An Hour

Title: An Hour
Author: Ky (venom69)
Fandom: Star Trek: Voyager
Rating: Age Friendly.
Summary: For an hour or so, she talks to him.
Character/Pairing: Janeway/Chakotay
Spoilers: None… the show’s ended!
Warnings: None.
Prompt Number for fic101: 30 - Rose
Author’s Notes: Song belongs to Luther VanDross
Disclaimer: Usual guff. Not mine, promise to put them back where I found them.
Date: 20/01/07

***

There's a rose
In a fisted glove
And the eagle fly’s
With the dove

***

Once a week she walks to the top of the hill and sits with her back against the old lone tree that rests there. The hill is not steep, but it'd getting harder and harder for her to climb it and when she sits, her aching legs stretch out in front of her body, her feet near the plaque that rests in the ground.

For an hour or so, she talks to him.

Tells him about her week, what's happening. She laughs about some of the things that her students say, she sheds a tear occasionally and sometimes she thinks that she can hear his voice as he replies, the words carried along the wind.

She speaks aloud when she talks.

Part of her thinks that he is still with her. His footsteps are still imprinted on her mind so they should be imprinted in the earth around her. When the wind rustles around her, she imagine his arms. When a leaf falls on her head, she imagine him shaking the tree with laughter at her anecdotes.

There is never anyone else here when she is.

Everyone knows her time, knows when she has her hour with him. They stay away out of respect and understanding.

She will never forget the day that he died. The day that she walked into the hospital to see him lying on the biobed, cold and still, lacking the natural glow of life that she had grown so used to seeing him wear. The doctors had said that it was old age, but she had know that he wasn't old enough for that - none of them were, not really.

This week, she tells him about the party coming up.

She doesn't want to go, not without him. It's the first reunion party since his death and she is not sure that she could face walking into a room of their old friends without her hand on his arms and his voice in her ear promising her that it would be a good night. She misses her friends, those that she doesn't see often, but their soft smiles of sympathy are not something that she could bear.

The last time she saw them all together had been his funeral, but most of that day is a blur of tears and sorrow to her.

Running her fingers through the lush grass beside her, she smiles softly.

They picked the perfect spot for his final resting place. This was where they had sat on their first real date. He'd packed a picnic lunch and transported them to the base of the hill, telling her that she had to walk to the top for something to eat and then laughing at her indignant look.

He loved it here.

She loved it here too.

This place holds so many memories for her - their first date, first kiss, his proposal - and she almost wishes that her happy memories weren't tainted by the knowledge that his body lay beneath the earth at her feet.

He wouldn't have wanted it any other way.

"It's time for me to go," She says as her hour draws to a close. She can almost hear his sigh, but she has a class this afternoon and she will be late as it is. "I'll see you next week, Chakotay."

She swipes the leaves away with her fingers and leaves a peace rose across his name.

***

End