate gift but it seemed far more logical to bequeath Amanda a living plant that could produce flowers every year if cared for properly.

He recalibrated his path based on the setting sun and headed in the direction of his apartment, cutting through a narrow alley behind a group of busy restaurants. Half a block later, the gleam of an aquamarine stone in the front window of a consignment store caught his attention. Unless he was mistaken, the diamond-shaped amulet was vokaya, a mineral found only in a handful of small mines in the Go'an region of Vulcan. Petra had also indicated jewelry was an appropriate gift and though it was clearly Vulcan in origin, its vivid beauty paralleled Amanda's human personality.

It took a considerable amount of time and money to convince the elderly Vulcan shop owner to part with it, but once the transaction was complete and the necklace was tucked in a box in his breast pocket, Sarek resumed his journey home, relieved to have an errand done but still lost in a maze of his own conflicted existence.

"It's nighttime, it's nighttime," Amanda sang, clapping her hands in rhythm to the music. Her audience of three and four-year-olds didn't seem impressed by her efforts to lead them in a rousing rendition of the sleepy time song.

Her night at the daycare had been impossibly long, with boring stretches frequently punctuated by ugly tantrums and defiance without warning. She wasn't sure if the kids were feeding off her sour mood or vice versa, but she wondered how she was going to survive two more hours of this.

When she asked Owen Jacobs to help her clean up the stuffed animals at the end of circle time, he threw a fit and bolted out of the room. When he slammed face first into the edge of the door, splitting his head open and unleashing a spectacular shower of blood, Amanda knew her night wasn't going to get any better. An hour of chaos ensued beginning with calling the paramedics and notifying his parents and ended writing the necessary statement detailing what had led to his injury.

As she knocked on Adam's door to submit her report, tears brimmed in her eyes. When he told her to come in, she prayed he wouldn't ask too many questions and actually make her cry. She couldn't bear enduring his disappointment on top of everything else. She set the PADD on his desk without comment.

"Are you okay?" he asked, giving her the distinct impression that he himself could be better.

"Have you heard back from the hospital?" she asked slowly, trying to sound calm.

"Owen's going to be fine," Adam reassured her. "He's not the first little boy to smash his head and he won't be the last."

"It happened on my watch," Amanda sniffed. "I'm sorry."

"And sometimes kids are kids," he replied. "Don't apologize."

She dabbed at the corner of her eyes with the knuckle of her index finger and nodded.

"Isn't your birthday tomorrow?" he asked, clearly desperate to change the subject to something more cheerful. What Adam didn't know was how little she was looking forward to officially turning another year older.

"Yeah."

"Any plans? Sarek taking you out?"

She grimaced. Sarek had agreed to tutor her in the afternoon, so saying yes wouldn't exactly be a lie. "I think so. Anyway, how's T'Vara doing? She came back a while ago, right?"

His face darkened with anguish. "She's not coming back."

It took Amanda an awkwardly long time to process his words and come up with the most probable meaning. Was T'Vara dead? Sick? In prison? "I don't understand—"

"She broke things off."

"Oh Adam, I'm so sorry." And to her surprise, she truly was.

His face reddened and he turned back to his computer. "I probably shouldn't have said anything. I didn't mean to make things awkward. I'm not looking for pity I just…"

"You seem like you're still processing it," Amanda said gently.

"Yeah."

Emboldened by his sudden display of vulnerability and inspired by her own self-pity, she asked, "Hey, do you want to go get coffee after work? We don't have to talk about relationships or anything if you don't want."

He looked hesitant but gave her a weak smile. "That sounds okay. You like Pete's Place, right?"

An hour and a half later, they settled into the same overstuffed booth where she'd sat with Sarek the night they met. She thought she should be excited to be grabbing coffee with Adam, but they were both in too glum a mood for her to feel any thrill in the experience.

She searched for some neutral topic to discuss but before she could settle on one, Adam blurted, "T'Vara is getting married."

Amanda nearly spit out her macchiato. "To who? She was only gone for a few weeks! You mean she went home to Vulcan, met someone, and agreed to get married in less than a month when she knew she had a boyfriend waiting for her on Earth?"

"She didn't meet someone," he said darkly, taking a sip of his mocha latte. "She's known someone. She's had a marriage arranged for her since childhood."

Amanda blinked at the cascade of shocking information that flowed from Adam like rain. "Wait, her parents arranged a marriage?"

"I hear it's quite common on Vulcan, actually. Particularly in families that are serious followers of Surak."

Amanda slumped back in her seat, stunned by the revelation. "I didn't know that."

"Apparently it's not something they advertise."

Of all the places her mind could have chosen to go with that information, it immediately settled on Sarek. Sarek followed Surak. Was he engaged? Was engaged even the right word, or should it be betrothed? Did it matter? He was older than T'Vara: what if he was actually married? Her mouth went cotton dry and she felt sick to her stomach.

"I didn't mean to upset you," Adam said. "Part of me feels like I shouldn't be dragging you into this but you have a Vulcan boyfriend and I thought you might understand how deep a connection it really is. The melding. It felt so real."

His voice cracked and he made a poor effort to conceal his growing distress by taking a long drink of his mocha. Sarek loved mochas. Was Sarek married? Should it really matter if he was, since she wasn't his real girlfriend anyway?

"I'm so sorry, Adam," she offered.

"I'm sorry too, for dumping this on you. I just don't feel like I can talk to anyone else about it and I really need to talk about this. I understand if you want to leave."

"No," she murmured. She felt like she should be flattered by his willingness to confide in her, but she couldn't shake the thought of Sarek being married. Sensing she ought to be putting on a supportive friend face, she sipped her drink and quickly asked, "If she knew she was engaged, why did she agree to date you?"

"She told me she wanted to make sure she was—" He stopped himself and pulled out his PADD. His voice was now shaking with anger. "Hang on, I want to make sure I get her exact words right. She wanted to be sure she was 'destined for a life of logic' and decided the best way to know was to 'live among an illogical species and determine if she was still devoted to pursuing the serenity of logic after forming illogical close personal attachments.' The goal was to see if she had the 'discipline to give them up in the name of duty.' I guess she gave me up in the name of duty."

Until then, Amanda was sure there had to be some kind of limit on how stunned a person could be. "So she used you like a social experiment? She came to Earth to slum it up with the irrational humans and then once she had her fill, she just threw you away?"

Adam's hands gripped his cup so tightly the knuckles turned white. "I would hate her if I didn't miss her so much. She was the best thing that ever happened to me."

"Not if she was dating you while she was engaged to someone else."

Adam hung his head. "I keep telling myself that. I thought I had everything figured out. I have a job I love, good friends, I had the perfect woman."

"You still have a job you love and good friends," Amanda encouraged, wishing she could say the same. She doubted many of her friends would remember her birthday over the weekend when they were all too focused on studying for the last round of midterms before finals.

"Thank you for being such a good friend," he murmured.

There was a time when it would have pained her to be referred to as only a friend, but now Amanda felt grateful. Adam was a good guy but it was clear it was going to take him months if not years to get over T'Vara, if he ever did. What had she seen in him exactly, besides the fact that he was great with kids? He'd barely ever given her the time of day until now, when he needed someone to listen to his woes.

She quickly finished her drink and made an excuse about needing to get home to study. He wished her a happy early birthday and even gave her an awkward side hug as they parted ways. All she wanted to do was crawl into bed, pretend like the day had never happened, sleep through the birthday that she was sure no one would remember, and then wake up on Monday ready to fail another physics midterm.

Unfortunately her dorm room had once again been requisitioned for Mara and Vedek's sexual amusement and instead of sinking into her soft bed to cry herself to sleep, she found herself fleeing the building for the sanctuary of the library. She scanned her physics text and read the same homework problem four times, fully aware she wasn't really absorbing the words.

Tomorrow she would be nineteen and begin her last year as a teenager. Two years since she'd literally lost her mother in a traffic accident and figuratively lost her father to grief. She'd spent the past year surviving college and dreaming about getting together with Adam, but now the illusion of the perfect happily-ever-after she'd made in her mind was shattered by finally seeing how depressingly ordinary he was. She had her whole life ahead of her but on this particular night, shrouded in the gloom of the university library, all she could think about was what she didn't have.

Her eyes blurred as she continued to force herself to read about the basics of the electromagnetic spectrum. Sarek could help her make sense of this. Too bad he was probably married. The tears began to roll freely down her cheeks and soon students were casting nervous glances in her direction. Not that she cared: she was hardly the first person to have an emotional breakdown in the library before midterms.

When the crying stopped, Amanda laid her head down on the desk and began to doze. She was startled awake a short time later by the buzz of her PADD. After wiping her eyes with the back of her hand, she reached for her tablet and felt perplexed by the message she found.

Sarek
Stardate 2229.34; Time 2204
I apologize for the late hour and hope I am not disturbing you. Would it be possible to arrive at your quarters fifteen minutes prior to our originally scheduled meeting?

Amanda sighed. What a dork, asking if he could show up early. What a polite, adorable dork.

Grayson, Amanda
Stardate 2229.34; Time 2204
That's fine. Why?

Sarek
Stardate 2229.34; Time 2204
I have been informed I should conceal my true motivation and reveal it at a later time to build suspense.

Grayson, Amanda
Stardate 2229.34; Time 2205
What does that even mean?

Sarek
Stardate 2229.34; Time 2205
I intend to surprise you.

She laughed. It felt delicious to laugh.

Grayson, Amanda
Stardate 2229.34; Time 2206
It's not a surprise if you tell me you're going to surprise me.

Sarek
Stardate 2229.34; Time 2206
True.

She loved how honest and simple things were with him. Her smile broadened but quickly faded at the memory of her conversation with Adam.

Grayson, Amanda
Stardate 2229.34; Time 2208
Can I ask you a personal question?

Whole lifetimes seemed to pass in the three minutes it took him to respond.

Sarek
Stardate 2229.34; Time 2211
You may, though I reserve the right to refuse to answer.

She took a deep breath. She wrote and deleted various permutations of her query before finally settling on the shortest possible version. No extra words to conceal any emotion. Better to keep things as neutral as possible.

Grayson, Amanda
Stardate 2229.34; Time 2215
Are you married?

Sarek
Stardate 2229.34; Time 2215
No.

Grayson, Amanda
Stardate 2229.34; Time 2215
Engaged?

Sarek
Stardate 2229.34; Time 2215
No.

Grayson, Amanda
Stardate 2229.34; Time 2215
Betrothed?

Sarek
Stardate 2229.34; Time 2216
I am quite unattached. Why do you ask?

Amanda's heart threatened to burst with joy, then she was forced to confront why she could possibly feel that way.

Grayson, Amanda
Stardate 2229.34; Time 2222
No reason. See you tomorrow.