FIC: The Life and Times of Winona and Jim: R
Title: The Life and Times of Winona and Jim (Or Five Times Jim said "Aw, mom." And the one time Winona said "Aw, Jim.")
Fandom: Star Trek XI
Characters/Pairing: Winona Kirk, Jim Kirk, Jim/Bones
Rating: R (for naughty words, just in case)
Warnings: Mentions of child abuse (not explicit). Angst and some very heavy schmoop.
Words: 3168
Disclaimer: Gene Roddenberry, Paramount Pictures, JJ Abrams. They own all. I'm just playing. No money, no malice.
Summary: Five Times Jim said "Aw, mom." And the one time Winona said "Aw, Jim."
Notes: Written for this prompt over at the kink meme
Also: I've never written in this fandom, aside from a drabble or two, though I am reading a lot in it at the moment, have collected far too many prompts and will be doing some more writing in the not too distant future. That said I've taken some liberties here, mostly with age, and probably with location and whatnot, and of course that Winona is around. Feel free to point out any errors. This is also not beta read, so all mistakes are mine.
1. Rules Are Rules
“James Tiberius Kirk, you’ll brush your teeth and go to bed like a good little boy or so help me...”
“So help you what mom?”
He was an ordinary boy, three and a half, and he already had comebacks to rival his older brother when he was that age. Winona was certain she’d be driven insane by this child, and was determined that there was a line that was drawn and he was not going to cross it.
“You’ll find out, mister, if you carry on... Now go on, scoot...”
She watched as the little terror batted his too bright blue eyes, just like his father’s, right back at her, feigning innocence.
“But mom!”
“Right, that’s it. Your PADD’s are gone. No more of your daddy’s journals until you learn to do what you’re told first time.”
“But...”
“James...” she warned.
“Aw, mom, that’s so....”
“Yes, unfair. Now, scoot.”
It was unfair, but she knew in her heart of hearts that she could never take those journals from him. They were the only way Jim could really connect with the man who had loved them more than his own life. She was going to make sure Jim understood what the rules were, but she wasn’t going to be a monster while she did it.
2. How Heavy Are Cows Anyway?
Winona watched out of the kitchen window that overlooked the fields at their house in Iowa. She sighed when she saw her youngest son high-tail it over the wide expanse of ground, hop over a fence and promptly come barging in through the back door.
“What have you done now, Jim?”
“Nothing.” He gasped. “Honest... Really I didn’t do...”
The almost violent pounding on the front porch screen interrupted them, and Jim silenced almost dramatically as Winona glared at him, before heading to see what trouble he’d got himself into this time. She wasn’t surprised when she came back into the kitchen to find him sitting at the table, almost stoically, waiting for her response to what she’d been told.
Sometimes, it was better to use few words, Winona thought. This was not one of those times. She took a seat opposite him.
“Cow tipping! Cow tipping, Jim! What on God’s green earth do you think you’re playing at? You’re lucky Mr Maddox allowed me to discipline you on this, or you’d be looking at charges. And don’t you think that batting those baby blues at me will get you anywhere!”
“Mom, please, let me...”
“I don’t want your excuses, Jimmy. You’re eleven years old, for goodness sake. You shouldn’t have been anywhere near the Maddox farm. I thought you were going to visit Jeanie. You told me you were going to visit Jeanie.”
“I..”
“You lied to me. And not only that, but you did something stupid in the process, which could have ended up with you getting hurt. Do you know how heavy cows are?!”
Winona tried desperately to hold back the laughter, and looked to the floor, hoping it was enough to stop her son from seeing the humour that was bound to be dancing behind her eyes.
“Well, I’d, um, imagine that they’d be quite, um, heavy? I guess.”
“No going out for two weeks. You’re grounded, buster.”
“Aw, mom...”
“Yes, I know. It’s sooo unfair.”
Jim ran out of the room and stormed up the stairs to his room, slamming the door as he did.
“And don’t think I won’t know if you sneak out, mister!” She shouted after him, before bursting into laughter over the kitchen table.
3. Out of Sight, Out of Mind This turned out to be a lot longer than expected and a lot more angst-ridden
If there was one thing Winona could’ve changed, it would have been her acceptance of Christopher Pike’s offer of a mission, involving research at the Starfleet Academy in San Francisco. In the end, it had turned out to be a ruse to get her to talk to him about George and the Kelvin, and of course the “incident” that led to her husband’s death, but the joy of the research they’d managed to complete far surpassed her anger at the man she’d once considered a friend.
She’d left Jim with “Uncle” Frank at home, and Sam had gone to spend time with her father. When the call came through to the academy that her son had driven a car off a cliff and was in police custody in Iowa, Winona couldn’t believe it. When they said he wasn’t at the station, but at the medical facility, she nearly had a heart attack.
She didn’t care how long it took to get to Jim, all that mattered was that she could see him and know for herself that he was relatively unharmed, and, above all, safe. When she got to the hospital in Iowa, and was promptly placed in a room on her own, her son nowhere to be seen, the panic set in. All at once she was bombarded with thoughts that he was dead, that she would never see the bright sparkle of his eyes, never catch him honest-to-goodness smiling, never be on the receiving end of a witty retort. That she’d never be able to hold him and tell him just how much she loved him.
More than an hour and far too many heartbeats later, she knew that taking that mission five months ago had been the worst thing she’d ever done.
She’d left her son with a monster: entrusted his safety to the care of a man who didn’t care at all. When the police told her, in detail, the extent of the physical and emotional abuse that her boy had suffered over the past months, Winona felt like screaming.
She threw up, cried, threw up again, and wished she was dead.
All she could think of was that she’d let Jim down; let George down, and that that thing who had lived in her house, shared her bed; that thing had hurt her boy, and she’d been oblivious to it all.
She threw up, cried, threw up again, and then wished that thing was dead.
When she ran outside without looking back, no-one stopped her, no-one followed.
By the time she’d reached the house, her anger and hate had boiled over into a seething rage that consumed her. She parked up a fair way away from the main house, and walked the rest of the way. The lights were on. She slipped into the house through the back porch, gripping the baseball bat that she’d picked up from the yard on her way through in her delicate hands.
The bastard didn’t even see her coming.
If anyone noticed that when she returned to get her son, that she was wearing different clothes and was freshly showered, no-one mentioned it.
Jim looked up at her as she came over to the bio-bed in the bay where he was waiting for her. She refused to cry, because he needed for her to be strong. She needed to be strong for him. There would be time to cry later, but now was not the time.
The first thing she did was smile. The second thing she did was pull him into an all-encompassing hug.
“Aw, mom....”
His voice sounded so small, and his breath hitched as he sank into her.
“It’s ok Jimmy. I got you. I’m not going anywhere.”
And she knew right there that she meant it.
4. Birthday Suit
“For God’s sake Jimmy!! Put some clothes on!”
Of all the situations Winona had been in while she was raising her boys, this was the most embarrassing.
Of course, she knew that it was a natural thing, and really not all that surprising. And that it was inevitable, especially with Jim being such a good looking young man; but she didn’t think she’d ever actually end up walking in on him mid-flagrante with a girl who looked far too young to be doing anything of a remotely sexual nature, let alone with her son.
She walked out of the bedroom with much more haste than she had entered it. By the time she’d made it to the kitchen, slumped into a chair, and let her head fall to the tabletop, Jim was already at her heels, thankfully, mostly dressed. A chest she could deal with.
“Mom! You’re back, uh, um, early?”
Bracing herself for the mischievous glint she knew she would find in his eyes, she raised her head from the table where it seemed to be embedded, and tried to be passive.
“Well,” she coughed, clearing her throat. “It is your birthday, so I thought I’d surprise you.”
“Um, mom?”
“Yes.”
“You kinda did.” He laughed, and she couldn’t help but flash him a smile. “Really, mom, is it that bad? Not like you haven’t seen it all before.”
She felt the blush creep across her face as she considered the ease with which he was dealing with the situation, and immediately felt like an idiot. She was a grown up, and getting flustered over something that was normal and healthy was not something that should have gotten her into such a state.
She laughed.
“Very true, Jim. But please, no more surprises in the future, ok? At least if you warn me that we’re going to have company, I’ll know not to come into your room. Deal?” She held out her hand.
He took it in his and shook, nodding. “Deal.”
“Now go on, scoot. Get your ‘friend’ and we’ll go out for dinner and celebrate your birthday properly, yeah?”
She watched as he turned away, mumbling something under his breath as he did.
“Oh and Jim?”
“Yes mom?”
Winona waved her hands around in the air suggestively, before bringing her hands to her neck and making a face at him. “I suggest you wear a high neck top.”
“Aw, mom...”
“Yes Jim, I know, it’s so unfair. But honestly, I’m not taking you out anywhere when you look like you’ve just gone ten rounds with Count Dracula.”
5. Like Father Like Son
Winona knew, of course, that Jim would end up in space. It was something that she’d seen light him up like a spark when he was younger and he read through his dad’s journals, and any others that he could get his hands on, just to feel-out the idea of space, travelling and living in it.
If there was one thing about Jim Kirk that made him so like his father it was that he was a free spirit. Jim Kirk wouldn’t be tied to the earth. It wasn’t in his blood to be. He belonged in space. As his mother, Winona knew that was a fact. It was fate. It may have even been his destiny.
But knowing it and accepting it were two completely different things.
And she was having a really hard time accepting it.
Damn Christopher Pike and his stupid dares.
The vid-call came through in the early hours of the morning, with Jim looking worse for wear. He regaled the tale of his meeting with Pike, and it was so vivid in its description that Winona practically felt as if she’d been a fly on the wall at the bar. He’d mentioned that Pike had dropped his dad’s name like it had been said in passing, but Winona knew that if Pike had any aces up his sleeve to play, that was the one that had sealed his hand.
She was, for lack of a better word, speechless. Thoughts of all the disaster and death that accompanied a Captaincy of a star ship assaulted her head-on, accompanied by long buried but not forgotten memories of George in his final moments, as he gave his life for her, and the other survivors of the Kelvin. Pike was an asshole, and she swore that the next time she saw him she’d rip him a new one.
“Mom?”
Jim’s voice bought her back to the conversation, and she shook her head, as if to clear her mind.
“Yes Jimmy?”
“What should I do?”
Her heart sank. She knew then, that no matter what she said, he was going to take Pike’s challenge. Jim had never been one to turn down a dare - and this one, was monumental. Her eyes met his on the vidscreen, and she knew he’d already made his choice. He just wanted her approval. Her support.
“I think I’m the last person you should be asking for advice on this, sweetie.”
“Jeez, mom, you haven’t called me that in years. I can see you’re not too thrilled with the idea, but I mean, well, honestly, what do you think?”
If she told him what she really thought; that she was scared that he’d go off and die on a mission somewhere, and that she’d be left alone with only memories again, then she’d be being terribly unfair. But how could she say she hadn’t seen this coming, that it had just come earlier than expected? She couldn’t. She wouldn’t be being honest with herself if she did. He was born for this.
For all his faults, for all the times he’d been told he wasn’t as good as his father, he was just like him. And she loved him more because of it.
“You’re just like your dad, y’know?” She took a deep breath, a breath that brooked no interruptions. “He had a passionate streak a mile wide about the things he loved, about his desires, his ambitions. You’ve got that passionate streak too, except it’s the span of the entire universe when you let it out. I can see it in you now: you’re already thinking about what you’ll do once you’re a Captain, the things you’ll see, the people and places you’ll encounter; the life you’ll have.”
She smiled and let out a small sad laugh as a tear rolled down her cheek.
“If it’s in your heart Jimmy, if it’s part of you, so ingrained in you that you can’t see yourself doing anything else, ever, then you do it, you hear?”
“Aw, mom...”
“No, I mean it. And you don’t let anyone, not even me, tell you any different. You got that?”
“Yeah, mom, I got it.”
“When do you leave?”
“Tomorrow. Well, actually, in a few hours. I’ll call and stuff when I’m settled. Promise.”
Winona nodded and took a good hard look at the man on the screen in front of her. As the screen went blank, she could still see him clear as day.
A bright spark in all that darkness...
Wherever George was, she knew he’d be proud.
+1 A Blessing This is very, very schmoopy and quite lengthy
“Honestly mom! You’ll like him. He’s all ‘space is disease and danger wrapped in darkness and silence.’” Jim stated with a mock drawl, chuckling as he remembered word for word what Bones had said to him that day on the shuttlecraft. “You’ll get on like a house on fire.”
“Alright then. What time should I expect you?”
A few hours and a shuttle ride later Winona smiled as she opened the door and was immediately grappled into a bear hug by her son, who was surreptitiously removed by a seemingly disgruntled Georgian man, who obviously wanted an introduction.
“Mom, this is Bones.”
The man raised an eyebrow, and reached out his hand. “Leonard McCoy. Pleasure to meet you, ma’am.”
She couldn’t help it. Honestly. Winona barked out a laugh. He may as well have curtsied he was being so polite. This was not a man she imagined through her son’s descriptions of him. Oh yes, he was handsome, in a rugged way, and he was very Southern, and very tall, but the ‘Bones’ she’d been told about was grumpy and cynical. At least that was what she’d been led to believe.
“Sorry, Leonard, I just wasn’t expecting such manners.”
“Well, I’m not surprised seeing as how you’ve had to put up with Jim here.”
That was more like it. She laughed again and ushered them inside, noting with pleasure the way that Jim’s eyes lingered on the man for a little longer than was necessary, and smiling as McCoy’s hand slipped into the dip of Jim’s back just so... Her son definitely had some explaining to do. There was much more to know about Leonard ‘Bones’ McCoy than she’d been told.
The night went by fairly quickly, they ate good food, talked about old times, caught up on new ones, and Winona finally had Bones to herself while Jim went to shower up before bed. She had a feeling that she knew what the older man was going to say, but she didn’t stop him.
“Is this where I get the ‘you take good care of my boy’ speech? Cause I have to say, if it is, I think I’ll leave now.”
Winona dropped her hands to her sides and shook her head. “If you know Jim as well as I think you do, then it should be damned obvious that he can take care of himself. So, no, it’s not that speech, besides, I have a feeling you’d take care of him regardless. Just don’t...”
“I won’t. I won’t hurt him.” Bones levelled his eyes to hers as he spoke. “He’s been through so much already, too much.”
“You know?”
“He doesn’t talk about it often, not that I’d expect him to, but yeah, I know.” Winona was sure she looked as stunned as she felt. “Know what you did to the bastard too. You’ve got more control than me. I’d have killed him.”
She paused then, took a breath and willed herself to get control before the tears could fall. “I nearly did. How did he...?”
“He bumped into him a couple of years ago and Frank told him what you did, but I think he’d pretty much guessed already.”
“Well, he is supposed to be a genius.”
“Yeah. Can’t get him to stop talking about that though.”
She smiled at that before she spoke.
“He loves you, y’know?”
“I know.” Leonard smiled, and for a minute Winona was taken aback by the pure bliss that danced over his face as he relived a memory. “He told me once, after some speech about me being part of him, ingrained into his life so much he couldn’t see himself being with anyone but me. I love him, too.”
She nodded. There wasn’t really anything else to say. There were no warnings she could give that this man wouldn’t already be aware of. It occurred to her, then, that Jim had brought this man home to meet her because he wanted her blessing.
Later that night, she walked into his room without thinking, and found the two men wrapped in each others arms. They looked like nothing in the universe could separate them, even in sleep. Peaceful. Serene. Complete.
And when Jim’s bright blue eyes opened and met hers, she nodded, and smiled before she spoke.
“Aw, Jim...”
Fandom: Star Trek XI
Characters/Pairing: Winona Kirk, Jim Kirk, Jim/Bones
Rating: R (for naughty words, just in case)
Warnings: Mentions of child abuse (not explicit). Angst and some very heavy schmoop.
Words: 3168
Disclaimer: Gene Roddenberry, Paramount Pictures, JJ Abrams. They own all. I'm just playing. No money, no malice.
Summary: Five Times Jim said "Aw, mom." And the one time Winona said "Aw, Jim."
Notes: Written for this prompt over at the kink meme
Also: I've never written in this fandom, aside from a drabble or two, though I am reading a lot in it at the moment, have collected far too many prompts and will be doing some more writing in the not too distant future. That said I've taken some liberties here, mostly with age, and probably with location and whatnot, and of course that Winona is around. Feel free to point out any errors. This is also not beta read, so all mistakes are mine.
1. Rules Are Rules
“James Tiberius Kirk, you’ll brush your teeth and go to bed like a good little boy or so help me...”
“So help you what mom?”
He was an ordinary boy, three and a half, and he already had comebacks to rival his older brother when he was that age. Winona was certain she’d be driven insane by this child, and was determined that there was a line that was drawn and he was not going to cross it.
“You’ll find out, mister, if you carry on... Now go on, scoot...”
She watched as the little terror batted his too bright blue eyes, just like his father’s, right back at her, feigning innocence.
“But mom!”
“Right, that’s it. Your PADD’s are gone. No more of your daddy’s journals until you learn to do what you’re told first time.”
“But...”
“James...” she warned.
“Aw, mom, that’s so....”
“Yes, unfair. Now, scoot.”
It was unfair, but she knew in her heart of hearts that she could never take those journals from him. They were the only way Jim could really connect with the man who had loved them more than his own life. She was going to make sure Jim understood what the rules were, but she wasn’t going to be a monster while she did it.
2. How Heavy Are Cows Anyway?
Winona watched out of the kitchen window that overlooked the fields at their house in Iowa. She sighed when she saw her youngest son high-tail it over the wide expanse of ground, hop over a fence and promptly come barging in through the back door.
“What have you done now, Jim?”
“Nothing.” He gasped. “Honest... Really I didn’t do...”
The almost violent pounding on the front porch screen interrupted them, and Jim silenced almost dramatically as Winona glared at him, before heading to see what trouble he’d got himself into this time. She wasn’t surprised when she came back into the kitchen to find him sitting at the table, almost stoically, waiting for her response to what she’d been told.
Sometimes, it was better to use few words, Winona thought. This was not one of those times. She took a seat opposite him.
“Cow tipping! Cow tipping, Jim! What on God’s green earth do you think you’re playing at? You’re lucky Mr Maddox allowed me to discipline you on this, or you’d be looking at charges. And don’t you think that batting those baby blues at me will get you anywhere!”
“Mom, please, let me...”
“I don’t want your excuses, Jimmy. You’re eleven years old, for goodness sake. You shouldn’t have been anywhere near the Maddox farm. I thought you were going to visit Jeanie. You told me you were going to visit Jeanie.”
“I..”
“You lied to me. And not only that, but you did something stupid in the process, which could have ended up with you getting hurt. Do you know how heavy cows are?!”
Winona tried desperately to hold back the laughter, and looked to the floor, hoping it was enough to stop her son from seeing the humour that was bound to be dancing behind her eyes.
“Well, I’d, um, imagine that they’d be quite, um, heavy? I guess.”
“No going out for two weeks. You’re grounded, buster.”
“Aw, mom...”
“Yes, I know. It’s sooo unfair.”
Jim ran out of the room and stormed up the stairs to his room, slamming the door as he did.
“And don’t think I won’t know if you sneak out, mister!” She shouted after him, before bursting into laughter over the kitchen table.
3. Out of Sight, Out of Mind This turned out to be a lot longer than expected and a lot more angst-ridden
If there was one thing Winona could’ve changed, it would have been her acceptance of Christopher Pike’s offer of a mission, involving research at the Starfleet Academy in San Francisco. In the end, it had turned out to be a ruse to get her to talk to him about George and the Kelvin, and of course the “incident” that led to her husband’s death, but the joy of the research they’d managed to complete far surpassed her anger at the man she’d once considered a friend.
She’d left Jim with “Uncle” Frank at home, and Sam had gone to spend time with her father. When the call came through to the academy that her son had driven a car off a cliff and was in police custody in Iowa, Winona couldn’t believe it. When they said he wasn’t at the station, but at the medical facility, she nearly had a heart attack.
She didn’t care how long it took to get to Jim, all that mattered was that she could see him and know for herself that he was relatively unharmed, and, above all, safe. When she got to the hospital in Iowa, and was promptly placed in a room on her own, her son nowhere to be seen, the panic set in. All at once she was bombarded with thoughts that he was dead, that she would never see the bright sparkle of his eyes, never catch him honest-to-goodness smiling, never be on the receiving end of a witty retort. That she’d never be able to hold him and tell him just how much she loved him.
More than an hour and far too many heartbeats later, she knew that taking that mission five months ago had been the worst thing she’d ever done.
She’d left her son with a monster: entrusted his safety to the care of a man who didn’t care at all. When the police told her, in detail, the extent of the physical and emotional abuse that her boy had suffered over the past months, Winona felt like screaming.
She threw up, cried, threw up again, and wished she was dead.
All she could think of was that she’d let Jim down; let George down, and that that thing who had lived in her house, shared her bed; that thing had hurt her boy, and she’d been oblivious to it all.
She threw up, cried, threw up again, and then wished that thing was dead.
When she ran outside without looking back, no-one stopped her, no-one followed.
By the time she’d reached the house, her anger and hate had boiled over into a seething rage that consumed her. She parked up a fair way away from the main house, and walked the rest of the way. The lights were on. She slipped into the house through the back porch, gripping the baseball bat that she’d picked up from the yard on her way through in her delicate hands.
The bastard didn’t even see her coming.
If anyone noticed that when she returned to get her son, that she was wearing different clothes and was freshly showered, no-one mentioned it.
Jim looked up at her as she came over to the bio-bed in the bay where he was waiting for her. She refused to cry, because he needed for her to be strong. She needed to be strong for him. There would be time to cry later, but now was not the time.
The first thing she did was smile. The second thing she did was pull him into an all-encompassing hug.
“Aw, mom....”
His voice sounded so small, and his breath hitched as he sank into her.
“It’s ok Jimmy. I got you. I’m not going anywhere.”
And she knew right there that she meant it.
4. Birthday Suit
“For God’s sake Jimmy!! Put some clothes on!”
Of all the situations Winona had been in while she was raising her boys, this was the most embarrassing.
Of course, she knew that it was a natural thing, and really not all that surprising. And that it was inevitable, especially with Jim being such a good looking young man; but she didn’t think she’d ever actually end up walking in on him mid-flagrante with a girl who looked far too young to be doing anything of a remotely sexual nature, let alone with her son.
She walked out of the bedroom with much more haste than she had entered it. By the time she’d made it to the kitchen, slumped into a chair, and let her head fall to the tabletop, Jim was already at her heels, thankfully, mostly dressed. A chest she could deal with.
“Mom! You’re back, uh, um, early?”
Bracing herself for the mischievous glint she knew she would find in his eyes, she raised her head from the table where it seemed to be embedded, and tried to be passive.
“Well,” she coughed, clearing her throat. “It is your birthday, so I thought I’d surprise you.”
“Um, mom?”
“Yes.”
“You kinda did.” He laughed, and she couldn’t help but flash him a smile. “Really, mom, is it that bad? Not like you haven’t seen it all before.”
She felt the blush creep across her face as she considered the ease with which he was dealing with the situation, and immediately felt like an idiot. She was a grown up, and getting flustered over something that was normal and healthy was not something that should have gotten her into such a state.
She laughed.
“Very true, Jim. But please, no more surprises in the future, ok? At least if you warn me that we’re going to have company, I’ll know not to come into your room. Deal?” She held out her hand.
He took it in his and shook, nodding. “Deal.”
“Now go on, scoot. Get your ‘friend’ and we’ll go out for dinner and celebrate your birthday properly, yeah?”
She watched as he turned away, mumbling something under his breath as he did.
“Oh and Jim?”
“Yes mom?”
Winona waved her hands around in the air suggestively, before bringing her hands to her neck and making a face at him. “I suggest you wear a high neck top.”
“Aw, mom...”
“Yes Jim, I know, it’s so unfair. But honestly, I’m not taking you out anywhere when you look like you’ve just gone ten rounds with Count Dracula.”
5. Like Father Like Son
Winona knew, of course, that Jim would end up in space. It was something that she’d seen light him up like a spark when he was younger and he read through his dad’s journals, and any others that he could get his hands on, just to feel-out the idea of space, travelling and living in it.
If there was one thing about Jim Kirk that made him so like his father it was that he was a free spirit. Jim Kirk wouldn’t be tied to the earth. It wasn’t in his blood to be. He belonged in space. As his mother, Winona knew that was a fact. It was fate. It may have even been his destiny.
But knowing it and accepting it were two completely different things.
And she was having a really hard time accepting it.
Damn Christopher Pike and his stupid dares.
The vid-call came through in the early hours of the morning, with Jim looking worse for wear. He regaled the tale of his meeting with Pike, and it was so vivid in its description that Winona practically felt as if she’d been a fly on the wall at the bar. He’d mentioned that Pike had dropped his dad’s name like it had been said in passing, but Winona knew that if Pike had any aces up his sleeve to play, that was the one that had sealed his hand.
She was, for lack of a better word, speechless. Thoughts of all the disaster and death that accompanied a Captaincy of a star ship assaulted her head-on, accompanied by long buried but not forgotten memories of George in his final moments, as he gave his life for her, and the other survivors of the Kelvin. Pike was an asshole, and she swore that the next time she saw him she’d rip him a new one.
“Mom?”
Jim’s voice bought her back to the conversation, and she shook her head, as if to clear her mind.
“Yes Jimmy?”
“What should I do?”
Her heart sank. She knew then, that no matter what she said, he was going to take Pike’s challenge. Jim had never been one to turn down a dare - and this one, was monumental. Her eyes met his on the vidscreen, and she knew he’d already made his choice. He just wanted her approval. Her support.
“I think I’m the last person you should be asking for advice on this, sweetie.”
“Jeez, mom, you haven’t called me that in years. I can see you’re not too thrilled with the idea, but I mean, well, honestly, what do you think?”
If she told him what she really thought; that she was scared that he’d go off and die on a mission somewhere, and that she’d be left alone with only memories again, then she’d be being terribly unfair. But how could she say she hadn’t seen this coming, that it had just come earlier than expected? She couldn’t. She wouldn’t be being honest with herself if she did. He was born for this.
For all his faults, for all the times he’d been told he wasn’t as good as his father, he was just like him. And she loved him more because of it.
“You’re just like your dad, y’know?” She took a deep breath, a breath that brooked no interruptions. “He had a passionate streak a mile wide about the things he loved, about his desires, his ambitions. You’ve got that passionate streak too, except it’s the span of the entire universe when you let it out. I can see it in you now: you’re already thinking about what you’ll do once you’re a Captain, the things you’ll see, the people and places you’ll encounter; the life you’ll have.”
She smiled and let out a small sad laugh as a tear rolled down her cheek.
“If it’s in your heart Jimmy, if it’s part of you, so ingrained in you that you can’t see yourself doing anything else, ever, then you do it, you hear?”
“Aw, mom...”
“No, I mean it. And you don’t let anyone, not even me, tell you any different. You got that?”
“Yeah, mom, I got it.”
“When do you leave?”
“Tomorrow. Well, actually, in a few hours. I’ll call and stuff when I’m settled. Promise.”
Winona nodded and took a good hard look at the man on the screen in front of her. As the screen went blank, she could still see him clear as day.
A bright spark in all that darkness...
Wherever George was, she knew he’d be proud.
+1 A Blessing This is very, very schmoopy and quite lengthy
“Honestly mom! You’ll like him. He’s all ‘space is disease and danger wrapped in darkness and silence.’” Jim stated with a mock drawl, chuckling as he remembered word for word what Bones had said to him that day on the shuttlecraft. “You’ll get on like a house on fire.”
“Alright then. What time should I expect you?”
A few hours and a shuttle ride later Winona smiled as she opened the door and was immediately grappled into a bear hug by her son, who was surreptitiously removed by a seemingly disgruntled Georgian man, who obviously wanted an introduction.
“Mom, this is Bones.”
The man raised an eyebrow, and reached out his hand. “Leonard McCoy. Pleasure to meet you, ma’am.”
She couldn’t help it. Honestly. Winona barked out a laugh. He may as well have curtsied he was being so polite. This was not a man she imagined through her son’s descriptions of him. Oh yes, he was handsome, in a rugged way, and he was very Southern, and very tall, but the ‘Bones’ she’d been told about was grumpy and cynical. At least that was what she’d been led to believe.
“Sorry, Leonard, I just wasn’t expecting such manners.”
“Well, I’m not surprised seeing as how you’ve had to put up with Jim here.”
That was more like it. She laughed again and ushered them inside, noting with pleasure the way that Jim’s eyes lingered on the man for a little longer than was necessary, and smiling as McCoy’s hand slipped into the dip of Jim’s back just so... Her son definitely had some explaining to do. There was much more to know about Leonard ‘Bones’ McCoy than she’d been told.
The night went by fairly quickly, they ate good food, talked about old times, caught up on new ones, and Winona finally had Bones to herself while Jim went to shower up before bed. She had a feeling that she knew what the older man was going to say, but she didn’t stop him.
“Is this where I get the ‘you take good care of my boy’ speech? Cause I have to say, if it is, I think I’ll leave now.”
Winona dropped her hands to her sides and shook her head. “If you know Jim as well as I think you do, then it should be damned obvious that he can take care of himself. So, no, it’s not that speech, besides, I have a feeling you’d take care of him regardless. Just don’t...”
“I won’t. I won’t hurt him.” Bones levelled his eyes to hers as he spoke. “He’s been through so much already, too much.”
“You know?”
“He doesn’t talk about it often, not that I’d expect him to, but yeah, I know.” Winona was sure she looked as stunned as she felt. “Know what you did to the bastard too. You’ve got more control than me. I’d have killed him.”
She paused then, took a breath and willed herself to get control before the tears could fall. “I nearly did. How did he...?”
“He bumped into him a couple of years ago and Frank told him what you did, but I think he’d pretty much guessed already.”
“Well, he is supposed to be a genius.”
“Yeah. Can’t get him to stop talking about that though.”
She smiled at that before she spoke.
“He loves you, y’know?”
“I know.” Leonard smiled, and for a minute Winona was taken aback by the pure bliss that danced over his face as he relived a memory. “He told me once, after some speech about me being part of him, ingrained into his life so much he couldn’t see himself being with anyone but me. I love him, too.”
She nodded. There wasn’t really anything else to say. There were no warnings she could give that this man wouldn’t already be aware of. It occurred to her, then, that Jim had brought this man home to meet her because he wanted her blessing.
Later that night, she walked into his room without thinking, and found the two men wrapped in each others arms. They looked like nothing in the universe could separate them, even in sleep. Peaceful. Serene. Complete.
And when Jim’s bright blue eyes opened and met hers, she nodded, and smiled before she spoke.
“Aw, Jim...”