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They sat together, cross-legged on the bed, one candle burning on the nightstand.
Deanna dipped a finger into the tin of salve before rubbing it into Beverly’s chapped hands. Despite her efforts to be gentle, Beverly inhaled sharply at the sting as Deanna passed over the raw crease of one of her knuckles.
Deanna’s face twisted in sympathy. “Sorry,” she murmured, without pausing in her work.
There might have been an argument to be made for Picard to take the proper bedroom, he being the commanding officer. But the mid-rate boarding house that they could afford had exactly one available option that could accommodate the five of them, and it contained one room with a barely double bed and one room that was quickly reconfigured with three cots.
It just made sense for them to divide the rooms by sex, and so Deanna and Beverly enjoyed the relative comfort of a proper bedframe and feather-filled bedding, while the three other officers did their best to get rest on rickety, temporary compromises. Poor Will couldn’t even stretch out without some part of his body slipping off the edge.
“I can’t believe it got this bad so quickly.” Deanna clucked her tongue softly at the toll Victorian disinfectants had taken on Beverly’s hands in just two days. “You have the medical tricorder with you during the day, don’t you? Why not just use the sanitizing function?”
“Oh, that would be a dream at this point, but it would give me away in an instant.” Beverly sighed wistfully at the possibility of some 24th century help in the cholera ward. “I almost didn’t get the job because my hands were too smooth when I met with the Head Nurse. She took it as a sign that I wasn’t being diligent about hygiene.”
“How do you mean?”
“She assumed that I didn’t wash my hands.” Beverly winced as Deanna passed over a particularly red patch of skin. “It’s reassuring, really. It’s only been a few decades since Semmelweis and Pasteur and Lister started putting together how infection and cross-contamination make patients sicker. That hospitals are now so stringent about hygiene that carbolic acid is in—"
“Carbolic acid?!”
“For surgery, yes, but it’s not what I’m washing my hands with. This is just from scrubbing so many times a day with scalding hot water and lye in the soap.”
“I thought you said cholera wasn’t even virulent.”
“Well, that was maybe temporalist of me. With access to clean water and basic medicines, it’s easy enough to treat and mitigate. But, in 1893? Even in a large city like this… maybe especially in a large city, they just don’t have the capacity yet to manage it. I mean, bubonic plague is going to run through San Francisco in the next ten years, if you can believe it.”
Deanna hummed softly, noncommittal in her thoughts on pre-space flight public health infrastructure. She began to work the last of the salve into Beverly’s fingers, trying to alleviate some of the cramping she’d watched Beverly try to stretch out earlier that evening.
“You know, you didn’t have to wait for me to get back with Will and Geordi to do this.”
Deanna felt the pang of doubt ripple through her. “You said that you didn’t mind helping me?”
She squeezed her fingers reassuringly to soothe Beverly’s insecurity. “I don’t. It’s kind of fun having someone to do all this stuff with.” She glanced up and made sure that Beverly saw her smile. “What I meant was that the Captain was back first this evening.” Deanna kept her eyes down as she wiped her fingers clean and replaced the lid on the tin. She let the observation hang between them.
Beverly rubbed her hands together to absorb the remnants of the medicated balm, and Deanna suppressed a smile as she sensed the faint butterflies rolling through her. “Oh, well, I didn’t want to bother him with it.”
“It’s not like we’re on the ship with communiques and emergencies competing for his attention. I’m pretty sure that he was reading a novel when we arrived.”
Beverly laughed softly at that—not just a novel, Northanger Abbey of all things.
“So?” Deanna prodded. “You could have saved yourself a couple hours of discomfort with a simple request of a friend.”
She didn’t usually do this, goad Beverly about the deep, tangled feelings that ran between her and the Captain. But something about being so far removed from their usual lives, sharing all of this physical intimacy by necessity… They’d even been whispering to each other under the blankets about childhood crushes and other significant firsts the night before. Well, it all just reminded Deanna of how much she’d wanted a sister when she was growing up.
Beverly cast a wary look at her, acutely aware of the array of feelings Deanna could register.
“Does it feel too personal? Like it might blur lines you’re not ready for?” That was certainly more direct than Deanna would normally venture with these two.
She shrugged indifferently. “You already know that’s part of it, Deanna…” There was no point in trying to deny it. More than ever, Beverly was appreciating how proximity could heighten Deanna’s senses, and they were practically on top of each other at the moment.
“And the other part?” Deanna was too curious about the unrest that was holding her friend back to hold back herself.
Beverly grimaced in discomfort. “Jean-Luc gets so touchy when I’m unwell.”
Deanna’s mind went warm and tingly, the way it always did when Beverly used the Captain’s given name. However, she didn’t let this knowledge show. “Unwell?” Deanna asked as she divided her hair in three sections and began carefully twisting the thick curls into a low braid.
“Hurt or sick. Or even just when he thinks that I haven’t been getting enough sleep.”
“How long has the Captain been monitoring your sleep,” she couldn’t help but interject with a chuckle.
Beverly ignored the bait. “It’s like he wants to help, but he doesn’t know what to do with physical ailments or weakness and so he gets frustrated, and then…” She searched for how to describe it.
“Touchy?” Deanna offered the characterization back to her.
“Yeah. He feels inept and cracked skin isn’t worth managing feelings over.”
“So, it wasn’t just because you didn’t trust yourself alone with him while he did something so sensual as massaging your hands?”
Beverly rewarded Deanna’s boldness with a wry quirk of her lips.
“Worried he’d accidentally brush across that sensitive spot on your wrist,” she waggled her eyebrows for effect.
“Deanna…”
“Don’t forget, Bevvy, that I can feel every time your stomach flips when he raises that thoughtful eyebrow during the staff meeting.”
“Never call me that again,” she muttered by way of deflection.
“I’m just saying.” Deanna picked up the scrap of fabric sitting on the bedside table and quickly knotted it to hold her hair at bay through the night.
Beverly laughed despite herself. “What, and you’re going to tell me that Will, with all of his eyebrow brandishing, has no effect on you?”
“The eyebrows? No.” She shook her head for emphasis. “When we he starts winking though…” Deanna made a show of fanning herself as an olive branch.
The corners of Beverly’s mouth turned down, impressed. She couldn’t ever remember seeing him wink at Deanna, although it definitely seemed like the sort of thing that might be in his bag of tricks.
“About Will…” The tone of Deanna’s voice turned hesitant, and Beverly’s posture straightened in response. “This thing with him insisting that he walk you to and from the hospital?”
“You mean escort me? Deanna, he holds onto my arm the whole way.” She grabbed Deanna’s arm to emphasize her point. “The whole way.”
“So, what’s going on with that?”
“He’s worried about me being out alone.” Beverly shrugged. “He says that I’m not taking ‘prevailing social norms about how women should act in public’ seriously enough. I guess he heard some stories when he was hanging out with a group of police officers when we first arrived—”
“Wait, out with or just around? Has he explained that to you yet? Because I keep asking if he’s actually with the police or if he’s just pretending—”
“And he won’t give you a straight answer?”
“And he won’t give me a straight answer!”
“Deanna, he is being really cagey.” Beverly looked at her seriously. “And I think he’s having too much fun with it.”
“Like, there has to be some sort of Academy or entrance exam, but we haven’t been here long enough for that. But then how did he get that badge? That badge looks really official.”
“He actually used his whistle this morning to break up an argument on the corner!” Beverly gave Deanna an exasperated look. “Anyway, he seems genuinely worried about my safety. And, to be honest, from what some of the other nurses at the hospital have said, misogyny is a serious concern in this time. Plus, it would be hard to get a good spinning back kick out with all of the petticoats and everything if something happened and I needed it, so I’m just treating it as time to catch up with him.”
Deanna shook her head at the predictably unpredictable antics of William T. Riker, erstwhile Starfleet Commander.
“Well, if he gets tiresome, I’m sure we can find you another escort.” Deanna looked at her, eyes dancing. “I’m sure the Captain could spell him for a day or two.” She didn’t make any effort to hide her teasing smile. “I think he’d be happy to hold you close and keep any ruffians away.”
It was a step too far, even if there was more than a grain of truth to it. Probably because there was more than a grain of truth to it. Beverly reached out a sad, reddened hand and pinched Deanna’s side, intent on quieting her.
It had, unfortunately, the opposite effect.
Deanna yelped, grabbing for her side as she dissolved into a fit of laughter. Beverly watched in horror as Deanna threw her head back to take a breath and almost immediately lost her balance and rolled backwards off the edge of the bed. Beverly gasped, coming onto her hands and knees so that she could offer Deanna a hand. Something about the image Beverly presented set Deanna off again, and rather than leaning forward so that Beverly could pull her up, Deanna fell back, pulling Beverly over the edge as well.
By no definition of the word were Troi and Crusher being loud. In fact, the periodic exchange of muffled voices on the other side of the wall gave the impression that they were trying very hard to be quiet. It wasn’t even all that late, and they’d only just retired to their rooms for the night. But with the occasional protest from the bedframe when they shifted their weight, and the distinctly feminine rise and fall of the voices that carried through, all three men lying in the dark next door were keenly aware of the friendship deepening while they all lay silently in the cold, uncomfortable dark.
The walls were paper thin. That fact hadn’t surprised any of them, but neither had they really appreciated what it would be like for the five of them to live in it. Throats clearing discretely, springs creaking at the slightest provocation, virtually anything coming into contact with the floor, and they were all painfully aware that others were awake, moving, restless.
Will was in physical discomfort, yes, but he was enjoying the scraps of conversation that he could make out through the wall. He liked the way that these two women that he cared about so much trusted each other so completely. The ease with which they had taken to sharing a bed, dressing and tending to each other in these bizarre circumstances, put a smile on his face that he couldn’t quite explain.
He wondered how much of the thread behind his head the Captain was picking up on. He’d heard more than once about Picard’s legendarily acute hearing. Will watched his jaw clenching in the dim light from the moon coming through the one window in the room, and it gave him the impression that he was chewing on some surprising insights.
Geordi, for his part, had just sighed and shifted on his cot for the third time in ten minutes.
“Maybe I should go say something to them,” Will offered. “They probably don’t even realize.”
Picard shook his head against his pillow. “They’re fine, Number One. This is a stressful situation and blowing off some steam is natural.”
There was something unusual about the Captain’s contemplative air in the last day or two, something perhaps like longing. Will didn’t know where it was coming from, but it had certainly piqued his interest.
An unmistakable thud next door made them all jump. The peel of laughter that followed immediately after pulled Will down with it, but he still noted the way the Captain rubbed his hand over his face and the very annoyed snort from LaForge.
“That’s Deanna,” he noted casually. “She’s fine.” He paused, thinking about just how little cushion the worn carpet in the other room would provide. “She’s got a doctor in there with her, in any case.”
“That’s happened before?” Geordi allowed a crumb of amusement at the idea.
“She’s surprisingly clumsy.” He knew that they knew – everyone knew – but he didn’t know exactly how much or how recently they knew, so Will kept the second half of his explanation to himself.
Another, slightly less disruptive thud followed, accompanied by the richer and more resonant laugh of Beverly.
“There goes the doctor,” Geordi muttered sardonically.
“But Beverly isn’t clumsy,” Picard observed, an undercurrent of concern in his voice.
The air in the room skittered unexpectedly. No one knew about that. People speculated – Will speculated – but the Captain’s tone made him think that he was speaking from purely platonic experience, even if one could read something more intriguing between those words.
Will was already pushing himself upright, an angry wail from the inner workings of his cot accompanying the move. “I’ll go.” He didn’t want to risk either of the others walking in on whatever was happening over there. “I’ll take care of it.” He looked down at himself as he opened the bedroom door; the ridiculous Victorian nightshirts weren’t doing any of them any favors.
Hand on the doorknob, Will was speaking before he’d even entered the room. “Guys, really, you need to get it together.” He sounded tired, even to his own ears, but he was met with a redoubled howl of laughter from Deanna while Beverly tried to cut her own off, resulting in a choked clicking sound from the back of her throat. They were both in tears.
Beverly tried to regain some sense of calm, but that only succeeded in highlighting how preposterous they must look. It hadn’t mattered when it’d been just the two of them in a pile on the floor, but with Will looming over them, candle still burning on the nightstand for more than adequate illumination, Beverly started to flounder, trying to get at least some piece of the voluminous shift she was wearing to cover at least some part of her legs.
Will, tense from trying to navigate the odd feelings ricocheting in the other room and tired from not having had a comfortable night of sleep since they’d arrived, rolled his eyes along with the rest of his head for full effect.
“Oh, spare me the false modesty.”
“Will!” Beverly exclaimed while Deanna, absolutely no help at all, seized her sides as her laughter started causing her muscles to cramp.
“Someone else might have been in my head, Dr. Beverly, but my body still spent enough time between your legs to remember what they look like.” And he winked.
Beverly flushed scarlet—that wink was no joke. “God dammit, Will,” she hissed through her teeth, “I told you that we were never talking about that.”
Will looked ready to retort, but Deanna had collapsed into an all-out cackle, setting back his entire mission into their bedroom to get some quiet. Taking matters into his own hands, quite literally, Will reached into the tangle of limbs and plucked Beverly up and onto her feet, propelling her back onto the bed in one expert motion. He went back in for Deanna, with deliberately less precision, hooking her around the middle before hefting her up with a grunt and tossing her beside Beverly.
Deanna, gasping for air around her laughter, pinned Will with what she intended to be a scolding look. “Will, we agreed no more picking me up and throwing me around.”
Given the ludicrous circumstances, Will could not be satisfied with any simple comeback. He raised an eyebrow at Deanna, challenging the validity of said agreement, and then looked at Beverly with so much insinuation in his eyes that she too was lost to another fit of laughter.
Realizing that he had sabotaged himself by stirring the women up again, Will sat on the edge of the bed in defeat, hands clasped loosely between his knees. Beverly was obviously the oldest in the room but piled on the bed like this it didn’t just feel like she’d acquired a little sister, but an older brother too. Will never had been a big brother, but sitting with them like this, sighing as though a great responsibility rested with him, Beverly didn’t doubt that he would have excelled at it.
“If it’s going to continue to be a problem, one of you can go sleep in the other room and I’ll stay in here with the other.” He delivered the line as though he weren’t renowned for being the problem himself. “I could even help you with all that corset stuff in the morning.” He winked a second time, and Deanna shot him a look that Beverly had never seen pass between the two of them before. She muttered something under her breath in Betazoid, and Will snorted in response, throwing up his hands and conceding defeat.
“What was that,” Beverly murmured to her.
“I said that we were fine on corsets but could really use his help getting all of the twists and curls set.”
Will didn’t refute it, but Beverly was certain that his grasp of Betazoid was too thin for either corsetry or coiffures. She let the moment pass, hoping that Deanna would keep her thoughts on Jean-Luc to herself in exchange.
He stood, patting Deanna on the head as though she were a doted-on pet. She was used to it, or something close enough to it, that she was able to efficiently swat his hand away. Will bent over and placed a sloppy kiss on the top of Beverly’s head with more of that older brother energy that she was beginning to realize she might actually like.
“Okay, well, no more shenanigans tonight, ladies. It’s time for everyone,” he cut his eyes at the wall between the bedrooms, “To get some sleep.”
“Sorry,” Beverly said contritely, the smile still pulling incorrigibly at her lips.
“I just don’t want the Captain having to come in here issuing censures for your permanent record,” Will said with only a hint of seriousness.
Deanna smirked to herself. “The Captain is working out his own issues right now.” She glanced meaningfully at Beverly, and Will’s eyebrows rose conspiratorially at the silent exchange. “But we are on Geordi’s last nerve.”
That got Beverly’s attention, and she somewhat shuffled herself beneath the blankets. “We’ll be good, Will.” She wasn’t sure about Deanna, but she held up a corner of the quilt for her to at least encourage the illusion of it.
Will rolled his eyes and closed the door without further comment.
Deanna blew out the candle and spent a decadent half minute burrowing and adjusting herself among the pillows. When she had finally settled, she and Beverly both lying on their sides turned towards each other, she couldn’t miss the mischievous look still sparking around Beverly. Beverly winked at her slowly, theatrically, in the dark. Deanna clamped a hand over her mouth to silence the laughter that threatened to bubble up again.