Captain James Kirk, Personal Log - The Enterprise is nearing completion, and while it's been an enjoyable stay on Starbase Yorktown, I'm ready to get back into space. I'd be even more ready if I wasn't distracted by the fact that the USS Alessia is docking in just a few days and I've received a message from Captain Tara Reese requesting a meeting at a bar near Yorktown Central Plaza when they arrive. It's been five years since I saw Tara, at the Academy. Right after I was given the commendation and relieved Pike of command of the Enterprise. I remember looking up in the audience and seeing her there. She—she looked so proud of me. Other than Bones, she was one of my closest friends at the Academy. I always wondered why she seemed immune to my charms. I tried to find her afterwards, but so many people kept stopping me, by the time I made it to where she'd been, she had disappeared. I never got to say goodbye. I'm not sure why I'm so nervous to see her again. It'll be old friends, getting together for drinks. Why am I so nervous?
**********
Captain Tara Reese, Personal Log - The ship is hours away from Yorktown. As soon as I finish up all the proper protocols, I've arranged to meet with Jim Kirk at the Plaza Pub. It's been ages since I've seen him. Of course, I've heard all about his exploits. I always knew he had it in him to be a true hero, not just a pretty face in a captain's chair. But, even I never expected quite so much as what I've read. I wonder if he's still the flirtatious charmer he always was? He always pretended to be so hurt that I wouldn't go on a date with him. Sure, we had drinks plenty of times, but always with other friends—usually Bones. I wonder what it'll be like, seeing him again? I'm not sure why I sent him the message in the first place. Perhaps I'm just a little sentimental and missing home. Maybe it's my heart trying to play tricks with me again. The Alessia will be docked for three weeks as we have some system overhauls, restock, and have a little downtime. Last reports said the Enterprise would be leaving anytime within the next few weeks. What are the chances of seeing him again after tonight?
**********
Jim Kirk sat at the bar, sipping on his first beer. He had considered waiting to start drinking, but decided it might help ease his nerves. He was in the middle of another deep breath, attempting to keep his nerves calm, when a voice called out from behind him.
"Hello, Jim."
He turned and smiled as he laid eyes on the woman he'd been waiting for. Tara Reese. She was even more beautiful than he remembered her. More beautiful than her current official Starfleet record photo did credit for. Not that he'd looked, or anything. "Well, hello beautiful."
Tara rolled her eyes at him, just like she always used to do, but he noticed a pink tint to her cheeks this time. He didn't remember having that affect on her in the past. "I do have a name, Jim. Do you remember it?" She asked sarcastically as she came closer.
He quickly slid off his barstool and met her, pulling her into a hug. "Of course I do, Tara. It's so good to see you."
She hugged him back. It felt real, genuine, and it wasn't till that moment that either of them realized how much they had really missed each other—and the hugs. "Good to see you, too, Jim."
They separated and he slid back onto his barstool, her taking the one next to him. She quickly ordered a beer from the bartender, then turned to Jim. "So, how are things, Jim? How's the new Enterprise coming along?"
"Things are good. The ship should be ready to go any time now. Scotty's a bit of a perfectionist, so we're a little fuzzy on the actual timeline. It depends on how satisfied he is with the work being done."
She chuckled. "Barrett—my engineer—is the same way. She's never satisfied with the work if it isn't her own."
"Yeah, so tell me—how are things on the Alessia? You've captained her, what, two years now?"
She nodded. "Yup. Not all of us jumped to Captain quite as quickly, or as unconventionally, as you did, Jim."
"You deserved a ship the moment you walked out of the Academy, more than me—you always were a brilliant leader, and obviously have incredible patience and fortitude to put up with me and Bones through Academy."
She laughed. "I won't argue with you on the patience and fortitude. How is Bones?"
"He's good. As grumpy as ever. Quite annoyed that I got our five year mission extended. He was a tad bit jealous he didn't get an invite to this little get together."
She shrugged, trying not to make a big deal out of it. "I figured you had at least a week or so before you're leaving. We're here for at least three. We can maybe all three get together another time—just like old times."
"He'll be happy to hear it. And what about this? Just me and you—you'd never let that fly back at the Academy. If I remember correctly you made sure that I could never improperly assume anything even remotely resembled a date."
She stared at her beer a moment before taking a long swig. "I just thought it'd be nice for the two of us to get together, you know, the two captains."
He watched her carefully. "Is that what this is? Just two Captains getting together to talk shop? Compare notes about the life of a Captain? I'm a little disappointed."
"What, Jim? Were you hoping for a date, just like you used to when we were cadets? Looking for a one night stand with your old best friend?" her last comments had come out more snippy than she'd meant.
"Whoa, Tara, I—"
She sighed. "I'm sorry, Jim. Just—just forget I said that."
"That's going to be kind of hard to do." He swallowed. "It's probably deserved though, isn't it? I was terrible. All those girls, all those one-night stands." He shook his head and took another drink. "And there you were, the perfect friend, my best friend, the perfect picture of beauty and intelligence, the perfect girl, with the ability to counter and resist every move I made on you." He shook his head. "I'm glad you did—I didn't deserve you."
"I had to protect myself, Jim. And you. You were better than the way you got when you had your sights set on your latest pick. And I knew that if I didn't say no to the date, I wouldn't be able to say no to—to whatever came after it. And I couldn't bear the thought of being the next girl who woke up alone after a night with Jim Kirk."
"You would never have been 'the next girl,' Tara. You were always something special to me."
"You say that now. But I had to be certain. Neither of us would have been able to bear the repercussions."
They were silent for a few minutes. Jim knew she was right. And while he liked to think he would have treated her differently, even he couldn't guarantee what old Jim would have done. "Did—did you hear about what happened. About my sort-of death?"
"There was nothing 'sort-of' about it, Jim. Yes, I read the reports, in detail. You were dead. Bones brought you back to life using blood from that Human Augment."
"Yeah—Khan Noonian Singh. Both my destroyer and my savior."
"Your destroyer? Last I checked it was Marcus who woke him up, Marcus who fired on your ship—"
"True. A Starfleet Admiral," Kirk said with a shake of his head.
"A Starfleet traitor. You seem to keep running into those, don't you? I heard about Balthazar Edison."
"I suppose Edison, Khan, even Marcus... they all felt they were doing what was right, didn't they."
"But that doesn't make it right. Murdering innocents is never right."
Kirk smiled. "You always did have a pure heart, Tara. And it seems you've been keeping tabs on my career."
"Well, your career happens to have involved some pretty impactful news for all of Starfleet, so it didn't require much digging."
Jim considered the past five years. "We lost him, Tara. Pike—we lost him."
Tara rested a comforting hand on Jim's arm. "Yeah, I heard. I tried to make it back for his memorial, but... we were too far away to make it back in time. I'm so sorry, Jim. I know he was like a father to you."
"Yeah... yeah, he was. He was special to you, too. I remember... he recruited you, too."
She smiled. "Yeah, yeah he did."
There was a longer pause, where both of them took another drink. Finally, Jim spoke up. "We got distracted by talk of right and wrong. The point is—my death, it—it changed me. As you can imagine."
"I can tell."
"How?"
Tara smiled, but blushed. "Because no less than five beautiful women have walked past us and your attention has stayed on me the entire time. Since I walked in."
He grinned and took the last sip of his beer before turning to fully face her. "Well, there's a very good explanation for that."
"Oh? What's that?" She said, glancing out the corner of her eye as she finished her own beer.
"When the most beautiful woman in the galaxy is sitting across from you, you don't look at any other women."
"Stop it, Jim."
"What? It's the truth."
"My being so 'beautiful' as you put it, didn't stop you during our academy days."
"I was blind during our academy days. And foolish. Definitely foolish. I already said—I've changed, Tara. So, would the most beautiful woman in the galaxy care to dance with me?"
Tara's eyes went wide. "Dance?"
"Yup. Come on, I know you can. Let's dance."
"But it's a slow song."
"Your point?" He said as he stood and held his hand out.
She sighed and followed suit, taking his hand. "I'm going to regret this later."
He pulled her close and leaned down to whisper in her ear. "I'll make sure you don't," he said as he pulled her close and placed his hands on her hips.
As they swayed to the song, Jim's eyes remained on hers. She looked up at him, a bit in awe. "You really have changed, haven't you?"
"In all the good ways, I hope. I mean, I'm still the devilishly charming and handsome Jim you knew, I just don't flirt with every woman in the room anymore."
She laughed. "And I see you are as humble as ever."
He grinned. "Of course."
She took a deep breath and melted further into his embrace, resting her head on his shoulder. "I've missed you, Jim. We had a lot of good times, didn't we?"
He rested his cheek on her head, taking in a deep breath, attempting to memorize a smell that seemed ever so faintly familiar. His hands slid further around to her back. "The best of times. I'm glad you sent me the message and invited me here. I'm glad you decided we should meet alone, first. Without Bones."
"I really don't know why I did that."
He gently squeezed her sides. "Maybe because you needed this as much as I did."
She looked up into his eyes again and they sparkled in the slowly changing lights of the bar. "What exactly is this, Jim?"
"The chance to hold someone who you know you can trust. The chance for me to make up for all my foolishness."
"What are you implying, Jim?"
"From the moment I saw the name "Captain Tara Reese" come across my PADD, I haven't been able to get my mind off you. All those great memories. All those rejections, as perfectly justified and sound as they were. Maybe somewhere in my idiot head there was a little piece of me that knew what I really needed, what I'd really want. I was just too foolish to see it then.
"And what is that, exactly?" She whispered, unable to take her eyes off his.
"You," he said. "Even before I turned around and saw you tonight—I realized something was going to change tonight. I knew that seeing you again was going to change me yet again. And now, I think I owe you something." He leaned down and gave her a gentle kiss.
When they pulled back, her eyes were teary. "Jim, we can't do this. We're starship captains. Within weeks we'll both be gone and flying different directions in space. How would this ever begin to work?"
"By spending as much time together as we can over the next three weeks. Then, thanks to all the technological sorcery of today, we keep in touch. I'll write you, you write me. And we take advantage of the moments we do have. There aren't that many Starbases out in the universe yet, surely we'll both end up at the same one at the same time again sooner than later."
"But you could be gone tomorrow, or the end of the week, or next week—"
"Or my ship could suddenly be scheduled to leave the same day as yours."
Her eyebrow went up. "How on earth would you manage that?"
"Scotty owes me one."
"Jim, I—"
"Come on, let's get out of here. It's too noisy, and you never liked bars anyway," he said as he took her hand in his and began pulling her out of the bar.
Her mouth hung open in surprise until they were out of the bar and into the quiet of Central Plaza at night.
"What do you mean I never liked bars?"
"You never said it outright. But it was always obvious. I knew it."
"I thought you didn't notice."
"I noticed. I was just too selfish to stop dragging you to them anyway. I was surprised when your invitation was to the Plaza Pub."
"It just seemed like a good place to meet."
He was still holding her hand and walked her towards one of the aqueducts. Once they were at the edge, he kept hold of her hand and leaned against the handrail. "I'm sorry, Tara. You were always such a good friend to me, and I was so selfish."
"You were a good friend, too, Jim. Just in your own way. If anyone had messed with me, you would have taken care of it. And I could talk to you about anything."
"But you hardly ever did. Because it was always Bones and I talking, complaining. I see it all so clearly now, you were so good to us."
"You guys meant the world to me. You made me feel like I was a part of something important, made me feel like I had a family even though mine was so far away."
"How are Mr. and Mrs. Reese? Still living in North Carolina?"
She nodded. "Still there, in the mountains."
"You still owe me a trip to those mountains sometime."
She chuckled. "I suppose I do. Well, if our ships are ever both at Earth, maybe we can both take a little leave and we'll go back home, visit my family, take a hike through the Blue Ridge Mountains."
He smiled. "That sounds great."
They stood there for a bit and watched people milling about, on their way too and from work, restaurants, wherever.
"Hey Jim?" she asked as their eyes both moved to gaze through the sheiding into space.
"Hmm?"
"You gonna let go of my hand anytime soon?"
"Nope. Not letting you go till I have to."
She blushed, and shook her head. "Jim?"
"Yeah?"
"I'm okay with that."
"Good." He turned towards her again. "So, just to be clear. That whole speech you gave about why you always refused my advances—I want to be sure I understand. You turned me down because you cared so much about me. Not because you didn't care."
She simply nodded.
"And... do you think you still care about me?"
"Jim, while I may have changed a bit too, some things haven't. Do I seem like the type of person to dance with you, to let you even hold my hand, if I didn't still care?"
"I just mean—this isn't some weird platonic friendship thing, right? You're feeling what I'm feeling here?"
Tara's face softened, almost to the point of tears, and she reached up and cupped Jim's cheek. "Oh, Jim, what you're feeling now—I've felt that way for almost as long as I've known you."
His eyes fell closed at the feel of her hand on his cheek and he sighed happily and whispered. "Why didn't you say anything?"
She remained quiet long enough that he opened his eyes to see her. One eyebrow was perked up. "Jim," she said softly, "You weren't ready for these feelings. Not then. You cared enough that you would have tried—we would have gone on a date. You would have tried to handle the relationship on my terms. But you weren't ready for it."
"And now—now you think I am?"
"I'm not even sure I'm ready for it, much less you."
"Then why do this?"
She sighed and smiled sweetly up at him, resting her hands on his chest. "Well, I suppose even I cannot hold out forever against the charms of devilishly charming, handsome, James T. Kirk, dashing Captain of the infamous Starship Enterprise."
He smiled, then let out another sigh and leaned forward just enough to place a light kiss on her forehead, his lips staying close by her skin. "God, I'm so glad you asked me to meet you tonight."
"Yeah. Yeah, me too."
"So, what now?"
"Honestly, I have no idea. I hadn't exactly planned beyond meeting you at the bar."
"Well, what did you expect to happen?"
"Not—not this. I don't know, I guess maybe I thought I'd find some version of old Kirk that still wasn't ready for more than a casual fly-by-night relationship. I figured we'd catch up, I'd come to grips with the fact that nothing was ever going to happen, and we'd at least try to keep in touch better—as friends."
"And if that had happened, what would you have done after leaving the pub?"
She considered it for a moment. "Probably would have gone back to my quarters at Starfleet headquarters, watched a movie, maybe made some popcorn."
Kirk grinned. "Popcorn and a movie? Sounds like fun."
Her eyebrow perked up. "Coming back to my quarters, Jim? Now you really are being scandalous."
He grinned. "I'll be on my best behavior, Captain's honor."
She chuckled. "I'm afraid your former lifestyle may have defamed any chance at you using 'Captain's Honor' as a way of giving your word, Jim. But, it does sound fun. Like good old times."
"Except, in good old times, you wouldn't have let me in your quarters if I didn't have Bones tagging along."
"Should I call him."
"Oh no, while I've got your hand in mine, I plan on making this as much a date as I can."
**********
Hours later Jim Kirk was reclined on the couch in the main room of Tara Reeve's quarters. His legs were sprawled out in front of him, one arm on the arm rest, the other stretched out across the back of the couch. This in and of itself wasn't too odd, and might have hearkened back to 'the good old days' as they'd been calling them all night.—except, there was one major difference. One that Jim Kirk had no problem with. Tara Reese was curled up into his side, one arm pinned half behind his back, the other resting on his chest. She'd fallen asleep half way through the second movie, and as it was now ending, he reached over and tapped the PADD laying on the table by the armrest and turned off the viewer. Tara's head was partially tilted towards his face, so he could just make out her own. He smiled. She seemed relaxed, and it brought to him a new, unique sensation of pride unlike any he'd felt before. He was proud to be the one that she felt peaceful and relaxed enough with to fall asleep in his arms. Never had he ever felt this way before. He never would have guessed things would turn out this way, but the more and more he thought about it the more he realized that all along it had been meant to be.
He brushed a hair away from her cheek and tucked it behind her ear, then adjusted his arm that had been on the back of the couch to curl around her back, his hand stroking her back gently. There were so many different ways he realized now that he loved this woman. And, naturally, that he wanted to show her his love. But, she was different, and for Tara Reese, love didn't start with the physical. It started with the heart, the mind, the soul—it started with commitment. Eventually, he sure hoped, it would end up with some deeper physical display. But for the first time in his life, he found himself content to be holding a woman in his arms while sitting on her couch, having just watched old classic movies together. They talked through most of the movies, having both seen them before. They talked about the Academy some more, about her experiences captaining the Alessia, and his captaining the Enterprise. He found it harder than he'd expected to recount losing Pike, to talk about dying. He enjoyed telling her about his friendship with Spock, and how much Spock and Bones irritated each other. They laughed, and they held each other and shed a few tears through the harder parts.
Thinking of the harder parts now, as he held her in his arms, just made him think about what was going to happen in three weeks when they had to say goodbye. He could no more ask her to leave the Alessia than she could ask him to leave the Enterprise. They were captains, and both were dedicated to their crew—their family. He sighed as he realized—the fear that was creeping into the edges of his mind—it was the reason he'd never allowed himself to even consider a more serious relationship. Finding someone you cared about that wasn't on your ship meant that you had to say goodbye and didn't know when you'd see them again—or if you ever would for that matter. Finding someone you cared about on your ship meant that if things didn't work out, it got really awkward when you were stuck in space with an ex.
But he knew one thing for sure. Tara Reese was worth it. Whatever happened, he was going to prove to her that he could be committed.