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The day has been saved. The anomaly has been destroyed, the ship is safe, and the Klingons have returned to their side of the quadrant.
All should be well.
Yet it is not. It is not well at all.
Striding quickly through the halls of the ship, eyes peeled for a flash of white, he sees it. Christine. Hurrying the other way. Luckily her trajectory is easy to deduce and he turns, rushing through halls and taking the turbo lift to catch her. Which he does. Right outside of the door to her quarters.
Christine hesitates to see him, eyes wide, but her expression shutters as she tries to push past him to enter her room. “Not tonight, Spock,” she murmurs. Refuses to make eye contact. Refuses to even look at him and winces back as he steps forward into her space.
“We must speak,” he says lowly. His hands are clasped behind his back, his posture stiff. Perfectly Vulcan. Though he would risk a smile if he knew Christine would return it. She always encouraged his smiles before, said they made him look happy and younger. He doesn’t understand why she refuses to look at him now.
“Tomorrow. I’m tired.”
“Tonight,” he says firmly. Breaking he reaches out and grabs her elbow, holding her still for a moment just to make her glance at him before releasing her. “Please.”
Christine hesitates. He can see the emotions war on her face before her shoulders slump and she sighs. “Fine,” she whispers. And lets him in.
It’s not the first time he’s been in Christine’s quarters. He doesn’t find them much changed. There are the photographs along the wall of Christine and all her various friends. The empty cup of coffee next to a padd on her desk. The toppled pair of spare boots by the door. Past the partition he can see her bed, unmade, and the sight of it makes his heart clench.
The last time he was in here he had not had the opportunity to study her space. To try and use what he learned there to understand Christine more. The last time he had been in here they’d been tearing each other’s clothes off and he’d been pushing her into that unmade bed. Ruffling the sheets further, making a mess, as Christine had cried his name and begged him not to stop.
Now she will not even look at him.
How have things managed to change so quickly?
Christine steps into her own space and looks around. Face unreadable, shoulders tense, she picks up the empty coffee cup and throws it in the recycler. Starts tidying the small domestic messes all without looking at him. “You wanted to talk. So talk,” she says.
Clasping his hands behind his back, Spock tries to order his thoughts. He has worked through this once before. If he wishes to know why, if he does not wish to be the ex in this dreadful equation he wishes to escape… Then he needs to talk to Christine. To make her understand that the fellowship does not need to be the end of their relationship. He has been left behind before, many times and by many different people, but he has faith that she will return to him. He understands the importance of temporary sacrifice in order to further one’s career.
They are very different, but they have been happy. Can they not find acceptance and happiness in their differences?
“I must apologize to you,” he says, but the words come out quietly. Christine still hears him, she pauses in her relentless tidying, still not looking at him, but tilting her head to show she is listening. “At the bar… I antagonized you in order to elate an emotional reaction. I was attempting to acquire the data Uhura required to study the anomaly however… I should have told you that I was pleased for your success.”
She still doesn’t look at him. Why won’t she look at him? Inhaling sharply, Christine sighs and more carefully picks up a discarded piece of clothing to add to the laundry chute. “I figured that’s what you were doing. It wasn’t very nice, Spock. That said… I’m sorry too. I’m excited about the fellowship, but saying that I was ready to leave you… I shouldn’t have said it that way. Not in front of all those people.”
He nods and some of the tightness in his chest fades. They have both made mistakes. They are both sorry. There is still the opportunity to fix this. To go to the other room and use the bed and rebuild the connection that he so craves. The one that makes him feel alive.
“I am pleased that you received your fellowship opportunity. I have been reviewing the literature of Doctor Korby and he seems to be a gifted researcher,” he says. Steps closer and Christine allows him to get close. He can see the turn of her cheek, the blue of her eyes, but even though he is standing near her she doesn’t look at him. “Perhaps during your time away I can come visit you.”
“I don’t think that would be a good idea.”
Why not? The question is on his lips, but he pushes it away. “Then I will comm you. I have no qualms with taking this relationship ‘long distance.’ If this is what you want, Christine-”
“No,” she whispers.
The quiet of her voice is almost enough to shatter him. He tries to search her face, but Christine is difficult to read without being able to see her eyes and why will she not look at him? He wants her to look at him. Forcing a human smile to his lips, she likes those, he tries to remember what it is to joke. “No, you do not wish to go on the fellowship?” he quips.
It is a very poor joke.
Christine looks at him at last. But it is a look of supreme annoyance, of disappointment, that he sees on her face. It’s enough to stop the breath in his chest, to make his heart begin to race, until she turns from him and walks away. “Face it, Spock. It’s over,” she says as she heads towards her desk.
Why?
“Why?” he asks. Wishes the word had come out more confidently as his own gaze goes to the floor and his mind races. The last time he was here he’d been kissing Christine. His hands had been tangled in her hair and her fingers had stroked his ears and he’d felt as if he’d known what it was to be happy for the first time.
She’d told him that she wanted him to be happy. That she was pleased to be with him as he learned to embrace all of the human emotions that were also a part of him as he discovered what it meant to be him. That she was with him. That she would stay with him.
Had it all been a lie?
Christine doesn’t look at him. Instead, she goes to her loveseat and sits, stares out the window as she pulls a pillow onto her lap and holds it tightly. “It’s just not working out,” she says. Watches the stars drift by.
He stares at her. Tries to understand. Touches his chest because there is something painful there that he is having trouble putting a name to but cannot ask Christine now what the emotion might be. “Is it something I did? Are you… Are you no longer interested in me now that my experiments in human emotion are at an end?”
Blinking rapidly, Christine holds the pillow tighter. “It’s absolutely nothing you’ve done. You’re perfect, Spock.”
If he is perfect then why does she no longer care for him? Stepping closer, as if seeing her face will help him understand, he tries to remember when Christine began to push him away. When he began to displease her. “Is this because I cannot understand your time on J’Gal? I have already expressed that I am willing to learn. If you are unwilling or unable to show me via a meld I would gladly converse with you or read in order to understand.”
Christine’s eyes close. She appears to be having an emotional reaction, though she turns her face away. He fears she is crying. He doesn’t want her to cry. “It’s not that either. It really isn’t you Spock. People just don’t work out sometimes.”
That’s not them though. They were working. Christine had been there for him and he… he had been happy. The stars had been reflected in Christine’s eyes as he had moved above her and she’d been so incredibly beautiful his heart had swelled. A woman who could move him physically, one that challenged his mind, one that he could open his heart to… Why wouldn’t she look at him?
A thought strikes him. A terrible thought. “The Ensign. The one from the future. You told me he’d mentioned my future to you.”
Sniffling, reaching to wipe away a tear, Christine shakes her head. “Just drop it, Spock. We don’t have to talk about this anymore.”
“We do. You did not tell me the specifics, but your behavior towards me changed after the incident.” What had she been told? What had the Ensign known that had transformed their happiness into ash? Surely the revelation that he would one day chose to be more Vulcan was not enough to send Christine away. “Do you no longer care for me because in the future I will not smile?”
She does let out a broken sob at that. He’s making her cry. He’s never wanted to be the source of her tears. Yet as Christine quickly collects herself he finds himself glad because if Christine still cares enough for him to weep then perhaps he can convince her to love him again.
“You really think I’m that shallow?”
“I do not know. You will not tell me your reasons why we must end.”
Christine takes a shaking breath, stares out the window at the stars outside.
“Did he tell you something else of my future?”
She shakes her head.
“Did he tell you your future instead?” Striding forward, desperation filling him, he looks down as tears fall like jewels along Christine’s cheeks. How can she not be looking at him even now? “If he warned you of some illness or injury, know that I will do whatever it takes for it to be averted.”
Shaking her head again, Christine smiles bitterly through her tears. “He didn’t tell me anything, Spock. Nothing important.”
“Then what?”
“It’s what he didn’t tell me.”
The answer is enough to give him pause. He doesn’t understand.
Taking a ragged breath, Christine reaches up and brushes away her tears. Looks at him at last. “He said that he’s read every book about you. Knows everything. He told me that he knew all about your childhood growing up on Vulcan, your relationship with your parents, your pet shalat…”
He nods, still not knowing where she is going with this. “He was very intrusive. It was most disquieting.”
“Yeah, but… Spock, he told it to me.”
“Why would he not? We are close and you are my friend.”
Christine looks at him. Her eyes are the bluest thing he’s ever seen. “Spock, he knew all about your life… and he knew nothing about me.”
He stares. Comprehension dawning. Horror too. In works to come, in the pages of text that will be used to detail his life… Nurse Chapel is absent. Her name is not mentioned. Her importance to him uncommented on.
It is… Impossible.
Tears fall. More glittering diamonds from the sapphire blue of her eyes. “So you see? It’s never going to work out. I’m not part of your future, Spock. I’m not important.”
“You are. You are vital to me.”
“No I’m not. You’re the important one.” Christine laughs, a bitter sound, and pulls the pillow tightly against her chest. “You’re the one that Boimler was worried that he’d destroyed the entire future for all because you laughed once. I might be important somewhere, but it’s not to you. I’m not even a footnote in your life.”
“Christine.” Sitting next to her on the loveseat, he reaches for her hands. Takes them between his own. Holds them very tightly for he fears if he lets her go it will be for the last time. Through the touch of her skin he can feel her sadness. Her grief.
Her love.
She loves him still. He clings to that.
“The future is unwritten. If Ensign Boimler is too foolish to see your import to me-”
“It’s not him, it’s the entire future, Spock. You’re going to be out there doing amazing things and I’m… I’m just not going to be there with you,” Christine says. She pulls her hands away, turns from him, stares at the window as he gazes upon her and wishes he knew the words that would change her mind. “I’m sure I’ll also be out there doing things, but… It just won’t be with you. I’ll have to find my own way forward. This fellowship could be my way forward.”
Forward. Without him. Suddenly he feels very left behind again as the pain in his chest again begins to swell. His gaze goes to the floor, but still Christine speaks. She is likely attempting to be reassuring. He is not reassured.
“I know it hurts, but it has to be this way. There’s no reason to drag it out or get too attached if we know we’re never going to be together. It’s easier this way. There’s not going to be any dragged out relationship woes or fights or, or, any of the bad stuff. We can just end it here and it’ll be over. We can go back to being friends.”
“I do not think I can return to being friends with you. Not if you are unwilling to fight for me here.”
“Then I guess we’re not friends anymore.”
Christine’s voice is hard and the tears are gone as she stands. As she walks away from the loveseat leaving him behind. Again. Eyes closing, trying to fight the pain that threatens to overwhelm, Spock takes a shaking breath. “Nurse Chapel?”
“Yes?”
“What if Ensign Boimler was wrong? What if you were meant to be in my life and we are changing the future now by denying our natures? What if we are making a mistake?”
Christine smiles. It is beautiful. He looks at her and the pain is so intense because as she stands there, eyes rimmed in red, she is so beautiful. She is beautiful and brilliant and the last time they were here together they were happy and now they are this.
“If I’m making a mistake then I guess I’m going to spend the rest of my life loving you and kicking myself. Because we can’t be together. But you’re so wonderful, Spock. I hope that whoever you are supposed to be with sees that too.” Still smiling she turns, heads for the fresher door. “You can see yourself out. Night, Spock.”
Moisture pricks at his eyes as he stands. As he slowly walks towards the door. Inside the fresher he can hear the water of the shower running. He can hear Christine cry. He wants to go to her, to rip open the door and tell her that he rejects her view of the future. That he will write her onto every page of his story because he needs her as much as he needs oxygen to breathe. That he will find Ensign Boimler and make him understand the grievous mistake he has made in discounting Christine Chapel.
Yet he passes the door. Lets himself out. Allows the door to close and lock behind him.
He’d been right the first time to walk away.
Christine is not willing to fight for their future. She would rather run, she would rather leave him behind. She would rather trust in the words from a stranger promising an uncertain future than putting her faith in him. In them.
If this is what human love is, then he was foolish to ever begin his experiments in emotion in the first place. A mistake he will never make again.
After all. He’s the ex. He knows her why. And she is already ready to leave him.
The equation is simple.
Even though the final result hurts so hard.