Uhura and Christine finally have that tea they agreed to after Uhura's first prenatal visit. In addition to the quiche that Sulu had taught her to make, Uhura and Christine share homemade plomeek soup and apologies.

I heard he sang a lullaby

I heard he sang it from his heart

When I found out thought I would die,

Because that lullaby was mine

~How Could an Angel Break My Heart by Toni Braxton~

Plomeek and Apologies

Christine looked around the cabin noting all the changes since her last visit when she sat at this very table having tea with Uhura. She had said some awful things back then, and she apologized to Nyota again.

"I understand," Uhura squeezed her hand. "I wasn't exactly my best self back then either."

Uhura's easy forgiveness made Christine feel even worse. It seemed that Nyota had moved on with her life while Chris still found herself crying at odd moments over her failures with Spock. This meeting was about her and Nyota but how could she not think of Spock when there were signs of him everywhere she looked, from the wall hangings to the new bookshelf filled with Vulcan books, and the meditation mat on the floor near the bed which she had seen in Spock's old quarters before.

She wanted to remark about the new decor, but she bit her tongue. This meeting was not about Spock. She was here to patch up her friendship with Nyota, if it was possible. So she ate her quiche and sipped her soup and tried not to think about the man who broke her heart and the life she was never meant to have with him.

Christine was surprised at the taste of the soup. It is nothing like the plomeek soup she prepared for Spock on her one failed attempt to serve him.

"What is this?" She asked. It smelled like plomeek, but tasted so much better than the soup she had prepared.

"Why? It's plomeek soup. I thought you had it before?" Uhura said.

"I have. I even made it remember? But it tasted nothing like this."

"Oh? Well, do you like it?"

"Yes! It's delicious. It actually tastes good," she said sheepishly. "Mine tasted like chalk."

"Well, when I first had it, I didn't care for it either. I added a lot of earth spices to it to jazz it up, but the real secret is to not overcook it."

"Still, Earth spices can't account for how good this tastes. It is milder, sweeter. Hmm," Christine nearly cleared her bowel.

"Thank you, Chris. To be honest, I had a little help from Sulu and Amanda. Sulu grew the roots in his garden and Amanda provided the basic recipe. I just spiced it up Uhura style," she giggled, and the sound touched something deep inside Christine's heart. She had truly missed Nyota's joyous personality and friendship.

But hearing Uhura casually talk about Spock's mother gave Christine a moment's pause. She had already accepted that Nyota was Spock's wife, but it still stung at odd times. She was trying her best to get over the entire affair, but once again she was reminded that Ny knew parts of Spock's life she could only imagine.

"Well, whatever you did, it's great," she said.

"Thanks. Spock likes it too. I am glad I can give him a little home cooking once in a while. I know how hard it is for him to find foods he likes in the ship's food banks. You would think that after all this time Starfleet would program the replicators with more non-human recipes. More and more non-humans are joining the fleet after all."

"Yes, I guess so," Chris said. She couldn't care less about the ship's food banks right about now.

"And most of the vegan fair is so bland," Uhura continued, oblivious to Christine's discomfort. "I mean, if I have to eat it, it better at least taste good. No wonder Spock looks so thin." She shook her head.

"Yeah, Chapel replied no noncommittally. This conversation was quite uncomfortable for her. She didn't come here to talk about Spock. But it seemed Spock was ALL Nyota had to talk about. So be it. "You said this is Spock's mother's recipe?" she couldn't help asking.

"Yep. I made it a little sweeter for Spock's sake though."

"Sweeter for Spock?" Christine was surprised to hear that.

"Yes, Spock has a sweet tooth. He'd never admit that, though. But I noticed that he prefers the sweeter Vulcan dishes, and he really likes candy." Uhura grinned like a Cheshire cat at a private joke.

"I never noticed he liked sweets," Christine said. How could she have missed that about the man she claimed to love?

"No? Oh well, I guess I just noticed. We used to eat together a lot when he was teaching me ... everything. Back when Nomad wiped my memory."

"I never thought of adding anything extra to it. I just assumed he liked traditional Vulcan recipes," Christine said, more to herself than to Uhura.

"I suppose that is logical?" Uhura said, not thinking anything of it. "But he's only half Vulcan. He has human taste buds too and his human mother fed him until he left for Starfleet." She shrugged as if that should be obvious.

Christine looked at Nyota who only picked at her meal. She was Spock's wife. She was cooking his meals, and she was even starting to pick up his speech patterns. Christine wanted to believe that should be her casually mentioning Amanda and knowing Spock's meal preferences. She should be catering to him every night, not Nyota who never even wanted to get married at all. But she had to accept reality. Spock was not hers and never would be. He was Nyota's husband, and she had the ring that was flashing on her finger to prove it.

Christine sighed. "I never thought of it that way. Spock always seemed so proud to be Vulcan. Before his parents came aboard for the Babel conference, I would never have imagined his mother having any human characteristics. I had assumed she adopted Vulcan culture as her own and raised Spock as such. I never really knew anything about Spock except professionally," she said thoughtfully. "But you seem to know so much about Spock, even before you were married... I feel like I never knew him at all," she said sadly.

"Nyota, you asked me once why I loved Spock, and I didn't have an answer. I still don't know how I came to love him. I loved Roger so much, knew so much about him. What he liked, what he didn't like, his favorite food, what made him happy, knew what he would do in any situation. Knew what he would and wouldn't say. I knew Roger intimately. I loved everything about him, even his flaws..." She took a deep breath.

"I had convinced myself that I loved Spock that way too. I thought he was lonely and needed somebody to care for him, to accept him, human and Vulcan. I thought I knew the Spock nobody else knew or saw." She laughed at herself. "What a joke. I never had a clue about him, did I? I just saw what everyone else saw, just what was on the surface. A stoic Vulcan."

"But you, Nyota. You had a real relationship with Spock this whole time, didn't you? You had a true bond. And I accused you of stealing him from me. But I never even had him, while you always did. I am genuinely sorry for the cruel things I did and said to you, Nyota. Can you ever forgive me?"

"Of course I forgive you, Christine. You wouldn't be sitting here in my cabin enjoying my homemade plomeek soup if I didn't forgive you." She got up and hugged Christine around her shoulders and whispered in her ear, "I would have poured it on your head instead." It took Chris a moment to get the joke, and they laughed together.

"Thank you," Christine said through tears. "Ok, ok there is one thing I've been dying to ask you."

Uhura looked wary. "What is it?" she asked.

"It's about the Vulcan wedding. I know the first time we had to rush Spock to Vulcan, he was supposed to be meeting his wife, and then he comes back thinking he killed the captain and says he is no longer married. And the second time we go to Vulcan, he takes you and marries you and then you stay there for a week. So just what goes on at these Vulcan weddings?" Christine asked.

Nyota wished she could confide in Christine and tell her about the crazy things she experienced on Vulcan. But she could never compromise Spock's privacy regarding any part of Pon Farr and especially not to Christine. She may forgive her friend, but it would take a long time if ever for her to forget all the hurtful things she'd done in the name of love. And she was sure it would take Christine a while to get over them, too.

"Chris, I hope this doesn't spoil our reconciliation, but I cannot tell you what happened on Vulcan. Suffice it to say, it was out of this world. Can you respect that?"

Christine looked at her for a long moment, and then she nodded. "Fair enough, I won't ask again."

Uhura nodded and retook her seat, but as they finished the plomeek soup Uhura suddenly stood up rushed to the lavatory.

Christine rushed in to stand next to Uhura as she retched until there was nothing left. Chris had a sinking suspicion she knew exactly what was happening when she helped her friend clean up and rinse her mouth.

"Ny, when was the last time you had your menses?" Christine asked.

"Christine, don't ask me something like that." Uhura brushed her off and went back to the main room.

"Well, I know you Ny. You were always in the sickbay once a month with headaches and cramps, yet I haven't seen you in a while."

"Well... I wouldn't visit the sickbay when you were there, now would I?" Uhura snapped, but Christine was unfazed and kept going.

"Maybe... But you always had terrible periods. You complained about them all the time to Dr. McCoy. We tried to convince you to go on suppressants and you refused..." Christine was putting it all together.

"Christine, just drop it, please?" Uhura took a seat on the side of her bed.

"You're pregnant, aren't you? That's why you were in the sickbay the other day."

Nyota sighed. There was no point in lying to the old busybody. "Yes, but you can't tell a soul. Spock and I are not telling anyone for now. Our families don't even know yet. Please keep this to yourself?"

"I won't tell a soul. You can count on me," Christine swore. "Ny... um... Are you... okay with all this?"

"Yes, I am. I'm so happy. I really want this baby." Uhura smiled despite looking the worse for wear.

"Well good, then. Congratulations," Christine said, and she plastered a smile on her face as she helped Nyota lie down to rest. She truly was happy for her friend and wished her health and happiness, but at that moment, as she tucked Nyota in, her heart was breaking.

*/*/*

Christine left Spock and Uhura's quarters after making sure Uhura was okay and resting comfortably. She had seen Uhura have a panic attack in the rec room and seen her leaning on Spock around the ship. She'd seen the way Spock comforted Uhura so gently in the sickbay the other day. Now it all made sense and it just broke her heart all over again.

She fled Nyota's quarters and ran, looking for someplace she could be alone and have one last cry to herself. She had to stop living for the hope that there could ever be a chance for her and Spock. He was a married man and now he was going to have a baby with his wife, her friend. It was all over for her.

Rushing through the corridors of the ship with her vision blurred, she saw people going about their business, fixing the ship, doing their jobs, laughing, joking, smiling; meanwhile, all her dreams were shattered the moment Nyota admitted she was pregnant.

Oh, how Christine wished it was her lying sick in Spock's bed being loved and fussed over and touched by him. Oh, how she wished Spock would have looked at her just once the way he looked at Uhura every time they were in a room together. She would have given anything to be having Spock's baby, but it wasn't meant to be. Uhura was his wife. Uhura was to be the mother of his child.

She'd come aboard the Enterprise an engaged woman who looked forward to getting married and having a family of her own. But five years later, she was nowhere near that goal. Roger was gone. Spock was married to Uhura who was living the life Christine wanted for herself. She was all alone with nothing to show for her time onboard but an empty cabin and a bad plomeek soup recipe.

And it was nobody's fault but her own. She'd become so obsessed with Spock that she stopped being Christine Chapel, a brilliant bio researcher. In five years, she could have married any other guy on this ship and had kids of her own. She could have finished her medical degree and been a full-fledged doctor instead of a glorified nurse. She could be teaching back on Earth at the academy, lecturing on her experiences in deep space.

And yet, for the past five years, she'd been stuck on Spock. It was like waking up from a coma and discovering that everyone around her had changed and grown except her. All she had to show for her efforts was a few new gray hairs. She wanted to fall in love and get married and have babies and be loved by someone, too. She wanted a shiny ring on her finger and a room full of Vulcan artifacts, too.

Christine reached her cabin and stumbled to the bed, falling on it face first.

"Damn you Nyota Uhura!" she cried into her pillow. Damn you!

I love the original Star Trek series, but one thing I hate about the subsequent movies is that nobody is allowed to really grow or change too much. They all end up back on the Enterprise in their same roles, doing the same things 50 years later. I understand they are not actual people and it's fiction, but it still feels wrong. Thank god for fanfiction where we can make their lives more than the shows allow.