She never got the chance to tell Nyota that she's family.
When Gaila finally gets assigned a room mate, she's not exactly thrilled. She knows that she should be because she wanted someone to bond with, a girlfriend to watch stupid movies and eat ice cream with. But they tell her in the office that the only person in need of a room mate is... difficult. That's the word they use. But Gaila thinks she's getting pretty good at reading people, so she figures out what they really mean to say is a complete and utter bitch.
So as she's moving her stuff into the double room, she's dreading meeting this ice queen that even the hellions of the dorm office hate. A quick hack into the system shows that N. Uhura has been through two room mates in seven months. And Gaila would bet all the money she has in the world they were a hell of a lot easier than her. Because while she thinks she's really awesome, she knows that she's all kinds of difficult. She enjoys mess. Something about the freedom of being able to choose where her clothes go and not having someone to tell her to keep it clean. She also enjoys spending forever in the bathroom and bringing people back for sexcapades.
Her research of human behaviour has shown that all these things are not desirable for a room mate.
So when N. Uhura appears in the door, Gaila is relieved. For one, she's absolutely gorgeous. Her smooth caramel colored skin is breathtaking and Gaila immediately wants to run her hands all over it. It looks really smooth, absolutely soft to the touch and she is insanely jealous of the person who gets to lick it. Maybe that could be her in a couple of months, but she wants to take things slow and not fuck this up. Not all girls were open to that, she'd soon learnt. It was a personal peeve of hers. How could so many human be so close minded?
But it wasn't just the skin that Gaila is enamoured with, or the way she was so effortlessly balancing several PADDs and a book bag while chewing on what Gaila guesses is the last of her lunch. Or the fact the Cadet reds looked pretty spectacular over her curves. She wasn't even in love with the fantastic bright colors of her earrings (jade, like her!).
No, what Gaila likes best about N. Uhura was that she's not scary at all. The first thing she does when she sees Gaila is burst into a smile, and finds a way to place her stuff – neatly – on the bed before rushing to help her with her own boxes.
"I'm Nyota." is all she says, and like that Gaila is done for.
The next three years are really hard, and as much as Gaila likes to think they were friends from the first smile it's a complete lie. The reason, she later learns, that Nyota went through so many room mates, was because she was a perfectionist. First year Cadets aren't known for their sticking power, which is why so many of them drop out of certain classes when they get too hard. But not Nyota. Gaila finds her up studying to complete extra credit work she asks for and three days after she moves in Ny lays down some rules that are absolutely, under no circumstances, to be broken.
Number one is no sex-overs on exam nights. The rule is first no sex-overs at all, but Gaila pleads and pouts, and Nyota finally gives in. Exam nights are a no-no and other than that she asks that she just be a little discreet and give her fair warning. Gaila concedes this is reasonable.
Rule number two is that she doesn't hog the bathroom for longer than forty five minutes at a time. She can come out, let Nyota do her thing, and then spend all night in there for all she cares. But they have to share and apparently two hour long soaks when Nyota has appointments to get to are not acceptable. She breaks that one a couple of times but after the first year she thinks she's doing pretty well.
Three is that Gaila keep her mess on her side of the room. Simple enough, even if Nyota has to toe back a thong every now and then.
And number four, which Gaila really hates, is that she's not allowed to sleep with any of her professors or lab partners. It really sucks because some of them are so damned cute. But Nyota doesn't want to have the awkward "so you slept with my room mate" talk with any of them. So she does her best to keep her hands to herself.
There is the one slip up in their third year, but in her defense he was really cute.
But when these rules are met and appeased, Nyota is the most charming, brilliant and sweet human Gaila meets at Starfleet. She holds back her hair when the suppressors they give her make her sick every morning. She finds a discreet med student when she thinks she might be pregnant with an Andorian baby. (She's not, thank god because those babies would not be cute.) And even though she never gets to sleep with her, there are nights when Gaila is sick to the stomach from lack of physical contact, suppressors and no sunlight and Nyota crawls into bed with her and falls asleep there, like a human teddy bear.
All in all, they are perfect room mates. Differences and heated arguments when Nyota finds Kirk under her bed aside.
But what Gaila never tells her on those nights when she's physically sick from all the fucking around with her body and not enough of what she needs, is that the one thing she needed the most was a friend. A true, honest-to-god would die for you friend. Most of the people Gaila befriends are sweet and kind, loving and charming as hell. Most of them are great in bed too. But she knows that there is a limit to their affections. And while Gaila certainly doesn't think she'd find it in uptight Vulcan-lover N. Uhura, she does. A missing piece of the puzzle that is her constant life amongst humans.
What she never tells Nyota is that while she requested a room mate, she got a sister. It's not a word she ever really understood before she met her but now she does. All the nights that they fall asleep together in bed, over books, in the hover-cab after a long night, Gaila realizes when people ask her if she's got a family, she doesn't have to say no anymore.
She can say yes, I've got a gorgeous sister Ny, and she's just brilliant.
But she never gets the chance to tell her that.