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“As I looked at all the relationships around me- Some that had gone on forever, some that were reigniting, and some that had just begun- I realised something. It should have been me.”
--JD, Scrubs
Metal grazed his finger as he started at the top of the picture frame and slowly ran his thumb down the arches of the border. Unhooking the pins at the back, the cardboard slid out neatly onto his desk, making a soft patter as it fell onto the glass. Perfectly stilled, Jon took the picture out of the frame and held it up to the light now, as bare as the moment he first held it up thus after he had hand-developed it.
It was the last day of their hiking trip and just as they crested over the last knoll before the home stretch to the trailhead, he had stopped to admire the vista out onto the lake for a few placid moments. He was a little ways behind Erika, at the bottom of the knoll. A deep intake later, when he turned to look up the path ahead, Erika was standing there, looking down at him. The scene was perfect. The wind had blown her pony tail to one side and her figure was framed by the boughs of the birch tree tunnel ahead. Sunlight dancing in her hair, was accompanied by its partner, amusement in her eyes as she cocked her head at him, hands on her hips.
"Are you coming Jonathan?"
He had to take a picture of that. ”Just a second.” Rummaging through his bag, Jon had suddenly paused and held his hand up, his voice lowering with a rascally smile. ”Hold still.”
That was twelve years ago to this day. Twelve years he had seen with about that number of warp five ships built and the face of intergalactic politics redefined. He had seen his crew grow up around him, some of whom would stayed on Enterprise over the years, and some who would leave for new assignments. Hoshi had become his second officer. She and Trip were expecting a daughter in May. T’Pol had left several years ago to return to Vulcan, but still kept in touch with him on a regular basis. Her ‘reports’ were always as prompt and consistent as they had ever been. From what he heard, she and Koss had met again to reconcile. But over the years, as she wrote to him, it seemed like Koss had been a source of support to her in the years after her mother’s death and had since become a lot more important to her. Though T’Pol being T’Pol, she had not exactly come out and said it aloud, which was why it took years for him to begin to deduce it on his own. He had just opened a letter this morning inviting him to the wedding in July. His brow raised at that. July on Vulcan. Well, he hoped it would not be like a July in Oklahoma or he would have to carry the aging Porthos around in a carrier bag with him everywhere he went. Travis had been offered the captan’s chair of his own cargo vessel and crew, but declined, transferring instead to the Hampshire. Scuttlebutt said he had taken up rapport with their lovely comm. officer. Even Malcolm, after twelve years of the bachelor life had grown a warm and adoring glance in his eyes by the end of his shift instead of a five o’clock shadow. Whoever this mystery girl was, Jon could already tell, she was a keeper if she made him this happy and excited about something other than explosions.
Everyone of the old crew had or had found a special someone. Everyone but him.
"I don’t know why I ever stopped searching for you, Rike."
One brush of his lips to his fingers and their gentle touch to the face imprinted on the worn development paper would not be enough, but maybe this new Federation would.