Rumors

Free Web Hosting Provider - Web Hosting - E-commerce - High Speed Internet - Free Web Page

Tom was pleasantly surprised to meet Harry in the turbolift on the way up to the bridge at the beginning of his shift. "Not pulling the night shift, Harry?"

Tom nodded, catching the last of a yawn with the back of his hand. "You can say that again."

Harry was quiet for a moment before beginning hesitantly, "Tom, you know--" but he was cut-off by their arrival on the bridge. Tom looked at his friend to continue, but Harry waved him off. "It’s nothing. I’ll catch you at lunch."

Tom was slightly confused by this sudden bout of shyness, but it was hardly unheard of where Harry was concerned, so he shrugged it off and headed for the conn.

The morning passed slowly for Tom, with nothing much to do on the bridge followed by an uneventful staff meeting before lunch. B’Elanna came through a couple of times, but with engineering in the middle of a maintenance cycle she barely had time to slip him a half-smile as she waited outside the ready-room. At the meeting however, Tom began to wonder if it was just his imagination, or if the others really were sneaking looks at him and B’Elanna. They had wound-up sitting next to each other as she had come in late and taken the last available chair, but he was sure that their conduct had been nothing other than professional. He was probably just being paranoid.

Torres got snared by Chacotay as the meeting broke-up. Tom, catching the Commander’s "let’s talk seriously over tea" look, decided not to wait for her and went ahead to the mess hall with Harry. Once they were settled, Harry got down to pushing his food around his plate. "So what’s up?" Tom asked. "Is it Seven?"

"Oh, right." And he sank into a brief silence. "It’s just... You know that if you were having a problem or anything, you could talk to me, right?"

Tom couldn’t help but wonder at that particularly lame conversational segue. "She’s fine. Working hard, but you know her, she’s not happy if she’s not bashing her head against some problem or other. Literally or figuratively," he added with a smile. Harry chuckled along with him, but it was a transparent effort. Tom was about to press his friend to tell him what was wrong when Neelix bustled over.

Neelix leaned down to Tom conspiratorially, "So, how are things with the Lieutenant?"

Tom threw up his hands in exasperation. "She’s great Neelix. I’m great. We’re great." What was this fixation on his love-life lately? He excused himself quickly and left the mess hall shaking his head, not noticing the dirty look Harry was shooting in Neelix’s direction.

For the rest of the day, no fewer than seven people made subtle, or not-so-subtle inquiries as to the state of his personal life. Tom began to wonder if the ship’s rumor mill knew something he didn’t. Granted, news generally traveled fast, but how could his own relationship have deteriorated so far since breakfast without him knowing about it?

Around dinner time he dropped by B’Elanna’s quarters. She greeted him with a sweaty kiss. "Sorry about that," she said, wiping lubricant off his cheek, "you caught me before my shower. I got stuck talking to Chacotay during lunch, and I just finished up in engineering."

"I don’t think so," he answered, "but most of the ship seems suddenly very concerned about our relationship."

She turned suddenly coy, if such a thing was possible, "Oh you know, the usual: maintenance schedules, personnel transfers, his door is always open if I need to talk about anything."

Tom considered carefully. "So, you’re fine, and I’m fine, and our relationship is fine, but everyone on the ship is worried that something’s wrong."

B’Elanna stepped closer to him, slipping her arms around his waist. "You know what this means, don’t you?"