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“Aw, man,” Jim whines from somewhere between isles, “Bones is gonna kill me!”
Spock doesn’t bother looking up and instead continues wiping his counter clean—he’s certain he’s the only employee that ever does it. Only because the store is otherwise empty, he answers loud enough to carry, “Despite his current position as our manager, Leonard is in the process of becoming a doctor, and the Hippocratic oath alone would forbid such actions.”
Jim pokes his overtly handsome head around the doll isle to ask, sounding half incredulous and half warm, “Did you just tell a joke?”
Spock attempted to, but many nuances of human humour still elude him. He looks up, more drawn to the sight of Jim than anything, and keeps his face neutral. As usual, his blandness elicits a broad grin across Jim’s face. Jim’s blue eyes almost seem to twinkle in the fluorescent light of The Enterprise Toy Emporium. The only thing that makes serving wild Terran children and their over-indulgent parents bearable is that gorgeous face.
All of Jim is a threat to his Vulcan control, so whenever Spock’s parents comm to ask how earning his Starfleet credits is going, Spock downplays the journey.
Retail is boring. Jim makes everything exciting. Spock stands rigidly behind the counter while Jim rustles out of sight, not reporting the details of his transgression, and Spock doesn’t ask. It would only make him an accomplice, and his relationship with Leonard McCoy is already rocky.
Jim insists “Bones” likes him. But Jim is what humans call an unwavering “optimist.”
It takes Jim roughly ten minutes to right whatever it was he wronged, and by then, as Spock dully informs him upon his return to the counter, “It is time for your scheduled break. Please do not be late in your return.”
Jim grins again, another case of inexplicable beauty that Spock tries hard to be unaffected by, and promises, “I won’t. If I’d known what you were like around kids when I was first hired, I wouldn’t have stayed out at all.”
From anyone else, it would be an insult, but Jim’s eyes are undeniably fond. He waits in front of the counter for an extra minute, toying with the gold collar of his cotton uniform shirt, then seems to give up on whatever he’d meant to say. Spock exercises considerable strength and doesn’t watch him go.
Jim’s only been in the back for forty-five seconds before his footsteps are returning. Spock pretends to rearrange the tiny plastic horses in the cardboard box at his til, but then Jim’s right in front of him and there’s no point pretending not to notice. When he looks to his coworker, he almost has to take a step back.
Jim’s smiling from ear to ear, dazzling in the way he looks at Spock, not just his usual seduction of any attractive women that walk through their doors but focused all forward. Spock fights for his neutrality and returns Jim’s gaze.
“There’s Lego in the break room.” A single box that Spock set on the table, after spending an hour debating over which set to invest in. He taped a gift receipt on top just in case. He’s not proud of himself. But Jim’s look, as always, makes his failings worth it. “Funny, I seem to remember ranting to you yesterday about how much I wish I still had Lego.”
“Despite being entirely too old for such diversions,” Spock adds, whilst simultaneously wondering what’s wrong with him. Jim, as only Jim would, keeps smiling.
“And yet someone put a box in the break room, which, I’m assuming, is for all of us to play with.”
Jim and only Jim. Spock doubts any other of their coworkers would touch it anyway. Spock doesn’t say anything.
Jim steps closer, front leaning against the counter, hands sliding tantalizingly close to Spock’s across the newly-cleaned surface. He asks directly, in that oddly commanding voice of his that always compels Spock to answer, “Did you buy me Lego, Spock?”
Yes. Exactly for this reaction. Spock’s throat is tight. Somehow, he manages to answer, “I surmised that given what I have observed of your spending habits, you would not be able to afford such a frivolous diversion on your own.”
“But you could, even though you think building tiny structures for nothing more than fun is ‘illogical.’”
Spock remains quiet. He’s extremely grateful that his father is on Vulcan and can’t drop by to visit the store like Jim’s mother occasionally does.
Spock’s watch beeps. Jim’s too-short break is over, and his shift isn’t long enough today to merit a full lunch break, which he’d need to play with his new present. They wasted all of Jim’s time staring at one another.
Spock would, of course, excuse Jim for longer, but Jim comes around the counter anyway, taking over the til across from Spock’s. The bell over the door rings before Spock can say anything—he tries not to entertain personal conversations when customers are around to overhear it.
As the two incoming women usher a small boy into the gaming section, Jim whispers to Spock across their enclosed space, “Come over to my place after your shift—I’ll come back and pick you up. We can build it together.”
Spock says a faint, “Okay,” just before one of the women approaches the counter to steal Jim away.
For the rest of his shift, even after Jim’s gone home with an alluring wink and the Lego tucked under his arm, Spock’s shamefully, inordinately happy.