Story: Intimate Relations
Author: Deede
Email: jaylee_g@yahoo.com
Disclaimer: Paramount owns the Star Trek Voyager and it’s characters,
I just borrowed for a little non-profit geared fun.
Rating: R, for strong language and adult situations
Characters: P/T
Timeline: Follows “Someone to Watch Over Me”
Distribution: Imzadi Everlasting, my site and BLTS can archive
it. Anyone else, please ask.
Notes: This story was more a writing exercise for me than anything
else. In fact, I wasn’t even going to post it, but I’m under
strict orders to post it regardless of my trepidation, so here
it is. :-)

*****

Chapter One: Deck 9, Section 12


Seven’s little ‘field study’ got me thinking about relationships,
particularly my relationship. Not that I’d ever admit to the
borg princess that she had the capability of inspiring a certain
process of thought within me. After all, she was way out of line
with her quote, unquote ‘study’ and I’m still pretty peeved at
her. However, the way she was describing Tom and I in her notes
was so detached, so clinical, that I can’t help thinking that
she got it all wrong, that she missed the gist of us somehow…
the essence. There was no feeling to her analysis, no depth or
motivation, so it hardly seemed like any of it was real.  The
reality is that Tom and I ‘feel’ more than two people probably
should, but it works for us. It’s how we cope with the little
nuances of life.

My mother once told me that human men have the attention span
of an angry targ. Of course this was shortly after my father
had left us, so one would think I wouldn’t have put a whole lot
of stock in that poignant yet bitter-as-hell analogy; but I was
young, and angry, and pretty much in agreement at the time. I
mean, why wouldn’t I be? My father had left me as well as her.
Ditched us both for Kahless knows what reason and without the
common decency of leaving a return address. So yeah, my views
on the opposite sex weren’t exactly enlightened. I wonder what
my mother would say if she knew that her interesting take on
motherly wisdom completely screwed me up for years afterwards.
And maybe I never really got unscrewed, although I’m working
on it. Tom is usually more than eager to point out whenever I
revert to using that philosophy. “Uh, B’Elanna? You’re doing
that tormented inner child, ‘nobody loves me, everybody hates
me, I guess I’ll go eat some worms’ thing again. Knock it off.”

Whoever came up with that annoying little worm song needs to
be shoved out an airlock. It’s disgusting. Although I’ve known
klingons who have eaten worse things so I guess I shouldn’t judge.
And naturally I can’t let a comment like that pass without a
retort of some kind. He may have a point, and he may even be
right, but that doesn’t mean I’m not allowed at least a little
pride over it all. After all he’s not exactly in a position to
cast aspersions on my upbringing. Tom and I are a lot alike in
more ways than one, and the weird thing is that we’re both completely
cognitive of that fact, even if knowing doesn’t make things any
easier at times.

“Look who’s talking!” I say with a snort. Childish? Probably.
Petty? Definitely. But it felt good in a ‘ha, I sure showed you’
sort of way. Tormented inner children can sure be a bitch sometimes.
“Between the two of us, I’m not the only one with the scars of
an ‘alternative’ childhood.”

He turned to look at me then, eyes wide and unwavering, as if
he could stare right into my soul, as cliché as that probably
sounds. To cover my embarrassment at being caught in my act of
pure, unadulterated trivial-mindedness, I let my eyes roam: to
his beautiful, naked chest only half covered by the bed sheet
we’re sharing, to his chin as it clenches and unclenches, just
marginally, as he contemplates my words. I love it when he does
that. I can’t explain why, I just do. For whatever reason I just
find it kind of adorable. It’s a little thing, tiny really, but
one among many that keeps me looking. I never tire of looking
at him, indignant or not. Apparently he can never tire of looking
at me either, because he is still doing it, an ironic smile spreading
across his face.

“B’Elanna, ‘everybody’ had a screwed up childhood, in one way
or another. Whoever claims that they didn’t are either lying
or living in a very sad case of denial,” he responded with a
snort of his own.  The way he said it was amusing, using this
sort of a blasé kind of factual tone, as if he just pointed to
a chair and stated ‘this is a chair’, even if the content of
what he said was as jaded as hell. He knew it, and I knew it.

“That’s a pretty disturbing thought,” I reply with a grin, amused
by his theory despite the sadness of it. In a strange way it
was comforting to hear, as if it made me feel that I wasn’t entirely
alone in having a rotten deal as a kid. Although deep down I
knew that his perspective wasn’t entirely accurate. “I’m sure
there are plenty of people out there who had the perfect parents,
perfect house: a dog, a cat, a targ and tons of little, happy
babies crawling around with cute, tiny cherub smiles.”

He laughed at me then, eyes dancing. I love it when he laughs,
his whole face lights up and he looks… happy. So by association
when I make him laugh, I make him happy. It’s heartwarming. When
Tom laughs, the best place to be is in a relationship with him.

“Name one,” he challenged, resting his hands under his head as
he turned to flash a daring smile in my direction. I’m never
one to back down from a challenge, it’s not in my nature.

“Harry,” I state triumphantly, laughing as he suddenly moves
to grab me in his arms and pull me to him, naked flesh against
naked flesh. I love the way Tom feels beneath me, so warm, so
firm in all the right manly places. With Tom I actually feel
like a girl, soft and feminine, and not someone who can take
on the whole of Voyager’s population, male or no, which I probably
could. I have yet to test that theory. One more bad day in engineering
and it might be a possibility.

“You’ve got me there,” he confesses, tickling me. I don’t know
what inspired Tom to guess that I was ticklish but he did. In
fact, it wasn’t too long after we had started seeing each other
that he found that out. I’m pretty sure I’ve ruined the reputations
for klingons, or in this case, half klingons, everywhere with
that little bit of knowledge, but whenever I’m with Tom, I don’t
care. In our haven life is good… some of the time.


*****

There are times when I wonder how the hell I got here - here
being in a relationship with the beautiful, sharp B’Elanna on
one of Starfleet’s most advanced starships. Yet other times when
the haunting memories of my past seem so distant from where I
am now that they seem like another lifetime all together, though
I’ve never truly forgotten, and undoubtedly never will. One of
the lingering side effects to being ‘permanently scarred for
life’ according to B’Elanna, who looks amused as she says it,
as if to say, ‘we can’t go back and change it so we might as
well accept it as part of the irony that is us’.

Apparently B’Elanna and I aren’t the only ones trying to figure
everything out. In fact, no one was really more amused than I
was that Seven picked B’Elanna and I to observe in order to understand
‘human mating behavior’. I mean, I love B’Elanna more than anything,
but we’re not exactly the social norm, if there really is such
a thing. After all, not five years ago B’Elanna was an angry,
‘I’ve got principles to spare’ maquis soldier, and I was the
fallen son of an Admiral dead set on proving that the stigma
associated with that didn’t bother me. It’s almost shocking when
I think of how far we’ve come. Hell, it’s a miracle that I earned
the love of B’Elanna to begin with, but I’m not about to look
a gift horse in the mouth.

Who knows what Seven would be writing if she saw B’Elanna and
I now, in her quarters, in bed, after a serious bout of ‘intimate
relations,’ talking and tickling… With me sitting next to B’Elanna,
watching how the light bounces off of her shiny brown hair, or
how her eyes sparkle whenever they meet mine and how all I can
think about is how much I want to steal a kiss from her. Not
that Seven would have been able to read my mind and decipher
my intent towards B’Elanna, but that knowledge would have probably
made her report a lot more interesting than it actually was.


B’Elanna probably doesn’t realize how good she looks right now.
Although she always looks good, but at this moment she’s actually
vibrant. It’s actually pretty endearing that she can be as attractive
as she is yet so unaware of it. It’s also sad. I suppose I’m
not one to talk when it comes to self-esteem issues; we all have
them to some extent. B’Elanna always claims that the two of us,
together, would drive a counselor to drink with just the reiterating
of our pasts alone. She’s probably right about that.  But none
of that really matters as I’m sitting here now, watching her
talk. Her body and hands get into the act as if to emphasize
her words while her voice rises and falls depending on the passion
she feels for what she is saying.

I love watching her speak. It’s just one of those couple quirks
you always hear about but never really experience until you’re
actually in a relationship. I always like to tease her that she
missed her calling in the dramatic arts, which never fails to
elicit a roll of her eyes, or sometimes, on bad days, a glare.
It’s worth it to see her get worked up. She’s amazing when she’s
angry. Or at least the kind of angry that is easy to snap her
out of.

With B’Elanna there are different stages to angry. There’s the
hot, sexy, ‘I’ve got passion to burn’, angry - the one where
a touch, a caress, and a soothing sentence or two has her softening
in little to no time. And there’s the ‘get the hell out of dodge’
angry, which I try not to be the recipient of too often, although
that can be fun too. Or at least the making up part that follows
it is.

“Didn’t your mother ever teach you that it’s rude to stare at
people?” she asks saucily, breaking me out of my reverie. I can
tell by her tone and the humorous twinkle in her eyes that she’s
not mad, merely teasing. And damn she’s sexy when she’s playful.

“Maybe. What are you going to do about it?” I retort, anxious
to see where her good mood will get me. Sitting at the helm all
day has left me with energy to burn, and there is no better way
to spend stored up energy than with B’Elanna. In fact, she takes
energy expenditure to a whole new level.

“Well,” she replied seductively, continuing our rouse, “you’ll
have to be punished.” And I swear I can feel all excess blood
within my body rush to a certain part of my anatomy.

“Tom, are you there?” I hear a voice coming from my combadge
on the nightstand next to the bed chirp, and I can’t help but
groan.

Now I like Harry. He’s a good friend, and a great guy down to
the core of his ever so angelic being, but damn if he doesn’t
have the worst timing known to mankind. I have to refrain from
sending a glare in the general direction of his quarters. 

Occasionally I experience guilt when it comes to Harry. After
all, aside from B’Elanna, he’s my greatest friend on Voyager.
And he is also a close friend of hers, which has made him seem
like a third wheel every once in awhile, especially after B’Elanna
and I started dating. As it is, a lot of my hard-to-come-by spare
time I spend with her, which doesn’t leave a lot of time to do
the guy pal thing with him, although we manage.

“Go away, Starfleet, we’re busy,” I hear B’Elanna call out, and
I can’t help but chuckle over her brashness.

“Oh god. You guys are together? Never mind, I don’t want to know
what the two of you are up to. Just forget I called,” he teases
back, signing off, and for a small insane moment I resent him
for intruding to begin with, but the feeling quickly passes.
After all this is Harry, my best friend, whom probably wants
to try out that new Captain Proton scenario I programmed for
the holodeck. I guess we have to make him allowances that would
annoy the hell out of me should anyone else try it. Which, on
Voyager, happens a lot.

I love living on Voyager. I even like the person I’ve become
while living on Voyager. After all, I get to fly this amazing
ship, help the doc in sickbay, while having the love of a beautiful
woman. But there are times when it gets a bit claustrophobic.
And other times when I can clearly get why maintaining a relationship
in Starfleet is hard. Finding time to spend together, while preserving
friendships and trying to get some degree of personal space does
get shaky every once in awhile, but ultimately it comes down
to worth, which B’Elanna definitely is, no questions asked.


*****

Chapter 2: Dancing Barefoot


I told Tom earlier that I just wanted to relax by myself tonight.
It was a hectic day, Tom and I have spent nearly every night
together this week, and I’m in one of those moods where I just
don’t want to be around people. I don’t want to dress up. I don’t
want to put on make-up or fix my hair. I don’t even want to engage
in pleasant conversation. I just want to stay in my quarters
and read, and maybe later, go to the holodeck and choose a workout
program that I may or may not actually use. After all, I just
downloaded a new klingon romance novel I’ve been dying to read
from the ship’s database.

Tom likes to tease me about my choice of literature. He calls
it my ‘guilty pleasure’ and it used to mortify me that he not
only had this little bit of knowledge into my reading habits,
but he had actually caught me reading one once. However, now
it doesn’t really bother me that he knows, either because, heaven
forbid, we’ve gotten comfortable with each other or it’s that
we’ve learned how to have fun with it. I’ve tried to show him
the particular benefits that accompany reading that sort of thing,
and usually he loves it. Hell, he even started reading one on
his own once, claiming that I can’t take capital on the inventiveness
to our sex life. Which was probably deserving of a good smack,
but I was too amused at the time to bother.

Still though, since the first time Tom caught me reading one,
I can’t read them in a public place like the mess hall. It has
to be in my quarters, alone. Call it this funny little hang up
I have. Besides, it’s annoying getting engrossed in something,
only to have someone come up and try to start a conversation.
I think the term ‘escapist reading’ is lost on some people.

I’m lucky to be with someone who grasps the concept of alone
time, in fact, sometimes he needs it as much as I do. In my experience
not many guys get it, or at least not the one’s I’ve dated in
the past. Being in a relationship is great, and I certainly love
Tom profusely, but there are moments when I just need to detach
myself from everything around me and just contemplate life, alone.
Plus, there are just some things that you can’t do in front of
others, no matter how much you love them. I wonder what Tom would
say if he knew that I like to walk around my quarters naked after
a shower and play some of that 20th century jazz music he plays
for me occasionally, in between his attempts to shove this weird
music called ‘rock and roll’ down my throat, while humming along,
and maybe, just maybe moving around to the beat a little. Yes,
klingons can dance. Not frequently but, you know, they have a
reputation to uphold, as do I.

‘Alone time’ on this ship is a rare commodity. Even time alone
with Tom is hard to arrange. On the first night we got together
we were interrupted by my engineering department, once by the
doc asking Tom if he could cover an extra shift in sickbay, and
once by Chakotay, who wanted to reschedule our weekly hoverball
session. By the third call Tom and I just turned, looked at each
other, and then broke into a fit of laughter. We really had to,
otherwise we’d go mad.

It’s just one of the things we have had to learn to expect from
our life here. And truthfully, I don’t regret it. It can get
annoying at times, sure, but I love my job. It’s more than I
thought I could do after dropping out of the academy the way
that I did. And being an engineer is more than just a job, it’s
part of who I am. A piece of the ‘B’Elanna package’, as Tom calls
it. Either way, I wouldn’t trade it.  And Tom loves his job as
much as I love mine, so I know that he wouldn’t either.

I’m jumpy tonight for some reason.  I half expect to get a call
from someone, somewhere, but all the while I’m still relishing
being away from it all in a paranoid, ‘the peace can’t last too
long because fate likes to play with me like I’m one of those
odd looking earth puppets with the string things attached to
their limbs’ kind of way. Of course, the problem with this particular
moment of zen is that I’m thinking about Tom anyway, which sort
of defeats the purpose of my cutting myself off from the rest
of the world for the evening.

Come to think of it a massage doesn’t sound too bad at the moment.
It dawns on me that time by myself, on this occasion, isn’t really
as appealing as it had seemed on my way home. I wonder where
Tom is right now…

*****

Sitting alone in the mess hall isn’t exactly what I would prefer
to be doing at the moment, but in a pinch, it will do. It’s certainly
better than giving B’Elanna grief over not taking advantage of
the free time we have when she’s not in the mood for company.
Almost two years of dating and I know better than to crowd her
when she doesn’t want to be crowded. 

It’s funny, I’ve heard a lot of guys go off on how their girlfriends
cling to them once they get together. They enter their life like
a force of nature and then practically take over from there.
Not my girlfriend. If anything she has this philosophy that,
‘yes, we love each other, and, yes, we enjoy being together,
but that doesn’t mean we have to be glued at the hip. We’re still
individuals, who happen to be a couple.’ And most of the time
I appreciate that she feels that way. Hell, I do too - for the
most part. But once in awhile I wish she was a bit more clingy.


God, what an odd thing to wish for, a shrink really would have
a field day with the two of us.

I see Harry approaching and this time it doesn’t bother me in
the slightest. I could actually use the company. What does bother
me is the inquisitive look he is giving me. I know what he is
going to ask before he says it.

“Why are you here by yourself? Are you and B’Elanna fighting
again?” he inquires as he makes himself comfortable, and I can
only sigh.

It bothers me that people automatically assume that B’Elanna
and I are fighting whenever we’re not together. Not that we don’t
fight here and there, or actually, engage in ‘heated discussions’
as B’Elanna calls it. But it’s certainly not all we do. Our problem
is that we are both strong willed, and both as stubborn as hell,
but in a way that works for us. As Neelix claims, we’re both
very passionate people, and neither of us will ever be in danger
of becoming boring.

“No, she is just enjoying her ‘alone time’,” I reply off handedly,
and as natural as I can make it sound.

Harry gets this puzzled look on his face when I say it though,
and I start to wonder if ‘alone time’ is normal amongst other
couples, or if it’s just indigenous to B’Elanna and I because
we’re both somewhat screwed in the head.

“Alone time?” Harry asks, his face clearly stating that we are,
in fact, not of the mainstream when it comes to couplehood, at
least by his perspective.

“Yeah, alone time,” I explain, for some reason needing him to
understand so he would know that B’Elanna and I aren’t fighting.
“We can’t always be together. Some things we like to do separate.
After all, we had lives before we got together. Besides, it’s
healthy to have a little time to ourselves. It doesn’t mean we
love each other any less.”

“I thought the idea behind being a couple is that you spend your
free time together,” he states logically, clearly bent on the
idea. It’s on the tip of my tongue to tell him that his linear
views on relationships are why he has such a hard time maintaining
one, but I don’t, because it’s mean, and I really don’t want
to hurt his feelings. It’s just that I sometimes think that Harry
lives in a different world than B’Elanna and I do.

“Well, B’Elanna and I respect each other’s individuality,” is
all I can respond with, hoping he’ll leave it at that.

His chuckle in reply to that puzzles me… until I turn my head
to follow his line of vision, which is on my girlfriend as she
strolls in the door, spots us, and then heads in our direction.


“I guess B’Elanna doesn’t need that ‘alone time’ after all,”
Harry retorts teasingly.

“Guess not,” I say with a smile, my heart lifting the closer
she gets. It’s touching that she gave up her self-proclaimed,
‘no one allowed’ break to find me. And just when I was thinking
of her. There are moments when there isn’t anything in the universe
I wouldn’t do for her… this is one of them.

“I thought you were going to spend the night closed off in your
quarters,” I ask as she approaches, curious over why she came,
despite my happiness in seeing her.

“Yeah, but then I thought it might be more fun if I let you give
me a massage instead,” she replied with a sassy smile.

Harry laughs at B’Elanna’s roundabout means of making a suggestion,
but I recognize her request for what it is. Right now she needs
me, or, at the very least, wants my company. B’Elanna isn’t one
for admitting need very easily, at least not blatantly, so she
hides it under blanket statements like that. There are times
when it gets frustrating, but mostly it’s kind of charming. It’s
just a part of who she is, and I wouldn’t want her any other
way. I like what we are, together and separate.

*****

Chapter 3: In This Corner, Weighing at…


Stewing over another infamous ‘Tom vs. B’Elanna’ argument wasn’t
exactly how I envisioned our evening would wind up, but then
I wasn’t banking on Tom and I getting into the age-old struggle
over our individualistic tastes: with him wanting to use some
elaborate program on the holodeck and with me wanting nothing
more than to lay low. It’s typical really, we’ve had this argument
before and we’ll more than likely have it again, but that doesn’t
make it any less painful when it does happen.

I hate fighting with Tom. I’m fully aware that a lot of misinformed
people out there think that klingons, even half ones, get off
on it. But really, I don’t. I know we do enough of it that the
crew of Voyager have probably come to the conclusion that it’s
our own twisted version of foreplay. In fact, I know they do.
Chakotay admitted as much to me once when he was feeling brave
enough to approach the subject. And I’d be lying if I said that
the gossip as far as Tom and I are concerned doesn’t bother me,
because it does. I’ve spent my whole life fighting my supposed
klingon tendencies and blaming my admittedly short fuse on them
by my own right. I don’t need other people doing it for me. It’s
a case of I can do it, but no one else can. Logical? No. But
then, I’m not Vulcan, so go figure.

If anything, my reaction to our fights, internally, is anything
but the strong pride and willfulness that usually is attributed
to klingons. I hate it. It grates on my nerves, it dominates
my thoughts, in some cases, if the fight is really bad, it even
makes me feel kind of nauseous. Although I’d never admit any
of this to Tom.

Yet, through it all, in a small way, I know that we are doing
the best we can. Neither he nor I have really been in a serious
relationship before, so inexperience is definitely a factor,
but I think a lot of it just stems from who we are.

If there is one lesson I learned from my mother it’s how to be
self-sufficient, maybe even overtly so. There is a whole lot
of trust involved with being with someone, in allowing them that
power to play with your emotions. Honestly, there are times when
I wonder if the whole relationship business is worth it. Certainly
it seems easier not to have to work at being with someone, but
then Tom will smile, or laugh, tell a joke, or touch me tenderly
in passing, and I realize that the rewards of being with him
far outweigh the effort needed to maintain our relationship.


By nature Tom and I are both prone to push people away. Another
byproduct of that less than stellar childhood we both experienced.
We’re just two helpless kids who learned the hard way that survival
means not putting much stock in how people perceive you, because
no matter how much you try to live up to others expectations
you just end up disappointing them and yourself along the way.
Yet at the same time, with Tom, I actually want to be involved
in his life, I actually want to hear what he has to say: to experience
him, to be with him. Simply put, I love him - I fell in love
with him. There is no going back from that.

So here we are, two stubborn, pig-headed, determined, yet jaded
individuals with enough emotional baggage to take a journey on
a five month pleasure cruise, trying to reconcile the fact that
we have to actually learn, and work, and strive to be together.
Contrary to popular belief being in a relationship is not as
instinctive to the nature of mankind as we’re mistakenly led
to believe, although my parents should have pounded that lesson
home a long time ago. I think it’s something people need to learn
for themselves though. Maybe there is a little optimism in each
of us, searching for love, daring to believe that we deserve
to be loved in return.

I once complained to Tuvok during one of our meditation sessions
that I had a hard time figuring out how this whole relationship
thing is supposed to work, especially considering Tom seemed
to struggle with it at times as much as I do. And then the Oh-so-wise-Vulcan-Master,
as Tom calls him, proceeded to ask me a bunch of questions. Do
I enjoy being with Tom? What does Tom bring to the relationship?
What do I bring?

I answered all the questions as best I could and by the end of
it Tuvok simply nodded, looked at me with that disturbingly unaffected
expression of his, and replied, “It appears the benefits of being
in a relationship with Mr. Paris outweigh the disadvantages to
your union.”

And that was it. No further advice, no follow-up. Just that and
a “are you ready to proceed with our meditation, Lieutenant?”


At the time I think I came up with some sort of retort like…
“Thank you, Mr. States-the-Obvious. I wouldn’t be in a relationship
if the good parts didn’t outweigh the bad,” but in retrospect
maybe Tuvok had been right on both counts. Even when Tom and
I fight, as we had done just a little while ago, our good moments
are what really matter. It’s what pulls us through. That and
the fact that we love each other: we make each other laugh, we
have a lot of good times together. And maybe - just maybe now,
since I wouldn’t want to give Tuvok too much credit for religious
purposes - sometimes the obvious needs to be said.

I need to find Tom.

*****

It’s peaceful just quietly sitting while holding B’Elanna tightly
in my arms. It feels right somehow, as if, just for that moment,
everything makes sense and life exists exactly as it was meant
to. As abstract as this may sound, I love the fact that B’Elanna
and I can sit in silence comfortably, without the need to make
conversation, or say things just for the sake of filling the
stillness.

There’s a certain euphoria in coming out of one of our arguments
unscathed, yet hopefully all the wiser. Though, knowing us, probably
not. At any rate, we lived through it. We survived yet another
proverbial bump in the road. I still love her, and she still
loves me.

I can’t help but be slightly amazed by it all. That B’Elanna:
beautiful, smart as a whip, and extremely passionate B’Elanna
- is mine. There are times when I don’t feel good enough for
her. And other times when I wonder how I got so damned lucky
at finding someone who is willing to put up with my mood swings
and funny little quirks. Particular this someone, the woman I
loved far before she even loved me back.

I’ve told all of this to B’Elanna once or twice and she just
looks at me, rolls her eyes, and claims that if I can put up
with her temper, she can put up with my… ‘blatant cries for help’
I believed she called it. And then she kisses me, and none of
it: not the fights, our baggage - individually and accumulated,
or our independence even matter in the grand scheme of things.

In B’Elanna’s arms I don’t feel like the washed up son of an
Admiral, or the previous Starfleet failure, in B’Elanna’s arms
I feel like the guy who has earned the trust and love of an incredible
woman. So maybe, somehow, somewhere, there has to be something
incredible in me as well. Or maybe I really am just damned lucky.
Either way, it’s a great feeling. And one of the many reasons
I don’t ever want to let go.

I’m not delusional enough to believe that B’Elanna and I will
never fight again, or that our relationship will ever be easy.
I’m not even sure I’d want it that way. But if loving B’Elanna
has taught me anything it’s that taking the easy way out of things
is less fulfilling, and infinitely rewarding than striving for
the best, and then learning along the way.

I’d take a fight with B’Elanna over living without her any day.
I’d take a moment with her over any other encounter I’ve had
in my life. So we may get the occasional scrapes and bruises.
Who doesn’t? Yet we have each other despite all of that, and
that’s what I hold sacred.

B’Elanna is smiling, a fact I can feel rather than see because
of the way she is positioned on my lap. I briefly wonder at what
point it was that I got so adept at reading her, but the thought
is quickly replace by the way she is wiggling against my body.

“I know what you are thinking,” she claims seductively, her voice
a husky whisper that sends thousands of tiny shivers up my spine.

“Oh, and what’s that?” I reply coyly, my heart already racing
in anticipation.

“You’re thinking that it’s long past time to go to bed,” she
announces smugly, repositioning her body to face me as her dark
eyes dance with positively naughty intent.

“You read my mind,” I confirm, moving to kiss her with everything
that I’m feeling for her. And I can’t help thinking, once again,
that all of this is just right somehow.


The End!