Chapter Text
January 4th
The comm line rang.
And rang.
And rang.
It always rang exactly 4 times, one more ring and the voicemail would click on.
Jim put his head in his free hand and drew in a deep breath. He didn’t know why he still did it, why he still called every year.
His mother never answered on his birthday. Because it wasn’t just Jim’s birthday.
It was the day his dad died.
Bones told him every year that it wasn’t just a memorial or death day, that something good did happen that day and that he was allowed to celebrate his own life.
The first time Bones was there to witness it, it was the start of their second semester.
Jim sat on the couch in his and Bones’ shared dorm, stoic and staring completely through an intense playoff football game Bones had on the holoscreen.
“Did ya wanna go out tonight?” Bones asked.
Jim tipped his head to the side and put it in one hand, fingers winding through the blonde locks and tugging as Bones noticed he did when he was really stressed.
Jim kept his hair short, a true ivy league crew cut, short enough for hand-to-hand combat classes, but long enough to yank on when he was worked up.
With a thousand-yard stare, Jim answered, “No, no I’m good.”
The issue with being born during an intergalactic disaster that your father died as a hero in, is that everyone knows your birthday. Whether you want them to or not.
A swig from a flask, “McCoy, Leonard McCoy.”
“Jim Kirk.”
And so it was demonstrated to him how often he was going to have to give his name out.
Later, after having been assigned a dorm- together, in a medic’s apartment opposed to a dorm, as Bones automatically got a rank with his MD, and they had nowhere else to put them- and hauling their crap in, Jim waited. He waited for Bones to ask in the lull of movement. ‘Are you related to that Kirk?’
But he never did.
Weeks went by. And they never discussed it.
Until, “Bones? You wanna go out tonight? I’m getting a taste for those fries from that place…” Jim sat at the kitchen table, tying his shoes.
“You do know I never consented to being called that, right?”
And Jim looked up at him with… alarm ? “Oh Jesus, B- uh, god, oh lord, have I been offending you all this time? I am so sorry- I never meant-“
Bones, indifferent to the name, pressed his hands in a downward motion, “hey, it’s fine,” he breathed. “I was just messin’ with ya. No need to worry.” He pulled his jacket casually off the hook by the door, but his mind was whirling.
What had happened to Jim that the mention of consent nearly gave him a panic attack?
He had a hunch, so he asked, “…is there anything I shouldn’t call you ?”
Jim paused, ever so slightly, in a way most people wouldn’t notice.
But Leonard McCoy wasn’t most people. He was a medical doctor with a PhD in psychology and another one in pathology. He was a trauma informed physician, he made sure to be. And he could see trauma behind Jim’s eyes.
That pause, that flinch , it meant the answer was yes, and a hard yes.
“I’m just… Jim. I don’t much care for any variation of James or Jim, e-especially Jimmy… I’m just… Jim.” He tried to shrug it off, but again, Bones wasn’t one to be fooled. He could see the hurt in the shrug. The fear .
But he knew it wasn’t anything he was going to be able to touch at such an early point in their relationship.
So he nodded, grabbed his shoes, and followed the kid out.
At the bar, they got a booth and sat across from one another, sharing a plate of cheese fries.
“Y'know,” Jim mused, “I’m surprised you don’t rail on these things and rant about how this crap will clog your arteries,” he smirked.
Bones recognized a goading jibe, Jim wanted to lessen the tension and also take the focus off himself. So he’d oblige if that’s what the kid needed. “Nah, people should eat what they want. Restrictive diets just…” he shook his head, “never work. Long term, it’s better to just give your body what it’s asking for.”
Jim blinked at him. “Bones, my body is asking for cheese fries.”
Bones stared back at him, equally as sarcastically stoic, “then give it the dang cheese fries.”
“…you’re strange.”
He rubbed his face, “I’m-"
Then a very pretty girl they took Basics of Engineering with drunkenly stumbled over to their table.
“So-so-sooooo,” the brunette giggled. “I lost the bet, so I,” she pointed to her chest. “Have to ask you,” she dug her finger into Jim’s chest, “if you’re really that Kirk?”
Bones didn’t even hear the question, he could only see Jim’s reaction to having someone unexpectedly touch him. Jim was someone who was fine touching others- a slap on the arm, a meaningful shoulder grab, even a hair ruffle (that little Russian kid) but those were all ‘at arm’s length’ touches. Jim wasn’t one to haul anyone in close or hug them. He was starting to wonder if Jim initiated contact to prevent others from doing so. He noticed that even in classes, Jim didn’t lean close when he whispered. If someone leaned towards him, he quickly went the other way. On the one occasion he couldn’t, he went so straight and rigid that Bones was worried for his spine. For some reason, the kid didn’t like physical contact being initiated.
People seemed to have the impression that Jim slept around, even though they were mere months into the academy.
Apparently, getting in a bar fight in Iowa because you’re hitting on a girl who said she wasn’t interested, gives you a reputation before you even step on campus. Not to say he hadn’t thought about having a little fun on campus. And he probably would, at some point- Gaila kept messaging, she kept flirting- she was an Orion it’s like breathing to her- but she was also older herself, and more mature than anyone knew.
Most thought of Gaila as an airhead and a pity admission.
…She and Jim had a lot in common it would seem.
A lot of people would forget Jim was older than the rest of them. It was easy for their classmates to see Bones as different, older, and off limits. (Except for a few bold nurses…) But Jim? Jim they all assumed was 18-19 just like them and fresh out of high school.
He might have only been a few years older than his first year classmates, but it felt like a lot when he spent time with fourth years, as well as living with Bones who was 28. And it was typically the first and second years, the 18-19 year olds, that wanted Jim.
But it just… didn’t feel right to him. People thought he was immature, and Pike and Bones both made sure to remind him he was, in some ways. But Jim was more mature than they all knew. He had grown up hard and fast. And he didn’t feel right messing around with… kids.
Kids were what he took care of, what he saved no matter the cost. …but that was a long time ago.
He’d never be the playboy people thought he was. Especially if- when - he got his own ship. It was already a rule in place that he wouldn’t touch any being under his command in that way. And cocky optimistic as he was about getting that command, he was hesitant to start sleeping around.
Plus, he had Pike overseeing his every move. Chris had seen Jim walking around the quad at 2am once and called him in to ream him out- until he heard the truth. Jim had been helping someone move dorms after a 2 week ‘and they were roommates’ situation ended badly.
Jim asking Chris why he was in his office at 2am- and then ratting him out to Una- taught him that Jim was going to be just fine. That Jim was smart enough to be just fine.
The thing about it was that Jim seemed to enjoy the reputation. He leaned into it. And Bones just watched.
He watched the kid as he spent most nights tidying up their dorm, not out banging every species he could, like the rumors were saying that week.
No, Jim didn’t bring home girls, he brought home the results of fights.
Not often, but it happened. And still not for the reason people assumed.
The first time Jim had gone out and come back bloodied- he had been defending a guy against someone getting a bit too handsy- not coming on to the victim himself. But the rumors started that he was at least bi if not gay, and he seemed to lean into those as well.
Any rumor there was for him to throw himself into that took away people’s chances to see him for what he really was- broken, alone, and on his last chance- he took it.
So he was the suave guy, the guy who always gave you his full attention when listening, (that one was sincere at least), the guy that could flash a wink and a smile and get what he wanted.
He tested out of 3 classes in his second week at the academy.
So naturally people assumed he was flirting and sleeping his way out of classes.
That rumor, Bones had no idea about until months in, partly because he kept his head down and ignored rumors on purpose (because he was a doctor, thank you, a busy one. Secondly, why ?), and partly because he lived with the kid. He saw him pretend to study and then go in and ace the class- when he graded the test. He wasn’t sure how Jim was supposed to be cheating when the early classes are run by such low-level faculty that the students grade each other's work, but the rumor ran.
Then when he found out the new rumor was that Jim was sleeping with said students for good grades- him included- he resolutely went back to ignoring rumors.
(Jim was an allosexual male, sure. He had hormones just like everyone else. He even had flings during the academy years. But far fewer than anyone would ever guess. And never to get anything from anyone. No- not even Gaila for help with the Kobayashi Maru years later. That just simply wasn’t Jim.)
But Bones could tell even without using his PhD in psychology that sure, Jim wanted to flirt. He got self-destructive and wanted to cause trouble. But he didn’t much desire the actual sex part as much as people assumed.
He never stumbled in in the early morning hours smelling of perfume.
And he never came home drunk.
Oh, he came home tipsy. He came home after having a couple. But he for some reason refused to cross that line into drunk . Not that he didn’t pretend to. Jim thought often about the night in Riverside, how he leaned into the drunk guy persona to flirt, but once he found out Uhura was studying xenolinguistics, that mask dropped. “Morphology, phonology, syntax,” had rolled off his tongue as he complimented her own.
It was why she had cocked her head and admitted she was impressed, why she let him keep talking to her. She hadn’t been kidding when she said he wasn’t anything she couldn’t handle, and it was partly because she was realizing he wasn’t actually the drunk hick she had assumed. And the body language expert, being wrong about someone? She realized he wasn’t drunk at all, and she was in.
Pike had seen through the drunk persona too, for what it’s worth.
“Who am I, Captain Pike?”
“Your father’s son.”
“Can I get another one-"
“For my dissertation…”
He completely ignored the state Jim was trying to project himself as in, and only saw the real one.
So when Bones had first gone out to a bar with Jim, he expected him to get plastered like any other college kid- Jim was actually legally old enough to drink and looked it. (Which worried him but he tried not to let it worry him because no he wasn’t about to get attached to anyone there, especially not space-bound people.) But he didn’t.
Jim ordered a beer, offered to split some fries with Bones, and then said he needed to get back.
So Bones, the nights he couldn’t accompany Jim out, watched. He watched him come home every time and every time he was never worse off than tipsy.
Even when he came home bloodied. No, in fact, that night he was stone cold sober.
After he started noticing Jim never got truly plastered, he started noticing how Jim responded to people who were . Because only a month into the academy and Jim had loaded no less than 6 girls into cabs back to campus.
But anytime there was a man who was drunk, Jim seemed to almost… cower. That’s too strong of a word for James T. Kirk, the kid usually only showed fear when backed into a corner and even then it mostly came out as aggression, but Bones had clocked it.
Because usually when someone got drunk enough to be loud enough to cause enough of a scene to draw Jim’s attention, he’d immediately go stiff as a board. Bones could watch the kid’s eyes rake over every detail of the person, as if sizing them up in case… in case of what? He was learning that any fights Jim got into were usually because he was trying to protect someone or stick his nose where it didn’t belong. So he was thinking that Jim was simply assuming all drunk men cause fights?
And it scared him to think where he could have gotten than idea. And likely how young he was when he did.
Jim could see a drunk man from across the room and instantly cower, just for a moment, before shaking it off and putting a well practiced front back on. Then he’d watch them. His eyes wouldn’t leave someone if he had any inkling things might go south.
The kid’s hypervigilance started to worry Bones.
But even though he typically handled drunk girls just fine, a drunk girl with very little control of her limbs bonelessly throwing her finger in Jim’s chest was absolutely not what he needed.
Usually, Jim would pull himself up, pull on a mask, smile and charm her away. If it were any other subject, that is. “Uh,” he nervously looked between her and his roommate. “Why? I mean- yeah- but- why-“
“Oh my god !” She shrieked so loud they both flinched, even over the music. “So it is true? Oh my god ! Guys !” And just like that, she was off. Gone. Stumbling over her own feet, but gone.
Jim ran a hand through his hair and latched on at the crown, pulling slightly. He tried to laugh it off, but it came out almost… desperate. “I’ve been getting that more and more,” his apologetic blue eyes flashed up at Bones. “I’m sorry.”
“Why are you sorry?” Len shook his head. “Ain’t your fault people are too nosy for their own good.”
“No, but you’re stuck with the roommate who everyone thinks they know.”
‘Who everyone thinks they know.’ He didn’t miss that.
“Well,” Len finally said. “I prefer to get to know people myself, instead of assuming or relying on a name.” He snorted, “I’m from the south. Them people still try to rely on last names to get ahead. Someone not doin’ that is…” he looked Jim up and down, thinking of being told there wasn’t a chance he’d get an agreement where he could regularly see Jo- not with the Treadway name involved. “Refreshing.” He finally said.
Jim gulped a couple of times, and Bones didn’t miss the way he dug the heel of his hand into his chest where the girl had touched him. He wanted to tell him to breathe, that everything was okay, but the way Jim’s blue eyes flashed all over the room, particularly focusing on the exits, he knew it wasn’t the time. Not yet. Not yet in their relationship. “Why don’t we take these fries back home, yeah? It’s really loud here tonight.”
As they walked, slowly walking back to campus and sharing the box of fries as they went, he decided to say something. “It would really annoy me if the whole universe knew my name and birthday.”
Jim looked at him with that same expression he’d had when the girl asked him about it. Fear, shock, panic.
“I just mean it’d be annoyin’! Everyone thinkin’ they know ya when they don’t. It’s ain’t like you remember that day…” The message he was trying to send was hey, I don’t care who your dad is, you’re clearly your own person on your own path.
Just as the silence was stretching too long, Jim spoke. “It doesn’t even feel like a birthday. It never has. It’s not the day I was born, it’s…” he swallowed hard. “It’s the day the father I never knew died. And that’s all my m- the person who gave birth to me sees it as. That’s why she never answers my call on my birthday.”
“ You call her on your own birthday?” Bones gaped.
“Yep.”
“…why?”
“…I don’t really know.”
And then they were. On his birthday. Jim dissociated. And Bones lost as to what to do.
They had been at the academy for what, not even 5 months? And he was trauma informed- he could see the signs of years of abuse and neglect. The way the kid hid food around the dorm alone was telling that he’d experienced some kind of food insecurity. He had a sneaking suspicion the uncle was at fault, the man Jim rarely spoke of except when he had a little too much to drink and started mumbling about some alcoholic named Frank and how he didn’t want to be like him.
“Careful, B’nes,” he had slurred one night, early on. “I grew up with an- an- *hiccup* angry drunk guy and dunno what I might do…”
And that broke Leonard H. McCoy’s heart.
And then it clicked why Jim refused to cross the line from tipsy and oversharing into truly drunk.
So he could understand why Jim hated calling his mother. Hated the rejection even though he didn’t want to talk to her. Hated her for all the wrongs she’d done to him.
But Jim just sighed, getting up from the couch like a man tied down with sandbags. “I need to make a call,” he said lowly.
And Bones paused, considered, and decided to go for it. “Do you want company?”
When Jim’s eyes flew to his, full of alarm, he tried to placate, “for support? On the call? I know you said before it ain’t exactly easy…”
Jim stared at him blankly for a moment. It was like he needed to shake himself out of a stupor. “Uh, no, thanks, I… I got it.”
But the next year when he offered, Jim hesitantly nodded, and let him sit in as he left the message.
“It’s me. I guess it’s that day again. I hope you’re well. I’m fine, in my second year now.” He glanced at Bones before looking back at his communicator. “I’ve got a pretty great roommate and classes are still a breeze.” He smirked cockily, but shakily, as if trying to pump himself up. “Chris sends his best, as does Una.” He took a breath. “Talk to you next year.”
Talk .
Ha.
His hands shook as he set the communicator down on the kitchen table.
Bones tentatively laid a hand over his for just a moment, trying to show support, solidarity.
Jim nodded, accepting it.
The third year, Jim asked for Bones to be there.
The fourth, Bones just showed up. Bourbon and hypo in hand, “pick your poison.”
So Jim took the bourbon, obviously, and sat down at the foot of his bed, Bones on the couch in the living space.
He took a breath as he made the call, and waited.
First ring.
Second ring.
Third ring.
One more…
“Hello?”
Jim jumped so hard, his bourbon splashed all over his hand, causing Bones to rush over.
“Hel-mo-hi.” Jim settled on lamely. “I uh, I was getting ready to leave a message…”
“Happy birthday, Jim.”
“Thanks…” he laughed nervously. “Uh, how are you?”
“Well… I actually need to discuss that with you.”
“What’s that?”
“...my health.”
“What about it?”
“Jim…” She sighed, and he could hear her shaking her head. “Jim, I have xenopolycythemia,”
Bones’ eyes went wide, and he instinctively moved closer to Jim.
“That’s…” Jim began.
“Fatal. No cure,” his mother finished.
There was a beat of silence before Jim looked up at Bones, “there’s really nothing they can do?”
Bones shook his head sadly, lips tight.
“No, there’s not. They’ve tried some theoretical methods but… but nothing has worked.” Winona said. “So I’m terminal. I’ve got about… well. Maybe a month.”
“A mon-”
“But really the reason I need to talk with you about it is because of Callie. She’s barely 16 and I can’t leave her alone, nor… Nor do I want her to go to Frank.”
Bones watched Jim’s jaw tick and tighten. Was it that she mentioned him, or was it that he was hurt that she wouldn’t leave Callie with him, but did Jim and Sam?
“Well I obviously wouldn’t want that either,” Jim said slowly.
“Which is why… I’m asking you if you would consider letting her live with you.”
“With me ?” Jim’s blue eyes flashed to his best friend’s in panic.
“I still know people in Starfleet. I can have some people pull some strings and get you clearance for her to live onboard,”
“Now, hang on-”
“She just finished her second year of college pre-reqs early,”
“I thought she was 16?”
“She graduated high school at 14, remember? It doesn’t much matter, she’s pretty self sufficient, you won’t need to chase after her too much, unless she mouths off,”
Self sufficient? Jim’s eyes met Bones’ yet again. He knew that was his mother’s code for her hands off parenting style. Who knew how self sufficient she actually was, versus being neglected. And the mouthing off part? She was 16, so maybe that was true, but-
“She’s a lot like you, actually,” she scoffed. “So I think you’ll get along.”
He couldn’t help but wonder what hidden meaning that held.
“So can I talk to her now?”
“Jim, I never said you couldn’t talk to her.”
“Are you going home for Thanksgiving to see your sister?”
“No… I don’t get back to Riverside much. Being there when I met Pike was a one off. Winona has a tendency to take her annoyance with one child out on the other, so I try not to interfere too much for Callie’s sake.”
“Interfere… how?”
“Asking why the child has fingerprint bruises on her arms doesn’t help matters, I’ve learned.”
“Do you guys talk at all?”
“…No.”
So his question of if he could contact Callie held more weight than just asking for someone’s number. He had hers. He just needed to know if Callie was going to be punished for whatever sins his mother believed were committed by him.
“I actually thought it would be best if we talked to her together about it.”
He looked over at Bones who clapped a hand on his shoulder and mouthed with a nod, “together.”
“Callie?” He heard her call. “Come in here, now.” He winced at her tone.
“Wait, she knows about this right?” Jim cut in worriedly.
“Of course not! Why would I tell her before asking you?” She spat.
Bones out a hand on his shoulder and motioned for him to take a deep breath with him, try to calm down before he got heated.
He reached down to mute Jim’s comm, “you sure about this, kid? This is a big decision,”
“Bones, what if it were Jo?”
And at that, Bones unmuted the call himself.
Jim could hear Winona talking to Callie but it was muffled. He called out to her with forced excitement so she knew he was present, “HI CALLIE!”
There was more muffled speech before, “don’t I get a choice?”
“It’s Jim or Frank.”
His blood froze. What? Why would she say that to her?
“The state would place you with him, you know that.”
He could hear the panic rising in Callie’s voice, “but is Jim even-”
“YES! We talked about it and if you’re up for it… I’d love for you to come live with me.”
There was more muffled conversation, followed by Winona’s tone changing into the shrill freaked out narcissistic tone, and Jim cut in, “you guys still there?” He may not have been able to save Callie in her life so far, but he surely could be there now.
“Yes, I’ll live with Jim.”
Silence hung after the call ended and the details were ironed out.
Jim sat looking at the communicator in his lap with Bones just watching him.
“Bones,” he finally spoke, “I don’t know how to be a parent.”
“Well, Jim, you’re not a parent. You’re her brother. And that’s the first thing y’all’ll fight about if you’re not careful.”
“I don’t want to be a parent! I want to be the cool older brother, but that doesn’t feel right either.”
He shook his head and shifted, still sitting at the edge of Jim’s bed, “it’s gonna be a balancing act, kid. You’re probably going to have to figure that out together, unfortunately.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean she’s 16, been in college, lived with your mother, and just experienced a huge trauma. I doubt there’s much ‘parenting’ to be done, what she needs is support. And support I know you can do splendidly.”
“What about rules? Boundaries? Curfews?” His voice pitched upward as he neared panic.
Bones held his hands up placatingly, “okay, okay. I hear you. But, you need to hear her . Meet the child as she is before you go decidin’ her bedtime based on who she used to be.”
“I wouldn’t even be able to do that. I feel like I’ve never gotten the chance to know her.” He stared into his untouched bourbon he’d set on the floor.
“That’s not your fault.”
“Isn’t it? I mean, I’ve had 16 years to try and get to know her better, and haven’t at all!”
“Jim, ask yourself, Really ask. Whose fault is that? Yours, or your mother’s? You told me once that she takes out frustration on the siblings. You were protecting her by staying away.”
“Was I really? I can only imagine what she went through. I mean, you heard how she spoke to her just now! Who knows how bad it is behind the scenes. Shoot,” he scoffed, “I know how bad it can be with her.” He ran his hands through his short locks. “For all I know, she hates me for leaving her there!”
“Jim, what evidence do you have of that?”
“Don’t ‘therapist’ me, Bones.”
Bones shrugged, “you asked for help.” He paused, “need I remind you of your reaction the first time I took you home for thanksgiving?”
Jim scoffed and put his face in one hand, “I still think it was a valid question.”
“Jim, you asked my mom what your bedtime was.”
“I asked when lights out was, that’s totally different!”
“My point is,” Bones raised his hands, “maybe you’re a lot more alike than you know. You would need to talk to her to find out.”
“You’re coming with me, right?”
“To Riverside?”
“Yeah?”
“I’m not sure that’s the best idea, kid.”
Jim’s face fell with heartbreaking speed.
“Your little sister is going to lose her mom, she doesn’t need some strange friend of her estranged brother’s hanging around.”
“Is that what we are? Estranged?” Jim asked in a small voice.
“Jim, I didn’t mean-“
“No, you’re right. An-an-and estranged comes from Latin word extraneus, meaning, 'not belonging to the family',”
“Jim, you’re spiraling,”
“Just because she agreed to live with me doesn’t mean she does or will like me, she could be a carbon copy of our mother, or-“
“Jim, I’m talking to myself, aren’t I…” Bones sighed as Jim began to pace.
“I mean, I’m 25-”
“26, today.”
“I’m 26! What do I think- what does Winona think- no- no, no! If I can take care of a ship of 1000, I can take care of one teenager on top of that!” He swung his arms out wide, “yeah! It’s just one more crewman, right?”
“Let’s not swing too far the other way, now… she’s 16 not 26.”
“I’m 26.”
“Yes, Jim.”
“I’m 26 and I’m taking custody of my 16 year old sister.” Jim stared out the window so long that Bones had to bark, “breathe!”
“You still sure about this?” He asked once Jim was taking in oxygen again.
Jim nodded, “I don’t question the decision at all. I just question the wisdom of it.”
“Which is all I was tryin’ to say, I’m not sure how smart my coming to Riverside with ya is when it’s already such a delicate situation.”
“Bones since when am I trusted with anything delicate?”
“Negotiations between the Thrikiexians and Thudedians last month. That was delicate work and I was proud of you.”
“A 16 year old girl might be more delicate…”
“In some ways, maybe.”
“What do you mean?”
“She’s not a character in a book. She’s multidimensional. She is going to get here and have likes and dislikes and opinions and traumas and she will be a whole mess of a human, same as the rest of us. She’s not some flat person we can just insert into different situations. But she ain’t gonna break from having to bend a little, either.”
“I don’t want her to have to bend! I want everything to be the way she needs it.”
“You’ll never accomplish perfection, don’t fool yourself into thinking you can,”
“I don’t believe in no-win-”
“I never said this was a no-win scenario! Hush!”
Jim hushed.
“It’s gonna be trial and error, and that- that is like parenting. You’ve got to just experiment and see what works for you both.”
“I don’t want to mess her up even more.”
“You won’t, Jim,”
“How can you say that? Look at the examples I’ve had!”
“You mean me and my ma and Pike for the last 3 years?”
Jim went silent, unsure of how to respond to that.
“Jim, you’ve had plenty of bad examples. But you’ve had good ones recently, too. Give yourself some credit here. Look how good you’ve been for Pavel,” he reasoned.
“Yeah but he’s 18,”
“And you’ve been hanging around him since he was 14!”
Jim stayed silent before finally asking, “do you think maybe he would have an idea on curfews, then?”
“So what’s she like?” Nyota asked over her tangerine at breakfast.
Jim startled, surprised no one was pushing him about his mom being terminal. They’d been sympathetic, but they hadn’t harped on it.
“My sister?”
She nodded.
“We’ve… we’ve been messaging since… since my birthday,” it was early and Jim was having trouble deciding what tone to take, what tone felt right. “She’s… shy.”
“Oh?” Nyota smiled, raising an eyebrow. “Pray tell.”
Jim thought back, We can set up a comm line for you to be able to talk to your friends after we leave orbit, he had messaged.
Her reply puzzled him, that’s okay. I don’t need that. Maybe she didn’t have a lot of friends? He knew how small Riverside was.
“She’s hard to get out of her shell, would be a better way to put it,” Jim said.
He tried to get to know her through small tidbits of nonsense. I’m still listening to 20th century rock, he had messaged. But if a band you like is ever touring, you might be able to catch a shuttle to the concert.
You’d let me go alone?
I didn't mean that, of course I’d go with! It’d be fun.
I wouldn’t make you take me to see a band you don’t even like!
What if I wanted to?
There had been another hour-long pause.
Well, if you really wanted to, I’d love that.
What had Winona done to her?
Another time, he tried, do you collect anything? I’ve been collecting antique books since the academy. And traumas, he thought.
Trauma, lol came back instantly. Before, jk jk. Sorry. My humor is weird. No, I don’t.
My humor is weirder, trust me.
“I think we have the same sense of humor,” Jim added to his description after thinking about it.
“Aye, that’s good!” Scotty had jumped in to affirm.
“Da, it vill be nice to have someone else young onboard!” Pavel tried to help.
“I think it’ll be nice to finally get another girl at this table,” Nyota tossed out.
“I admit I am not the best with… young ones,” Spock said with a contemplative head nod. “However, I do often appreciate their fresh insight.”
“You don’t consider them illogical?” Bones retorted.
“Yes, but at times, illogic leads to new logic.”
“That ain’t what you said to me when-“
“Well I think,” sulu cut in, “this is the meaning of going where no man has gone before. People like Pav and Callie getting to see the universe? That’s what Starfleet is all about.”
I don’t know much about Starfleet, mom's hatred only recently reversed. Is there anything I should know? Rules?
He’d worked not to sigh at her immediate asking about rules. It confirmed too many suspicions. But he also balked a bit. What rules were there for a non-Starfleet person living on a Starfleet vessel?
He’d asked Pike. His response had been simple. Don’t tell her anything classified or leave it out for her to find. Otherwise, this type of thing is going to be up to Captain's discretion for now. I’d suggest treating her like a cadet at first- give her open access to the public ship areas, tours of the private ones to satisfy curiosity. Show her where medbay and the bridge are. Both so she knows the two important places but also so she knows where to find you and McCoy.
Are you suggesting I’m in Medbay a lot?
No, I’m suggesting your best friend is going to be as involved in her life as you, which is a good thing.
Because I can’t handle this?
No, because he’s a father and also is your best friend. He will be a good support for you and Callie. Use him.
So his answer to Callie’s question was, basically just don’t go in restricted areas that are locked anyway.
He knew she probably wanted something solid, like a curfew or list of chores.
There aren’t like, chores to do. I have a kitchen that I don’t use. You can, if you want. There’s a porter that tidies up while I’m out. Laundry gets done by them too.
I don’t need someone doing my laundry when I’m going to be doing Jack squat all day. Are you sure there’s nothing I can do?
The only thing I can ask for is patience. Patience with me, because this is new to me, too.
He sighed, thinking about the final question he asked his mother before Callie had joined the call.
“She still doesn’t know, right?”
She sighed. A different type of sigh from her normal annoyed ones. A sigh with… emotion behind it. A sigh that meant something. “Correct. Callie still doesn’t know about Tarsus.”