"Champagne Moments"
by Maisie (maisierita@comcast.net)
copyright
1999
(Voy, C/P, PG-13, 1/1)
Disclaimer: Paramount owns the boyz. I'm simply taking them out for a little joyride.
Warning: Implied m/m relationship.
Feedback: Please! All constructive comments will be seriously considered. Grammar nits welcome. <g>
*****
He found me in Sandrine's. I suppose "found" is putting it a little bit strongly, since even now I won't flatter myself to suppose he was actually looking for me when he entered the holodeck. Our truce had been bartered years ago, and he'd actually conceded that he now considered me, in some respects, a friend, but still, it wasn't very often that Chakotay actually went so far as to seek out my company. In fact, when we were off duty, he *never* sought out my company.
No offense taken, of course, since it's not as if I ever went specifically looking for him when we were off duty, either. He might not have wanted to kill me anymore, and I hadn't brought up the life-debt thing in years, but it's not as if I couldn't list a hundred things I'd rather be doing in my free time than chatting with a certain tattooed First Officer.
That being said, I was only mildly surprised when he pulled up the chair next to me at the bar. There were, after all, only the two of us in there, and for him to have sat anywhere else would have been pretty damn rude. I'd deactivated the holocharacters about a minute after I'd entered the bar, having spent five of the last seven duty shifts in Sickbay. I'd had quite enough of holograms, thank you very much.
"Drinking alone, Tom?"
I spared just enough energy to raise an eyebrow at him. He has a marvelous talent for stating the obvious. I think that's why he's such a good First Officer: he spends a lot of his time telling Captain Janeway what she already knows.
Taking the eyebrow as the answer it was intended to be, he marched blithely on. "What are you drinking?"
I flicked my head towards the bottle on the counter.
"Champagne?" He was mildly surprised. "What's the occasion?"
I realized that I was actually going to have to use words to answer this one, so I swallowed the champagne I'd just sipped. "It's our anniversary. B'Elanna and me. Our first date."
He nodded. "Two years?"
I nodded back.
"Impressive."
"I suppose you could say that."
He took a quick look around the empty bar and let his eyes settle back on me. "Forgive me for being nosy, Tom, but isn't it customary to celebrate your anniversary with your girlfriend?"
Instead of answering, I took a moment to reflect that Chakotay had called me "Tom" more often in the past six months than he had in the first four and a half years we'd been stuck out here. I credited it to Her Holiness and the demotion she'd slapped me with. There were very few people comfortable calling me "Ensign", and Chakotay wasn't one of them. Unfortunately, he couldn't call me "Lieutenant" any more, which had been by far his favorite form of address, so now it was usually "Tom", both on and off the Bridge. My only consolation about the whole Monean fiasco was that the Captain didn't like to call me "Ensign" either -- I suspect because it reminded her of her spectacular failure to turn me an obedient little lapdog -- so she had to force herself to call me "Tom" all the time, too, "Mr. Paris" being too formal. If I listened hard enough, I could almost hear her teeth grinding.
Hell, I'll admit it, I was still bitter. Getting me out of New Zealand was her own bright idea, not mine. It's not as if I asked to be her reclamation project. I didn't particularly want to be reclaimed. I never asked to be held to standards higher than she held for the rest of the crew, especially herself . . .
. . .which was all well and good but was still pretty far away from the answer to the question Chakotay had asked, namely: why wasn't I sharing this particular anniversary with my better half?
"She's working," I answered, a bit belatedly. "Some conduit ruptured and she wants it fixed tonight."
Now it was Chakotay's turn to raise an eyebrow. "Sounds like something the night shift could handle on their own."
"You know B'Elanna," I answered mildly. "She doesn't really trust anybody else to do the job right."
He chuckled, conceding the point. "Still, it's too bad about your anniversary."
I shrugged. "I'll live." I conjured a glass from behind the bar and poured him some of the champagne. "Try it. It's really pretty good."
He frowned for an instant, mistrusting, I suppose, my motives. "Don't you want to save some for B'Elanna? For later?"
"She's not coming," I answered, as noncommittally as possible. "And I hate to waste good liquor."
He frowned again. "This *is* synthehol, isn't it?"
"Of course it is." As if I could have gotten a hold of real alcohol. My replicator account has restrictions on it that I haven't yet been able to circumvent, not that I've been really trying, and I'd feel funny asking someone else to replicate the stuff for me. Much as I'm loath to admit it, my account is restricted for good reason. "It's still good liquor, Commander, even if it won't get you drunk."
He gazed at me silently for another minute before taking a healthy swallow. A smile crossed his face as the champagne worked its way through his system, and he relaxed a bit. "So why isn't B'Elanna coming?"
"She says it'll be too late by the time she's done working."
"Oh. Sorry."
"Don't be. It's not like I was planning this for a long time. To tell you the truth, I'd completely forgotten it was our anniversary. I only remembered about it this afternoon." I stared into the depths of my glass, seeking wisdom. "Two years," I mused.
"It's a long time," Chakotay answered.
Too long, I thought.
Chakotay's strangled cough alerted me to the fact that I'd spoken that incriminating thought out loud. Oops.
We sat there for a few minutes, he staring at me in silent consternation, while I wondered furiously how much I'd have to bribe him with to keep that comment to himself. Finally he broken the silence with an understated, "Are the two of you having problems?"
I snorted before I could stop myself. It's a habit I've been struggling to break for years but as of yet I haven't had much success. "A few."
"Want to talk about it?"
"Not particularly."
He shrugged and took a sip of his champagne.
I sighed. "It's just that, you can't base a relationship on make-up sex, you know." He didn't say anything and I kept going. "That's all we have, Chakotay. Make-up sex. That's the sum total of our relationship."
He was gentle. "You're exaggerating."
I was vehement. "No. We fight, then we make up and have fabulous sex, then we're okay for a couple of days until we start fighting again." I downed the rest of my drink. "It's kind of pathetic."
"I thought you loved her?"
"I love the sex." I shook my head. "God, I'm such a sleaze."
"If it's so bad, why are you still together?"
"Frankly, I don't think either of us wants to be the one to call it quits. And -- damn, I am *such* a pig -- the sex is really good, Chakotay. I mean, *really* good. I don't think I want to give it up."
He thought about it for longer than I would have expected. "Well, not to be indelicate, but there are plenty of people on the ship you could be sleeping with. Most of them would jump at the chance to get you in bed." I looked sideways at him, and he had the grace to blush, but he nevertheless continued, "It's true, Tom. Most of the women, a lot of the men. I think even Kathryn-"
I couldn't help it. I shuddered.
He laughed. "Not on your top ten list, huh?"
"Not on my top *hundred* list. No offense, Commander, but Kathryn Janeway is about the *last* person on this ship I'd want to get into bed with."
"You still haven't forgiven her."
"No." I don't lie much anymore. It's gotten me into too much trouble in the past.
He was very serious. "Why not? You disobeyed a direct order, stole a shuttle, forced her to fire on you-"
I winced and waved my hand to stop the depressing litany of my sins. "I deserved everything I got. I know that."
"So then why . . .?"
"Because she wasn't punishing me for what I did. She punished me because I had the gall to disappoint her. Trust me, if it had been Squeaky Clean Kim in that shuttle, he'd have gotten off with a reprimand in his file."
"Squeaky Clean Kim? You call him that?"
"Not to his face."
"What do you call me behind *my* back?"
"You don't want to know."
He grinned and let it drop, returning to weightier concerns. "Seriously, if the only reason you're staying with B'Elanna is for the sex, you've got plenty of other options."
"I don't want to sleep around, Chakotay. I've sampled enough mattresses to last a lifetime." I poured myself another glass of champagne, and refilled his, noting absently that he'd finished it when I wasn't looking. "At any rate, it's not *just* the sex."
He didn't have to say, "Aha!" It was written all over his face. All he said, though, was, "What else, then?"
"I like waking up next to her."
He nodded, but didn't speak.
I moodily twirled the champagne around in my glass, and contemplated the bleakness of my existence. It could, suffice it to say, have been better. I mean, it wasn't as bad as being in prison -- not *nearly* as bad, not even on the same scale of badness -- but it wasn't great, either.
"Tom? Can I ask your opinion about something?"
"Sure." Thankfully, he was changing the topic.
"What do you think about me and Kathryn?"
"In what way? As officers? People? Friends?"
He was uncomfortable, and wouldn't meet my eyes. "Together. As a couple. Romantically. Do you think we'd make a good match?"
As I've said, I don't lie much any more, but I considered it before opting to tell the truth, uncomfortable as that was bound to make things. "No."
He didn't flinch. "Why not?"
"Because you're too good for her." I shrugged. "You deserve better, Chakotay. For one thing, you deserve someone who's not a psycho."
"She's not a psycho."
"Hey, you've got your opinion, I've got mine." I gulped the rest of my drink. "Why are you asking me? You know I don't have the highest regard for her."
He was looking into the distance. "I was just curious."
For once I was perfectly serious. "Chakotay, it would never work. You don't agree with her on anything. Not the important things, at any rate. You're always arguing."
"You and B'Elanna are always arguing."
"Exactly. And look how well *we* worked out."
"But you had two good years."
"One. One good year and one mediocre year and God knows how many more barely tolerable years to come." I put my hand on his arm. "You don't want to end up like us. Trust me. Find someone else. Most of the people willing to hit the hay with me would be at least as eager to sleep with you."
He shook his head. "Nope. Everyone's too intimidated."
I laughed. "What, by the tattoo? I'm not."
His eyes flashed up to meet mine. "I know."
I gulped. What the hell was *that* look?
"Tom." His voice was low, and by all the gods I don't hold holy, I swear it was . . . *sultry*. I mean, what the hell? Like I said, we'd become friends, more or less, but that didn't explain his tone of voice. "Listen to me." I hadn't realized my hand was still on his arm until he covered it with his own, and I reflexively tried to pull it away, without success. "Don't settle for 'barely tolerable' years with B'Elanna. You'll be doing both of yourselves a favor if you end it."
I finally managed to get my hand out from under his. "I don't want to end it. Being with her . . . it's better than being alone."
Now his hand was on *my* arm and his eyes were smoky. "But not as good as being with someone you love." Before I'd had a chance to fully process his last comment, his hand was off my arm and the smoke had disappeared from his eyes. "I'd better be going."
My addled brain couldn't handle much more than a weak, "Okay."
"I'll see you around, Tom."
"Right. I'll see you around." He disappeared out the door and I sat there staring at my stunned reflection in the mirror behind the bar, replaying everything he'd said and trying to decide if what I thought I'd heard was actually what I'd heard, or whether it was something else entirely, something completely innocuous, or --
/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\
"Tom? Are you watching that log entry *again?*"
I'm a bit sheepish. "Yes."
He's standing in the doorway, looking positively edible. "Why?"
"Because I'm sentimental. I recorded it ten years ago today."
He chuckles, obviously amused by my ever-more-eccentric eccentricities. "On our fifth anniversary. I was there, remember?" He crosses the room. "I've got the champagne. Can you turn that off and come to bed?"
"I was almost to the end."
"You've watched it six times today. You know how it ends."
"But Cha-"
"Come to bed, Tom. That's an order."
I sigh without really meaning it. "Yes, sir."
I click off the screen and watch as my younger self blinks out of existence, and remember that fateful conversation in the bar. Much as I hate to admit it, Chakotay was right about one thing. It's definitely better being with someone you love.
*****
The End
*****
Loved it? Hated it? Let me know!