Work Text:
Be my what
My open and shut
My everything but
My little hot slut
And we tumble down like Jack and Jill
And I miss all of the joy you kill
But I love you still
Be my thrill
"Be My Thrill" - The Weepies
oooo
Robbie is excited about seeing Kate. His wife asks him directly about this, says, "Honey, are you excited to see Kate?" because she knows that they were close. Their trailers had been practically flush for seven years, there was no way to avoid being close. But when Carol asks him specifically about Kate, he lies.
"Not really," he says. Carol raises an eyebrow. "Okay, I mean, you know. It will be nice to see her. I saw her a couple months ago at that thing, so..."
"I thought you were better friends than that," Carol says.
"We are," Robbie says. "We are, but, you know, she's in New York now and... it's whatever. We'll have fun. Are you sure you don't want to go?"
"The kids," she says.
"Taylor's here," Robbie says. Taylor is their oldest but Carol doesn't want to leave them alone and he can't make her go. The convention is paying his way, anyway, but he doubts they would pay hers too. Maybe. "You're right, babe," he says. "It's only for a few days."
"I know you hate these things," Carol says, putting a pair of his jeans into the suitcase.
"It's easy money," he says. "Free trip to jolly ole England."
"We'll miss you," Carol says. "Say hi to everyone."
"I will."
"And tell Kate that next time she's in L.A. she should come to dinner!"
Carol is a good wife, a sweet woman who has stuck by his side through thick and thin. He loves his wife, he loves his children. He should stay home, should call his agent and beg off sick and spend this weekend in bed or playing with the kids or actually working. All appearances subject to change, and all that crap.
"I'll mention it," he says, zipping his suitcase closed.
oooo
There was a time when the cast would have all flown out of LAX together, the same plane and everything. Ethan used to get drunk on flights, drinking out of those tiny little bottles and worrying about the engines making funny noises. Kate would reach across the seats and touch his arm, talk him out of demanding to speak to the captain or generally making a complete ass of himself. But now, they're all coming from different places, so he doesn't recognize anyone on the flight and he's well past the days of anyone recognizing him. He doesn't exactly still have the physique of Tom Paris anymore, either.
Not everyone will make the trek this far either. Just Kate and Tim at this one, he thinks. Tim hasn't been doing much. His daughter had recognized Tim on an episode of Hannah Montana a couple years ago, and just thinking about that makes Robbie wince. Hannah Montana. Man, that is grim.
He sleeps for most of the flight. The only time he gets to fly first class anymore is when someone else pays for it. They stop briefly in New York, and then it's back in the air, then breakfast, and then wheels down. A driver picks him up and takes him to the hotel. Nothing starts until tomorrow, so he just falls into his bed and doesn't even bother to try to figure out what time it is.
A knock on the door wakes him up and he thinks it might be... but no, it's Tim. They shake hands, and then hug.
"You look like shit, man," Tim says.
"Fuck you," Robbie says. "I'm old."
"We're supposed to be a this talent brunch thing in an hour," Tim says. "Maybe you should shower?"
"Brunch?" he asks. "I haven't even had dinner yet." He pulls back the curtain to see sunlight and then checks his watch.
"Well, the stuff starts this afternoon, so they're supposed to brief us on security measures I guess," Tim says.
He must have slept through the night and not realized it.
"Shit."
"Yeah, I really don't want to be shot by some whack job fan for under half a million dollars, you know what I'm saying?" Tim says.
"I do," he says. "I'll shower. I'll meet you in a bit?"
"I'm in 1608," Tim says.
"Hey, what about... I mean, have you seen Katie yet?"
"Ah," Tim says. He steeples his fingers and loses all his expression. "I do not believe Captain Janeway has boarded yet," he says in his Tuvok voice.
"Dude," Robbie says, shaking his head. "Get out now."
Tim grins.
oooo
Robbie is starving. At the brunch, the 'talent' is milling around, blowing hot air into one another's faces - Jesus Christ, there's Stewart, that smug bastard - but Robbie makes a beeline for the buffet table. He wears a ball cap and keeps his eyes low. He does hate these things but doing one or two of these a year will put his youngest through college so...
"Mr. McNeill!"
He turns around to see a young man holding a clipboard. Robbie is wary of people holding clipboards.
"Yeah?"
"I'm David," he says. "I'm working for Collectormania, and I just wanted to welcome you officially."
"Thanks," Robbie says, shaking his hand.
"I hope your lodgings are acceptable? And your travel was not too tiring?"
"It was fine, thanks," Robbie says. David hands him a piece of paper.
"This is your personalized schedule and contact info. You're slated for signings Saturday through Monday and a speaking engagement later tonight. Would you mind initialing my list so I have documentation that we spoke on this matter?" David asks, extending the clipboard.
"Uh, okay," Robbie says, taking his pen. He scans for his name and sees that Kate's is right below him and she's already signed off. He scribbles next to his name.
"Where is Kate Mulgrew?" Robbie asks, scanning the room. He doesn't see her right away.
"Ms. Mulgrew is..." David falters when he doesn't see her. "Oh, bother, I just saw her."
"Don't sweat it, Dave," Robbie says.
"You are seated beside her for your signing sessions," David says.
"I'm going to get some food," Robbie says, turning away. He loads a plate and decides not to think about spending hours at her side and how much she hates doing these things. Kate is Kate, of course, the only woman who can so greatly benefit from this franchise while simultaneously looking down her nose at it, but he really doesn't want three days of her constantly muttering under her breath about time poorly spent. Then again, when Kate is on, she is really, really on. Really on. Maybe her mood will be good.
"Jesus, Robert, how much bacon can one man eat?"
Her voice really hasn't changed. He looks up to see her peering at him over her glasses, a big green scarf wrapped around her neck.
"I like bacon," he says, popping a piece into his mouth. "Why are you blond?"
"Why are you dressed like you're going to the supermarket?" she shoots back, dropping into the seat next to him.
"I liked it red," he says, ignoring her sour mood. So much for her being on.
"That was Janeway, not me," she says.
"Well, maybe I just like Janeway better," he says.
"You and me both," she says, and then grins. "Hi!"
"Hi," he says, and allows her to lean in and air kiss both of her cheeks. How does she live with herself? She's heavier too, but still sort of captivating in her own way.
"Where were you yesterday? Didn't you get in last night? I did," she says.
"Sleeping," he says, shoveling food into his mouth. She pulls a face, but he doesn't care. He's hungry.
"Well," she says. "There was this cocktail thing. It's like high school. The Brits don't care for the Trek actors, so I was made to listen to Tim talk about his career, a term I use lightly, and Patrick burst into spontaneous Shakespearean monologues to what? Prove his not as addled as he looks? And anytime anyone else spoke to him, he pretended not to know us and I kept thinking, I wish Robbie were here, and it turns out you were but you were sleeping!" She throws up her hands.
"You're in rare form."
"Sorry," she says. "I hate these things."
"Why do you come?" he asks.
"Money," she says. "A break from my life."
A break from her husband, she means. He's heard there have been some problems. He doesn't ask. That was all a long time ago, anyway, he reminds himself. There's being on set, and then there's the real world and the two don't mix. He looks to see if she's got her wedding band on, but her hands are tucked away into her lap.
"How are the boys?" he asks. She smiles.
"Great."
"Hey," he says. "I was thinking of skipping this part. You want to get out of here?"
"But what about the whole..." She waves her hand toward David who is trying to figure out why his microphone isn't working. He's gesturing wildly to an uninterested looking man in the back of the room.
"Sit at the table and sign. And besides, I don't see Stewart here anymore," Robbie says. Her face scrunches.
"Let's go."
But then David gets his microphone to work and neither have the heart to walk out while he's so enthusiastically mid-speech.
oooo
The first day at the table with her is normal. It's always the same, the long line, the sharpies, the glossy pictures of someone who barely looks like him anymore. Nothing makes him feel older than staring down at his own young, thin, smiling face.
"Look alive, Mr. Paris," Kate says. "It's about to start."
She thinks she's being cute. He lets her. Beltran was originally scheduled to be here and if he'd come, Robbie would have been banished down at the end of the table with Tim and Beltran would be sitting next to Kate instead. It's what the fans always want to see. What could have been. Instead, they have what was.
Kate's trailer had always had this open door policy. Something about being a mother, he'd thought. Sometimes her boys were in there after school with their nanny, doing their homework or watching TV. Sometimes his kids were in his trailer too, especially when the youngest came along and he was at work so much. But sometimes it was just them at three in the morning, waiting for the shot to start and he would wander next door because her trailer was always cleaner and smelled like the fresh flowers that were delivered to her every day. And she never bothered with fluorescent lights but instead always had lamps with fabric draped over them so the lighting was lush and rosy and warm. He would go over there and sprawl on her couch in his costume while she sat at the mirror and ran lines with herself, or sometimes she would sit next to him, her exhausted head on his shoulder, her wig making his neck itchy.
Or sometimes...
He needs to focus. He's barely an hour into this thing and already his signature is practically illegible and all he can seem to talk to anyone about is the weather. He signs his name over his face on a DVD, the actual disc, and then sends the girl and her mother on down the line to Kate.
When they break for lunch, Kate drags him into the corner of the back room where craft services is set up and looks at him over the rims of her glasses, like he has tried to swipe a book and she's a very pissed off librarian.
"What is the matter with you?" she hisses. "You have all the personality of a dead fish out there."
"Why do you care?"
"Because after they're done with you they come to me," she says. "Can we get a little less Robert and a little more Thomas, please?"
"Jesus," he mutters. "They pay us no matter what, you know."
"Be better," she scolds. "Now."
He feels like a chastised child as she glides away, but in a way, it all feels oddly familiar and thrilling. Kate grabbing him and pulling him into some dark corner. He shakes his head, tries to clear the cobwebs.
But the second day of signing, she scoots her chair a little closer to him and he swears he feels her foot against his. When he looks at her, his eyebrows high on his forehead, she grins back, wide and innocent. But he knows that glint in her eyes.
She begs off going to dinner with him and Tim citing some prior engagement with a friend.
He's back in his hotel room by ten o'clock and when the knock comes, he honestly believes it's Tim, wanting one more thing before bed. It's why he throws open the door with such ease. When he sees her, though, he jumps.
"Hey," he says. She's gussied up, as much as Kate will gussy herself. It just means a black dress and kitten heels, but her hair is longer now, and down and she has red cheeks and lipstick on. It's nothing compared to the amount of make-up they'd slathered on her to be Janeway, but it's more than nothing and she actually looks pretty good.
"Can I come in?" she asks. He steps aside, used to following her orders anyway. This time, her scarf is an orange and rust number, one of those sheer accessories that has nothing to do with warmth. It slides away from her body silently and puddles to the floor. He realizes that she has been drinking. From the looks of her flushed skin, red wine. Not enough to qualify her as drunk, but certainly her inhibitions have gone. She kicks off her shoes and sits herself on the edge of the bed.
"Katie," he says, warningly. "What are you doing?"
"How long has it been?" she asks. "Five years?"
"Three," he says, maybe too quickly.
"Atlanta." She snaps her fingers. "I forgot."
"We had been drinking," he says. He's still not 100% sure about Atlanta, actually. Just because they'd woken up together in bed didn't mean anything. The nudity could have been... well, they'd been drunk at any rate.
"I've only had one glass," she says pointedly but then her face changes slightly. "Maybe two."
"We don't need to be doing this again," he says, crossing his arms. "We shouldn't."
"Should, shouldn't, what does it matter at this point?" she asks.
"You were the one who didn't want to cheat on your husband, you know," he says.
"And then you fucked me nine more times before the wrap party," she says. "What about your wife?"
He sighs, rubs his face in his hands. He's had on set affairs before. It's Hollywood and he isn't immune, but this is the only one that seems to haunt him. The one that never seems to end. She's not even leggy or a starlet or particularly vapid. If she were, this would be easy. He'd fuck her and she'd leave and then he could go home to his wife and kids but this... this is Kate.
"What about your husband?" he says instead. He can see very clearly now that there is no ring on her finger any longer. She shrugs, pushes herself farther back on the mattress so her head is on a pillow. Her hair spread out under her, her knees bent. It's like she's arranged herself in the way that would be most irresistible to him. He looks at him with heavy eyes.
"Robbie," she says, her voice deep in her throat.
He never really had a chance.
oooo
She spends an hour telling him about Shakespeare, about winning a coveted role. It's hard to really listen with her draped across him and they have to take frequent breaks when he slides into her and she can't talk anymore, but eventually, exhaustion takes over and he has to hear her out. She tells him it's in Connecticut, she invites him to come. "Maybe," he murmurs, slipping her earlobe between his teeth.
"I'd like for us to be friends," she says, her breath hitching slightly. He likes to hear her make that noise, even though it's not going to lead to anything - at least not until morning.
"We are friends," he says. "We've been friends for fifteen years."
"I don't think so," she sighs, pushing him away. "Unless we're on set or in bed we hardly speak."
"That isn't true. Conventions," he says, as if stating the extreme obvious.
"Still work."
"I went to your kid's art show," he argues. Who would do that for someone who wasn't a friend?
"Not on the night I was there," she huffs.
"I donated money to Tim's campaign for governor!" Robbie says.
"That's being a good democrat," she says.
"I'm not even a constituent of Ohio," he says. "Come on. I did all that for you." She pretends to inspect her nail beds, looks at the clock and starts scanning the room for her various pieces of clothing. "Kate. What do you want? Do you want us to go on dates? That isn't... this is what we can have. This right now, but not anything more."
"I like your wife," she says. "And your children."
"I like them too," he says.
"I don't want to destroy your family, I just would like to see you more often is all," she says. "Even if your penis stays in your trousers for the entire visit."
He chuckles.
"Okay. We could probably work on that, at least. You could do a guest spot on Chuck!"
"Please," she says. "I am Cleopatra now."
"God, you are such a haughty bitch," he mutters. She smacks him on the chest but not hard enough to hurt, and soon he has coaxed her back into his arms so they can get at least a few hours of sleep before facing the last day of this pathetic attempt at prolonging their Star Trek fame.
"Hey, did you hear what Beltran is doing?" she asks.
"No, what?"
"Absolutely nothing," she says and cackles.
Shit, he thinks. He might actually love her.