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“It’s just-- become a thing is all,” Erica says.
“That’s the exact opposite of it being a ‘one time thing,’” Christine says, “because it’s a one time thing. One. Once. Never to happen again.”
“Except that ‘it’ has happened twice now.”
Her indignant rebuttal is on the tip of her tongue: the first kiss was a feint. The second was a fluke; the fault of the ship being blasted sideways, more or less, and her and Spock being in proximity to one another. His face could have smushed anyone else's face. Bad luck (and some wonky space physics) decided it would be Christine’s. She swallows back her pride and says, “You’re making it sound… purposeful.”
“I don’t think it sounds like anything,” Erica replies, as judicious as ever. “Look, we both know scuttlebutt travels fast--”
“Please stop trying to wrangle old-timey naval slang into every conversation--”
“--Never. I just wanted to let you know, as your friend, what I overheard floating through the p-ways. It’s not like anyone’s talking 1138. It’s just…”
“It’s just what?”
“Surprising. Spock’s… Spock. You know? ‘I am a Vulcan. No emotion. Only logic.’ I’m pretty sure 99 percent of the crew thinks T’Pring was a figment of our very vivid imagination— a long-distance girlfriend from a research asteroid, you know? So seeing you and him together, friendly… It’s like seeing your teacher at a bowling alley or pouring you a drink at a bar. It’s different. It’s weird. It’s a broadsword swinging through the veil and it makes everyone uncomfortable.”
It’s no secret it’s human nature to talk and gossip, and Christine would be lying if she said she never, ever partook in ear hustling the yeomen… but to be the subject of active scrutiny? “It’s not like that,” she says, tiptoeing to a feeling resembling misery. “I didn’t think Spock would actually put what happened between him and I in an official decklog.”
Erica pats her on the shoulder. She is the perfect picture of sympathy, with a fair helping of I told you so. “And that’s where you went wrong.”
She drops her head in her hands. “Yeah, yeah; human logic versus Vulcan logic, yadda yadda. Even if I told Spock his logs were subject to dramatic reenactments, he wouldn’t change a thing.”
“Huh. That’s not a bad idea.”
“What? No, Erica… no.”
“Someone needs to keep Enterprise Bingo funky fresh.”
With a vague promise to not harass the ensigns, Erica leaves for her watch on the bridge, and Christine goes back to work. A steady trickle of patients keep her busy through her shift until it’s time to hang up her hypospray. Instead of clocking out and heading to her quarters, she peeks her head into Doctor M’Benga’s office.
“Nurse Chapel,” he says, once she catches his eye. His desk is neat as a pin, but the work bench behind him is scattered with concoctions -- some steaming violently behind a forcefield, some bubbling ominously.
“Do you have a sec? I can come back later--”
“Nonsense. I have all the time in the world,” he replies.
“Okay.” She takes a breath. “This is a little… embarrassing, but I wanted to let you know that Lieutenant Ortegas brought to my attention earlier today that….”
Doctor M’Benga’s gaze remains steady and calming, giving no hint that he knew what she was trying to spit out. “Go on.”
Rip the bandage off, Christine. “There’s a rumor going around amongst the junior folks that Mr. Spock and I are-- together.”
Again, no reaction.
“We aren’t together,” she rushes to say. “I really, really respect the professionalism we have here at Starfleet and I know I’m on loan from Stanford Morehouse, but-- I didn’t want you to think I was--” She takes another breath. “I didn’t want you to hear something from someone else and think… badly of me.”
“First, let me address the term: on loan,” he says gently. “You are not on loan anywhere, Christine. You are as much a part of the Enterprise as the warp core itself. Second… Mr. Spock and your relationship, in whatever stage it is or is not, is no one’s business but your own. I do not think badly of you now. And I am sure I will not think badly of you in the future. But I do appreciate your honesty. If you like, I can talk to Captain Pike…”
To say her heartstrings were tugged would have been an understatement. “No, no, I really don’t think I need a top-down intervention,” she says. “But I appreciate it. I just wanted to let you know.”
“I understand. If you need to talk to someone… about anything… I am always here.”
Christine leaves medical feeling relieved -- and touched. Being told she’s a part of the crew is exactly what she needed to hear, even if she can’t quite shake the unease that’s lingered behind since Erica’s confession. The problem is that the one person she wants to blurt out her thoughts to is exactly the person who landed her in the predicament in the first place.
After dinner alone in her quarters -- tomato soup and grilled cheese; complete comfort food -- she takes a stab at her research paper, but her thoughts come in jumbled spurts, and she deletes twice as much as she keeps.
Restless energy takes her to C Deck. The gym is empty when she arrives, and she hops on the treadmill furthest away from the entrance. She sets the screen to a nature trail that reminds her of home, and gets lost in the evergreens for a while.
A time later, she hears the doors hiss open. Peripherals on, she sees that it’s--
It’s Spock.
Of all the places, she thinks, and dutifully ignores the teeny-tiny part of her that chimes in with the fantasy of him swinging by her stateroom to find it empty. Don’t feed the beast. She stops the treadmill and hops off, fully intending on walking straight past him with a simple wave, but he stays by the doors, clearly waiting for her to approach.
“Christine,” he says in greeting. “It appears you have finished your exercise regimen.”
“That I have,” she replies. She’s sure her face is shiny with sweat and beet red. “And you’re still in uniform. Weird choice of workout clothes, don’t you think?”
He glances down at himself, as if he forgot he put on his standard issued Starfleet pants this morning. “It would seem so. However, I came in search of you.”
Christine’s heart skipped a beat. “Y-you did?” Get it together, woman. “I mean, my communicator didn’t go off. Is everything alright? I can head straight down to medical.”
“That is not necessary. I see how what I have said might have given cause for alarm. I am here on a personal matter.”
“Uh… huh.” It seems her earlier thoughts hit the nail right on the head. “Is this a walk-and-talk kind of a conversation, or do we need to take it back to one of our rooms?”
“While privacy is not required, I believe it would be desired,” he replies. “If you are amenable, we may use my living quarters.”
Though she suggested it, she didn’t really mean to use their staterooms. Rumors notwithstanding, going in and out of a senior officer’s quarters without valid reason wasn’t the best look. She should offer the private exam room in the sickbay instead, or anywhere else, really. But it’s Spock, she thinks. “Let me take a shower first. Give me, like, fifteen minutes.”
“I will await your arrival.”
The sonic shower she takes is both the longest and shortest one in the history of all time. What could possibly not require privacy but was so delicate a topic even a Vulcan would think to be discreet?
She dresses quickly. She also considers lugging her medbag with her, but the hokey pretense makes her feel weird, and she leaves it by her door before leaving for Spock’s.
The first thing she notices about his room is the ambient temperature. It’s warm. Warmer than any place on the Enterprise. Not uncomfortably so, but it makes her wonder. Was he constantly cold? Or did he need a place that reminded him, in some small insignificant way, of home?
“Nice digs,” she says, after taking the rest of it in. His room isn’t the spartan landscape she was expecting. Decorative trinkets are placed here and there; some unlit candles stand along his work desk. And was that a tiny harp? “Is that a--?”
“The Vulcan lute,” he supplies.
“Neat. I assume you can play.”
“Indeed.”
“And… are you any good?”
“I learned the instrument as a young child, and have continued my practice into adulthood. Though I have not played in some time… I believe my abilities would be considered adequate.”
“Soooo… you’re basically a rockstar on Vulcan. Got it.” She imagines a young Spock plucking diligently away at the instrument. “You don’t have to be humble on my account. I know now isn’t the right time, but I’d love to hear you play.”
“Then when the time is more appropriate,” he says, “it would be my pleasure.”
It’s times like this, Christine thinks, when she wishes Spock would tell her no. That only immediate family and the closest of his friends would ever get to hear him play -- because the more she peels back the layers, and the more he openly shares, the deeper she finds herself slipping into dangerous territory. They’re friends, and she’s holding on to dangerous hope.
He gestures to a set of chairs. Wordlessly, she settles into one. Spock takes the one across from her.
She clears her throat. “I can’t help feeling like I’m in trouble.”
“Quite the opposite,” he says. “Earlier today, I overheard Ensigns Zier and Liu discussing the Serene Squall incident, as well as the phaser malfunction from last Tuesday. More specifically, they were discussing you and I, and my official report. Suffice to say… It has come to my attention that a part of the crew believes you and I are involved in a romantic relationship.”
She sinks into the chair, deflated. She can almost feel the heat radiating from her face. “It’ll blow over soon enough,” she says. She flaps her hand; no big deal. “You know how the crew gets when we’re in warp too long.”
“By your reaction, I can only assume this is not the first time you have heard this information.”
She shakes her head. “Lieutenant Ortegas has ears and eyes in every nook and cranny of this ship. And an in with the yeomen, believe it or not. She told me about it this morning.” She bites her bottom lip. “Does it bother you? The rumor.”
“It does not.”
“Right.” She shrugs. Of course not. “What’s the point of letting something that’s not true get to you?”
“I believe that is generally the desired reaction of… idle gossip, is it not? Using half-truths or gross presumptions to garner a reaction from the subject.” He pauses. To her surprise, a faint flush begins to creep up beyond the V-neck of his shirt. “In this case, however: Starfleet Regulation 1138 poses fraternization as a punishable offense when good order and discipline is affected only. And as you and I do not breach officer and enlisted lines, nor am I in your direct chain of command, there is no other logical reason for a romantic relationship between you and I to be considered illicit.”
The solid clarification of where they stand comes as a relief, but that is not the point. “It-- it wouldn’t be bothersome because of a regulation, Spock. It’s me. And you. Together. People thinking we’re together.”
“A detrimental impact to the Enterprise’s mission is the only reason it would be undesirable,” he replies evenly.
Christine blinks slowly, trying to decipher what lurked between the lines of what Spock said. Or, rather, what is glaring her directly in the face. The only reason. Removing all obstacles, it leaves the most obvious answer. Her eyebrows furrow. Outlandish, irrational hope begins to transform. “You-- wait.”
He offers her his hand, palm up.
After a moment’s hesitation, she places her hand in his, palm down. The gentle sensation of static meets in the middle. She feels a tendril of emotion poking at her. It’s an invitation, or some kind of telepathic version of it, and she pushes forward to take it as her own. As if looking through a foggy window pane, she sees herself through Spock’s eyes; and just as quickly as she fell forward, she is tipped back out.
“I care for you, Christine,” he says. The heel of his hand rests lightly atop her fingertips, warm and dry.
She saw a glimpse of it. His affection for her, echoing endlessly within him. “That was-- I can feel you.”
“Then you know that I am certain.”
She draws her hand back. For so long, she thought her run-ins with Spock were guided by her own subconscious desires. But now she sees his part in everything, too. Tours of the ship altered ever-so-slightly to bring him to medical; a scientific journal sent to her PADD just because he thinks she would be interested in it; dinners in the galley instead of his quarters; the fantasy of fingers combing lightly through blonde hair. Her words, her advice. Her. “It’s hard to dispute touch telepathy,” she says, meeting his even gaze. Knowing what she now knows is a heady thing, and she's easily tempted into teasing: “But… I’m an Earth girl. And we do things a bit differently there. To be sure of things.”
His eyebrow curves gently up. "And... what is it that Earth girls do?"
Resolved, she hooks her finger into his shirt and pulls him forward. Their second real kiss is just as electric as the first; energy enough to birth the beginning of something new; something to be explored, and for many years to come. She pulls back, the stars in her eyes reflected in his.