FIC: The Graceful Waltz
Title: The Graceful Waltz
Pairing: Kirk/McCoy
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: They don't belong to me.
Word Count: 4,518
Summary: This dancing around each other has to end at some point. Bones makes a move and Jim goes home.
Notes: Still no fanmix. Oops. An unnamed series. Hard-Earned Rights, in which Jim was in a shuttle accident, followed by Just About Time in which Jocelyn wonders whether or not Kirk's made his move yet.
Hard-Earned Rights // Just About Time // The Graceful Waltz // One // The Grave Memorial Of A Life Unlived // Houses & Heartwarmings // Guess Who's Coming To Dinner // Enterprise On My Mind // Your Fate's Not In The Stars // A World of Solemn Thought // Time Can Never Kill The True Heart
The Enterprise leaves from Iowa’s dry docks in a week’s time.
After spending so long in McCoy’s welcoming home, it inevitably comes time to leave. Joanna doesn’t even bother to hide her tears as she presses tight hugs to Jim and hugs McCoy for so long that she might well fuse herself to his frame if she holds much longer or much tighter. They say fond goodbyes before piling up the car with their luggage and making the two-day trip up to Iowa.
The car-ride is awkward and their conversation is stilted. Anytime they veer close to the subject of them, McCoy finds fit to discuss the next five-year mission or Kirk talks nervously about not seeing his mother for six months and wondering what it’s going to be like.
They stay at a motel in Ohio and Jim is the one who asks for two rooms. From the look of relief on Bones’ face, he feels like that’s earned him a couple dozen points in his favor. In the morning, Jim illegally enters Bones’ room and lunges onto the bed, sprawling behind Bones, ruffling his hair and draping himself out on the other half of the mussed coverlets.
“You’re thirty,” Bones accuses.
“So?” Jim feels like an impudent child. He’s refreshed and they’re within striking distance of his home. Beyond that, Bones is looking at him with tired fondness and they’ve got the rest of the day to have avoidant conversations about this, that, and any other subjects. He stretches out his back and wiggles his hips slightly while smacking Bones in the face with a pillow. “Just because I’m not Bones McCoy-thirty doesn’t mean I’m not growing up.”
“You should be slowing down.”
“Oh, I’m plenty slowing down. Notice how I didn’t maul you,” Jim points out. “Or put your hand in warm water. Or toss cold water on your face.” He can actually go on for a while, but he adjusts the pillow beneath his head and relaxes back against the stiff-as-rock motel bed. “Besides, you worked out that muscle I pulled in my back the other week. I think that’s proof enough that I’m getting old.”
“You’ll never be old,” Bones sleepily mumbles. He sounds like he’s ready to drop off into the world of slumber again if Jim lets him. “You’re going to be perpetually young, even when you’re eighty.”
And then Bones starts laughing madly.
Maybe it could have been written off as a stroke, but Jim’s absently tickling his midsection and doesn’t even look surprised when Bones rolls over and traps his wrists above his head, a growl softly emitting from his throat and a glare in his eyes. Jim writhes slightly and doesn’t exactly tell his best friend that he’s infinitely sexy when he gets angry like that. He ends up on his back, pinned to the bed, and stares up at Bones with a sated smile on his face.
“I’ll get old,” Jim insists. “And grey. And you’ll still be at my side. Bones…” he gives a soft laugh. “You’ll probably outlive me,” he points out. “You’re the most stubborn being in the whole universe I’ve ever met and I’m including that planet with the elders who insisted on upholding ancient Roman tradition.”
Neither of them say a word to that, but if Bones is thinking anywhere along the lines of what Jim is, he’s entertaining a quiet vision of some kind of future where they both survive the worst that space has to offer.
There’s grey in their hair and there are wrinkles and neither will move as fast as they once had, but Jim likes to think that Bones is going to be there with him, romantically or not, and they’re going to make it out alive, even if Jim has to bring down the whole universe and tame it to make sure this happens.
Jim is the first one to sit up and groan, scrubbing his hand through his hair and padding across the room to drape an arm over the bathroom door’s frame, swaying into the tiled room as he watches Bones.
“Borrowing your shower,” he informs Bones with a cocky grin. “If I’m not out in thirty minutes…”
“Yeah, I know, I’ll ream you a new one for using my hot water to jerk yourself off,” Bones finishes off the sentence in a way completely untrue to what Jim had been about to say.
What? No, really. That isn’t at all what Jim had been intending to say. It’d been more along the lines of If I’m not out in thirty, I expect a rescue party and mouth-to-mouth.
Still, that doesn’t stop him from thinking about Bones the whole time he’s in the shower and he might have matured a lot in the last five years, but when he touches himself, he’s still only about milliseconds away from moaning out Bones’ name just to see if he comes running.
He stops himself from calling out any particular names, but he still touches himself. This time, though, he closes his eyes as he comes and thinks about twenty years from now and being healthy and alive thanks to Bones’ miracle hands. He thinks of white hair at Bones’ temples and a grown Joanna and grandkids and he thinks of slow and burning sex as he thinks of himself screwing Bones into the mattress while he bitches about being ‘a doctor, not your woman for the hour, Jim’ with that growl in his voice.
He dries himself off quickly and catches his reflection in the mirror.
“You’re not there yet,” he tells the Kirk in the mirror while he rubs the towel through his hair and leaves it sticking up in every last direction. He flicks the towel into the sink as he adjusts the one sliding low on his hips and grins as he wanders back out into the bedroom. “Bones, where’s breakfast!” he announces cheerfully, happily ignoring the fact of his nudity.
To his credit, it’s not like Bones says a thing about it. They’re as good as domesticated at this point. Jim’s just working backwards to earn all the fun stuff that they’ve managed to skip to get to this point.
*
The minute they get in, Frank takes their suitcases up to their respective rooms and then vanishes into the kitchen to put together dinner. Sam’s not been home for months, Winona tells Jim between affectionate kisses to his cheeks, and she’s more than happy to finally fill the house with some actual life. The golden retriever (barely more than a pup) lies reclined and lazy on the floor and peers up at Jim without much interest at all.
They exchange small talk and Winona clasps Bones by the cheeks and studies him long and hard while Jim flushes and prays that nothing is said that’s bound to humiliate him for…oh, he doesn’t know, maybe his entire life.
“So you’re Doctor Leonard McCoy,” Winona remarks when she finally releases Bones and clasps Jim’s hand in her own, tugging him closer to her side for this odd half-hearted and half-affection, half-desperate hug. “From all the stories Jim’s told us, I think we owe you about a dozen apologies.”
“Oh?”
“My boy’s apparently a handful.”
“You have no idea, Ma’am,” Bones says with a hearty laugh and it turns his voice into something warm and delightful and it makes Jim shiver. Jim is fond of staring at Bones when he smiles and laughs like that. He’s like a moth to the flame as he watches the corners of Bones’ lips curve upwards in a mad dash for the ceiling.
Bones catches his eye and Jim grins back at him and bites down on his lower lip, suddenly feeling like he’s fifteen again. That feeling hardly dissipates when suddenly his mother is clasping his hand tightly and turning on the old record player and insisting that he dance with her because she needs to practice before she puts those skills to use in public.
“Mom, wha…?” Jim laughs out the words, even if he’s helpless to doing whatever his mother asks of him. He loves her more than anything in the whole world and some days, they each felt as if the other was all they had left. That had been the fair summation of his childhood - him, Sam, and Winona all clinging hard onto each other as if they would spin away when gravity dared to separate them. Sometimes physical distance removed them and Sam would wander away from home and Jim would act up, but Winona always came home to the boys and Jim’s always been grateful for that.
He hadn’t needed to be a hero as a child. All he had to do was survive in order to make his father’s sacrifice worth it. His time for playing the hero is recent because it’s not just about making the sacrifice worth it - it’s about making his father proud, wherever his spirit is.
Suddenly he’s on his feet and he’s trying to make sure he’s got a graceful frame and he’s trying not to feel too self-conscious. He’s dimly aware that Bones has slipped out of the room and suddenly it’s just himself and his mother and they’re attempting to dance away all the worries of the past.
One, two, three, they go, one, two, three and turn. Neither of them is well-practiced or perfect at this, but they’re both enthusiastic. Winona smiles until the laugh lines show on her face and Jim’s laughing as he stares fully at his feet and counts silently, mouthing each number while his shoulders hunch forward. His mother is only attending a small affair, she explains, but Winona wants to know at least one dance and the waltz seems simplest.
“Now this is just a shame, ma’am,” McCoy greets patiently, dropping his bag of books neatly by the door. He’s gone out to the car to retrieve the last of his possessions and has only now returned. “Permission to cut in, Jim?”
Jim glances over his shoulder and his cheeks flush an embarrassed pink the likes of which hasn’t graced his face since he was fifteen and his mother had come back from an off-world mission to find him generously attending to himself in the den. In his defense, no one was supposed to be home for another two days.
It happens so smoothly that Jim’s not even aware that his position as lead has been usurped until suddenly he’s standing on the sidelines and watching Bones take his mother’s hands, brush a hand through his hair (in sheepish modesty or something like) and they begin to gracefully dance as Bones gently gives instruction and advice.
McCoy’s danced his fair share in his lifetime. Weddings, anniversaries, birthdays, showers. These are the things you get involved with when you have a young wife on your arm and a new baby. Jim’s well aware of the life Bones led before Starfleet and so he understands how it can be so easy for McCoy to lapse back into old patterns and talents
“Just like that,” Bones is advising with that soft grin of his, the one that makes his face light up and the one that Jim had almost thought would never return. It had existed only in photographs of the past until some time during the mission when out of nowhere, Jim had seen McCoy smile like he’d never seen before - with genuine and absolute unfettered joy. Jim believes in miracles, he does, and to this date the greatest miracle he’s ever born witness to involves getting the happiness back in Bones’ eyes and the smile back on his face. “You want to trust in your lead and keep your eyes up,” he adds, two fingers sliding under Winona’s chin and raising her gaze. Her short pixie-cut hair bobs forward as she looks up at him and affords him an anxious smile.
Jim knows that he ought to feel left-out, but he can’t help the swell of warmth and delight at this scene. He just wishes he could record it.
He’s lost in thoughts when he realizes that someone has been calling his name gently.
“Jim, come back here,” Winona beckons after Frank’s given her a call to come and try the sauce for the dinner, lest he over-salt it. Jim still tenses at his voice, but he’s long since learned that the disdain he held for the man when he was a child was born out of such typical cliché that he almost hated to admit it.
For all that Frank tried, he had never been Jim’s actual father and Jim had blamed him for that because it was easier than blaming his mother and easier than blaming some foreign threat he had never seen before. Now that he’s met Nero, now that he’s watched him die, he can happily place the blame elsewhere and he’s starting to try and give Frank the benefit of the doubt. ‘Evil stepfather’ had been a good place to lay his childish fury before, but he’s a grown man now. He needs to be beyond that.
Jim obeys his mother dutifully and ends up suddenly placed in Bones’ arms, his hand slowly pushing up McCoy’s wrist and past the speedy pulse in order to twine their fingers together. “Uh…” he says, mouth going dry as he stares wildly and widely at his mother. “Mom?”
“Practice, Jim,” she lightly teases. “You need to learn some day and I’m still holding out hope on attending a lavish wedding for you. You need to be able to waltz for that. I’ll be right there, Frank,” she calls over her shoulder before pressing a kiss to Jim’s cheek and leaving the room.
Bones tightens his grip on Jim’s hand lightly, barely even. Jim feels it like a sledgehammer coming down to strike him in the head, which would help to explain why he feels so absolutely dizzy right now.
“Don’t break my toes, Jim,” Bones says in a quiet lilt of a tone. “Don’t think I want to put down ‘injury via clumsy Captain’ in an official medical record.”
They’re just standing there and they’re not actually dancing. Jim feels like maybe he ought to take the first step, but he’s busy trying to tell his heart that it’s not having an attack just because it’s trying to beat out of his chest. He tries to recall the first time he thought he fell in love rather than lust and he tries to remember how he had subdued the feelings.
He exhales and drifts in slightly closer and reminds himself that they aren’t supposed to be pushing things too quickly. Or, scratch that. Jim isn’t supposed to be pushing things too quickly and that means behaving. When he brushes his thumb in a gentle circle, he can feel McCoy’s pulse just lightly under the pad of his fingers and when he turns half-lidded eyes up, he can see Bones’ lips falling open. They’re moist and Jim wants to groan because this is like putting an addict in front of the world’s most legendary wine and daring him not to drink.
Jim manages a rueful smile, his lips feeling like they might crack when they turn upwards. “Sorry about my Mom,” he manages quietly. “She’s a little much sometimes. And the wedding thing will pass, it’s just that I’m thirty and…”
“And she’s waiting for you to grow up?” Bones finishes his sentence for him.
“I think she’s waiting on the rest of the world to figure that I already have,” Jim says and tries not to get too annoyed. McCoy knows that as well as he does, but denial’s a heavy weapon when a person lets it act as a thick shield. He’s grown up plenty and he’s done a fine job of it. He’s one of the most respected Captains in the fleet and it’s not because of the Narada incident. It’s because he worked five long years to prove to the universe that not only is he capable, but he’s more than capable of exceeding the expectations of everyone around him. “And besides. I’m pretty sure she’s really not that serious about the wedding thing. Well, kinda almost sure.”
“My mother went into fits of delight at mine,” Bones confesses with a rueful smile. “Damn near thought she might have an apoplectic fit of joy at the gift table.”
“You don’t talk much about your wedding.”
Bones shrugs idly and they’re finally moving in an idle sway back and forth. It’s not exactly a waltz, but there’s enough movement that it can be called graceful. “My mother died not long after it. It felt like a bad omen. Jocelyn tried to get me out of my moods, but she was pregnant and subject to moods herself. And then…”
“And then your Dad,” Jim agrees quietly.
They don’t have to talk about that because it’s a tense subject and one that Jim hadn’t even known about until they had arrived to an alien planet and the Federation had sent a message strictly instructing that: DR MCCOY WILL NOT BE PERMITTED PLANETSIDE FOR THIS PARTICULAR MISSION AS HE IS EMOTIONALLY COMPROMISED. It hadn’t taken long for Jim to ferret out the truth after that about vaccines and cures and pleaded deaths that happened too early for comfort. Since then, it’s been an elephant in the corner of the room that they never exactly approach, but they let it sit. They let it out of their sights and ignore it.
They’ve stopped dancing.
Jim is looking up at Bones with wide eyes and checking his internal clock to wonder if it’s time yet and when he catches the look of intent in Bones’ eyes, he falters. There’s something there he recognizes from other people, but he’s never seen it focused on him, never seen it in those warm brown eyes.
“Bones,” Jim says, swallowing the dryness in his throat and wishing like mad that he could quantify what’s going on here. There’s hardly any space between them and Bones has moved his hand from Jim’s shoulder to his back, sliding slowly down the fabric until he’s hitching him in with a hand on the small of his back.
They’re so close that when Bones exhales, Jim can feel the soft warmth of his breath against his cheek and it’s going to drive him crazy if something doesn’t happen soon.
“Jim, Leonard,” his mother’s voice interrupts whatever was coming next. “Dinnertime, boys.”
It might be absolutely childish, but the only retort on his lips is a whiny ‘Mom’ that is desperately fighting to come out. He never does find out the intent that Bones held because they’re suddenly two feet apart and it’s like the moment never happened. They sit to dinner, they discuss the political machinations of Starfleet, they break bread and laugh over childhood stories of Jim’s antics and Winona’s travels.
Jim helps with the washing up and flicks soap bubbles at Bones as they discuss the repairs that the Enterprise will be enduring while at the dry dock just miles away. There are renovations to be made and certain quarters will be receiving a full upheaval. Kirk’s asked for his to be repainted and redone to allow for a feel that’s slightly more like home.
He doubts he’s ever going to tell Bones that he came to this decision after spending so long within the walls of Bones’ Georgian home.
He slings a towel over his shoulder when Bones leans his frame heavily on Jim and that’s all he’s going to give as an indicator that he’s tired. He doesn’t have to say a word at this point because Jim knows Bones so thoroughly that even blinking could be interpreted with one-hundred percent accuracy. He takes the hint and leads Bones away from the sink, tugging lightly on his hand to coax him upstairs.
Jim knows the way to the guest room like he knows the back of an Andorian’s hand. He leads Bones up the stairs and doesn’t even think how funny he must look with the cloth draped over his shirt, yet.
He doesn’t know Bones like that same hand apparently. Jim’s expecting to send his friend off to bed and to exchange awkward pleasantries. Jim might sneak into the room in the middle of the night to reminisce about his childhood, but that’s as far as his mind will offer plans for him.
Instead of Bones turning in for the night, suddenly Jim’s back is pinned up against the wall and he’s staring at Bones like he’s grown a second head and decided to name it Scotty sometime in the last little while.
“Uh…”
“Shut up, Jim, and go with this,” Bones commands as broad hands begin to circumnavigate the span of Jim’s waist and brush against his torso before settling at his hips. Jim wants to know if his mother had spiked Bones’ dinner to get him acting like this, but as it’s pretty much exactly what he wants and he’s not about to complain.
He’s sure there’s some kind of psychological explanation for this. It’s probably the same reason why McCoy hasn’t initiated anything and then suddenly he’s okay to pounce on Jim in the second floor hallway of his childhood home.
He’s never been good at just letting things lie and so before he knows it, the words are out of his mouth. “Why now?”
“The moon’s full, the mood’s right, hell, I don’t know Jim,” McCoy admits as he leans in and brushes his lips against the corner of Jim’s and damn very nearly well steals his breath away from him. “I’m feeling more like I’m capable of actually doing this than I have in months and I’m not looking this gift horse in the mouth. I’m not scared, Jim. Not now. I’m not scared.” His hands traverse down Jim’s biceps and to his wrists, securely pinning him in place before their mouths meet and they share the first kiss that’s something more than chaste. Jim wants to insist that there’s no reason for Bones to be scared because if they’re going to plummet and fall to the ground, they’re at least going to do it together and Jim would promise Bones that he’ll always break his fall.
There is intent and desire pouring off of Bones and it’s a flood coming to wash Jim away. He’s ready to fully give himself over to it.
If he’s going to go out with a bang, he might as well give a soft whimper in the meantime.
His hips hitch forward as his head falls back against the wall. Bones tugs his lower lip into his mouth and sucks lightly the once before aligning their noses and pressing the full weight and warmth of his body against Jim’s. They stay aligned like this for another moment before the kissing begins again and Jim shoves his hands down McCoy’s trousers and they simply hook there, yanking Bones closer by the waistband of his loose jeans.
Whatever’s triggered this in Bones, Jim isn’t going to fight it. Some whim of the moment, some flash of courage, but whatever it is, it’s gotten them further than anything else has in the last three months and Jim wants to give gracious thanks to whatever it could be.
“Jim?”
His mother’s voice floats down the hallway as if a ghost’s and Bones freezes up with his hands cupping Jim’s cheeks. “Yeah, Mom?” he replies hoarsely, as if his thumb isn’t inches away from brushing McCoy’s cock.
“Put the dog out before you go to bed, please,” she requests sleepily and the sound of a door clicking shut is all they hear before the mood is utterly broken and Bones eases away with a rueful smile.
Jim supposes it’d be asking the universe to find out if McCoy’s courage and sudden spell of desire has somehow lasted past that bout of cold water. One look at his best friend’s face and he understands immediately that whatever touching they’ll be doing that night will be incidental and not sexual in the least.
“You heard the lady,” McCoy instructs, voice rough with a hoarseness that Jim would love to ascribe to a need that only Jim can fulfill, but it’s probably just exhaustion seeping through his skin. They’ve had a long few travel days and they both need all the sleep they can go so they can stay in their right minds. Jim makes sure to walk McCoy to his door and leans heavily against the frame as Bones turns to look at him and brushes his fingers through Jim’s hair, earning a shuddered exhalation from his Captain.
“You’re a fucking cocktease, Leonard McCoy,” Jim accuses as his voice comes out strangled. He knows it’s not Bones’ fault that their timing absolutely sucks and they shouldn’t keep doing this under the watchful eyes of the women in their lives, but it’s either this or under the full purview of hundreds of crewmembers.
Somehow, booking a hotel room for the night makes things too impersonal and Jim doesn’t want that to be the start of them, whatever that start will be.
He watches Bones with a lingering look of yearning in his eyes and exhales as he leans into Bones’ body, chest pressed against his.
“Put the dog to bed, Jim,” Bones encourages lightly. “And then bring your pillow to my room.”
“To…?”
“To sleep, Jim. Your mother and stepfather are down the hall,” Bones reprimands lightly and pulls away until they aren’t touching any longer. Bones retreats into the small guest room and arranges the quilts until he’s made room for himself in this little spot of Jim’s life.
He nestles his way in and Jim watches him for a long moment.
This dance is over, but Jim knows that there’s more waiting in the future. He bounds downstairs to let the dog out and is met with a curious look in the canine’s eyes. Jim grins as he accompanies him outside into the warm evening air and stands there under that beautiful full moon shining down on him.
“Things were so much easier when I was loose,” Jim informs the dog, who merely yawns as he does his business and trots back to the door to be let back inside. Jim’s not expecting high conversation, but hey, he has to try. He puts the dog to bed before sneaking up into McCoy’s room and lies down behind him all night.
As he falls asleep, he hears Bones’ voice from his memory and there, in his thoughts, he’s counting softly.
One, two, three.
Jim dreams of kisses that night and counts to three. He wakes up and feels like his feet are aching and his heart is soaring. He’s waltzed in his dreams to the tune of the dance he and Bones are doing around each other. Sooner or later, they’re going to come to a midpoint.
It’s just one, two, three until they get there.
THE END
Pairing: Kirk/McCoy
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: They don't belong to me.
Word Count: 4,518
Summary: This dancing around each other has to end at some point. Bones makes a move and Jim goes home.
Notes: Still no fanmix. Oops. An unnamed series. Hard-Earned Rights, in which Jim was in a shuttle accident, followed by Just About Time in which Jocelyn wonders whether or not Kirk's made his move yet.
Hard-Earned Rights // Just About Time // The Graceful Waltz // One // The Grave Memorial Of A Life Unlived // Houses & Heartwarmings // Guess Who's Coming To Dinner // Enterprise On My Mind // Your Fate's Not In The Stars // A World of Solemn Thought // Time Can Never Kill The True Heart
The Enterprise leaves from Iowa’s dry docks in a week’s time.
After spending so long in McCoy’s welcoming home, it inevitably comes time to leave. Joanna doesn’t even bother to hide her tears as she presses tight hugs to Jim and hugs McCoy for so long that she might well fuse herself to his frame if she holds much longer or much tighter. They say fond goodbyes before piling up the car with their luggage and making the two-day trip up to Iowa.
The car-ride is awkward and their conversation is stilted. Anytime they veer close to the subject of them, McCoy finds fit to discuss the next five-year mission or Kirk talks nervously about not seeing his mother for six months and wondering what it’s going to be like.
They stay at a motel in Ohio and Jim is the one who asks for two rooms. From the look of relief on Bones’ face, he feels like that’s earned him a couple dozen points in his favor. In the morning, Jim illegally enters Bones’ room and lunges onto the bed, sprawling behind Bones, ruffling his hair and draping himself out on the other half of the mussed coverlets.
“You’re thirty,” Bones accuses.
“So?” Jim feels like an impudent child. He’s refreshed and they’re within striking distance of his home. Beyond that, Bones is looking at him with tired fondness and they’ve got the rest of the day to have avoidant conversations about this, that, and any other subjects. He stretches out his back and wiggles his hips slightly while smacking Bones in the face with a pillow. “Just because I’m not Bones McCoy-thirty doesn’t mean I’m not growing up.”
“You should be slowing down.”
“Oh, I’m plenty slowing down. Notice how I didn’t maul you,” Jim points out. “Or put your hand in warm water. Or toss cold water on your face.” He can actually go on for a while, but he adjusts the pillow beneath his head and relaxes back against the stiff-as-rock motel bed. “Besides, you worked out that muscle I pulled in my back the other week. I think that’s proof enough that I’m getting old.”
“You’ll never be old,” Bones sleepily mumbles. He sounds like he’s ready to drop off into the world of slumber again if Jim lets him. “You’re going to be perpetually young, even when you’re eighty.”
And then Bones starts laughing madly.
Maybe it could have been written off as a stroke, but Jim’s absently tickling his midsection and doesn’t even look surprised when Bones rolls over and traps his wrists above his head, a growl softly emitting from his throat and a glare in his eyes. Jim writhes slightly and doesn’t exactly tell his best friend that he’s infinitely sexy when he gets angry like that. He ends up on his back, pinned to the bed, and stares up at Bones with a sated smile on his face.
“I’ll get old,” Jim insists. “And grey. And you’ll still be at my side. Bones…” he gives a soft laugh. “You’ll probably outlive me,” he points out. “You’re the most stubborn being in the whole universe I’ve ever met and I’m including that planet with the elders who insisted on upholding ancient Roman tradition.”
Neither of them say a word to that, but if Bones is thinking anywhere along the lines of what Jim is, he’s entertaining a quiet vision of some kind of future where they both survive the worst that space has to offer.
There’s grey in their hair and there are wrinkles and neither will move as fast as they once had, but Jim likes to think that Bones is going to be there with him, romantically or not, and they’re going to make it out alive, even if Jim has to bring down the whole universe and tame it to make sure this happens.
Jim is the first one to sit up and groan, scrubbing his hand through his hair and padding across the room to drape an arm over the bathroom door’s frame, swaying into the tiled room as he watches Bones.
“Borrowing your shower,” he informs Bones with a cocky grin. “If I’m not out in thirty minutes…”
“Yeah, I know, I’ll ream you a new one for using my hot water to jerk yourself off,” Bones finishes off the sentence in a way completely untrue to what Jim had been about to say.
What? No, really. That isn’t at all what Jim had been intending to say. It’d been more along the lines of If I’m not out in thirty, I expect a rescue party and mouth-to-mouth.
Still, that doesn’t stop him from thinking about Bones the whole time he’s in the shower and he might have matured a lot in the last five years, but when he touches himself, he’s still only about milliseconds away from moaning out Bones’ name just to see if he comes running.
He stops himself from calling out any particular names, but he still touches himself. This time, though, he closes his eyes as he comes and thinks about twenty years from now and being healthy and alive thanks to Bones’ miracle hands. He thinks of white hair at Bones’ temples and a grown Joanna and grandkids and he thinks of slow and burning sex as he thinks of himself screwing Bones into the mattress while he bitches about being ‘a doctor, not your woman for the hour, Jim’ with that growl in his voice.
He dries himself off quickly and catches his reflection in the mirror.
“You’re not there yet,” he tells the Kirk in the mirror while he rubs the towel through his hair and leaves it sticking up in every last direction. He flicks the towel into the sink as he adjusts the one sliding low on his hips and grins as he wanders back out into the bedroom. “Bones, where’s breakfast!” he announces cheerfully, happily ignoring the fact of his nudity.
To his credit, it’s not like Bones says a thing about it. They’re as good as domesticated at this point. Jim’s just working backwards to earn all the fun stuff that they’ve managed to skip to get to this point.
*
The minute they get in, Frank takes their suitcases up to their respective rooms and then vanishes into the kitchen to put together dinner. Sam’s not been home for months, Winona tells Jim between affectionate kisses to his cheeks, and she’s more than happy to finally fill the house with some actual life. The golden retriever (barely more than a pup) lies reclined and lazy on the floor and peers up at Jim without much interest at all.
They exchange small talk and Winona clasps Bones by the cheeks and studies him long and hard while Jim flushes and prays that nothing is said that’s bound to humiliate him for…oh, he doesn’t know, maybe his entire life.
“So you’re Doctor Leonard McCoy,” Winona remarks when she finally releases Bones and clasps Jim’s hand in her own, tugging him closer to her side for this odd half-hearted and half-affection, half-desperate hug. “From all the stories Jim’s told us, I think we owe you about a dozen apologies.”
“Oh?”
“My boy’s apparently a handful.”
“You have no idea, Ma’am,” Bones says with a hearty laugh and it turns his voice into something warm and delightful and it makes Jim shiver. Jim is fond of staring at Bones when he smiles and laughs like that. He’s like a moth to the flame as he watches the corners of Bones’ lips curve upwards in a mad dash for the ceiling.
Bones catches his eye and Jim grins back at him and bites down on his lower lip, suddenly feeling like he’s fifteen again. That feeling hardly dissipates when suddenly his mother is clasping his hand tightly and turning on the old record player and insisting that he dance with her because she needs to practice before she puts those skills to use in public.
“Mom, wha…?” Jim laughs out the words, even if he’s helpless to doing whatever his mother asks of him. He loves her more than anything in the whole world and some days, they each felt as if the other was all they had left. That had been the fair summation of his childhood - him, Sam, and Winona all clinging hard onto each other as if they would spin away when gravity dared to separate them. Sometimes physical distance removed them and Sam would wander away from home and Jim would act up, but Winona always came home to the boys and Jim’s always been grateful for that.
He hadn’t needed to be a hero as a child. All he had to do was survive in order to make his father’s sacrifice worth it. His time for playing the hero is recent because it’s not just about making the sacrifice worth it - it’s about making his father proud, wherever his spirit is.
Suddenly he’s on his feet and he’s trying to make sure he’s got a graceful frame and he’s trying not to feel too self-conscious. He’s dimly aware that Bones has slipped out of the room and suddenly it’s just himself and his mother and they’re attempting to dance away all the worries of the past.
One, two, three, they go, one, two, three and turn. Neither of them is well-practiced or perfect at this, but they’re both enthusiastic. Winona smiles until the laugh lines show on her face and Jim’s laughing as he stares fully at his feet and counts silently, mouthing each number while his shoulders hunch forward. His mother is only attending a small affair, she explains, but Winona wants to know at least one dance and the waltz seems simplest.
“Now this is just a shame, ma’am,” McCoy greets patiently, dropping his bag of books neatly by the door. He’s gone out to the car to retrieve the last of his possessions and has only now returned. “Permission to cut in, Jim?”
Jim glances over his shoulder and his cheeks flush an embarrassed pink the likes of which hasn’t graced his face since he was fifteen and his mother had come back from an off-world mission to find him generously attending to himself in the den. In his defense, no one was supposed to be home for another two days.
It happens so smoothly that Jim’s not even aware that his position as lead has been usurped until suddenly he’s standing on the sidelines and watching Bones take his mother’s hands, brush a hand through his hair (in sheepish modesty or something like) and they begin to gracefully dance as Bones gently gives instruction and advice.
McCoy’s danced his fair share in his lifetime. Weddings, anniversaries, birthdays, showers. These are the things you get involved with when you have a young wife on your arm and a new baby. Jim’s well aware of the life Bones led before Starfleet and so he understands how it can be so easy for McCoy to lapse back into old patterns and talents
“Just like that,” Bones is advising with that soft grin of his, the one that makes his face light up and the one that Jim had almost thought would never return. It had existed only in photographs of the past until some time during the mission when out of nowhere, Jim had seen McCoy smile like he’d never seen before - with genuine and absolute unfettered joy. Jim believes in miracles, he does, and to this date the greatest miracle he’s ever born witness to involves getting the happiness back in Bones’ eyes and the smile back on his face. “You want to trust in your lead and keep your eyes up,” he adds, two fingers sliding under Winona’s chin and raising her gaze. Her short pixie-cut hair bobs forward as she looks up at him and affords him an anxious smile.
Jim knows that he ought to feel left-out, but he can’t help the swell of warmth and delight at this scene. He just wishes he could record it.
He’s lost in thoughts when he realizes that someone has been calling his name gently.
“Jim, come back here,” Winona beckons after Frank’s given her a call to come and try the sauce for the dinner, lest he over-salt it. Jim still tenses at his voice, but he’s long since learned that the disdain he held for the man when he was a child was born out of such typical cliché that he almost hated to admit it.
For all that Frank tried, he had never been Jim’s actual father and Jim had blamed him for that because it was easier than blaming his mother and easier than blaming some foreign threat he had never seen before. Now that he’s met Nero, now that he’s watched him die, he can happily place the blame elsewhere and he’s starting to try and give Frank the benefit of the doubt. ‘Evil stepfather’ had been a good place to lay his childish fury before, but he’s a grown man now. He needs to be beyond that.
Jim obeys his mother dutifully and ends up suddenly placed in Bones’ arms, his hand slowly pushing up McCoy’s wrist and past the speedy pulse in order to twine their fingers together. “Uh…” he says, mouth going dry as he stares wildly and widely at his mother. “Mom?”
“Practice, Jim,” she lightly teases. “You need to learn some day and I’m still holding out hope on attending a lavish wedding for you. You need to be able to waltz for that. I’ll be right there, Frank,” she calls over her shoulder before pressing a kiss to Jim’s cheek and leaving the room.
Bones tightens his grip on Jim’s hand lightly, barely even. Jim feels it like a sledgehammer coming down to strike him in the head, which would help to explain why he feels so absolutely dizzy right now.
“Don’t break my toes, Jim,” Bones says in a quiet lilt of a tone. “Don’t think I want to put down ‘injury via clumsy Captain’ in an official medical record.”
They’re just standing there and they’re not actually dancing. Jim feels like maybe he ought to take the first step, but he’s busy trying to tell his heart that it’s not having an attack just because it’s trying to beat out of his chest. He tries to recall the first time he thought he fell in love rather than lust and he tries to remember how he had subdued the feelings.
He exhales and drifts in slightly closer and reminds himself that they aren’t supposed to be pushing things too quickly. Or, scratch that. Jim isn’t supposed to be pushing things too quickly and that means behaving. When he brushes his thumb in a gentle circle, he can feel McCoy’s pulse just lightly under the pad of his fingers and when he turns half-lidded eyes up, he can see Bones’ lips falling open. They’re moist and Jim wants to groan because this is like putting an addict in front of the world’s most legendary wine and daring him not to drink.
Jim manages a rueful smile, his lips feeling like they might crack when they turn upwards. “Sorry about my Mom,” he manages quietly. “She’s a little much sometimes. And the wedding thing will pass, it’s just that I’m thirty and…”
“And she’s waiting for you to grow up?” Bones finishes his sentence for him.
“I think she’s waiting on the rest of the world to figure that I already have,” Jim says and tries not to get too annoyed. McCoy knows that as well as he does, but denial’s a heavy weapon when a person lets it act as a thick shield. He’s grown up plenty and he’s done a fine job of it. He’s one of the most respected Captains in the fleet and it’s not because of the Narada incident. It’s because he worked five long years to prove to the universe that not only is he capable, but he’s more than capable of exceeding the expectations of everyone around him. “And besides. I’m pretty sure she’s really not that serious about the wedding thing. Well, kinda almost sure.”
“My mother went into fits of delight at mine,” Bones confesses with a rueful smile. “Damn near thought she might have an apoplectic fit of joy at the gift table.”
“You don’t talk much about your wedding.”
Bones shrugs idly and they’re finally moving in an idle sway back and forth. It’s not exactly a waltz, but there’s enough movement that it can be called graceful. “My mother died not long after it. It felt like a bad omen. Jocelyn tried to get me out of my moods, but she was pregnant and subject to moods herself. And then…”
“And then your Dad,” Jim agrees quietly.
They don’t have to talk about that because it’s a tense subject and one that Jim hadn’t even known about until they had arrived to an alien planet and the Federation had sent a message strictly instructing that: DR MCCOY WILL NOT BE PERMITTED PLANETSIDE FOR THIS PARTICULAR MISSION AS HE IS EMOTIONALLY COMPROMISED. It hadn’t taken long for Jim to ferret out the truth after that about vaccines and cures and pleaded deaths that happened too early for comfort. Since then, it’s been an elephant in the corner of the room that they never exactly approach, but they let it sit. They let it out of their sights and ignore it.
They’ve stopped dancing.
Jim is looking up at Bones with wide eyes and checking his internal clock to wonder if it’s time yet and when he catches the look of intent in Bones’ eyes, he falters. There’s something there he recognizes from other people, but he’s never seen it focused on him, never seen it in those warm brown eyes.
“Bones,” Jim says, swallowing the dryness in his throat and wishing like mad that he could quantify what’s going on here. There’s hardly any space between them and Bones has moved his hand from Jim’s shoulder to his back, sliding slowly down the fabric until he’s hitching him in with a hand on the small of his back.
They’re so close that when Bones exhales, Jim can feel the soft warmth of his breath against his cheek and it’s going to drive him crazy if something doesn’t happen soon.
“Jim, Leonard,” his mother’s voice interrupts whatever was coming next. “Dinnertime, boys.”
It might be absolutely childish, but the only retort on his lips is a whiny ‘Mom’ that is desperately fighting to come out. He never does find out the intent that Bones held because they’re suddenly two feet apart and it’s like the moment never happened. They sit to dinner, they discuss the political machinations of Starfleet, they break bread and laugh over childhood stories of Jim’s antics and Winona’s travels.
Jim helps with the washing up and flicks soap bubbles at Bones as they discuss the repairs that the Enterprise will be enduring while at the dry dock just miles away. There are renovations to be made and certain quarters will be receiving a full upheaval. Kirk’s asked for his to be repainted and redone to allow for a feel that’s slightly more like home.
He doubts he’s ever going to tell Bones that he came to this decision after spending so long within the walls of Bones’ Georgian home.
He slings a towel over his shoulder when Bones leans his frame heavily on Jim and that’s all he’s going to give as an indicator that he’s tired. He doesn’t have to say a word at this point because Jim knows Bones so thoroughly that even blinking could be interpreted with one-hundred percent accuracy. He takes the hint and leads Bones away from the sink, tugging lightly on his hand to coax him upstairs.
Jim knows the way to the guest room like he knows the back of an Andorian’s hand. He leads Bones up the stairs and doesn’t even think how funny he must look with the cloth draped over his shirt, yet.
He doesn’t know Bones like that same hand apparently. Jim’s expecting to send his friend off to bed and to exchange awkward pleasantries. Jim might sneak into the room in the middle of the night to reminisce about his childhood, but that’s as far as his mind will offer plans for him.
Instead of Bones turning in for the night, suddenly Jim’s back is pinned up against the wall and he’s staring at Bones like he’s grown a second head and decided to name it Scotty sometime in the last little while.
“Uh…”
“Shut up, Jim, and go with this,” Bones commands as broad hands begin to circumnavigate the span of Jim’s waist and brush against his torso before settling at his hips. Jim wants to know if his mother had spiked Bones’ dinner to get him acting like this, but as it’s pretty much exactly what he wants and he’s not about to complain.
He’s sure there’s some kind of psychological explanation for this. It’s probably the same reason why McCoy hasn’t initiated anything and then suddenly he’s okay to pounce on Jim in the second floor hallway of his childhood home.
He’s never been good at just letting things lie and so before he knows it, the words are out of his mouth. “Why now?”
“The moon’s full, the mood’s right, hell, I don’t know Jim,” McCoy admits as he leans in and brushes his lips against the corner of Jim’s and damn very nearly well steals his breath away from him. “I’m feeling more like I’m capable of actually doing this than I have in months and I’m not looking this gift horse in the mouth. I’m not scared, Jim. Not now. I’m not scared.” His hands traverse down Jim’s biceps and to his wrists, securely pinning him in place before their mouths meet and they share the first kiss that’s something more than chaste. Jim wants to insist that there’s no reason for Bones to be scared because if they’re going to plummet and fall to the ground, they’re at least going to do it together and Jim would promise Bones that he’ll always break his fall.
There is intent and desire pouring off of Bones and it’s a flood coming to wash Jim away. He’s ready to fully give himself over to it.
If he’s going to go out with a bang, he might as well give a soft whimper in the meantime.
His hips hitch forward as his head falls back against the wall. Bones tugs his lower lip into his mouth and sucks lightly the once before aligning their noses and pressing the full weight and warmth of his body against Jim’s. They stay aligned like this for another moment before the kissing begins again and Jim shoves his hands down McCoy’s trousers and they simply hook there, yanking Bones closer by the waistband of his loose jeans.
Whatever’s triggered this in Bones, Jim isn’t going to fight it. Some whim of the moment, some flash of courage, but whatever it is, it’s gotten them further than anything else has in the last three months and Jim wants to give gracious thanks to whatever it could be.
“Jim?”
His mother’s voice floats down the hallway as if a ghost’s and Bones freezes up with his hands cupping Jim’s cheeks. “Yeah, Mom?” he replies hoarsely, as if his thumb isn’t inches away from brushing McCoy’s cock.
“Put the dog out before you go to bed, please,” she requests sleepily and the sound of a door clicking shut is all they hear before the mood is utterly broken and Bones eases away with a rueful smile.
Jim supposes it’d be asking the universe to find out if McCoy’s courage and sudden spell of desire has somehow lasted past that bout of cold water. One look at his best friend’s face and he understands immediately that whatever touching they’ll be doing that night will be incidental and not sexual in the least.
“You heard the lady,” McCoy instructs, voice rough with a hoarseness that Jim would love to ascribe to a need that only Jim can fulfill, but it’s probably just exhaustion seeping through his skin. They’ve had a long few travel days and they both need all the sleep they can go so they can stay in their right minds. Jim makes sure to walk McCoy to his door and leans heavily against the frame as Bones turns to look at him and brushes his fingers through Jim’s hair, earning a shuddered exhalation from his Captain.
“You’re a fucking cocktease, Leonard McCoy,” Jim accuses as his voice comes out strangled. He knows it’s not Bones’ fault that their timing absolutely sucks and they shouldn’t keep doing this under the watchful eyes of the women in their lives, but it’s either this or under the full purview of hundreds of crewmembers.
Somehow, booking a hotel room for the night makes things too impersonal and Jim doesn’t want that to be the start of them, whatever that start will be.
He watches Bones with a lingering look of yearning in his eyes and exhales as he leans into Bones’ body, chest pressed against his.
“Put the dog to bed, Jim,” Bones encourages lightly. “And then bring your pillow to my room.”
“To…?”
“To sleep, Jim. Your mother and stepfather are down the hall,” Bones reprimands lightly and pulls away until they aren’t touching any longer. Bones retreats into the small guest room and arranges the quilts until he’s made room for himself in this little spot of Jim’s life.
He nestles his way in and Jim watches him for a long moment.
This dance is over, but Jim knows that there’s more waiting in the future. He bounds downstairs to let the dog out and is met with a curious look in the canine’s eyes. Jim grins as he accompanies him outside into the warm evening air and stands there under that beautiful full moon shining down on him.
“Things were so much easier when I was loose,” Jim informs the dog, who merely yawns as he does his business and trots back to the door to be let back inside. Jim’s not expecting high conversation, but hey, he has to try. He puts the dog to bed before sneaking up into McCoy’s room and lies down behind him all night.
As he falls asleep, he hears Bones’ voice from his memory and there, in his thoughts, he’s counting softly.
One, two, three.
Jim dreams of kisses that night and counts to three. He wakes up and feels like his feet are aching and his heart is soaring. He’s waltzed in his dreams to the tune of the dance he and Bones are doing around each other. Sooner or later, they’re going to come to a midpoint.
It’s just one, two, three until they get there.
THE END