Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

It’s a Wednesday afternoon and the first week of the new semester. Jim’s standing by the entrance of the restaurant with a fortune cookie in hand. He has to eat it out here because a) he’s supposed to be wiping down the menus, b) a customer might walk in, c) Gaila and Scotty can’t see him snacking—not that c) really matters because Scotty’s in the kitchen and Gaila’s trying to sleep off a nasty hangover behind the bar.

Cracking the cookie open, he pops half of it in his mouth and pulls the slip of paper out of the remaining half only to have it slip from his grasp somehow. Juggling between the fortune and uneaten half of the cookie, he ends up letting the piece of paper fall to the ground because it’ll survive and stay in one piece whereas the cookie won’t.

After popping the other half of the cookie into his mouth, he heaves a sigh and gets down on all fours to grab the fallen fortune because it somehow managed to find its way under the stand. Under normal circumstances, he would just leave it there, but he wants to see what he has coming his way, and the last thing he needs or wants is the owner, Christopher Pike, getting on his case about snacking and littering in the workplace.

‘Heads up! Love is on its way!’

Ever the non-believer, he snorts and rolls his eyes.

That’s when the med student walks in.

With his rear still in the air and facing the door, Jim scarcely notices the guy’s presence until a tired, annoyed voice speaks up, “Dammit, Christine, did you ‘accidentally’ send me to another strip club?”

Jim blinks and crumbles up the slip of paper in his hands. He straightens his back and turns around to see a man standing there with furrowed brows, scowling. The guy’s got a copy of Grey’s Anatomy tucked under his arm, a backpack slung over his shoulder, bags under his eyes, and a cell phone to his ear. He doesn’t seem to have noticed that Jim’s no longer bent over and is currently staring at him with a baffled expression on his face.

“Uhh….” The situation presents a bunch of firsts for him. For one thing, he’s never seen anyone pull off ‘attractively annoyed’ quite as well as this man. For another, he’s never seen anyone look so irritated at supposedly being misdirected into a strip club before.

(Sadly, this isn’t the first time he’s been mistaken for a stripper.)

The man growls, “What do you mean this is a restaurant and not a strip club? I may be hung-over and sleep-deprived, but I’m not blind.”

Jim can’t help but feel just a little flattered at the vehemence of the accusation.

There’s a long pause between the man and whoever’s on the other line. “Oh,” the guy mutters, “fuck. Are you serious?” He draws in a deep breath, and with no small amount of dread, looks up at Jim.

“Welcome to Starfleet Bar and Grill, my name is Jim and I’ll be your waiter this afternoon,” Jim recites with an amused smile.

“Goddamn it—fuck,” the man repeats. There’s a sheepish glimmer in his eye, but he still narrows them like everything’s Jim’s fault somehow and grumbles, “Table for one, please.”

Jim falls a little in love right then and there.

--

The med student, who Jim’s affectionately dubbed ‘Bones’, is back the next Wednesday with the same scowl and shadows under his eyes, but at least he’s looking a lot more awake this time. Jim tries his best to hide his excitement and smiles. “Hey there. Table for one?”

Grunting his agreement, Bones follows Jim to his table. “Coffee,” he grunts without looking up as Jim hands him the menu. The copy of Grey’s Anatomy’s is sitting on the table next to his plate with post-it notes sticking out of random pages.

“Of course, I’ll get right on it,” Jim says with a wink. It’s his come-hither wink, the same wink that makes everyone within a 2km radius swoon and once got him laid without ever having to say a word.

Bones doesn’t notice the wink.

Unfazed, Jim walks over to the bar where Gaila’s watching him with a knowing smirk. It’s two in the afternoon and the place is practically empty, which leaves Jim a lot of time to tend to his (only) customer or to chat with Gaila behind the bar seeing as they’re the only ones on shift. He would go to the back to talk to Scotty, but that would mean not being able to keep an eye on his customers and heavens forbid they get anything but the very best service from Jim. 

“You have to admit he’s good looking,” he tells her, pulling out a coffee mug.

“Can’t deny it,” she agrees. “Do you even know his name?”

“Not yet,” he admits. “I just call him Bones ‘cause he was reading something on the femur last week.”

“That’s cute.” Gaila arches a brow and asks, “Does he even know you exist?”

Jim shrugs. “He thought I was a stripper when he first walked in last week. I think that’s gotta count for something, don’t you?”

A grin spreads on her lips. “He thought you were a stripper? It doesn’t get much better than that, does it? I like him already. Do you think Pike would agree to installing a pole here?”

Grabbing the pot of coffee, he glances over at the man. “How much more do you think I’d make as a stripper? Maybe I’ll take it up as a second job. Think I’d be any good?”

Gaila gives him a sympathetic pat on the arm. “I think you’ll have a short but satisfying career as a stripper. But after your name gets out, you’ll never get a job related to your engineering degree, Stripper Jim.”

“Thanks for that. Sounds like something straight out of a fortune cookie: ‘You will have a short but satisfying stripping career. But beware, strip and forego your engineering career.’ Stripper Jim’s a terrible name, by the way,” he adds after a moment of thought, “I was thinking something more along the lines of Captain Kirk. That sounds much more respectable.”

“Nope, I’m sticking with Stripper Jim,” she retorts, shooting him a pointed look, daring him to challenge her on it.

Jim sighs, knowing better than to argue with her on his stripper name. “Fine, whatever floats your boat. You just gave me a brilliant idea on how to get his attention though.”

“By that, do you mean bending over to pick things up at every given opportunity?” she asks with a twinkle in her eye.

He gives her a playful shove. “Hey! While yes, that’d be the foolproof way of doing it, I’ll have you know that my plans are generally higher quality than that!”

She laughs. “Of course. So do you think he’ll be here every week for the rest of the semester? You know, enough time for you to carry out your master plan.”

Jim perks up at the thought. “I hope he will. Hey, Spock’s gonna be working on the shift schedule next week, isn’t he? Better start pestering him about letting me work Wednesdays. I mean, who can complain about having a customer like that? Easy on the eyes, smart—it’s just too bad he’s not much of a talker.”

“He looks kind of pissed off,” she observes, “at everything.”

“Like I said, not much of a talker—for now, anyway. I’m working on it.” He grins and looks over affectionately. “I think it’s a med student thing, the whole constantly exhausted and annoyed thing. He was like this last week as well, except he also looked like he was about to pass out.”

Gaila arches a brow and points out, “The semester just started last week.”

“Yes, and while you were out getting wasted, he was probably trying to get ahead on his reading or something studious like that. Not that I know very much about being studious, I haven’t even downloaded my course outlines yet,” he tells her before bringing the coffee over to Bones, who’s scowling at his phone and texting something to someone angrily. If emotions could be sent via cell phone, the receiver’s phone probably would’ve exploded by now.

No one should be allowed to pull off ‘pissed off’ so attractively.

As pleasantly as he can, Jim slides the cup over and asks, “So have you decided on what you’d like to eat? Gonna go for the Terran Burger again?”

Bones puts down his phone in favour of taking a large gulp of his coffee. He lets out a satisfied sigh, anger momentarily forgotten, and shakes his head. “Nope. Think I’m gonna try the Klingon Sub today.”

The way he draws out his words does funny things to Jim’s heart.

Jim nods and smiles. “Good choice. The Klingon Sub’s great. Did you want fries or salad with your sandwich today?”

“Fries sound good, thanks,” Bones replies, handing him back the menu and returning his attention to his phone, rolling his eyes at whatever new message he’s received.

“Sure. I’ll be back with your sandwich and more coffee in a minute.” Sauntering to the kitchen, he calls out, “A Klingon Sub with fries, Scotty.”

“Comin’ right up,” Scotty replies.

“I’ll be in Pike’s office if you need me,” Jim informs him, slipping into the back.

After having broken into Chris’ office so many times, the man stopped bothering to lock his door. And after having hacked into the desktop so many times, Chris started doing all his serious business-related work on his laptop, leaving the desktop and printer for staff usage. Chris clearly has a soft spot for him—for them (because Gaila and Scotty are just as bad as he is if not worse), otherwise, they probably would’ve all been fired ages ago.

Jim emerges from the office a minute later with a freshly printed strip of paper in his hands and a grin on his face. Scotty arches a brow when he peers up from arranging his masterpiece of a club sandwich. “What’re ye doin’ with that, lad?”

“Not much. Just being my usual awesome self,” Jim answers with a grin, opening the container of fortune cookies that they handed out to customers in lieu of mints. He then proceeds to hack the fortune cookie and replaces the original (and lame) fortune with his own. Setting it aside, he grabs the plate Scotty slid over and heads back out, swinging by the bar to grab the coffee pot and to blow Gaila a kiss on the way.

After dropping off the dish and refilling Bones’ coffee, he returns to the bar and turns to Gaila with a triumphant grin. “‘Expect a new interest in your immediate future,’” he recites to her.

She arches a brow. “What now?”

“I hacked his fortune cookie and replaced his fortune with my own.”

“You’re using fortune cookies to drop hints and to flirt with the guy,” she repeats.

Jim grins. “I’m a genius when it comes to creative wooing. I know.”

Gaila laughs, nothing but delight in her voice. “You’re so cute sometimes—for a wannabe stripper, I mean.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” he asks, affronted.

She reaches out and pinches his cheek because she knows he hates it. “You’re cute, but you’re no Magic Mike.”

--

“So, Spock. O flatmate, O best friend, O buddy of mine,” Jim begins, aiming for casual and missing by a galaxy.

Spock arches a brow. “What do you want, Jim?”

He shrugs. “Not much, really. It’s just, I was thinking about you and all the hard work you do at Starfleet, what with the work schedule and stuff. So I thought I’d try to make your shift scheduling a little easier by volunteering to work on Wednesday afternoons and evenings for the rest of the year.” He raises a hand and points to it. “See this? This is me volunteering and taking one for the team. I mean, I’ve been working it these last two weeks anyway and it’s worked out well. And really, who wants to work Wednesdays? No one. That’s who. So don’t even worry about Wednesdays. I’ve got it. No need to thank me.”

There are times when he feels like his subtlety is lacking.

This is one of those times.

Not even Spock looks convinced. “Actually, I believe Mr. Sulu is also available on Wednesdays. And seeing as I am expected to be impartial when creating the work schedule, it would be only fair if you two switch off every other week.”

Jim frowns. “No, I doubt Hikaru wants to work then. Not many customers or tips or anything, you know?”

“I do not believe he has a history of complaining about working Wednesdays…unlike you. Is there any particular reason why you feel so inclined to ‘volunteer’ to work Wednesdays this semester, Jim?” Spock asks.

“Because I’m a kind and generous person?” he tries.

Spock gives him his most unimpressed look.

“Fine, there may or may not be a particular reason,” Jim admits with a sigh.

“Fascinating.”

There’s a moment of silence between them and then Jim realizes that Spock’s waiting for either an explanation or an incentive to change whatever schedule he’s probably already come up with.

“Come on, best friend Spock!” Jim whines—because he’s not above using the best friend card.

“It would be unprofessional of me to take your preference into consideration over anyone else’s,” Spock replies—because he’s impervious to all the social implications and obligations of being a best friend.

Jim huffs and looks around, searching for new ideas. His eyes settle on the couch, and although he had hoped to save this for another occasion, he figures it’s a worthy cause.

“I’ll stop sitting in the middle seat every time Nyota comes over.”

Spock’s eyebrow goes up. “Nyota said you did it on purpose but I did not see enough evidence to be convinced of it. Until now.”

Nyota probably said something more along the lines of “he does it on purpose because he’s an asshole.” And she’s not wrong because it’s a known fact that Jim Kirk is sometimes an asshole.

It probably doesn’t help his case when he slings his arms around the pair’s shoulders when they sit down on either side of him and ask “so, guys! What do we feel like watching today?” in an overly cheerful manner.

Again, because he is sometimes an asshole—and a professional third wheel.

Jim shrugs. “So, do we have a deal?”

Apparently Spock’s not above accepting bribes.

And Jim’s perfectly fine with that.

--

By the time Monday rolls around and their biweekly staff meeting commences, everybody knows about his new little crush on the grumpy med student—even Spock, who’s pretending not to be paying any attention to them by keeping his eyes focused on their schedules for the next two weeks. Jim may or may not occasionally glance over just to make sure Spock’s following through with their little deal.

They’re at the point of the meeting where Chris gets to read out staff suggestions and comments out of the box that Jim had neatly labelled ‘Things Pike will probably say no to’ and Chris had added as a sub-label, ‘If suggested by certain people’. There’s a magic eight ball on the desk that they consult for trickier suggestions like switching to a new Russian brand of vodka because Pavel doesn’t like the one they currently have in stock—even though he’s still underage.

So far, nothing interesting has been suggested. There are a few asking for a new dishwasher since the one they’re using (not so affectionately named the Narada after the rival restaurant down the street) growls and froths angrily whenever someone so much as looks at it. They’ve been washing the dishes by hand for two weeks now because no one’s willing to put their limbs on the line.

“I’ll look into getting us a new dishwasher tomorrow,” Chris agrees although they all know he probably won’t look into it for at least another week, and then he reaches in to pull out the last slip of paper. His brows furrow in confusion as he reads, “‘Can we get a pole for Stripper Jim? Striptease Sundays would bring in a lot of customers.’ What? Stripper Jim?” He turns to Jim expectantly, looking more baffled than upset. “Jim? Is there something I should know about?”

Instead of answering, Jim frowns at Gaila. “I don’t work Sunday nights, you know that.”

She looks over at Chris and corrects her suggestion, “Sorry, make that Striptease Saturdays.”

Nyota immediately raises her objection, “I work Saturday night—so, no. And Pavel’s underage.”

“I don’t think anyone would notice that if Jim starts stripping,” Pavel voices helpfully.

Chris arches a brow at Jim and asks, “Do I need to threaten to fire your ass again?”

“You already did that at the last meeting!” Jim whines. “I don’t want this turning into a biweekly thing. Anyways, in my defence, it wasn’t even my idea, it was Gaila’s. I can’t help it if customers mistake me for a stripper even when I’m fully clothed.”

Hikaru scoffs, a smirk tugging at his lips. “Speaking of which, so I heard from a little birdie that someone’s got a little crush on a new regular.”

“If by little birdie, you mean a squawking parrot,” he shoots Gaila a half-hearted glare, “then the answer is an ambiguous maybe.”

Gaila doesn’t look offended in the least and reaches over to ruffle his hair. “If I’m a parrot, you’re definitely a monkey.”

He huffs. “Really? I was thinking of something cooler like a lion or a wolf—or a dragon.”

“I was thinking of that one fruit fly that you can never hit,” Nyota says, narrowing her eyes at him. She probably heard about his deal with Spock.

“I find that he holds a strange resemblance to an enthusiastic large dog,” Spock contributes, and Jim suspects that the minute curvature of his lips is as much of a grin as he can make without having his face crack and shatter into pieces.

“A large dog? Shouldn’t you be working on everyone’s work schedule?” Jim asks with a frown.

Chris snorts and rolls his eyes. “He’s obviously a crow. Smart as shit, distracted by shiny things, and annoying as hell. And no, we’re not getting a pole for ‘Stripper Jim’, Gaila. I don’t even have to pretend to consult the magic eight ball for that one.”

--

The unexpected September heat wave starts on Tuesday just as the air conditioning dies, and Jim’s pretty sure the Narada had something to do with it.

He doesn’t know how, exactly, but the thing’s evil and vicious and a threat to everything within a 2 Km radius, and it probably overheard their plans to replace it with a newer, friendlier dishwasher.

When Wednesday comes rolling around, the air con still hasn’t been fixed and the place feels like it’s on fire.

Jim doesn’t do heat well.

“I can’t take it anymore! How come Scotty gets to walk into the walk-in freezer whenever he wants and we have to sit out here and suffer?” he complains, with his face resting on the cool surface of the bar. Unable to take the heat, he takes off his yellow top and chucks it onto the barstool he’s standing next to, leaving him in his black undershirt.

Gaila pours herself a glass of water and fans herself with a menu. “Getting started on your stripping career, Jim? At least you have layers to take off. I’m stuck in this until the end of my shift, and I can promise you that no one will want to come near me by that time.” Then she looks up. “Heads up, Stripper Jim, your favourite customer’s here.” Slipping a couple ice cubes down his back, she gives him an encouraging pat and tells him, “Go get him.”

Despite the heat, Jim pushes himself away from the bar and makes his way over to Bones, who’s wandered over to his usual seat and doesn’t seem to have noticed the scorching heat. Jim slides a coffee onto the table along with a menu and pleads, “Please order a salad—or at least something that doesn’t require cooking. If we turn the stove on, I swear the entire place is going to blow up.”

Bones furrows his brow and looks up at him. “What?”

Jim waves his arm and gestures to the restaurant. “The air con broke. Wait, how come you don’t look affected by the heat at all? I have ice cubes down my back right now in an attempt to stay cool and you’re sitting there drinking coffee. How?”

“Oh, I thought it was a little warmer in here than usual,” Bones mutters. Then he adds with an amused shrug, “I’m from Georgia. This is nothing. Guess I’ll have the Vulcan Greens today and save your building from bursting into flames.”

“You’re a saint and a gracious human being. I promise we’ll build you a shrine over there by the bar where your unwashed plates and used cutlery will be put on display and worshipped.” Just to make his point, he starts bowing in an exaggerated motion.

This draws a chuckle from the man and suddenly, Jim feels his body temperature spiking up even further. “Right. I’ll be known as the guy who ordered a salad, not to watch his figure, but for the greater good of humanity,” Bones drawls.

Jim’s heart goes crazy and he blames the heat.

“Hey, I’ll have you know our salads are delicious,” he manages to say when his words return to him. Then he notices that Bones has a different textbook with him today. “Neuroscience? What happened to Grey’s Anatomy?”

Bones shrugs again. “We’re what? Only three weeks into the semester? I caught up on my readings for the week, so I decided to start reading up on neuroscience. Call it a new interest.”

Jim blinks, he absolutely blames the heat when his mind going blank for a moment at the unexpected turn of events. “A new interest…huh. Who would’ve thought?” Then he looks at the menu in his hands and snaps out of his trance. “Right. Salad. Worshipping you forever. Will get onto that now.”

His words earn him an amused (and possibly unimpressed) eyebrow raise from Bones.

“I meant your order,” he quickly corrects himself. “Heat. It’s bad for the brain—ha, brain. Neuroscience. Right. Salad. Wow, this heat’s seriously giving me brain damage—hey, you can totally use me as a case study! Oh my god. Sorry. Right, going now.” Shaking his head wildly, he turns away and makes his way to the kitchen.

When he makes his way back to the bar a few minutes later, Gaila snorts, “Smooth.”

The heat must still be affecting his brain because all he can say in reply is “Not a single word about this to anyone. Ever.” He gestures at his back and mutters, “Ice me, please.”

Gaila slides an ice cube down his shirt in a comforting manner and changes the subject because she can be a nice person when she feels like it. “So what are you planning on putting in his fortune cookie today?”

“Well, the last one backfired on me, so how about something more straightforward like ‘Your waiter really isn’t as stupid as he seems. Please give him a chance’?”

She wrinkles her nose in disapproval. “That’s a lame fortune to get. Think of something else.”

--

He decides on ‘Romance is in the air’ instead because his brain’s still messed up and it sounds a lot better than ‘Be wary of heat. It’s hot—ha! Hot! Just like you! Help, I clearly have no functioning brain cells left in my brain.’

Gaila gives him her blessing and he sends it out along with the bill.

“I’ve been meaning to ask,” Bones starts, apparently feeling social today, “but what’s a bar and grill doing giving out fortune cookies instead of mints?”

“We like to think it justifies the fact that we have an item called Kohm Fried Rice and spring rolls on our menu,” he says.

Bones chuckles.

Again.

Jim’s life is complete.

--

On Thursday morning, Chris brings in a mechanic to fix the air conditioner and save them from the heat. The mechanic’s a nice guy who does his job quickly and well, and he even offers to take a look at the Narada since he’s already there, the well-intended but suicidal fool. Jim and Pavel both crowd the guy, looking over his shoulder in morbid fascination while Scotty stays back and watches from a safe distance—he’s had too many close calls with the dishwasher and has learnt from his mistakes.

The Narada, sensing their intentions, begins frothing angrily and the second the mechanic opens the door, it spits out a soapy plate and a couple utensils at them. Jim manages to dive off to the side to safety, but the other two aren’t quite as lucky.

“Ё моё!” Pavel yelps as a fork flies past his head, nearly taking out his eye. He scrambles to shut the dishwasher door while the mechanic gets hit by a spatula (he’s lucky it’s only a spatula and not something sharp).

Kicking the Narada shut, the cutlery finally stop flying and the dishwasher returns to bubbling and hissing at them, probably feeling quite pleased with itself.

The mechanic looks justifiably terrified and bolts for the door, running past Chris, who just stepped out of his office to see what the commotion’s about, without waiting to be paid.

Walking towards the back of the kitchen, Chris crosses his arms when he sees Pavel on the floor, now at a safe distance away from the steaming dishwasher, and Jim, who smiles ruefully at him from behind a nearby countertop. He can hear Scotty laughing at their expense in the kitchen and shakes his head with a sigh. “At least he was smart enough to fix the AC first,” he mutters, rubbing his temples, trying to ward off the oncoming headache. “Maybe next time, we’ll find someone who can fix this son of a bitch or at least disable it long enough for us to unplug it or something.”

Jim exchanges dubious glances with Pavel. “What we need isn’t a mechanic, Pike. What we need is an exorcist. Like, a professional appliance exorcist. Because this thing? It’s malicious.”

Pavel nods, wide-eyed in fervent agreement, suds still clinging to his curls. It paints an adorable picture and he would look like someone out of a shampoo commercial if it wasn’t for the obvious fear written all over his face; the one that screams ‘I’m the survivor of a traumatic event that will haunt me for the rest of my life.’

Chris takes a moment to consider Jim’s words because they’re not as farfetched as they might sound. He remembers that one power outage they had a few months back. They had wanted to take advantage of the situation and unplug the Narada and chuck it out the back, but the thing just kept going like it was fueled by hate and spite as opposed to electricity like a normal kitchen appliance.

 “At least the AC’s fixed,” Chris says again.

--

Jim has very mixed feelings about this.

Seeing Bones sitting at his usual booth with two attractive women, one either side of him sends both a pang of jealousy and a wave of wildly inappropriate thoughts through Jim. The girls are talking and laughing while Bones huffs and rolls his eyes fondly at them. Jim wants to know what they’re talking about. He also wants to know if Bones is going out with one of them—or even both of them because hey, it could happen.

They could be shooting a porno together.

“Do you think they’re shooting a porno together?” he asks, leaning against the bar and watching them.

Gaila blinks. “A porno? What?”

“Those three. It’s either a sex tape or they’re all going out,” Jim reasons.

“Or maybe they’re friends,” she suggests slowly, like she’s talking to an idiot.

“Or maybe they’re filming a sex tape together,” he repeats, more firmly this time.

She rolls her eyes. “Oh my god, you’re totally jealous of them, aren’t you?”

Jim straightens up a little and waves her off. “Why would I be jealous? Have you seen me? I’ve got nothing to be jealous of!”

“I see that you’re not sitting next to your Bones right now,” she says smugly.

He sulks, defeated. “You win this battle,” he concedes.

“I win all the battles,” she corrects him breezily.

“Whatever, Gaila. I don’t even know who they are.”

“I can help on that front as well,” she offers.

That doesn’t surprise Jim because Gaila’s the most sociable person he knows. Part of it comes from the nature of her job and part of it is just because she’s Gaila. She knows at least half the campus’ population by name and once suffered from a hand cramp from excessive waving.

“That’s Christine Chapel and Carol Marcus,” Gaila tells him, pointing at the girls. “I’ve met them before. Actually, I’m pretty sure you have too. Remember that party Gary threw after finals last semester? Oh wait, of course you don’t.”

“Of course I don’t,” he repeats in affirmation. Ha. Like he would have any recollection from a post-finals party. “Guess I better go get Bones his coffee and see what his co-porn-stars want to drink.”

Standing by their table, he slides Bones’ drink over to him and is about to ask them for their drink orders when Christine suddenly stares at him, surprise evident. “You’re Jim Kirk, aren’t you?”

Confused, he nods. “That’s me.” It’s not all that surprising that she knows who he is—he’s very well-known all across the campus for one reason or another after all.

She turns back to Bones and exclaims, “This is the guy you thought was a stripper!? Oh, that’s just brilliant!”

Carol laughs. “I hope you at least left him a nice tip.”

Bones scowls at them while Jim grins and takes a theatrical bow. “Stripper Jim at your service. So what can I get you ladies to drink? Water? Coffee? Juice? Pop? Alcohol? We’ve got a wide selection of beer on tap, imported stuff, a nice house wine, and all the cocktails are personal creations by our very lovely bartender, Gaila over there.”

“I think I’ll have Sex with Green,” Carol tells him.

Christine leers. “And a Talented Tongue, please.”

Jim’s eyebrows shoot up at the matching smirks they’re wearing. Now he’s completely convinced that they’re filming a threesome and he wants to know how to get an invite to the event.

--

“It’s because of last week’s fortune, isn’t it?” he groans, standing next to Gaila. “First Bones finds a new interest in neuroscience and now he’s found new romance of the most epic kind. I’m secretly psychic, aren’t I? This would be a lot cooler if I could get things to go the way I want them to.”

“Stop whining about it and just subtly ask them if they’re together,” Gaila urges, mixing the drinks.

“Come on,” Jim hisses, “I am not going to ask them if they’re together. I do have some dignity, you know?” he says as he leans over to rest his arms on the counter. A moment later, there’s a spurting sound and Jim’s side is covered in ketchup and Gaila bursts into laughter. It’s loud and beautiful and causes everyone to look over at them. Slowly slinking down towards the ground, trying to disappear from sight, he groans, “Just a little dignity. That’s all I’m asking for.”

Wiping a tear from her eye, she takes a deep breath, trying to calm herself down. “Oh Jim, you fill my life with sunshine and happiness. I’m so happy we decided to just be friends. I’m going to make a cocktail in honour of you and I shall call it ‘Striptease’.”

“You’re welcome,” he mutters. “Who thought it’d be a good idea to put a dispenser here, anyway?”

“You did. You were supposed to refill them, remember?” she reminds him.

Brow furrowing, Jim looks at his ketchup-splattered side and sighs. He stands back up and takes his top yellow shirt off—again. “Looks like I’ll have to do laundry today after all. I was hoping to put it off till the weekend.”

“This is why Pike makes you boys wear layers,” Gaila teases him, pushing the drinks in his direction. “By the way, I’m sure you’ll be getting fantastic tips today. The three of them look very impressed by your display, Stripper Jim.”

Jim perks up and discreetly glances over. “Really? Do you think they’ll invite me to their porno shoot? Or at least put me on the guest list to their screening?”

--

‘Safety first’ is what he decides to go with this time because he really hopes they’re using condoms during their three-way.

“Surprisingly bitter, aren’t you?” Gaila notes, waving at the three as they made their way to the door. “You might as well have put ‘not that it’s any of my concern since I totally don’t care that you might all be dating each other and having mind-blowingly hot threesomes on a daily basis.’”

Not that he’s about to admit it, but that’s pretty much what he had wanted to write. “That’s too wordy.”

She gives him her best big sister smile and ruffles his hair, much to his displeasure. “Don’t worry, while you were in the back moping around and complaining to Scotty, I was out here being proactive and communicating via hand gestures. Now go and clear their table. We have customers waiting.”

Jim looks around at the empty restaurant and arches a brow. Gaila returns the look and shoos him away. Sighing, he drags his feet over to grab the money and wipe the table down. When he gets there, he flips open the bill folder to count the money and to check out the tip they left. Much to his surprise, there’s a message scrawled across the receipt with a Talented Tongue (Christine Chapel, he mentally reminds himself).

‘His name’s Leonard McCoy. And no, we’re not dating or involved in a three-way. Because ew. He’s single, and I expect a free drink next time. –C’

If he breaks into an idiotic grin, that’s between him and the table.

--

“So what do you think I should write next time?” he asks Hikaru conversationally. It’s Friday afternoon and they still have an hour before people come swarming in.

“You’re taking this really seriously, aren’t you?” Hikaru asks in return.

“What?” he asks. “You mean the fact that I can’t seem to stop thinking about him and wanting to talk to him even when he’s not around? I wonder stuff like what his schedule’s like or if he’s had a good day or if he studies in the library or in his room, and if he listens to music while he studies—what kind of music does he like? Did he grow up on a farm? How are his parents? Who are his parents? Is he more of a Striptease kinda guy or a Hot Boss kinda guy? You gotta know these things, you know? So, yeah, maybe I’m just a little tiny bit serious.”

Hikaru stares at him for a long moment then shakes his head. “I’m sorry I asked. But, no, Jim, that’s—you’re full-out pining after the guy.”

He frowns. “No, I’m not. Just because I think he’s the most amazing thing since the Hubble Space Telescope doesn’t mean I’m pining.”

Ignoring him, Hikaru continues, “I’m surprised, Jim. I’m also surprised the guy hasn’t noticed the attention you’re lavishing on him.”

Jim sighs, “I know, right? The problem is I can’t tell if he’s not noticing because he’s overly exhausted or because he’s not interested. Maybe I’ll ask Christine the next time she comes in.”

“Who now?”

“My new favourite customer? She’s Bones’ friend,” Jim explains.

Hikaru nods. “Ah, going straight for the inside scoop, are you? Maybe you should just write ‘Look up for new interest’ or something next time. At least then he would actually look and see you.”

He blinks for a moment then breaks into a grin. “Oh my god, you’re a genius. That’s totally what I’m going to write next week.”

“What’s going on next week?” a voice joins them.

They look up to see Nyota entering, getting ready for her shift. “Hey Nyota,” Hikaru greets her, “we were just discussing Jim’s great seduction plan. He finally got the guy’s name.”

She arches a brow. “Oh?”

Still grinning widely, Jim all but sighs dreamily to her, “His name is Leonard McCoy.”

It occurs to him then that he probably sounds like a dopey high schooler who finally managed to say hello to his crush after weeks of spying on them in the hallway and staring at the back of their heads in class while writing their names in bubbly hearts instead of taking notes. But then again, that’s pretty much how he feels like so it’s justifiable as far as he’s concerned.

Hikaru snickers, probably amused at how proud of himself Jim sounds.

Nyota on the other hand, blinks, focussing on something else entirely. “Leonard McCoy? The perpetually annoyed guy you’re pining after is Leonard?”

He frowns. “Why does everyone keep using that word? I’m not pining. I just like him a little above average, that’s all.”

Much like Hikaru, she ignores his protests and pushes ahead with the conversation. “Your Bones is Leonard?”

Jim perks up. He likes the sound of that. His Bones. “Yeah, my Bones is Leonard. Still not pining, by the way. But why? Do you know him? You know him, don’t you? Why was I not aware of this?”

“Maybe it’s because you didn’t have a name until now,” she suggests. Spock’s eyebrow arching and logical ways were clearly rubbing off on her in the most terrible way possible.

“Bah, semantics! So? Tell me more, tell me more! Fuel my curiosity and I’ll take one table of your choice off your hands tonight,” Jim offers because he is a generous human being and desperate to know more.

“You’ll also never sing anything from Grease in my presence again,” Nyota counters.

“Just suck the fun out of my life, why don’t you?” Jim drawls. “Well, you drive a hard bargain, but fine. You’ve got yourself a deal. Hey Hikaru, you’re our witness for this transaction.”

“Witnessing,” Hikaru says dutifully.

They shake on it because that makes it an official deal.

“Leonard’s a sweetheart,” Nyota says, which is one of the highest praises a person can get from her. “He’s a really good student and in high demand, but it doesn’t seem like he’s ever really noticed—or maybe he’s just never really acted on it because he’s a gentleman. He went through a rough breakup last year, but from what I’ve seen, he’s been dipping his toes back into the dating pool.”

“So I have a chance,” Jim says, trying to sound as nonchalant as he can, going so far as to give a little casual hum. It’s not enough to fool anyone, but the effort’s there.

“I suppose you have a chance,” she concedes. “I hope you’re as serious about this as you seem, Jim. I know a number of people who’ll hunt you down if you hurt him.”

“Duly noted. Wait, what if I’m the one who gets hurt from it?” Jim asks.

Nyota snorts and rolls her eyes, not about to concede any form of sympathy towards him when it can be avoided. There’s an unspoken rule between them where they’re only allowed to be openly nice to one another when things are serious. And for situations like this, it’s all eye-rolling and teasing remarks all the way. It’s not perfect, but it works for them.

“Don’t worry, Jim. If that happens, we’ll glare disapprovingly at him from afar,” Hikaru reassures him.

“I’ll get Spock to draw up waivers for both of you to sign if the time ever comes,” Nyota says after some consideration. “And I suppose I’ll offer angry words if it gets to that.”

Jim grins because he has the best friends a person could ask for.

--

“So the Narada chased off another mechanic,” Chris tells them on Monday, “and it’s gaining a reputation. No one in the phonebook’s willing to come in for dishwasher problems anymore. Do any of you have any ideas?” A couple hands shoot up. “And no, throwing lethal objects into it and hoping it’ll tear itself apart will not work. If anything, you’re giving it ammo and get hurled back at you,” he adds. “Just ask Scotty about the hammer if you don’t believe me.”

The hands fall back down.

None of them need to ask about the hammer incident because it was barely a year ago and the gigantic hole in the wall, revealing cracked bricks, is more than enough to remind them of the dangers that lurk in the kitchen. It’s a miracle they passed the health and safety inspection.

Jim’s hand flies up.

Chris arches a brow and says, “Also no to anything involving firearms and/or explosives.”

Jim lowers his hand with a pout.

“Right, so no new ideas on what to do with the Narada then. On the brighter note, we managed to get the AC fixed and the heat wave’s passed, so the chances of anything spontaneously combusting has been lowered by 42.76%, according to Spock. Also according to Spock, if I fire Jim, the chances of things bursting into flames gets lowered further by 83.82%.”

“Hey!” is Jim’s indignant response. “It was one time!”

“One time is all it takes,” Spock replies evenly.

Jim snorts, “You’re still pissed that your eyebrows were singed, aren’t you?”

Eager to move away from the impending argument, Chris rolls his eyes and says, “That’s enough, boys. Let’s move on with this meeting and our lives, please. Gaila? What’s this about a new cocktail?”

Gaila perks up. “Oh, the Striptease?”

“Striptease?” Chris repeats. “Why do I get this feeling that Jim’s involved somehow?”

It’s not a question, it’s a statement.

“To be fair, Jim’s pretty much involved in everything one way or another, so there’s a 99% chance of you being at least partially right if you blame Jim for something around here,” Hikaru says.

“96.52%,” Spock corrects him.

“I thought you were supposed to be my best friend!” Jim protests. “I know where you live, Spock!”

Spock almost snorts at that. “Yes, I believe we have been residing in the same dormitory for 406 days now, Jim. It would be worrying if you did not know where we lived.”

“You two live together and it’s terrible; we get it.” Chris raises a hand to cut them off before they can break into another argument. Seriously, these kids. “Anyways, where does a Striptease stand on our current list of cocktails? On a scale of a Minor Inconvenience to a Flying Scotsman, how alcoholic is it?”

“Well, it’s definitely not a mocktail—don’t worry, Pasha, once you’re of age, I’ll come up with something new like ‘Boy Just Legal’ or ‘Wild Russian’ for you. It’ll have lots and lots of vodka in it, and you’ll be the first to try it,” Gaila reassures Pavel with a pat on the cheek. “It’ll be right up there with Mind Meld.”

Pavel looks adorably pleased by her words and the mention of vodka. Gaila always names her cocktails in honour of her friends and in a way that makes it fun to watch people order them—usually uncomfortably. So far, Jim’s had three named in his honour.

“I’d say it’s somewhere between a Logical Man and a Ninja in My Pants. Don’t worry, it doesn’t even make top five,” Gaila says soothingly.

Chris doesn’t look soothed in the least.

Chapter Text

Jim is standing around the table when he watches Bones crack open his fortune cookie. Supposedly, it’s because Bones has to pay by card and Jim brought the card machine over, but he hasn’t punched any numbers in yet. And really, if he’s being honest, he just wants to be there when he reads his fortune.

‘Look up for something exciting.’

Bones’ eyebrow shoots up as he reads the slip of paper again. Then slowly, he turns and looks at Jim, who’s about to open his mouth and say something, but then his eyes keep going until they’re staring at the ceiling.

“Did you know that there’s a spaceship dangling off your ceiling?” Bones asks after a moment.

Blinking, Jim follows his gaze up to see that, yes, there is a grey model spaceship hanging off the ceiling with the words USS Enterprise printed on it. It even has little people in it, looking back at him with painted smiles on their faces. And all around it, there are stars and little planets just hanging around, waiting to be explored. How has he never noticed all this before? “Huh….”

Bones shakes his head and grumbles, “Those poor fools probably have no idea what they’re getting themselves into. Space is danger and disease wrapped in darkness and silence.”

“They seem to be handling it pretty well,” Jim tells him, without taking his eyes off the little Enterprise. In his mind, he can see the explorers traversing the galaxy, having awesome adventures, meeting aliens, exploring the final frontier—boldly going where no man’s gone before and whatnot.

“There are stars and planets and spaceships dangling off the ceiling too.”

“So there are,” he mutters in agreement, still entranced.

He doesn’t see Bones sneaking a glance at him. “Starships and space…I guess that’s pretty exciting.”

Jim smiles. “Yeah, that’s kinda really exciting.”

--

After Bones leaves, Jim finds himself in the kitchen, chatting with Scotty and snacking on a fortune cookie. He cracks it open to find,

‘Better luck next time.’

He can’t help but snort at the piece of paper. “Thanks.”

--

Christine comes in the next day for lunch with a man she introduces as Geoffrey M’Benga, another friend of Bones’. “I believe you owe me a drink of my choice, Jim,” she reminds him, a playful smile on her lips.

He nods. “Can’t deny it. So what’ll it be?”

“Well, it’s a Thursday, so I guess a Classy Lady will do,” she orders, but her mind’s clearly lingering elsewhere.

“Excellent choice,” he says, partly from reflex and partly because all of Gaila’s drinks are amazing. He glances at her and asks, “Is it really time for an official exchanging of threats already? If you must know, I have already been adeptly threatened—”

She cuts him off, “Your balls are forfeit if he gets unnecessarily hurt—”

His eyebrows go up. “Wow, okay, duly noted and feeling thoroughly threatened. I see you’ve had practice.”

Christine smiles, not denying it. “Someone has to do it for him. Go on then. I believe it’s your turn.”

“There’ll be lots of disapproving glares from my people,” Jim tells them seriously.

“A threat as good as any,” Geoff tries to say respectfully, but the effect’s ruined by Christine’s cackling. Jim’s immediately reminded of Gaila and can’t help but like her, albeit a little begrudgingly.

“You’re so cute if you think glares will do anything to us. Leonard glares at us all the time. Me and Geoff are immune and Leonard’ll never notice.” Trying to contain her laughter, she asks, “What else do you have up your sleeves? Go on, lay it on us.”

“A lot of guilt tripping. Whenever you see me, I’ll be like,” he lets his shoulders sag and drops his gaze to the ground, blinking forlornly. Then, he looks up through his lashes and shoots Christine his full-blown ‘post-hunter Bambi face’.

She frowns. “Oh, hey now. That’s not fair.”

Jim turns his gaze back to the ground and kicks an imaginary pebble.

“I feel like I just threw a puppy into oncoming traffic,” Christine groans, looking away. And Jim thinks he’s won the battle, but then she turns back to him with a smirk and says, “Dejected puppy faces might work on people like Leonard, but I volunteer at the pediatric ward. Impressively ‘aww’ as your face is, it’s nothing compared to some of the kids I have to deal with.”

With a huff, he trains his expression back into something more neutral. “You’re just a void of fun, aren’t you?”

“I could be worse,” she tells him. “I’ll give you one more try.”

“Fine, guess I gotta bring out the big guns, hmm?”

Christine arches a brow challengingly. “Yeah? Bring it on.”

“I’ve got Gaila and Nyota on my side—and I can probably hack into your supervisor’s computer and give you nothing but weekend shifts for the rest of the year,” he offers.

 She gives a nod of approval. “Better. Now we’re on even grounds.”

Pleased that he made his point, he bounces on his heels and grins. After he returns with their drinks, he launches into the story about the fortune cookie and how he’s secretly psychic and “did you know that our ceilings are decorated with stars and spaceships?”

Christine takes a sip of her drink and reaches out to pat him on the arm comfortingly and coos, “Oh sweetie, do you actually think that after a month into the semester, we’re still capable of rational thought? Especially with the midterms we just had. I’m surprised Leonard made it in at all. You should be flattered.”

He is.

He’s very flattered—and reading way too deep into this.

“You two seem to be doing fine,” he observes, because a healthy dose of skepticism never hurt anybody.

“There are three reasons for that. First of all, I’m amazing, and second, it’s Monday and I managed to get some rest yesterday. And third, I only listened to half the things you just said—and by that, I mean the important things—in order to conserve brain power,” she admits. “And Geoff’s actually fallen asleep with his eyes open. You get really good at that sort of thing after a while.” And to prove her point, she waves her hand in front of Geoffrey’s face.

No reaction whatsoever.

Jim blinks. “Oh. Are you guys really that sleep deprived?”

She pulls her lips into a tight line. “Think of it this way,” she begins, “some people watch porn and fantasize about being one of the parties involved. We watch mattress commercials and fantasize about slipping into a coma.”

“Wow. I’m sorry I asked.” He rubs the back of his neck. “Do you at least know what he’s gonna order? I’d feel bad for waking him up. Should I even get you food? Or should I run out and get you guys pillows?”

“Are you serious about the pillows offer?” Christine asks.

He shakes his head. “Sorry, no, I’m not allowed to leave the premises during my shift.”

--

They get a surprise visit from the rival restaurant’s owner, Nero, on Monday morning. Jim and Spock and conversing quietly among themselves, arguing over the merits of an equation Scotty came up with while drunk when Nero comes storming in, practically frothing at the mouth—much like their monster of a dishwasher.

The two of them turn to him with matching arched brows, and Spock asks, “Are you in need of assistance of some kind?”

Nero narrows his eyes and hisses, “I would rather suffer the bankruptcy of the Narada a thousand times. I would rather die in agony than accept assistance from you.”

Jim blinks in surprise. “Wow. Harsh.” He turns to Spock and asks, “What’d you do to piss him off so badly?”

Spock remains unmoved. “I, too, fail to understand the root of his anger.”

Nodding, Jim turns back to Nero. “So, what did you want again?”

“I want Spock dead now!” Nero yells, throwing his arms in the air.

He furrows his brows because nothing’s making sense. How can Spock, of all people, piss someone off so much that they want him dead?—sure, he pisses Jim off all the time, but never to the murderous extent that Nero is at. And more importantly, why Spock? Surely, Jim would make as good a nemesis as anyone. He’s the one with the crazy dream to live life like an action hero—and an action hero needs an arch nemesis, damn it. How dare Nero be so selfish and pick Spock over him when Jim’s clearly the one who needs to be hated by someone evil?

“Just Spock? Really?” Jim tries, because he has no sense of self-preservation (or decorum) at all.

Nero just scowls at him. Then, just as quickly as he came, he turns his heels and marches back out.

With his eyebrows raised, Jim crosses his arms and stares at Spock. “Holy shit. You just got yourself an arch nemesis, Spock. You don’t just get arch neme..nemesises? Nemesi?”

“Nemeses,” Spock corrects him.

“Right. You don’t just get arch nemeses by doing nothing! What’d you do? Set his house on fire? Call his kids names? Did you shove his granny into oncoming traffic or something?” He huffs, “More importantly, how come you get an arch nemesis and I don’t?”

Spock takes a moment to look thoughtful, then concludes, “I believe it might have something to do with that one time I reported a violation of safety code 3.07 section B in front of his restaurant. Or perhaps it was the time I pointed out an error in his net income statement when he came by to compare profits. However, I find his anger towards me illogical. I merely reported the findings and flaws I discovered.”

Jim gapes. “You got yourself an arch nemesis because of accounting? Fuck me….”

Not missing a beat, Spock shakes his head. “No thank you.”

Chris takes this opportunity to step out of his office, probably distracted from his work by Jim’s yelling and flailing arms. “What’s happening out here?”

 “Nero came by and declared Spock to be his mortal enemy,” Jim blurts, “and that’s not fair because that’s just way too badass for something that started over accounting and safety violations! Seriously, am I not good enough to be someone’s arch nemesis? Because I can come up with a list of reasons why I’d make an awesome arch nemesis—a very long list.”

“Oh god, this is happening,” Chris mutters, pinching the bridge of his nose. He knows Jim too well and knows that the subject won’t be dropped until someone appeases him either with a pep talk or alcohol. And since it’s a Monday morning and they’re all working, alcohol is not an option. Unfortunately. “No, Jim, I’m sure you’d make a formidable arch nemesis for someone, and just because Nero has beef against Spock doesn’t mean you’re not good enough. There are plenty of arch nemesis—”

“Nemeses,” both Jim and Spock say.

Rolling his eyes, Chris sighs, “Jesus—nemeses out there…in the big, evil metaphorical sea or whatever,” he waves it off with a shrug, “and one day, I’m sure you’ll find that special nemesis who was made just for you and will hate you for all eternity. I miss when kids used to whine about crushes and feelings.”

Jim chuckles. “Oh, don’t you worry. There’s plenty of that too. Want to hear about it?”

“No,” Chris cuts him off before he has a chance to start talking about his love life, “not necessary. Thanks. I can’t deal with both love and hate issues in one day—week, or even month. I’ll try to pencil you in for next month in between the follow-up talk about spirit animals and finding someone to put the Narada down. Would a Thursday work for you?”

“I think I prefer Mondays,” he replies. “In the meantime, let me tell you about Bones—”

“Yeah, no thanks. I’m gonna go back to my office now, but why don’t you tell Spock all about it?” Chris suggests because he’s secretly a sadist.

--

Bones is writing notes with a Sonic Screwdriver pen.

Jim feels like his insides are full of athletic butterflies doing crazy acrobats, and he hopes it won’t cause any complications during his next medical check-up.

“With your luck, it’s probably an allergic reaction instead of love,” Gaila tells him as she wipes down the glasses.

He doesn’t refute the claim but doesn’t encourage it either, just in case he ends up jinxing himself. Instead, he walks over with Bones’ usual coffee and smiles. “You a Whovian?”

Bones looks up from his notes and gives a vague shrug. “Sorta, I guess. How can anyone not like a character called The Doctor?”

“You’re such a med-nerd,” Jim snorts, feeling very pleased that Bones appears to be fully awake and they’re actually having a conversation. “I still think Bones is a wittier nickname.”

“Bones?”

Whoops.

“Yeah, it’s short for sawbones,” he says, making it up on the spot, doing his best to sound nonchalant about the whole thing. “It’s what I’ve been calling you and will continue calling you behind your back whether you like it or not because it’s an awesome nickname.”

Luckily, Bones doesn’t seem particularly displeased with it. “Whatever. That’s still nowhere near as bad as Christine and co. She’s the one who got me started on it after her and Carol came up with some sorta inside joke. They kept calling me Doctor—said it had something to do with my social skills and being ‘rude and not ginger.’ Then she bought me the pen and insisted I use it on the threat that I’ll wake up one day and find myself strapped in a helicopter,” Bones tells him, scowling at the memory.

Jim laughs. “Don’t tell me you’re afraid of flying or something, Bones?”

“Or something,” Bones grumbles back. “Something more like fear of dying in something that flies.”

“Hey, it’s a legit fear,” he says in between chuckles. He really shouldn’t be laughing, but he can’t help himself. “You really should’ve told her about your aviophobia before letting her take this Doctor thing so far. How will you ever fly the TARDIS across time and space if you can’t even handle a plane?”

Bones scowls. “Shut up and bring me a Romulan BLT.”

He gapes a little, the corner of his mouth still turned upwards in amused disbelief. “Did you really just dismiss me and tell me to get you a sandwich? I can see where she was coming from with the whole social skills thing. You, my friend, are definitely rude and not ginger.”

“Sandwich. Now,” Bones repeats, rolling his eyes.

Throwing his hands in the air, he backs away from the table. “Fine! I’m going! I’m going! This is me going, one step at a time, your Doctor-ness.”

--

“Pulling pigtails, now are we?” Gaila says after he gets back with a grin. “You better watch it, Kirk. Karma’s probably gonna bite you in the ass for all your teasing.”

Jim waves her off. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Karma bites him in the ass almost immediately after, when he breaks a glass and cuts his hand by the bar. Why do all bad things seem to happen by the bar? All bad things and the spewing of red liquidy substance.

It’s not a very serious injury—it’s more like a bad paper cut, really—but Jim cusses up a storm anyway.

Scotty comes out with the first aid kit when he hears the cursing, because he’s long since learnt that when Jim starts swearing like a sailor, there’s probably blood and pain involved. Before he can do anything, a voice on the other side of the bar speaks up, “What happened?”

The three of them look up from Jim’s hand and stare at Bones, who’s standing there with a worried look on his face. Gaila’s the first one to find her voice. She’s practically beaming and radiating gleeful malice because she lives to make Jim’s life a disastrous rom-com for her own entertainment. “Jim cut himself,” she tells Bones, “and you’ve got medical training. Would you mind patching him up, please?”

Bones doesn’t hesitate and nods. “Yeah, no problem. Show me your hand, Jim.”

Jim definitely doesn’t get a shiver down his spine from the way Bones says his name or gingerly holds his hand by the wrist.

Scotty retreats back to the kitchen and Gaila leans back and watches the rom-com that is Jim’s life.

Inspecting the wound and satisfied that there’s no glass embedded in it, Bones sighs, “Dammit, Jim,” another shiver, “you should know better than to try to pick up broken glass.”

“To be fair, it was a really big piece and I don’t know where that sharp edge came from,” he refutes.

He gets an ‘are you an idiot?’ eye-roll for his weak argument.

“So what’s the verdict, doc? Just give it to me straight. Will I ever get to play the bagpipe duets with Scotty again?” Jim asks.

Bones snorts, the corners of his lips curling up despite himself. “With a gaping wound like this, you’re lucky to escape with your life, kid.”

Gaila looks like she’s enjoying their banter far too much.

After disinfecting the cut, Bones goes through the first-aid kit only to arch an eyebrow. “No Band-Aids? Really?”

“We must not’ve refilled them after Jim’s last fiasco,” Gaila tells him, sounding like an exasperated big sister—complete with the eye-roll and everything. The issue’s definitely going to turn up at their next staff meeting along with a debate on what kind of Band-Aids they should get. (Jim had planned on voting for Avengers ones, but now, he’s pretty set on My Little Pony because he would pay his tuition fee’s worth of money to see Spock with one wrapped around his finger.)

“That’s fine, I’ve got a couple in my bag,” Bones says and disappears back to his table for a moment before returning with a couple in his hands.

Jim’s heart rate picks up a little when he sees it and he can’t stop the dopey grin from reaching his face. “Oh my god. Are those My Little Pony Band-Aids? Is this for real? Are you a brony?”

“What? No! It’s not like I’m the one who bought them,” Bones grumbles. “Why would I even—this was Christine’s idea of a joke, okay? I have Disney Princess stickers on my mirror because she found some going cheap somewhere. She even stuck a tiara sticker right where my head is. That’s what I have to wake up to every day.”

Their interaction reminds Jim of his and Gaila’s relationship, so he knows he’s right when he says, “Oh please. You wouldn’t trade it for anything in the world.”

Bones doesn’t deny it. Instead, he huffs, “Whatever. Are you just gonna stand there and make fun of the Band-Aids? ‘Cause if that’s the case, you can forget about picking your favourite one.”

He gasps, affronted. “You wouldn’t. Give me the manliest one. Like, the most badass pony Band-Aid you have in your surprisingly large collection.”

“I’m out of the blue ones, but you can have this one,” Bones tells him with a slight grin, sticking the pink Band-Aid onto his finger with practiced precision.

Jim can only grin back.

He plans on never taking that Band-Aid off ever again.

--

Bones ends up getting his coffee on the house in exchange for his medical services and leaves with a fortune that reads,

‘There will be lots of healing in your future. Things are looking bright.’

“You know, you two are surprisingly cute together,” Gaila notes with a satisfied hum, “in this dopey sort of way.”

Eyes lingering on the door, Jim recalls their brief interaction and turns to Gaila and asks, “Did you notice? He has the warmest eyes.” Then, with a dopey grin on his face, he starts idly caressing his finger and stroking the Band-Aid.

In response, being the awesome friend she is, Gaila promptly bends over and pretends to throw up.

--

When he gets back to the apartment later that day to drop off his things, Spock arches a brow and asks, “Why is there a pink adhesive bandage on your hand, Jim?”

Non-sequitur, Jim says, “Bones is amazing. I seriously want to have his babies and just follow him everywhere forever and ever or something—or have him follow me and have my babies, I’m not picky.”

Spock folds his arms behind his back and says, “In case you did not notice, Jim, and I highly doubt that to be the case, but I regret to inform you that you are both male and unable to bear children. And I am fairly certain that following him will lead to a restraining order which will hardly be beneficial to you and your future career.”

Jim rolls his eyes. “I didn’t mean literally have his babies, Spock.” Then he adds with a grin, “But when the time comes, we can always adopt.”

“Adoption? It sounds as though you are ready to make a very large commitment for this person,” Spock says, eyebrows climbing up his forehead.

“Commitment? Whoa,” he raises a hand, “hold up there, Spock! I said I wanted to have his babies and stalk or be stalked by him, not marry him. Let’s not get ahead of ourselves here.” He smiles and claps Spock on the shoulder. “Anyway, I gotta run. Good talk. Let’s do it again some time.”

And with that, he leaves behind a very confused Spock with his eyebrows nearly at his hairline.

--

They end up voting for bacon Band-Aids at their staff meeting—because who can argue against wrapping a slab of bacon around their wound? Jim just knows it’s going to cause ridiculous bacon cravings from all of them (even Spock, who’s vegetarian 99% of the time).

“A journalist came by the other day and said she wanted to feature us in the newspaper this week. It was something about local restaurants and rankings or something, so you’ll probably come across it if you decide to read the news.” Then he shoots Jim a look of warning. “I know she spent a lot of time talking to you, so if there’s anything weird in the papers, I’m coming after you. Consider yourself threatened.”

Jim nods solemnly. “Feeling sufficiently threatened.”

The rest of the staff share a good laugh among themselves while Nyota goes to grab a copy of said newspaper. They flip to the page to find that the lady had, indeed, gone around and rated all the local restaurants based on her experience and online polls.

“Hey, we were voted the best looking staff!” Pavel points out excitedly.

“Oh, the drinks menu got a special mention too,” Gaila notes, preening.

“This is gonna lead to all these new people coming in just to take a look at everyone, isn’t it?” Scotty asks. “We’re gonna need more cutlery at this rate because the Narada’s been eating them even though we put them far, far away from it. The thing’s a monster.”

“You kids can gloat about the article later. In other news,” Chris announces, changing the subject, “there’s a new restaurant opening later this week about half a block down. It seems chic and classy and all that jazz. I’ll need someone to go check it out. Volunteers?” Without waiting, he shrugs. “Sounds good, Jim. Thanks for volunteering.”

Jim blinks. “Yeah, anytime, apparently.”

Chris gives and offhanded wave. “Take someone else with you if you’re not comfortable spying alone. Actually, it’s probably better if you take someone.”

He mentally goes over the list of possible spy partners and turns to Nyota. “I’ll probably go on a Tuesday. Wanna come with?”

“I suppose. You need the adult supervision, anyway,” she replies with a shrug.

“Good, so that’s settled.” Going through the agenda, Chris says, “Let’s see, what else? Oh, Spock’s play is starting later this week, isn’t it? All of you better go watch it on your day off because we’re family and family support one another—even if that means having to attend strange, contemporary modern theatre art that no one understands.”

What had happened was, apparently, one of the professors thought a little acting might help him smooth out his bumpy social interactions and had suggested it. And with Nyota backing the idea, Spock never stood a chance. So now he’s starring in the upcoming play/drama and Jim is practically dying from excitement to see it.

“And speaking of Spock,” Chris continues, “Nero came by last week and declared himself to be Spock’s archenemy.”

“Still not fair,” Jim grumbles.

Everyone mumbles comforting sympathy to Jim.

“I am very sorry to hear that.”

“I still find it illogical that he should consider any of us an enemy.”

 “You’ll find someone. I’m sure there are plenty of people who hate you out there.”

“You’ll get your chance, lad.”

“Nero wouldn’t have made that good an arch nemesis for you anyway.”

“I’d be your arch nemesis any day.”

Jim blinks. “Really? That’s really sweet of you, Gaila, but no thanks.”

She snorts, “You’re right. You’d never stand a chance.”

“Seriously, why can’t you kids be into drugs and offensive music like normal young adults?” Chris sighs. “I think I’d rather bail you out of jail than put up with this.”

“You’d probably bake us cakes with nail files in them, and then make us tell you what lesson we learnt from the experience,” Hikaru jokes.

Chris doesn’t deny it because that’s what probably he would do in that situation.

Because Chris is the best boss anyone could ever have.

--

They hang up a picture with everyone making their ugliest faces possible along with the ‘Voted Best Looking Staff’ clipping right by the reservation stand so everyone can see and marvel at their beauty. Jim’s not entirely happy about the influx of attention because it means his usual lazy afternoons are now hectic and he can’t spend his Wednesday flirting with Bones as usual.

When Bones comes in, he looks around at all the occupied tables and arches a brow. “Why are there so many people?”

“Because we’re dazzlingly attractive,” Jim tells him, holding up the framed picture and news article, “according to everyone who voted online.”

Hazel eyes look from the words to the picture and back, chuckling. “I can see how they came to their conclusion.”

“Don’t worry, I saved you your usual seat. And I doubt this popularity will last forever,” he says with a shrug. “Most of these folks just came in for the sake of telling people they came in and got served by yours truly,” he gives a theatrical bow, “and can you blame them?”

Bones crosses his arms and scoffs, “You’re talking about how great it is to be served by you and yet here I am, still waiting to be seated.”

Jim laughs. “I’m doing you a service by letting you admire my attractiveness a little longer. You’re my favourite customer, after all.”

“I thought you weren’t supposed to have favourites.”

He gives a nonchalant shrug. “I’ve never been one to follow rules anyway. Besides, I’m a waiter, not a teacher. I’m allowed to play favourites. What about you? Am I your favourite server? I totally am, aren’t I?” he asks, waggling his eyebrows suggestively.

“You’ll be my favourite server if you actually get around to getting me my coffee,” Bones says, not missing a beat.

“I didn’t realize your love was so easy to win, Bones,” he teases.

And he could’ve sworn he saw Bones’ cheeks flush just a little.

(Though that might’ve also been due to exhaustion.)

--

“Why are there so many people here?” Christine asks when she comes in the next day with Carol.

“Hello to you ladies too.” Jim shows them to their seat and retorts with “Why do you med-students seem so surprised by the fact that we get customers?”

Carol laughs. “We’re not surprised by the sight of customers, we’re surprised by the number of them.”

“Yeah, well, they’re here to ogle and objectify us because we have the best looking staff in the area,” he explains.

“Oh, that,” Christine replies helpfully. “Speaking of objectification, we came here to make sure your intentions are pure.”

“And that you’re not delusional,” Carol adds.

Jim furrows his brows. “So you’re here to test me? I thought we already exchanged threats—has the test started already or do I have time to do a round and check on people and maybe fetch you two drinks?”

Christine seems to consider this for a moment before nodding and conceding, “Drinks first. Just coffee, thanks. We’ve got a study date with Leonard and Geoff later.”

He nods. “I’ll be right back.” Double checking on all his customers, he swings by the bar and complains, “Help. Bones’ concerned co-porn-stars are here to interrogate me—and not in the good ‘come join our three-way’ way.”

Gaila looks over his shoulder and waves at the girls who wave back with smiles. “Really sucks to be you right now, Jim.”

“That’s it?” he asks, reluctantly grabbing the cups of coffee. “That’s all the support I’m gonna get from you?”

She gives him an unsympathetic shrug and he has to remind himself that he likes Gaila. Really. He does. “We’re working right now, so it’s not like I can give you alcohol. Pike would never let me hear the end of it. Has anyone ever told you how whiny you are when you’re in love? I’ll give you a shoulder to cry on when you’re done, okay, you big baby?”

Jim rolls his eyes and waves her off and returns to Christine’s table with the coffee. “Right. Here are go.” He takes a deep breath and says, “Go on. Test me. Is there math involved? I’m gonna need a pencil and paper if there is.”

“Calm down, it’s really not as serious as we made it sound,” Carol reassures him. “We were bored and decided to drop by. We just wanted to make sure you knew what you were getting yourself into.”

Christine takes a gulp of her coffee and asks, “So what does a date with Leonard look like to you, in your head?”

His eyebrows go up. “Wow, not what I was expecting, but okay. I guess just mostly hanging out? Food, movie, maybe just TV, and beer. Maybe not so much food since he’ll probably have an issue with my impressive stock of instant noodles and TV dinners and will probably replace all my good stuff with healthy alternatives—which is cool, I guess, since I’m not about to get into domestic debates about groceries. That’s Spock and Nyota’s thing. Seriously, I came up with a drinking game because I’m, like, their professional third wheel. Every time they use ‘we’ unnecessarily, I take a drink and then I see how wasted I am by the end of the night.

“Let’s see, what else? If we’re watching TV, I’d listen to him bitch about how the doctors on TV are wrong ‘cause that sounds like something he’d do in that grumpy but fun way. I’d probably egg him on because I’m an enabler like that.”

The two of them look surprised. “That was a strangely sad and accurate description of Leonard’s day off.”

“Oh,” he adds, “and making out, of course. Lots of making out.”

“Didn’t need to hear that,” Christine tells him with a mild glare.

Jim grins. “And sex. Lots of sex. So much sex. I bet his hands are phenomenal.”

Carol laughs while Christine makes a gagging noise.

He’s pretty sure he just passed that test with flying colours.

--

Everyone available goes to watch Spock’s play on Sunday. It’s a dramatic play on illogic. It’s called 'I, Mudd' and Jim finds it hilarious beyond word.

Despite being Spock’s roommate, Jim’s never actually seen Spock practice for it or anything since he memorized the entire script the first time he read the damned thing.

They all watch as Spock turns to one of the android twins and monotonically proclaims his love for her only to proclaim his hate for the other.

“But we’re absolutely identical!” one of the twins protests.

“Yes, that is why I hate you,” he tells them with a pointed eyebrow arch.

They both supposedly get their minds blown by this and their brains shut down.

Jim’s curled up in his seat, trying not to laugh out loud at the ridiculousness that is this play. Pavel looks awed and Scotty’s fallen asleep. Spock’s clearly using his usual speaking voice, but it somehow works with this play. It’s a good thing Nyota’s not around to see their unique brand of moral support or they would probably get their asses handed to them in a minute.

After the play, on their way back to their apartment, Jim grins and claps Spock on the shoulder. “Good job with the play, man.”

“Yes, the director said I was impeccable. Perhaps I should have considered a career in acting as opposed my current studies in physics, chemistry, biology, law, finance and accounting, philosophy, and engineering,” Spock replies with a thoughtful nod.

Jim can’t tell if he’s joking—he really hopes Spock’s joking.

He cracks up anyway.

--

Jim and Nyota go to the new restaurant on Tuesday because what person can ever turn down the opportunity to be a spy for a day? He looks up at the shiny new sign, announcing the name of the restaurant and reads aloud, “Khan—what? Khan Noonien Singh? Noon-ian sing? Noo-nian sing? God, this is even worse than the Narada.”

She rolls her eyes and says, “It’s Khan Noonien Singh,” like it should be common knowledge and he’s an idiot for not knowing.

“You seem to be forget sometimes that not everyone’s as talented as you when it comes to languages and pronouncing stuff. I’m just going to call this place ‘Khan’,” he informs her.

Nyota shakes her head fondly at him and pushes him towards the door. “Come on, let’s just get this over with.”

Apparently, much like Starfleet, Khan serves a ‘fusion’ of food but specializes in Indian. Stepping inside, Jim’s reluctantly impressed by the interior. Walking down the entrance hall lined with beautiful black marble walls and low lighting. It’s a darker, very sleek and modern looking place—a place to bring a first date to impress him or her. When they make their way to the reservation stand, the host looks up and smiles professionally at them. “Table for two, sir?”

A little sheepishly, he smiles and nods. “Yeah, thanks.”

“Please follow me right this way.”

So far, this place seems to be the foil of Starfleet. It’s classy and chic whereas Starfleet’s laidback and fun. All the staff seem stiff and professional whereas Jim and co. are friendly and warm—or, they try to be…most of the time. He gets this feeling that none of the staff here would ever be caught dead with a pink Band-Aid or ketchup splattered shirt on.

The host even pulls out Nyota’s chair for her. She seems mildly surprised by the gesture. To be fair, though, she’s surrounded by people like Jim—and Jim only does that for old ladies and people he’s either flirting with or schmoozing up to.

“Here are the menus,” the host tells them. “Your server will be with you momentarily.”

The man leaves with the slightest of bows and the two of them immediately take the chance to scan through their menus analytically, taking mental notes of the choices offered, their prices, and the quality of the ingredients.

Jim’s looking through the drinks menu when a tall man in black approaches them with cold, sharp eyes and a pleasant smile that looked slightly wrong. “Hello, my name is John Harrison and I will be your server this afternoon. Can I get you started on something to drink?”

His voice is deep and makes Jim shiver in a bad way, and it’s not due to the English accent because that’s actually quite attractive—he still prefers Bones’ southern accent though. No, John’s voice sends shivers down his spine because it sounds cold and calculating, not unlike a serial killer or a sociopath.

They’re getting served by a sociopath.

Super.

Nyota’s the first to man up and order. “I’ll have the Cryogenic Sleep.”

Swallowing down his discomfort, he says, “I think I’ll have the Vengeance.”

“Very good,” John says, flashing them his unsettling smile again, “I will be right back with your drinks.”

“Oh my god, he’s a sociopath,” Jim says as soon as John’s out of earshot. “Do you think our deaths will count as work-related injuries?”

“Human Torpedo, Botany Bay, Ceti Alpha…, they certainly have interesting cocktails here,” Nyota says, reading over the rest of the drinks menu.

Jim frowns. “You mean expensive and sociopathic and nowhere near as good as Gaila’s?”

She smiles to herself and doesn’t deny any of it.

--

Their food comes out quickly, and again, although Jim’s reluctant to admit it, everything tastes fantastic. The presentation’s also surprisingly nice—especially for curry. Jim grumbles vague complaints for the first few minutes of the meal, even while he’s stuffing his face, just to remain loyal to Starfleet and Chris. Eventually, they relax enough to actually start a conversation, now that mental notes have been taken about the place.

“So how are things going with Spock?” Jim asks. “I’m assuming it’s all great since he hasn’t asked me any awkward questions in a long time. I swear, whenever you guys fight, it somehow gets more awkward for me than the both of you combined.”

Nyota shrugs. “Things are fine. We’re both busy with school and work so there hasn’t been much time to stir up any drama—not that Spock ever does it on purpose or know it’s happening until someone tells him.” Her words are light and nonchalant, like these are aspects of Spock that she’s acknowledged and come to accept over the years.

He nods. “That’s good to hear, I guess.”

“I believe I’m now obliged to ask you about how things are going on the Leonard front,” she says, taking a bite of her food.

“Things are good—”

She cuts him off, “And that’s all I needed to hear, thanks. If you start ranting about how good he looks with his stubble again, I’m going to have to cut this lunch date short.”

“Fine, no stubble talk,” he agrees. “Have I told you about his eyebrows?”

“Jim.”

He holds his hands up in surrender. “I’m joking! As gorgeous as they are, I don’t think I’m really comfortable with reciting poetry about them just yet—in public, anyway.”

Nyota arches a brow in an expression that clearly says ‘you’ve got to be shitting me.’ “Really? You’re writing poetry now? About his eyebrows?”

“And stubble,” he adds. Then he starts laughing at her unimpressed stare. “You’re looking more and more like Spock when you do that. But no, I don’t write poetry. About anything. Because I suck at poetry. I can recite Shakespeare and Keats and whatnot, but I can’t write. The only ‘poem’ I can think of is,

‘Bones, Bones,

Oh, how I want to make you moan,

My name,

Oh, look at how fast I just—’”

“Enough,” Nyota cuts him off, kicking him under the table. “More than enough. For a lifetime. Oh my god, we’re in public, Jim. You’re banned from poetry and literature of any kind for the rest of your existence.”

“Really? I thought that was surprisingly good,” Jim says. “It rhymed and everything.”

“I’m going to make sure this gets passed at our next meeting,” she tells him, because all decrees passed at staff meetings get translated into real life and are upheld without question. “We can’t risk having you ruin customers’ appetites with your…strange jumble of words.”

He raises his brows and asks, “Is it really enough to ruin someone’s appetite?”

“Yes.”

Jim eyes her dish, his intentions clear. “Does that mean you’re not gonna finish that then?”

Nyota rolls her eyes and pushes her plate towards him.

Despite his non-existent dreams of becoming a poet being shattered, he decides to count this as a win.

--

When they finally get around to paying for their meal, John comes back around with the credit machine for Jim. He has an even colder look on his face than Jim had thought possible. “I know who you are,” John tells them, voice steely, punching the numbers into the machine.

Jim wastes no time and sends Nyota a look that says ‘see? I told you he was a sociopath. I was right and now neither of us is going to make it out alive.’ When all he gets as a response is an eyebrow arch, he turns back to the man and decides to go for deflection. “I guess our reputations precede us. We’re pretty well known around these parts,” he says with a shrug, passing his card over to the man.

“James T. Kirk, server at the Starfleet Bar and Grill, working every day of the week with the exception of Tuesdays and Sundays. Despite your demeanour, your IQ scores and academic standings suggest that you are actually a genius. And seeing as you have memorized both the food and drinks menu as well as the general layout of this restaurant, I am inclined to believe that at least part of that is true. However, even if you memorize our menus and can roughly calculate our monthly electricity bill, it won’t help because I am better.”

Jim blinks. “At what?”

“Everything.”

He furrows his brow, all nervousness replaced by a mixture of annoyance and determination because the guy sounds like he’s trying to start something. “Who are you? You’re not just a server, are you?”

“No. That was merely a smokescreen to conceal my true identity. I am the owner of Khan,” John replies, swiping Jim’s card and waiting for the payment to be processed.

“What do you want?” Jim asks with a frown.

Narrowing his eyes, John tears off the merchant copy of the receipt menacingly and says, “I want to see you and Starfleet fall to ruins.”

“Sorry to break it to you, bud, but that’s not gonna happen,” he replies breezily.

“We shall see about that.” A small smirk graces the man’s lips as he rips the customer copy of the receipt and places both copies on the table with a pen. “Sign the merchant copy, please.”

“I know that,” Jim snaps back, “I work in a restaurant too.” Then he proceeds to sign the merchant copy with more force than necessary and shoves it back.

John turns to Nyota, who’s paying in cash. “Will you need any change for that, miss?”

She shakes her head politely because despite everything, they’re still in public and in a restaurant. “No, it’s fine. Thanks.”

“Excellent,” John says, voice devoid of any emotion except for hate—hate mainly directed towards Jim. “Thank you for your patronage. I, and the rest of the staff at Khan, hope you have a wonderful day and we hope to see you again.”

Jim scowls and pops the mint into his mouth. “Thanks. You too.”

They share another mutual glare before John returns to the back, presumably where his office is. Nyota looks over at him. “Well. Congratulations, Jim.”

Scowl immediately fading, he settles for looking a little shocked. “Did I just get myself a really badass arch nemesis?”

“I believe you did,” she confirms. “And he even comes with an English accent.”

“Oh my god, I bet he’s in his office, monologue-ing and plotting my demise right now. This spying mission couldn’t have gone any better,” he cheers.

Nyota shakes her head fondly at him. “Yes, I imagine you must be very pleased with yourself. Are you ready to go? I’ve got class soon.”

Unable to keep the grin off his face, he nods and grabs his jacket. “Yeah, let’s go.”

He grabs another mint on the way out because they’re ridiculously high quality and delicious.

--

With the exception of Bones’ visit on Wednesday, in which Jim got to tell him all about his new arch enemy, the rest of the week goes by uneventfully. And it’s become clear to Jim that Gaila’s starting to get impatient with his progress—or lack thereof.

“Half the semester’s already gone by, Jim,” she tells him with an exasperated sigh. “Why do you suck so much?”

“Not on the first date, I don’t,” he retorts.

Gaila narrows her eyes at him. “A first date that you still haven’t been on! Just ask him out already! He’s clearly not getting the fortune cookie thing, and I’m getting really annoyed with watching you two do nothing but flirt. And you two flirt a lot, even if it’s just over a cup of coffee. I just want to mash your faces together already.” She even goes so far as to grab two halves of a lemon and mash them together for visual aid. “Just like this.”

Jim waves her off. “Patience! I’ve got other things on my plate too, Gaila—like an arch nemesis with a badass English accent. I bet he’s thinking about all the ways he could destroy us right now. Because he’s an awesome arch nemesis like that.” John Harrison is his turn-to excuse for everything now and Jim’s been using it shamelessly for everything.

Forgot to do the dishes?

John Harrison’s fault.

Conveniently ‘misplaced’ Spock’s opera CD?

Damn that John Harrison.

Angered the Narada?

It was in cahoots with John Harrison.

It’s raining?

John Harrison probably did a rain dance.

Not asking Bones out?

“Blame John Harrison.”

“John Harrison, who hasn’t done anything yet! You don’t want an arch nemesis, you just want an excuse, Jim. He’s doing about as much as you right now! And by that, I mean nothing at all. Not doing anything. Not doing anyone. Not anytime. Not anywhere. Just,” she makes a frustrated noise and mashes the lemons together again.

“Yeah, I think you’re supposed to be cutting those halves into wedges, Gaila,” he tells her, pointing at the lemons. “Or if you’re trying to juice them, I think you should, I don’t know, use a juicer instead of another lemon?”

Jim laughs and runs away when Gaila glares at him and throws half a lemon at him.

He’s not deflecting.

Just like how he’s not too nervous to ask Bones out.

He’s not.

But if he is, it’s John Harrison’s fault anyway.

--

Expect a thrilling time in your immediate future’ is what he writes that Wednesday.

Bones snorts when he reads his fortune. “Don’t remind me.”

Jim arches a brow. “What?”

Passing Jim the slip of paper, Bones explains, “I’ve got a wave of tests coming up real soon. Thrilling times, indeed.”

‘I meant that suggestively, not sarcastically,’ is what Jim wants to say, but he’s pretty sure that wouldn’t go so well, so he refrains. Instead, he says, “Oh, that really sucks. Good luck, though. I’ll be sure to have your coffee the second you walk in next week.”

Bones’ lips curl upwards as he gathers his things and gets ready to leave. “You’re too good to me,” he says, only half sarcastic.

Jim grins and winks. “Anything for you, Bonesy.”

Behind the bar, he can see Gaila giving him a pointed look while mashing lemon halves together.

He really needs to talk to her about using those lemons for their intended purpose.

Chapter Text

They’re still riding out the wave of attractive staff-seeking customers, but it’s getting better. And true to his word, Jim shoves a cup of coffee into Bones’ hands the second he walks into Starfleet on Wednesday, earning him a sleepy nod of appreciation. Then he notices Christine right behind him and brings out another cup.

“So how’d your tests go?” he asks.

The two of them give him equally incoherent replies.

Jim nods seriously. “Uh huh. Did not understand a word of what you just said. C’mon, you two.” He steers them towards his usual seat and sits them down and points at their coffee. “Finish that up. I’ll be back in a sec to refill your cups and I’ll be expecting an actual answer with verbs and nouns and everything.”

He does his rounds and brings out a couple dishes before returning to their table where he finds Bones, face down on the table, and Christine resting her head on her menu. Jim knows exactly what they’re going through. Luckily for him, all his tests this semester are evenly spaced out, leading to minimal stress, giving him ample time to worry about other things.

Hazel eyes flicker up at him. “The pathology prof sucks.”

“Sucks so very much,” Christine agrees. “Suckity, suckity, suck, suck, suck.”

Amused, Jim arches a brow, refilling their cups. “How so?”

“He put a trick question at the end of the test,” Bones grumbles, inhaling his new cup of coffee. “I answered everything just fine, but then I got to the end and he put this stupid bonus question in asking us for our favourite animal.”

Jim doesn’t understand.

“I don’t understand.”

“We’ve been studying nothing but pathology for the last 24 hours. That question completely threw everyone off,” Bones explains, holding his cup out for more coffee. “We’re med students, not zoologists!”

He cocks his head to the side. “Was it really that bad? I mean, it’s a pretty easy question to answer. And, bonus marks. You just have to say something like dogs, cats, pigs, cows, or unicorns. Look, I just named five right there.”

“That’s not the point! You can’t just change the subject like that in a test,” Christine complains. “He did it on purpose.”

“So did you guys not answer it or something?” Jim asks.

“I wrote ‘colorectal polyp’ as my answer,” Christine admits. “I even drew a picture.”

Bones huffs in amusement, “That’s a good one, actually. It could probably pass as an animal of some kind.”

“Yeah,” she snorts, “a nice cuddly tumour in your ass. What’d you put?”

“Phosphotungstic acid haematoxylin.”

Christine blinks. “Wow.”

Jim lets out an impressed whistle. “I like how you managed to pronounce phospho-whatever but couldn’t give me a coherent response when I asked you how the test went.” He reaches out to refill their cups yet again. “But, really? You couldn’t just write cat?”

“Oh, shut your hole. It’s hard to think of an animal name when the only thing running through your head is ‘cancer, cancer, cancer,’” Christine tells him.

“I actually remember thinking of octopi,” Bones says thoughtfully, “but for whatever reason, I was convinced that it was something I just made up.”

“If it makes you feel any better, they are awfully strange creatures,” Jim offers with a sympathetic pat on the back.

--

‘A blue eyed man will surprise you.’

He watches as Christine reads his fortune over Bones’ shoulder. She arches a brow and shoots him a knowing smile, and suddenly, Jim just knows she’s somehow in cahoots with Gaila.

‘Does he know?’ she mouths at him.

Jim shakes his head. ‘No, shush.’

‘Why? It’s been months!’

‘Oh my god, you sound like Gaila,’ he groans soundlessly.

She arches a brow at him. ‘Nervous? Shy?’

‘No, just waiting!’

‘For what?’

‘Something!’ He looks around for something to say. ‘Ass tumour.’

Christine pouts and visibly deflates.

Bones, still only half-conscious despite downing four cups of coffee, completely misses their little silent banter.

--

“Oh my god, why is this happening,” he whines from the passenger seat, his voice slurred and nasally. He’s holding a pack of frozen peas to his head and a tea towel to his nose. His head’s throbbing, his fingers are frozen, and his nose is pumping out a pint of blood a minute.

“Stop whining, you gigantic baby, and just try not to get blood on my seats,” Gaila tells him, her eyes trained on the road. “Do you have any idea how hard it is to get blood stains out? I knew I should’ve upgraded to leather.”

Jim frowns. “I’m not bleeding that much—am I? I mean, I’m not gonna bleed to death or something, am I? Hey, do you think I’m concussed?”

“I don’t know, Jim. That’s why we’re driving you to the hospital right now,” she tells him.

“I think I might be concussed. I’m pretty sure I saw stars earlier, unless that was actually the decorations on the ceiling. Did you know we have space decorations on the ceiling? Tell Pike I approve,” he rambles.

“I change my mind. I think you’re concussed,” she tells him.

“By the way, why do you sound so familiar with blood stains?” Then he realizes what he just asked and who he just asked and tries to take it back. “Wait, never mind, please pretend those words didn’t just come out of my mouth—”

But because Gaila’s merciless when it comes to the possibly concussed (or maybe it’s just to Jim), she outright cackles. “Well, I can give you a clue, Jim. It’s less to do with first degree murder and torture, and more to do with the river of blood running down my legs once a month.”

“I don’t need to hear about this while injured! You’re a terrible person and—ow, yelling hurts my head,” he says, sounding more pathetic than he intended. “Why isn’t Spock the one driving me? He wouldn’t put me through this kind of torture.”

Spock would probably tell him all the other, better and more logical ways he could’ve resolved the conflict without getting himself hurt. It would be a blow to his pride and annoying, but at least he wouldn’t be talking about menstrual cycles.

Gaila’s smile doesn’t let up. “Because he had to give the police his statement, and everyone knows he’ll give them the most accurate and detailed statement they can possibly get. Besides, if you got Spock to drive you to the hospital, you probably won’t get there till tomorrow. He always goes just below the speed limit and follows all the rules. I, on the other hand, have no issue with speeding.”

Jim avoids looking outside because all the flashing lights hurt his eyes. “You drive like a maniac. We’re probably gonna die before we get to the hospital.”

“Would you rather I slow down and tell you all about my period on the way?” Gaila asks in a singsong tone.

“Oh my god, please don’t.” Jim tries to block out her voice by covering his ears. Unfortunately, he didn’t think it though and ends up with frozen peas on one ear and a bloodied cloth to the other, and his nose is still bleeding.

“Get that tea towel back over your nose, Jim! You’re dripping blood everywhere!”

“You’re the one who started it!”

“Don’t make me give you another concussion!”

A lot of screaming and yelling ensues for the rest of the drive.

--

When they finally arrive at the hospital, Gaila has to steer Jim up the stairs and towards the entrance because his head’s throbbing and can’t be bothered to do anything beyond remaining upright.

“How do I look?” he asks for the sake of asking.

“So very sexy,” she reassures him. “Drop dead gorgeous. I’m sure all the nurses will swoon and faint at the sight of you. Now, c’mon.”

“Jim? Good god, man, what happened to you?”

The two of them look up to see Bones standing there, confused and worried, and slightly blurry—though that might just be Jim. He grins and waves his bag of peas. “Hey, Bones, whataya doing here?”

Bones furrows his brow. “I volunteer here. I just got off shift. What’re you doing here?”

“I might be concussed,” he says. “Volunteer…is that why you’re always so tired when you come in?”

Hazel eyes glance over to Gaila as though questioning whether or not he should be answering Jim’s question. She gives him a helpful shrug. “I cut back my hours after the first month because Christine wouldn’t stop complaining about me sleeping through my days off.”

He gives a slow nod. “So that’s why you’ve been looking more awake. It’s good! I like having conversations with you, grumpy as you are. I like it. You’re secretly nice. As proven by your volunteering at the hospital. Hey, Bones, I’ll let you in on a secret, yeah?” He leans forward and whispers loudly, “I think I’m concussed.”

“Concussed and heavy,” Gaila whines.

Without hesitation, Bones goes to help her, taking Jim off her hands. “C’mon. Let’s go find you a seat before you fall over and hurt yourself any further.”

Jim smiles. “You’re the best.”

“Yes, you are,” Gaila agrees. “Why don’t you help him while I find a better place to park my car before it gets towed? I also have to report back to our boss so that might take a little longer. Call me if you need anything. Jim’s got my number.”

“That’s fine, I’ll bring him to the ER,” Bones tells her.

“Thanks.” She blows Jim a kiss and saunters back out the door.

Bones heaves a sigh and more or less drags him to the emergency room. “Are you in pain?”

“So much pain,” Jim says helpfully.

After helping him into a chair, Bones goes to the receptionist and returns with a clipboard and pen in hand. “I’m gonna need you to answer a couple questions. Think you’re coherent enough to do that or should I wait for the bartender to get back?”

He’s feeling a little more coherent now that he doesn’t have to worry about what his legs are or aren’t doing anymore. “Gaila? Nah, I’m pretty sure I can answer most of these. James T. Kirk, male,” and he continues blurting out the rest of his personal information.

“So what happened?”

“According to Gaila, this fight broke out while I was on shift and I went to break it up and got a fist to the face for my efforts. Oh, and I might’ve hit my head on the bar as well. That bar’s way too well acquainted with the taste of my blood. Did you know that that’s how I got my job?” In the back of his head, he knows he’s getting off topic, but he can’t stop himself.

Bones raises a brow. “What?”

Jim shrugs because it hurts to nod. “Yeah, I got into a bar fight there a long time ago and Pike made me repay him for the damages by putting me to work. Haven’t intentionally started a bar fight since.”

“Intentionally? Dammit, Jim, are you out of your mind? People get killed in bar fights!” Bones scowls and shakes his head. “Moving on. Allergies?”

“Oh my god, so many allergies. Either hold the peas or grab my wallet. There’s a list of my allergies in it.”

Grabbing his wallet and pulling the list out, Bones’ eyebrows shoot up and he stares at Jim like he’s a fascinating specimen of sorts. “You’re allergic to all these things?”

“Not fatally. Just, hives and rashes mostly,” he says.

“How’s the pain?”

“Painful,” Jim supplies.

“Thank you for that helpful response,” Bones deadpans. “By the way, why is there blood in your hair when you’re bleeding from the nose?”

Jim’s shoulders shake with suppressed laughter. “Gaila was telling me about her period and I tried to cover my ears. Hey, is my voice slurred? I feel like it might be slurred. Or maybe my tongue’s numb. Is numb tongue a thing?”

“I think you’re probably concussed,” Bones tells him slowly, enunciating his words carefully, “or drunk.”

“I didn’t drink though!” Jim points out. “So by the process of elimination, I must be concussed. We should strip down and huddle for warmth.”

That gets a snort out of Bones. “Wrong sort of emergency, try again.”

So he does. “Hey, can I distract myself from this pain by asking you weird and invasive questions?”

Bones arches a brow and hesitates, but after a moment of mulling, he sighs and gives in because he can’t help helping those in need. “Sure, I guess, if it helps.”

“You’re the best,” Jim tells him again. “Okay. First question: what’s your favourite animal?”

“You’re kind of an asshole when you’re concussed,” Bones says with a laugh.

Jim dips his head in agreement. “I’m actually kind of an asshole even when I’m not concussed. Not, like, all the time, but enough times that I can tell you that I’m seriously an asshole some of the times.”

Amused, Bones nods. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

“So, have you heard of angler fish?” he asks, mind wandering off again. “I’ve got a picture of one in the bathroom. It’s more of a hologram, really. It even glows in the dark.”

--

It turns out that he did have a concussion and the rest of his time at the hospital goes by in a blur. When he wakes up again, it’s Sunday afternoon and he’s in his own bed and staring at the ceiling with a headache that feels more like a 9.8 earthquake. He either had a really good night, or a really bad one, he concludes. And feeling the throbbing of his nose, he’s leaning towards ‘a bad one’.

He drapes an arm over his eyes and groans, “Of all things unholy, what the fuck happened to me? Spock? Gaila? Somebody?”

Pavel immediately bursts through his door. “Jim! You’re awake! That is very good news! Spock is at work, but I have Gaila on the phone. She is on her break right now.”

He peeks out from under his arm and sighs, “Put her on speakerphone, would you?”

“Right away!”

Her voice comes through almost immediately. “Hello, concussed beauty. How are we feeling on this beautiful Sunday afternoon?”

Jim glances outside and frowns. “We are feeling like shit today, Gaila. It’s raining, my head feels like it just gave birth and I might throw up on you, so you probably don’t wanna stand too close to me.”

Pavel takes a step back and turns the phone’s volume up.

“At least you’re getting a week off work to recover. I’ll let Pike know you’re alive and well.”

“I don’t know about the well part, but I’m definitely alive. So are you gonna tell me what happened?”

“What’s the last thing you remember?” she asks.

He furrows his brow in concentration and tries to remember. “Let’s see, we were working. A couple of assholes started a fight. I got punched in the face. Everything turns blurry. Did I hit my head? I hit my head, didn’t I? On the bar. I remember hating the bar and whoever put it there. We should replace it ‘cause it’s tasted blood—my blood—and it’s gonna want more.”

She cuts him off, “Stay focused, Jim.”

“Right. You’re telling me about your period and there’s blood in my ears because you suck, and I still wish Spock was the one who drove me. I remember the car stopping and then you pretty much pulling me out and then the rest just kinda fades away.” There’s a pause and it makes him nervous. “Why are you not talking, Gaila? I can practically hear you smiling. What happened next?”

“Only the best part. Of course you forgot the best part.”

“The best part?” He doesn’t like the sound of that. “Why? What’s the best part? Stop laughing and tell me the best part, Gaila. Don’t make me sit up and vomit all over Pavel because no one’s gonna be happy if that happens.”

Pavel shifts uncomfortably. It’s adorable how terrified he looks.

“You wouldn’t puke on Pasha.”

“You aren’t the boss of me, Gaila. I’ll puke on whoever I want.” Jim frowns and props himself up onto his elbows. “Sitting up now and feeling thoroughly sick.”

“He is actually sitting up,” Pavel tells her.

“Fine, fine, I’ll tell you. Don’t get your boxer briefs in a knot. By the way, I’ll tell you what happened, but it’s not because of your threats. It’s more because you’re probably gonna hurt yourself and I really don’t want to have to take you to the hospital again,” she sighs.

“Sure, whatever. Tell me now. It was someone important, wasn’t it? Did I run into John Harrison and confront him about being my arch enemy?” he guesses.

“Nope. That would’ve been pretty great, but this is even better.”

Jim has this feeling he knows where this conversation and hopes he’s wrong. “Please don’t tell me we ran into Richard Barnett and made an idiot of myself.”

“That’s right! We ran into Leonard—wait, what? Richard Barnett? The dean—”

“We ran into Bones!?” He immediately regrets his outburst when his head starts throbbing in protest.

“—of engineering? Why would you even think we’d run into him? He probably has his own private hospital.”

“I don’t know. Important people. He’s important and he’s a person. And I was really hoping it wasn’t a worst case scenario, which this definitely is because we ran into Bones?”

“We ran into your Bones,” Gaila confirms. “It was really cute, actually. You were all concussed and pretty much deadweight, and we were in the lobby, right? And then Leonard’s standing there—”

Jim arches a brow. “Since when did you start calling him Leonard?”

“Since I talked to him yesterday and since I’m friends with his friends. Now shush and let me continue. So Leonard’s standing there and he just got off his volunteer shift, right? So I figured he was free and more or less handed you over to him and let him drag you into the ER because I had to go park my car and report back to Pike.”

“You just ditched me there with Bones? While concussed? You’re the worst,” he groans.

“Or the best! I don’t know what happened, but when I got back, you guys managed to get the paperwork done and you were kinda just using his shoulder as a pillow and getting blood all over his shirt and asking him really random questions.”

He knows he’s going to regret asking, but he has to if he’s to do any damage-control. “What kind of questions?”

“I don’t know. Really weird questions? Leonard told me you asked if you could ask him weird and invasive questions to distract yourself from your pain. When I got there, you were asking him if he would ever consider being an operator for a sex line because you thought he’d do ‘a really, really good job.’”

Pavel looks embarrassed on his behalf, even though his sympathy’s kind of hard to pick out from underneath the suppressed laughter. Jim learnt a long time ago that Pavel’s really not as sweet and innocent as he seems most of the time, just like how Hikaru isn’t actually very zen and is surprisingly badass when he wants to be, but he tends to forget sometimes, because—they’re Pavel and Hikaru.

Jim takes a moment to glare at Pavel before pulling the covers over his head and groaning, “Of course I did. Nothing like weird and invasive questions to numb the pain.”

“Overall, I think he took it like a champ. I stopped you before you could finish sharing your thoughts on the effects different levels of gravity would have on sex though,” Gaila reassures him. “You’re welcome, by the way.”

“To be fair, it’s an important question to explore if we’re planning on sending people out there to start space colonies and whatnot,” he reasons. “I’m just a progressive thinker.”

“Uh huh. Did I mention that you’re the sunshine of my world and you make my life worth living?”

--

Chris finally lets him go back to work after nearly two weeks—that’s nearly two weeks he spent under careful supervision because apparently intense research and studying is not recently-concussed-friendly, and neither is strenuous exercise.

Finally back at Starfleet, he saunters over to the bar where Nyota’s standing. Someone’s kindly put up a ‘Please do not give yourself a concussion on the bar’ sign on the wall along with a tent card reading ‘RIP Jim’s dignity’. He takes a picture of the makeshift tombstone with his phone because even he can’t help but appreciate that one.

“So, what’d I miss while I was out of commission?” he asks her. “I’m surprised you guys managed to keep this place running without me.”

Nyota rolls her eyes affectionately at him. “We made do. The Narada scared off another mechanic, and your arch nemesis came by. He seemed upset that you weren’t in, so I told him you’d be back this week. Maybe he’ll come by again.”

Jim arches a brow. “Oh? That’s unexpected—and strangely sweet of him. But like I’ve been saying this whole time, he’s the best arch nemesis a guy could ask for. He actually cares in this hateful, ‘I want you dead’ sort of way. I bet Nero would never check in on Spock like that.”

“Spock’s never spent a week out of commission due to a concussion,” she retorts.

“Fair enough,” he concedes, “but the point still stands.”

“Leonard also asked after you,” she tells him like it’s an afterthought. “Gaila told us all about your run-in at the hospital. I’m kind of surprised he’s still willing to step foot in here.”

“You and me both,” he says honestly, “but no complaints here. What’d you tell him?”

She shrugs. “I told him you were at home, being pathetic.”

“I wasn’t being pathetic,” he protests.

Nyota sends him an unconvinced look. “You made us feed you soup with animal crackers.”

“That’s not—”

“And we did it. I think that tells you exactly how pathetic you were,” she retorts.

Jim opens and closes his mouth a couple times before nodding. “Yeah, okay, you win that one. To be fair, though, I was grieving over dead brain cells and my dignity—as you can see by that sign over there, marking the exact spot where it happened.”

Nyota sighs and shakes her head. “At least that’s all over with, I guess. Here.” She hands him a ‘Glad we don’t have to cover any more of your shifts!’ card, signed by everyone at Starfleet.

Just when he thought he couldn’t love them any more.

--

Someone manages to steal the Narada over the weekend. They have a sneaking suspicion that John Harrison’s behind it, but there’s no evidence linking the man to the crime. They discuss the incident/miracle during their staff meeting and Chris opens the floor for opinions.

“I’m surprised he managed to get close enough to it to actually steal it,” Hikaru comments.

“Two evil peas in a pod,” Jim says with a shrug. “I was wondering why he came by just to smile smugly at me. I bet they’re getting along famously. An evil restaurant owner and an evil dishwasher, it doesn’t get any better than that.”

Scotty laughs and decides to join in, “We should send them a card wishing them a happy honeymoon or something.”

“Should we call the police?” Pavel asks.

“I feel that we should report the incident,” Spock agrees.

Gaila shakes her head. “And say what? ‘Hi, officer. Jim’s arch nemesis took off with the demon dishwasher we’ve been trying to get rid of for over a year now, would you be so kind as to give him a good scolding?  No, we don’t actually want it back.’?”

“I’m with Gaila on this one,” Nyota chimes in.

They all turn to Chris.

“Well, boss?” Jim asks. “What do you think we should do?”

Instead of calling the cops and reporting it, they send John Harrison a thank you card and a box of chocolates.

--

Gaila has an evil glint in her eyes, and it makes Jim nervous. It’s doubly bad because it’s Wednesday and Bones is probably going to walk through the door at any moment now. Putting two and two together, Jim concludes that Gaila has a plan involving him and Bones and there’s nothing he can do about it. It doesn’t help that the restaurant isn’t nearly busy enough to keep her occupied.

He decides to confront her about it—before Bones arrives, because he has enough damage control to do as it is. “Alright, Gaila, spill. What’re you planning?”

She blinks at him with feigned innocence. “I have no idea what you’re talking about, Stripper Jim.”

Jim huffs and worries his lower lips because he has no way of actually getting Gaila to talk. He’s got nothing on her—no blackmail, no bribe, no external force to help him, nothing. She, on the other hand, has plenty of dirt on him and would have no problem using any of it against him. It’s an unfair fight and he lost before it even began. She seems to sense this and smiles while pretending to wipe down the counter.

He wonders if he should try begging.

“Begging won’t work,” she tells him, apparently reading his mind, “so don’t even try it, Jim Kirk. You know I’m immune to you and your charms.”

“Have I ever told you how you’re my favourite person in the world?” he tries, because flattery’s more schmoozing than begging. “You’re perfect in every way possible, and if I wasn’t banned from all attempts at poetry, I’d write something about your hair and how fair you are and…bears eating pears…on dares.”

Ever the encouraging person, Gaila outright laughs at his attempt at rhyming. “And this is why you’re not allowed to write poems—ever. All in all, nice try, but still no.” Then she glances up and her smirk widens. “Speaking of favourites. Your favourite customer’s here. Wouldn’t want to keep him waiting now, would we?”

Jim narrows his eyes at her and pours a cup of coffee before heading over to Bones. “Hey, Bones.”

Hazel eyes study his face for a full 30 seconds, and it doesn’t make him nervous at all. “The bruising on your nose seems to be fading. How’s your head?” he asks, taking a sip of coffee and giving a content sigh.

“My head’s as good as it’ll ever be. You must’ve had a lot of fun playing 20 questions with me at the hospital,” he jokes, walking over to Bones’ usual seat, occasionally glancing over at Gaila to make sure she’s still there, “nice, traumatizing fun.”

She smirks at him when she catches his eye.

Bones chuckles. “Don’t worry about it. Nowhere near as bad as Christine that one time she broke her leg and they hooked her up to a morphine drip. You did ask me what my favourite animal was though.”

Jim gapes. “I didn’t.”

“You did. Now that I think about it, I don’t think I answered.”

“Apparently I’m kind of an asshole when I’m concussed,” he says.

“Apparently you’re kind of an asshole even when you’re not, according to you,” Bones replies with an amused eyebrow arch.

He nods, pulling his lips into a line thoughtfully. “Yeah, don’t have much of an argument there, especially since your source is me.”

There’s a brief pause between them then Bones asks, “Do you really have a glow in the dark picture of an angler fish hanging in your bathroom? And one of those 3D portraits of Einstein where it looks like his eyes are following you everywhere?”

Jim’s eyes widen. “I told you about those? Oh my god, that’s even worse than when I get drunk. I find it fun to make our bathroom an uncomfortable place for guests,” he admits with a defeated sigh, “because I am an asshole.”

Bones seems to take it all in stride and just laughs.

--

Everything goes smoothly, but Jim knows better than to let his guard down when Gaila’s scheming against him. But still, he can’t help but think he got through it all when it comes time to hand Bones the bill and his usual fortune cookie. And as usual, Jim stands around when the cookie’s cracked open and the fortune read.

There’s a long pause then Bones hands a slip of paper over to him. “I think this was meant for you.”

Jim furrows his brow and lets out an intelligent “huh?”

He takes the slip of paper and reads,

‘You’re not the only one who knows how to hack fortune cookies, Jim.’

“Shit,” he mutters.

But before he can properly freak out, Bones looks up at him and asks, “You think I have warm eyes?”

Jim freezes.

What?

“What?”

There’s a mixture of surprise, confusion and amusement painted on the man’s ever so expressive face. In his hands, there are multiple slips of paper that Jim doesn’t remember putting into the cookie. “You think I have warm eyes?” Bones repeats.

Jim makes a garbled noise and snatches the fortunes and reads them.

 ‘So the thing is, Jim has a serious mancrush on you.’

‘Like, for real. He won’t shut up about you.’

‘He even bribed Spock into letting him work all the Wednesdays this semester.’

‘You have Jim Kirk pining for you. Congrats.’

‘He thinks you have the ‘warmest eyes’.’

‘You should leave a nice tip for the bartender.’

Jim turns and gapes at Gaila who waves back at him with a mock-innocent smile. He feels the slips of paper fall from his fingers and onto the table but can’t bring himself to care. Instead, he calls out to Gaila, “I don’t pine, Gaila! Why does everyone insist on calling it that?”

She shoots him a dubious look.

Then he turns back to Bones and points to the kitchen dumbly and says, “So I, um, just gonna….” He’s not sure what he’s going to do because if their roles were reversed, he would’ve done the same thing, so he can’t even be mad about it.

Bones just arches a brow at him expectantly and Jim tries to stop thinking about just how warm those hazel eyes look.

“Gonna,” he tries again, “try to finish this sentence without looking like a complete dork. Oh look, I failed—stop laughing, Gaila! Yeah, so, next week. See you next week.” He gives a jerky wave and goes to hide in Chris’ office for the rest of eternity.

--

Gaila comes in a couple of minutes later, cheeks flushed from laughing so hard, and he has to remind himself that he loves her and her death would cause him much grief and sadness. “Leonard left,” she tells him, residual laughter ringing in her voice.

“How are you such a terrible person?” Jim grumbles. “I hate you,”

“You love me,” she retorts.

“You’re the worst,” he mutters.

“Jim, the semester’s almost over. I just want you to be happy, you know that. I figured if you didn’t manage to scare him off with your incredibly awkward questions that night at the hospital, what’s a couple truth fortunes more gonna hurt?”

She has a point, but he’s not about to let her know that, so he makes a noncommittal noise in response.

Gaila sighs, “Seriously, you asked him which mythical beast’s mating habit he was most curious about—you were practically asking him about fantasy animal porn, Jim. I was there so don’t even try to deny it.”

“Still mad at you,” he grunts.

“I know ‘serious’ scares you, Jim, and I can tell you’re serious about Leonard, otherwise you would’ve asked him out already.”

He huffs, “You don’t know that.”

“Yes I do,” she retorts. “And I think it’s pretty clear that he likes you back. You don’t know if you’ll see each other next semester at all, so why let the chance pass? C'mon, he thought you were a stripper, how can anything possibly go wrong?” she teases him.

Jim groans, “Oh my god, you suck.”

“And you’re the saddest little space cadet I’ve ever seen.” She laughs softly and gives him a kiss on the head. “I’m rooting for you, Stripper Jim. If it goes wrong, I’ll poison his coffee for you.”

How’s he supposed to stay mad at her after an offer like that?

--

When he leaves the office and goes to clear the table, he sees the open bill folder and blinks, wondering if someone went and took his money. But no, the bills are all there and there’s writing on the receipt.

‘For Gaila’ and there’s an arrow pointing at a ten dollar bill.

Jim snorts.

Out of all things, of course that’s what Bones took away from all those slips of paper. But then he takes sees more writing at the bottom of the receipt and brushes the money out of the way to see ‘See you next week’ written in Bones’ doctor scrawl. He stares at it for the longest time until Gaila gets worried and approaches him.

“Grab a mop, I think my brain just exploded,” he tells her.

She looks down at the receipt and says, “Oh.” Then she grabs the ten the arrow is pointing to and returns to the bar.

Chapter Text

Jim’s nervous.

There’s no denying it with the way he’s fidgeting and worrying the inside of his cheek, careful not to crush the fortune cookie he’s holding. His eyes are probably wild and bright, and he’s pacing around like a caged animal. Gaila’s walked by more than once to flick him on the head to get him to stop.

“Calm down, Jim. He’s gonna show. I cornered him the other day and made sure of it—interrogated him and everything. Here,” she hands him a glass of water, “rehydrate yourself before you faint.”

Gaila’s the best.

She really is.

Jim gives a start when the door opens and Bones walks in, arching a brow at the sight of him. “You look like shit,” he comments drily.

He can’t help laughing. “Thanks, Bones. Here,” he says, handing him the fortune cookie.

Bones looks like he’s about to comment on how he hasn’t eaten yet but refrains. He cracks it open and read it silently to himself before turning his gaze back to Jim.

The fortune he put in was either, ‘Why not give it a go?’ or ‘Epic things come to those who say yes.’ With all the excitement, he forgot which one he ended up choosing. “I’m not allowed to make propositions to customers,” he explains. “The second you sit down, you’re a customer. Don’t judge me with your eyebrow, Bones. I got a whole lecture on it from Pike, okay?”

“Right,” Bones says slowly, “sitting down’s not okay…what about coffee?”

“I’ll get you coffee after, okay?”

“Fine. Proposition away.”

Jim decides to take that as encouragement and nods. “Okay. So the thing is, I’m kind of an asshole—as you know.”

“Yes, I believe we—on various levels of lucidity on your part—have established the fact that you are, indeed, an asshole,” Bones replies, amused.

“Oh, shut up, like you’re one to talk. You’re not exactly a ray of sunshine either, Bones,” he retorts.

Bones shrugs. “But not an asshole, because that’s your job.”

“Yeah, well, I’m not the one who wakes up a Disney Princess every morning. I bet you have squirrels brushing your hair while you sing.”

“Point still stands, you’re an asshole,” Bones drawls.

“So break the spell and turn me back into a prince,” Jim challenges.

An eyebrow arches up. “Unbelievable. You did not just.”

“I did,” he confirms, “and shut up, that was an awesome line. Give me a pen, I’m writing it down.”

Bones breaks into laughter and shakes his head. “Was that the proposition?”

“Yep. So, you free this Sunday?” Jim asks with a grin.

“It’s gonna take more than one session to break you out of your asshole-ish ways,” Bones tells him.

“Good, that’s what I was banking on because this is supposed be a long-term project.” Then, because he can’t help himself, he adds, “I’m seeing great things in your future, Bones.”

Bones snorts, “And by that, you better mean coffee.”

“Rude.”

“And not ginger,” Bones adds.

They both laugh.

This is going to be super.

--

Later that day, Jim finds himself in the kitchen, snacking on a fortune cookie instead of working—as usual. He pulls the strip of paper out and can’t help grinning when he reads,

‘Hold on tight! Good times ahead!’

Yeah, he thinks, that sounds about right.