I can't sleep. In the past, insomnia was a frequent and welcome friend. Together we'd stay up, have longs talks, work, read… But insomnia hasn't come to visit me since I left the Enterprise and got married. I can't even remember a night that either after making love or simply tumbling into bed, my eyes didn't close immediately and usher me into a restful somnolence.

But tonight… tonight I'm paralysed, stuck in this horrible, sleeplees limbo. I try closing my eyes and honing in on the smooth, almost inaudible lullaby sung by the respirations coming from the man holding me. Small puffs of air dance at the baby hairs at my neck. Ugh, I roll my eyes thinking of my hair: I still need to get a shower.

A shower. I feel dirty. I am dirty. Not only outside, I think, but inside. I've been violated over and over. First Ronin, then Jack. Oh Ronin was one thing. He was a parasite and in hindsight, I suppose I shouldn't take it personally. For him, I was the 'right place and right time'. But Jack, oh Jack was premeditated. He made me fall in love with him with no intention of returning that love. He took my virginity and years of my life – not only in marriage, but also in grief. And what was the purpose? I suppose the purpose was to give me my son. And, Wesley, I console myself, is worth all of that.

But tonight, when I close my eyes and try to sleep, I see Jack again: those heartless eyes, that hollow face, those evil hands... I pull Jean Luc's arm tighter around my waist like a safety blanket mystically acting as a shield to protect me from the monsters under the bed and in the closet.

Maybe if I get up and walk around, perhaps go downstairs and get something to drink… maybe then I'll be able to sleep. I turn my head to look at him before I heedfully disengage myself from his warm embrace. I know from experience that I could practically leap out of bed, jostling the whole ensemble and Jean Luc would just keep on sleeping as if nothing had happened. But, tonight, I'm being cautious.

I've always loved this home's large windows. So much light is let in through their tall grandiosity. Even in the bedrooms, they reach all the way to the ceiling, giving the occupant a full view of the land and surrounding vineyards. Jean Luc's father built this home with pride. He took great satisfaction in this land, and in this house. And, it shows.

At home, if I were to look out the window at this time, all I would see is utter blackness. No lights dare intrude on our sky after the sun has set and mandated it be dark. Here, though, it's nearly aphotic, bar the little lights that Robert entwined all along the vines. The whole yard is alight with an ethereal sort of sparkle. I smile remembering when I asked Renee about it:

Renee, why do you have small lights all along the vines?

He looked wistful as he delayed his response, as if gathering a great thought. Before he answered, he smiled as he stared at the dark sky overhead. "Papa put them there for me." He paused again. "He said that he wanted to bring me the stars until I could go and touch them myself."

And little stars are what they are; Shining, sparkling, effervescent. Beautiful.

Lost in my musings I barely hear soft footfall behind me. Large hands break my reverie as I register them on the small of my waist through the silk of my nightgown.

"Did I wake you?"

"Yes," he whispers against my neck as he pushes heaps of auburn aside to kiss that spot just below my earlobe.

I laugh at the tickling sensation. "But," I turn in his arms. "You never wake up – not for anything."

My movement hasn't halted his movement as his kisses continue down the thin, sinewy lines of my neck. "I went to pull you closer and you weren't there."

"Oh?"

I lean into him as his hands move from my waist, slowly up my ribcage, and over my shoulders before he replaces his lips with them on my neck. They reach their final destination, though, where they cradle my jaw. "I can't sleep without you, Beverly." He looks down. "I can't do anything without you, because nothing makes any sense if you're not in it."

I match his gaze, locking our eyes. Like a magnet is pulling me, I move as quickly as a serpent to capture his lips with my own. Earlier I at least feigned some air of chastity. But now, in the light of Renee's stars and in the aftermath of nearly losing him, I feel the distinct need to consume every bit of him that I can.

Just because we're married doesn't mean that I've stopped fantasizing about Jean Luc. In my fantasies, we make love with agonizing languidness. We take seconds and draw them into days as we reverently explore with hands, mouths, limbs... Oh don't get me wrong: we do that often enough. But right now, I can't wait for that slow ideal. The urge, no the hunger, to be joined to him is oppressive, obligatory.

I'm running out of air so I pull back. The brief hiatus gives him license to pull the white silk nightgown over my head and discard it listlessly on the floor. I mirror his action and his T-shirt befalls the same end. His shorts are the last fatality.

Out of habit and anticipation, my breathing speeds up. Seeing him bathed in nothing but the light of Renee's stars and the faint illumination of the moon causes me to salivate. "I want you," my hand insinuates itself over his heart where I pinpoint the familiar click and swoosh of the alloy valves. My fingers trace familiar lines of the faint, lingering scar of the Naussican blade -an ode to Jean Luc's foolish youthful indiscretion.

I feel his eyes on me, as he again memorises my shape. Those eyes roam every inch with a love and a tenderness that I never thought existed. He's worshipping me like I'm doing to him. But, beatification has its limits and soon I'm again goaded to action.

I fix my eyes on his, locking us together. Then I let my finger snake with deliberate slowness as it travels lower. I reach my target and he jumps, "Beverly!". That does it and he's lost every shred of self-control.

I wrap my hand around him, educing a groan from deep in his throat. But he knows if I do that, he won't last. So, he pushes my hand away as his mouth greedily claims my own. He pushes his tongue straight past my lips and engages me. There's that familiar duelling with no particular order or structure. We simply want taste one another.

His hands skitter maddeningly over my breasts, down my stomach eliciting small ripples in the muscles, and lower. But I won't give him the satisfaction that he denied me, so I tease him and push his hand away.

He breaks our kiss with a puppy dog frown. I smile and shake my head, "Uh, unh." It's a challenge; it's a plea. He takes the bait and in a moment I'm abruptly swept into his arms. The bed is only two paces away. So not as soon as I've been picked up, I'm thrown down on the downy, cushioned familiarity of the white covers; the softness of the bed and the blankets creates an enticing cocoon. The force of my landing draws a sheepish smile, making me laugh as I pull him down on top of me.

He's here, I think. He's with me and he's not going anywhere. I look at him, admiring him again for the thousandth time as he strums his fingers through my mussed, dirty hair. "You're so beautiful, Beverly," His breath warms my face before his kisses me again.

"I love you," I whisper between open-mouth kisses.

I register his burning, feverish erection against my thigh; its presence is again making me salivate. "Please," I can't bear it any long. The muscles comprising my walls have already started to preemptively contract in anticipation of him. And then there's that familiar tingling…

I don't think he wants to make me beg this evening, so he lets me reach for him, position him, and he pushes the rest of the way through. I cry out his name like a prayer when I first feel him enter me. He, though, gets his revenge for earlier as he pushes all the way with an excruciating sluggishness as a playfully retributive smile plays at him.

I breathe in relief when I feel him fill me and press up against my inmost parts. He wants to move; I know he won't last if I try to draw this out. But just for this moment I hold him still, my hand gently insinuating itself on his bottom. I want to revel in the feeling of finally being joined again. For these are the times when I am most complete: when I am physically, emotionally, and spiritually bonded to the man to whom my soul has cleaved.

He mirrors my earlier request, "Please Beverly". He begs against the warm skin of my neck. So I answer him with a smile, "move". And that does it. In a second he's pounding into me. I feel an orgasm build and dangle precipitously in front of me. So, I reach out and grab it, yelling his name as I'm pulled over the edge. His mouth, though, captures the zenith of my cry as his own orgasm floods over him. I feel a warmth spread from my womb to all the cells of my body.

I wrap around him in the spams of my orgasm. I hold tight to him not only with the muscles surrounding him, but with every contractile sinew in my body. Paroxysms of pleasure quake through me, leaving me boneless and incoherent. He's not finished yet, though, when I feel a stray hand move down, circling me and coating him wetly in the mixture of our combined pleasure. He moves until I'm gasping again, "Jean Luc!" I want to tell him that I can't take any more - that there isn't a categorised physiologic response to this type of ecstasy. But, he'll have none of it as he kisses away any argument or fruitless protest.

Finally, I feel alive. I didn't realize how completely and mordantly dead I've been until this moment when he's imparted life back into me.

"I missed you," Are the only three words that I can manage through the moisture and emotional spasms that I'm riding out. I keep him on top of me in the aftermath. He wants to move, afraid he'll crush me. But still I hold him with my last ounce of strength, tighter now that I feel him slipping away.

With the warmth of his form still covering me, I feel it – that other, more recently familiar and welcome friend: Sleep. And so in the afterglow of lovemaking and my utter satiation, I hold tight to my husband and take her hand as she ushers me into blissful oblivion.