Mojitos and Mai-Tais - Part 1

Posted on Sun Jun 16th, 2024 @ 8:02am by Lieutenant J'airesh Mora-Heath & Master Chief Petty Officer Chuck Finley [Reece]

Mission: Season 6 HIATUS
Location: The Beach
Timeline: Current
1049 words - 2.1 OF Standard Post Measure

ON:

It was such a lovely day for R & R - the weather was perfect, of course, and it didn't matter at all that any of this wonderful venue was contrived, there was no cause for any complaint whatsoever. J'Air was so much better and Dr Sthilg had done a fantastic job of putting her knee and hip both back the way they should have been, a little regenerated perhaps but 100% functional, pain-free and aesthetically unmarked with any scarring. He really was a perfect boss and teacher, as J'Air was the first to admit.

And as if that wasn't plenty of cause for her happy smile and delighted feelings today, Chuck was here and the two of them had no-one else to worry about but each other and nothing that needed to pull them away to attend to. Gazing up, looking blatantly and unashamedly adoring at the handsome, fit, incredible man beside her, J'Air had to pinch herself to make sure this was really happening - and happening to her!

"Ouch" she muttered, inadvertently aloud as she pinched just that bit harder than she'd intended to. She put her hand over her mouth as if to try to take the sound back and looked up, pretending not to have heard or uttered anything.

Chuck cracked open his left eye when he heard J'Air squeak. "Mmmm? What was that, Darlin'?" He sat up on the blanket they were sitting on, and looked over at the gorgeous redhead.

"Nothing, don't worry, just pinched some skin" she answered, honestly but making it a small thing. Well, it was really, just a small silly pinch but it was hard to explain why she had done it to herself so she shrugged it off as if it was just some accidental nothing. She did colour up a little though, like it or not, she couldn't help it. Just a soft blush to her cheeks, and even though she didn't realise it, the effect suited her like soft blusher make up would have done. Fortunately she wasn't wearing make up, so it didn't then double up and make her too flushed.

"This is lovely, isn't it?" she asked, hoping to change the subject - or at least divert it a bit. It had been part of what she'd been thinking but not all of it.

Smiling softly at her, Chuck noticed the change in color to her cheeks. However, he was a gentleman, so, if she didn't want to talk about it, he would respect her wishes. Looking out over the beach and water, he nodded, seeing the crew and families enjoying the peace and tranquillity that they had found here. "It really is," he agreed. "If I ever find a place like this back home, I'm gonna retire from Starfleet and move there, to spend the rest of my days in peace."

J'Air's heart skipped a beat. It was a mixed stab of the idea of Chuck moving away from her and a flush of the heartwarming picture of him perhaps thinking of them both being there together.

"That sounds amazing" she ventured, sincere in that it really did, but a little anxious that he might elaborate and make it clear that the vision didn't include her. "Do you have family back home?" was the best tentative exploration of things they had never even discussed before. "odd" she thought and then took in a big leap of courage and voiced it aloud.

"Do you feel it's odd - I do - that it feels like we've known each other forever and yet we know so little in reality about one another's off duty lives?" She said, unable to watch his expression but at the same time, probably a little relieved that he couldn't see hers either.

Chuck shook his head. "Just my folks, sister, brother and sister's husband. He then looked over at J'Air as he added, "and hopefully, you, one day." He saw the slight twitch of movement at the corners of her lips as he said it. "I mean, you don't expect me to spend my retirement without you right there with me, do ya, Darlin'?" He took a breath, then answered her question easily. "I figured you wanted to wait for the right time to ask your questions." He looked around, then back at her, "I've got nothing but time for you, my love. What do you want to know?"

Filling with a warmth that seemed to light up all the whole universe and her soul with it, J'Air was moved to hear what Chuck had to say. She tried to take a deep breath but it seemed to come to her with a tremble and her voice reflected that too.

She started in order, first comment first, her eyes starting to glow with moisture as she did so.

"I.... " she swallowed to steady her voice. "I was lying back in this deckchair, under this pretty sunshade, thinking that there couldn't be a nicer place nor a luckier woman than me right now but when you mentioned retiring, I couldn't help but get greedy and wonder if you had been thinking of any place in the rocking chairs on your porch for someone like me perhaps, to keep you company?"

She tried so hard to remain calm and serious, as her heart pounded and she struggled to sound as if this was NOT the most amazing subject the two of them could possibly have ever discussed, even in her dreams. She struggled for her *doctors' poker-face* that had been trained into her for many years now but it fought back and threatened to give her away.

"You have folks, a sister, a brother and a brother in law?" she repeated back to him. "I imagined you were made on Mount Olympus, a thought from a goddess with someone like Zeus for your dad!" she grinned, hoping humour might lighten this phenomenal soaring in her heart and her overwhelmed head.

~Did he say that? Am I making this up? Am I awake?~ she kept asking herself, too happy to make any sense, even to her own self. She just stopped herself from pinching herself again, when the memory of how much that had hurt the last time reminded her not to.


TBC ............