A/N: I'm struggling to get back into this. I know where it's going, but I've lost the thread thanks to various other projects eating my already very limited brain cells. Many thanks if you stick with it until I'm back on track. Can't promise this chapter has much to offer. Thanks to MissyHissy3 for the beta read, too.

Twelve

"I tried to love you less. I couldn't."

The Mandarins – Simone de Beauvoir

She was asleep.

Chakotay stood in the doorway of the office. Inside, Kathryn Janeway was slumped across her desk, her head cushioned against her arms. He wasn't quite sure what to do. It was already late and he knew he couldn't leave her there – from the angle of her neck she was already going to have one hell of a crick when she woke. Yet he was hesitant about waking her – indeed, about entering her part of the building at all. Since the day he'd given her Annika's coffee maker she'd seemed to have been avoiding him. Chakotay had the sense that in doing so he'd over-stepped somehow and as a result he'd backed off, unwilling to make her uncomfortable in her place of work.

He hadn't expected her to be here on a Sunday, certainly not this late. He'd passed earlier, seen the newly turned earth and surmised that she and Tom must have been working. There had been some forms he'd left in the gym that he needed to collect for Monday morning – applications for B'Elanna's first league bout – but he'd deliberately left it until now, wanting to be sure the place would be empty.

But it wasn't.

She was asleep.

Despite himself, he watched her for a moment. No wonder she'd succumbed – from the state of her jeans and shirt and the skin of her bare arms she'd been working like the devil all day. The depth of her dedication to this project had astonished him since day one, but he found himself even more surprised by her fiancé. Here was Kathryn on a Sunday night and he couldn't imagine she'd actually intended to stay so late. Hadn't she been missed? Hadn't Mark tried to call her – Chakotay knew from experience that the ring tone on her cell was loud enough to wake the dead. She'd apologised the first time he'd been with her when it rang, explaining that it had to be that loud as she frequently missed calls if they came through when she was on site.

The thought gave him an idea. He took out his own phone and scrolled through to her contact, thumb hovering over her name on the screen. Then he realised how ridiculous he was being and put the phone back in his pocket.

He knocked on the door, three hard raps. "Kathryn?"

Nothing. She didn't even stir.

He crossed to her desk, speaking louder still. "Kathryn?"

Still nothing.

Chakotay rested his hand on her shoulder, squeezing slightly. "Kathryn?"

She stirred at last, a frown creasing her forehead before she blinked. Chakotay stepped back, putting his hands in his pockets as she sat up. He saw the wince as she straightened her neck. Kathryn rubbed one hand over her eyes and blinked up at him blearily.

"Chakotay?"

"Hi," he said.

She frowned again, glancing around. "What time is it?"

"Almost ten. I didn't want you to sleep there all night."

"Ten?" she repeated, appalled.

"You've been out for a while, huh?"

She massaged her neck and gave a rueful, throaty hiccup of laughter. "Yes. What an idiot."

He smiled, squashing the urge to offer her help with her sore neck. "Not at all. You're just exhausted. Looks like you've moved a mountain today."

Kathryn sighed. "Yes, we're finally getting somewhere. Although it won't mean a thing if I don't start planting soon. The weeds will take over before I have time to blink." She pushed herself out of her chair, running a hand through her hair with a sigh. "Coffee. I need coffee. Will you join me? I know you don't drink it much…"

Chakotay watched as she crossed to the machine. "You're not heading home?"

She flashed him a sudden smile. "There is always time," she said, with a laugh so unexpectedly impish that it sent something in his belly fluttering, "to have one for the road. Anyway, since you're here, you should see what I was looking at when I fell asleep. I was going to leave you a note about it anyway." Janeway waved a finger at the papers on her desk as she set the machine. "Did you know you have a budding engineer among your students?"

He moved closer to the desk and looked down at the sheets of paper on her desk. "Oh? Who?"

"B'Elanna Torres. Believe it or not, those are fledgling schematics for a system that reclaims water from waste food."

Chakotay glanced up at her, surprised. "B'Elanna did these?"

"Yes. She pointed out – absolutely correctly – that water would be an issue for any garden we built. Tom Paris challenged her to find a solution and that's what she came up with. Pretty ingenious, if you ask me."

It was. Chakotay picked up one of the sketches, taking a closer look as Kathryn finished their drinks and crossed back towards him.

"Well," he said. "I guess now I know why she hasn't been around much. But I suppose I can't complain if this is the result, can I?"

Kathryn handed him his coffee in silence. He glanced up to see an inscrutable look on her face as she raised her mug to her lips. For a second he thought it was guilt, but how could that be?

"Do you think it has any chance of working?" he asked, putting down one schematic and picking up another as he took a mouthful of coffee.

Kathryn tilted her head to one side. "I'd like to believe it could. I certainly believe it deserves consideration by people who could take it further. That's what I wanted to talk to you about. There's a charity gala coming up in two weeks. It's being held by my benefactor," she gestured around the office. "He's the reason I'm here, really – him and the other donors who'll be there. I'll be making an address about our progress. I really think B'Elanna should present her ideas at the event. The sort of investors that will be there are always looking for this sort of opportunity. Chakotay, it could open so many doors for her."

Chakotay smiled, shaking his head as he looked at her.

"What?" she asked.

"I've been looking for a way to get B'Elanna Torres motivated to use that brain of hers ever since I met her. I thought that maybe boxing was the answer," he said. "But here you are coming up with something I'd never even realised she was interested in. And to think I almost threw you out when you told me you wanted this space."

Kathryn was staring into her mug again, that same peculiar look on her face. "It had nothing to do with me. She came up with it herself, and if anyone else had a hand in it, it was Tom. But I want to help her, Chakotay. It's clear that she has so much potential. She just needs… the right kind of chance. If that's what this place can offer her, then even if the garden doesn't last it'll have been worth all the effort. So – do you think she'd do it?"

"A presentation at this gala? You can always ask."

Kathryn grimaced. "I was rather hoping you'd do that. She doesn't have the highest regard for me. I doubt she'd listen to anything I had to say at this point."

Chakotay frowned. "Oh? Has something happened I should know about?"

Kathryn sighed, putting down her mug. She looked as if she were debating something with herself. "She told me a little while ago that she didn't want me here," Kathryn said carefully. "That I'd made things difficult. That I'd… been a distraction. And even if it isn't true, it made me aware that I should tread carefully here. This isn't my territory, I understand that."

Chakotay watched her for a moment, seeing the uncomfortable cast of her shoulders. "Is this… Kathryn, is this why you've been avoiding me recently?"

She looked surprised. "I didn't think you'd notice. And I wasn't avoiding you, per se… But what B'Elanna said made me realise I should probably set some parameters for working here."

He raised an eyebrow. "'Parameters'?"

Kathryn shrugged. "The first time I talked to you about sharing this space, I told you I'd be here during the day and it would be yours in the evenings. But that started to slide. I started to encroach on your space, on your time. I've just reminded myself of what we agreed to in the first place, that's all."

Chakotay smiled. "Kathryn, having you here hasn't been a burden. The opposite is true, in fact." He looked around at the walls, at the colourful ideas pinned all over them. "It's been uplifting to see someone create a vision for this place where others see only something barren, something hopeless. I thought I was the only one. You feel like an ally and I've appreciated having that."

He looked back to find her smiling too. "Well, you've more than returned the favour, Chakotay. There have been many times that I've felt as if I'm trying to do this alone. You changed that. Seeing your passion for those kids, for their futures… It's a very special thing. Which brings me back to B'Elanna." She indicated the sketches on her desk. "This can't go to waste, Chakotay. Will you talk to her? Tell her I'll help her if she wants - but she'll have to ask me."

Chakotay nodded. "I can tell you now that she won't feel comfortable in a room full of the sort of people I can imagine will be at this gala of yours."

"I can understand that. That's why you should attend too. You can offer her a familiar face as support and, in fact, I've been meaning to suggest it anyway. If you could find it in you to say a few words to the masses, it'd be a great help. Local input from someone who knows the area and its challenges – it'll show just how much progress we've made."

It wasn't Chakotay's idea of an ideal evening, but how could he refuse? "All right," he said. "Let me know when and where and what sort of thing you want me to say." Chakotay put down his empty mug, taking one last look at B'Elanna's schematics. "I should go. I've got to be in school early tomorrow."

"I'm sorry for keeping you."

He smiled. "You didn't. I wanted to be here."

She smiled back and they looked at each other for just a second too long. They both looked away at the same moment.

"I'm collecting trees tomorrow," Kathryn declared hurriedly, as she grabbed her purse and keys and followed him out.

"Trees?"

She nodded. "Peach, persimmon and apple, five of each. I have to start somewhere, so I thought – an orchard. What do you think?"

[TBC]