fic: Home is Just Another Word For You (Star Trek AOS)
Title: Home is Just Another Word For You
Fandom: Star Trek: AOS
Rating: all ages
Pairing(s): Uhura/McCoy, OC
Notes: This is for sullacat, who won me in help_nz's recent lightning round. 1,580 words.
Summary: At thirty-three, Nyota Uhura has a career and a family. Balancing the two isn't always easy, though Leonard is a big help, but it seems to be worth the effort.
On her first morning back in Nairobi, Nyota Uhura wakes up late. She can tell it’s late from the angle of the sunlight streaming through her bedroom window, and from the noise in the street below: dogs barking, children laughing, people riding by on bicycles, the occasional hum of a hover-taxi. She lies in bed for a few minutes, letting it all sink in. She’s back. She’s home, on Earth, in the city where she grew up, for the first time in six months.
Where’s Leonard? And Penda, for that matter?
Reaching out a hand, Nyota discovers that the other side of the bed is cold. Leonard must have gotten up some time ago. She listens, but the apartment itself is quiet. Maybe he took Penda to the park, since apparently that’s her favorite thing in the world at the moment. That, and her stuffed purple duck. Nyota was so tired when she got in last night, but she has a vague recollection of Leonard saying, We’re gonna let Mama sleep tomorrow, all right? and Penda nodding seriously in response.
Smiling a little sadly - as badly as she needed to sleep, she would not have minded being woken up by a toddler after all this time - Nyota stretches and yawns, then kicks back the blanket and pushes herself up.
She looks around the bedroom, something she didn’t get to do last night. It hasn’t changed much in the six months she’s been off-planet. There are more holos of Penda, of course, and that lamp over by the desk appears to be new, and she doesn’t remember seeing that quilt before, but apart from those things, the room is just as she remembers it.
Which is odd, she thinks as she slides out of bed and starts to grope around for something to wear. The way Leonard talked sometimes, when they spoke via subspace - when it was possible - it seemed as if life on Earth was hurrying along at an unbelievable pace, while she hovered above it, encased in titanium-alloy, suspended in time. She always felt restless after their conversations ended, never more so than when he held Penda up to say hello, and Nyota could see how much she had grown since their last transmission.
She knew, when she accepted her six-month assignment aboard the Jemison, that she would miss her daughter and Leonard. Penda was only a year old at the time, and just taking her first steps, just figuring out that putting things into containers and then dumping them out all over the floor was a fun game. Nyota had to weigh all that she knew she would miss against the opportunity Starfleet was offering her: first contact with an intelligent species so alien, the Universal Translator was all but useless.
Nyota doesn’t regret her choice, but the constant ache in her heart made the mission seem far longer than six months.
Dressed now in a green tank top and a clean pair of Leonard’s boxers - the ones with the basset hound print - her hair twisted back in a messy ponytail, she opens the bedroom door and steps out into the hallway. Someone’s been cooking; the scent of vegetables lingers in the warm, still air. It’s so quiet, though, she assumes she must be alone. She peeks into the living room anyway, just to see if there are any changes there, and is startled by the sight of Leonard sprawled across the sofa, his head tipped back against one arm, his bare feet propped up on the other. Penda is curled up on his chest, her thumb in her mouth, her purple duck tucked under her arm.
They appear to be asleep, but as Nyota crosses the carpeted floor, Leonard opens his eyes. She always liked the way they change color depending on his mood and the lighting; just now they’re a warm honey-brown. He sighs when she touches his forehead, brushing away a few errant strands of dark hair. It’s a tired sigh, she thinks. This separation wasn’t easy on him, even though her whole family has more or less adopted him and has been helping him out, watching Penda while he’s at the hospital, making sure there’s food waiting for him when he gets home. He resisted the idea at first - like her, he’s remarkably stubborn when it comes to self-sufficiency - but Nyota’s family wore him down eventually, and she knows he’s grateful. She’s grateful too.
“Hi,” Leonard whispers. His voice is gruffly tender.
“Hi,” Nyota replies, continuing to stroke his hair.
Silent seconds tick by and it isn’t awkward, even though he’s fairly garrulous ordinarily, and somehow they always found things to say to each other when she was on the Jemison.
At length she says, “I missed you.”
“I missed you too,” Leonard says. “We both did.” His gaze flicks away momentarily, to their daughter’s crown of thick black hair. “Your mother came by earlier, by the way. With chapattis and a big pot of sukuma wiki. In case you were wondering what that smell was.”
“That’s what I smelled. Oh, God.” She throws her head back in exasperation, but manages to keep her voice down. “I never liked sukuma wiki. How does my own mother not remember that?”
“Well, she left us a couple gallons of it. I think the idea is that we shouldn’t have to waste time cooking when we could be doing other things.” He cocks an eyebrow at her meaningfully and she groans.
“That is not what I want my mother thinking about. Just because I gave her one grandchild, it doesn’t mean--”
“Hey.” Leonard catches her hand and squeezes it. “Honey, I understand. She’s just trying to help.”
“Yeah, I know.” And just so he knows that she doesn’t regret having his baby, even though she spent most of her two tours aboard the Enterprise completely sure she never wanted to be a mother, she raises his hand and kisses it.
He shifts over, making room for her on the sofa. She sinks down beside him, letting her head loll against his shoulder. It’s cozy. Except for a few times when she was completely wrapped up in her translation work, she never stopped missing him when she was aboard the Jemison. As narrow as it was, her bed always seemed too big. Sometimes she would bunch up her spare blanket and wrap her arms and legs around it, trying to pretend it was him. It only made her feel farther away.
“Sukuma wiki,” Nyota says, shaking her head. “Now, if she’d brought over a few gallons of ice cream … that’s something I actually missed. Vanilla almond, black cherry, mmm…” As she speaks, her stomach growls loudly, and that rouses Penda.
The little girl lifts her chin and blinks sleepily. “Hi, Mama.” She still sounds half asleep, but her smile is incandescent and a soft warmth sweeps up Nyota’s body, from her toes to her scalp, which tingles.
“Hi,” she says back.
Nyota was nineteen when she joined Starfleet, twenty-one when she was assigned to the Enterprise. In the twelve years since then, so much has changed. Whoever thought she’d end up back in Nairobi, with a small daughter, with this man? Not that this is the end, she quickly reminds herself. And not that she isn’t happy to be here. When she looks back on her choices, she can’t help but think she made the right ones. Her daughter’s name, for instance. Penda means loved in Swahili. And she is. Very much.
Nyota curls against Leonard, wrapping her arms around him and Penda, who wriggles between them. “Duck,” she says, pushing the stuffed animal against her mother’s chest.
“Yes,” Nyota says, “I can see that. It is a duck. Does the duck have a name?”
“Duck,” Penda insists.
Leonard’s voice rumbles softly against her ear, “The duck is called Duck.”
“Oh, I see. Hello, Duck.” Nyota pets the stuffed head.
Penda beams. There are a few more teeth in her shiny pink gums, Nyota sees. She’s so much bigger now than she was six months ago. There’s so much more understanding and curiosity in her big brown eyes.
Something bitter and thick fills Nyota’s throat. She knew what she was doing when she accepted her assignment, knew it would hurt when she came back and saw how much she had missed, but…
As if sensing the shift in her mood, Leonard’s arm tightens around her.
“She’s beautiful,” Nyota says, her voice hitching. She swallows. “You’re beautiful,” she tells her daughter, stroking the silky black hair gently, and earning a delighted burble. “We made a beautiful baby, Leonard.”
There’s more that she wants to say, but for once in her life, she can’t summon up the right words. Well, she just got home. And, she tells herself, she has plenty of time to figure out what it is she wants to say.
Because for once in her life, she has no plans whatsoever, except to be with these people, to become part of their daily lives again. And the thought isn’t half as scary as she thought it would be when she was younger, or even as recently as half a year ago. In fact, it’s surprisingly, wonderfully liberating.
Nyota smiles and closes her eyes, inhaling the familiar, missed scents of the two people she loves most, and thinks that she could get used to this.
3/7/2011
Fandom: Star Trek: AOS
Rating: all ages
Pairing(s): Uhura/McCoy, OC
Notes: This is for sullacat, who won me in help_nz's recent lightning round. 1,580 words.
Summary: At thirty-three, Nyota Uhura has a career and a family. Balancing the two isn't always easy, though Leonard is a big help, but it seems to be worth the effort.
On her first morning back in Nairobi, Nyota Uhura wakes up late. She can tell it’s late from the angle of the sunlight streaming through her bedroom window, and from the noise in the street below: dogs barking, children laughing, people riding by on bicycles, the occasional hum of a hover-taxi. She lies in bed for a few minutes, letting it all sink in. She’s back. She’s home, on Earth, in the city where she grew up, for the first time in six months.
Where’s Leonard? And Penda, for that matter?
Reaching out a hand, Nyota discovers that the other side of the bed is cold. Leonard must have gotten up some time ago. She listens, but the apartment itself is quiet. Maybe he took Penda to the park, since apparently that’s her favorite thing in the world at the moment. That, and her stuffed purple duck. Nyota was so tired when she got in last night, but she has a vague recollection of Leonard saying, We’re gonna let Mama sleep tomorrow, all right? and Penda nodding seriously in response.
Smiling a little sadly - as badly as she needed to sleep, she would not have minded being woken up by a toddler after all this time - Nyota stretches and yawns, then kicks back the blanket and pushes herself up.
She looks around the bedroom, something she didn’t get to do last night. It hasn’t changed much in the six months she’s been off-planet. There are more holos of Penda, of course, and that lamp over by the desk appears to be new, and she doesn’t remember seeing that quilt before, but apart from those things, the room is just as she remembers it.
Which is odd, she thinks as she slides out of bed and starts to grope around for something to wear. The way Leonard talked sometimes, when they spoke via subspace - when it was possible - it seemed as if life on Earth was hurrying along at an unbelievable pace, while she hovered above it, encased in titanium-alloy, suspended in time. She always felt restless after their conversations ended, never more so than when he held Penda up to say hello, and Nyota could see how much she had grown since their last transmission.
She knew, when she accepted her six-month assignment aboard the Jemison, that she would miss her daughter and Leonard. Penda was only a year old at the time, and just taking her first steps, just figuring out that putting things into containers and then dumping them out all over the floor was a fun game. Nyota had to weigh all that she knew she would miss against the opportunity Starfleet was offering her: first contact with an intelligent species so alien, the Universal Translator was all but useless.
Nyota doesn’t regret her choice, but the constant ache in her heart made the mission seem far longer than six months.
Dressed now in a green tank top and a clean pair of Leonard’s boxers - the ones with the basset hound print - her hair twisted back in a messy ponytail, she opens the bedroom door and steps out into the hallway. Someone’s been cooking; the scent of vegetables lingers in the warm, still air. It’s so quiet, though, she assumes she must be alone. She peeks into the living room anyway, just to see if there are any changes there, and is startled by the sight of Leonard sprawled across the sofa, his head tipped back against one arm, his bare feet propped up on the other. Penda is curled up on his chest, her thumb in her mouth, her purple duck tucked under her arm.
They appear to be asleep, but as Nyota crosses the carpeted floor, Leonard opens his eyes. She always liked the way they change color depending on his mood and the lighting; just now they’re a warm honey-brown. He sighs when she touches his forehead, brushing away a few errant strands of dark hair. It’s a tired sigh, she thinks. This separation wasn’t easy on him, even though her whole family has more or less adopted him and has been helping him out, watching Penda while he’s at the hospital, making sure there’s food waiting for him when he gets home. He resisted the idea at first - like her, he’s remarkably stubborn when it comes to self-sufficiency - but Nyota’s family wore him down eventually, and she knows he’s grateful. She’s grateful too.
“Hi,” Leonard whispers. His voice is gruffly tender.
“Hi,” Nyota replies, continuing to stroke his hair.
Silent seconds tick by and it isn’t awkward, even though he’s fairly garrulous ordinarily, and somehow they always found things to say to each other when she was on the Jemison.
At length she says, “I missed you.”
“I missed you too,” Leonard says. “We both did.” His gaze flicks away momentarily, to their daughter’s crown of thick black hair. “Your mother came by earlier, by the way. With chapattis and a big pot of sukuma wiki. In case you were wondering what that smell was.”
“That’s what I smelled. Oh, God.” She throws her head back in exasperation, but manages to keep her voice down. “I never liked sukuma wiki. How does my own mother not remember that?”
“Well, she left us a couple gallons of it. I think the idea is that we shouldn’t have to waste time cooking when we could be doing other things.” He cocks an eyebrow at her meaningfully and she groans.
“That is not what I want my mother thinking about. Just because I gave her one grandchild, it doesn’t mean--”
“Hey.” Leonard catches her hand and squeezes it. “Honey, I understand. She’s just trying to help.”
“Yeah, I know.” And just so he knows that she doesn’t regret having his baby, even though she spent most of her two tours aboard the Enterprise completely sure she never wanted to be a mother, she raises his hand and kisses it.
He shifts over, making room for her on the sofa. She sinks down beside him, letting her head loll against his shoulder. It’s cozy. Except for a few times when she was completely wrapped up in her translation work, she never stopped missing him when she was aboard the Jemison. As narrow as it was, her bed always seemed too big. Sometimes she would bunch up her spare blanket and wrap her arms and legs around it, trying to pretend it was him. It only made her feel farther away.
“Sukuma wiki,” Nyota says, shaking her head. “Now, if she’d brought over a few gallons of ice cream … that’s something I actually missed. Vanilla almond, black cherry, mmm…” As she speaks, her stomach growls loudly, and that rouses Penda.
The little girl lifts her chin and blinks sleepily. “Hi, Mama.” She still sounds half asleep, but her smile is incandescent and a soft warmth sweeps up Nyota’s body, from her toes to her scalp, which tingles.
“Hi,” she says back.
Nyota was nineteen when she joined Starfleet, twenty-one when she was assigned to the Enterprise. In the twelve years since then, so much has changed. Whoever thought she’d end up back in Nairobi, with a small daughter, with this man? Not that this is the end, she quickly reminds herself. And not that she isn’t happy to be here. When she looks back on her choices, she can’t help but think she made the right ones. Her daughter’s name, for instance. Penda means loved in Swahili. And she is. Very much.
Nyota curls against Leonard, wrapping her arms around him and Penda, who wriggles between them. “Duck,” she says, pushing the stuffed animal against her mother’s chest.
“Yes,” Nyota says, “I can see that. It is a duck. Does the duck have a name?”
“Duck,” Penda insists.
Leonard’s voice rumbles softly against her ear, “The duck is called Duck.”
“Oh, I see. Hello, Duck.” Nyota pets the stuffed head.
Penda beams. There are a few more teeth in her shiny pink gums, Nyota sees. She’s so much bigger now than she was six months ago. There’s so much more understanding and curiosity in her big brown eyes.
Something bitter and thick fills Nyota’s throat. She knew what she was doing when she accepted her assignment, knew it would hurt when she came back and saw how much she had missed, but…
As if sensing the shift in her mood, Leonard’s arm tightens around her.
“She’s beautiful,” Nyota says, her voice hitching. She swallows. “You’re beautiful,” she tells her daughter, stroking the silky black hair gently, and earning a delighted burble. “We made a beautiful baby, Leonard.”
There’s more that she wants to say, but for once in her life, she can’t summon up the right words. Well, she just got home. And, she tells herself, she has plenty of time to figure out what it is she wants to say.
Because for once in her life, she has no plans whatsoever, except to be with these people, to become part of their daily lives again. And the thought isn’t half as scary as she thought it would be when she was younger, or even as recently as half a year ago. In fact, it’s surprisingly, wonderfully liberating.
Nyota smiles and closes her eyes, inhaling the familiar, missed scents of the two people she loves most, and thinks that she could get used to this.
3/7/2011