Title: Regret

Author/pseudonym: Caroline Crane

Fandom: Enterprise

Paring: Trip/Archer

Rating: PG13

Status: new

Archive: yes to list archives

Series/Sequel: final installment in the Heart on Fire series

Disclaimers: Insert standard disclaimer here

Notes: I hereby officially resign from this fandom. The ENT muse hates me or something, I sincerely regret ever taking this one up. It should not have taken me this long to get this series resolved. And I find myself having to apologize for the lack of resolution. Anyway here's the final part, sorry about the wait. Thanks to Kara for hosting my fic, if I ever get the urge to write more ENT slash I think I'll just get drunk instead.

Summary: Jon and Trip finally talk things out.

Warnings: none

Regret
by Caroline Crane

The second I say it I want to take it back. Just four little words, four words that could have meant anything. *You're the problem, Trip*. I could mean that he's a liability - a disappointment as a Chief Engineer, as a best friend, as a Starfleet Officer. I guess I just expect him to know what I
mean when I say it, but the look on his face as soon as the words come out of my mouth.he looks like I just spit in his face. Or worse, that I just told him I don't want him as my best friend anymore.

I should have known he'd jump to the wrong conclusion. Maybe I did; maybe I was hoping it would be enough to make him leave me alone, to avoid me as much as possible until I could come up with an excuse to get us back to Earth and find myself a new Chief Engineer. Part of me expects him to turn around and walk out of my quarters, and I know if he did I would have let him go. Maybe that makes me a coward, I don't know, but I don't have to think too hard about it because he's still standing there. He's so close to me I can feel his breath on my face, and I know I should move away from him but I can't. I tell myself it's because I can't let him see me back down, but I know as well as he does that it's a lie.

That's the trouble with being best friends with my first officer; he knows all my weaknesses, knows how to deal with me when I'm acting like a fool and he knows exactly how far he can push me. It's his job, in a way, part of the reason he's out here with me is to make sure I don't let my
all-too-human emotions run away with me. That's always been my weak spot, and I've proven it more times than I want to remember in the few months we've been floating around out here. He knows too much about me, that's why I've tried so hard to push him away for so long. For awhile I thought it had finally worked, that I'd finally pushed hard enough that he wasn't going to push back this time.

Until he showed up at my door in the middle of the night, looking lost and determined at the same time. That's exactly how he looks right now, standing less than a foot away from me and so close that I can feel it every time he moves. I want to push him away again, to hurt him if I have to just
to keep him from finding out just how much he could hurt me if he wanted.

"Go back to bed," I say, ignoring the flash of hurt in his eyes and the way his breath feels against my cheek when he answers me.

"Not until you tell me what the hell you meant by that. Come on, Johnny, you can't just say something like that and expect me to go away. We're friends, aren't we?"

"Sure, friends." I wince at the bitterness in my voice, looking down at his chest so I don't have to see the look in his eyes. He's the best friend I've ever had and I ruined it by falling in love with him, but I can't tell him that. I can't tell him how much it hurts whenever I see him talking to
Malcolm, or how I lie awake at night wondering who else he's sleeping with. I don't even know anymore if he would tell me, and that hurts more than anything. "As my friend you'll let this go, Trip."

"As your friend you know I can't do that, Jon." His hand lands on my shoulder before I see him move, and just that simple touch feels so good that for a second I can't stop myself from leaning into it. I look up at him again, struggling against the urge to say to hell with it and just kiss him, just to see what would happen. I do my best to keep my emotions out of my eyes, but I must not do a great job because as soon as I look at him his other hand lands on my cheek. "Johnny?"

Just the sound of my name - the name no one but him has called me since I was ten - makes my heart stop beating and before I can stop it he's easing me forward. I don't even try to stop him, even though everything in me is telling me I can't let this happen. It's the thing I've been working to avoid since the moment I asked him to be ship's engineer, and all he has to do is say my name and I fold. I'd laugh at my own pathetic lack of self-control if I wasn't about to lose the best friend I'll ever have.

But God, his lips feel soft against mine and when his hand leaves my shoulder to trail through my hair I close my hands around the front of his uniform, pulling him flush against me. And that feels even better, his lips parting under mine to let me taste what I've only imagined for the first time. I want to give in, to forget for just a little while that I'm the captain of Enterprise and there's a reason I've been pushing him steadily away for so long. There are a lot of reasons, and as soon as his hands move down to my waist to slide under my undershirt I flatten my palms against his chest and shove him away.

I catch him off guard and he stumbles backwards, catching himself on the wall and turning back to me with this look that makes it hard to stop myself from reaching for him again. "We can't do this."

His expression shifts from hurt and confused to indignant as soon as the words escape my lips, and instead of moving forward like I expected him to he takes a step backwards and runs his fingers through his hair. "We've been doing this for a long time, Jon. You know it as well as I do. Is this what you meant when you said I was the problem? Is this because of Starfleet and their stupid rules?"

Starfleet's rules are the last thing on my mind, but it doesn't surprise me that that's the first place his mind goes. Like I said, he knows me too well. "It's not about rank, Trip."

"Then what? Is it because we're friends?"

I turn away from him to keep myself from giving in to the temptation to pull him back into me and find out exactly what I've been missing all this time. In a way our friendship has everything to do with it, because that's what I thought I was trying to protect all this time. I told myself I never brought up that night in his quarters because I didn't want to ruin an otherwise perfect friendship, but now I'm not so sure. All this time I've been protecting my heart, and where has it gotten me? I don't know how to answer him without telling him everything, but a second later it doesn't matter anymore. I hear him move and my shoulders tense, but instead of leaving my quarters the way I expect him to he stops right behind me.

"You're gonna have to help me out here, Johnny. If you're not interested just say so, but it sure as hell didn't feel that way when you kissed me just now."

"That's not it." I hear his exasperated sigh and I know how frustrated he must be, but that just makes me even angrier. He doesn't have a right to be frustrated with me, not after the years I've spent trying to avoid this conversation. I turn to face him, startled for a second at how close he really is to me. I catch myself before I take a step backwards, crossing my arms over my chest and forcing myself to look him in the eye. "It's just a bad idea, Trip. We're friends, let's just leave it at that."

"Leave it at that.how the hell do you expect me to leave it at that? You've done everything but order me to stay out of your life, and when I finally do get you to talk to me you kiss me like that and then tell me to forget it. Not a chance, Johnny." He takes another step forward, his chest pressed against my arms as he leans forward and brushes his fingers across my temple. "I've waited for this for way too long to just forget it."

"You've waited for this." I don't want to think he means that the way it sounds, but it's hard not to when his fingers are warm against my skin and his breath's hitting my cheek again. I know what he means, I've known that he was attracted to me for years. It's not enough, though, I've told myself all this time that it's not enough and I can't back down now just because he feels good pressed up against me. "I'm sure you can find something to distract you."

I regret it as soon as I say it, partly because he looks like I just slapped him and partly because I'm afraid he might take my advice. I can't just fall into bed with my best friend and pretend it doesn't mean anything, though, so even if he does go running back to Malcolm it's better than torturing myself. He doesn't leave, though; he doesn't even move away from me, but he pulls his hand away from my face and lets it drop to his side.

"It's not like I haven't offered before," he says, looking just for a second like a twelve-year-old kid trying to charm his way into staying up for an extra half hour of cartoons. I want to pick up his hand and put it back on my face, warm the skin that he left so cold when he pulled away. I want to stop this whole stupid argument with another kiss, but I can't do anything but stand there and wait for him to continue. Instead of saying anything else he looks away from me like he's trying not to lose his last shred of patience.

"You were drunk," I hear myself say, the accusation in my voice making us both wince.

He looks back up at me then, his eyes wide and so open that for the first time since I've known him I can almost believe that he feels something for me besides just friendship. "So I was a little drunk, that doesn't mean I didn't mean it. Maybe I wasn't brave enough to say it sober, but I still
wanted you. I always have, you had to know that."

"How would I know that?" I still sound defensive, but I'm too busy trying to figure out what he's saying to worry about how I sound. "You never brought it up again after that night."

"You looked at me like you were ashamed to be my friend," he says, finally taking a step backwards. Then his arms are crossed over his chest and suddenly he's too far away, the hurt in his eyes making my stomach turn. "I was just glad you were willing to forget the whole thing and still be friends, that was more important than how I felt."

The truth hits me like a solid blow right to my stomach, and I feel the floor start to move under me. I stumble backwards before my knees give out, the weight of what he's telling me moving me back to sit down hard on the edge of my bed. "What are you saying, Trip?" I ask when I catch my breath. My voice is small, so quiet I'm not even sure he can hear me from all the way across the room.

"I'm saying that I wanted you then and I still do, Johnny. I was ready to never tell you, but somehow I managed to screw up things between us anyway so there's no point keeping it a secret anymore."

I look up at him and he looks so miserable, but there's a hint of the hope I've always loved most about him right around the edges of his expression. If I trusted my legs to hold me up I'd get up and touch him again, but instead I just shake my head and look back down at the floor. "What about Malcolm?"

"That's over," he says, his voice so soft I have to strain to hear him. "It never even started, not really. He's hung up on somebody else too, mostly we were just commiserating together."

I don't want to know what his definition of 'commiserating' is. I have a pretty good idea already from the rumors I've overheard, and it's hard to keep anything like that a secret on board a starship. I know I don't really have a right to be jealous, but that doesn't mean I have to hear the details about their relationship. I'm still not clear on what all this means, I know what I want to believe but after all this time I'm afraid to let myself. "I don't."

"Don't say it," he interrupts before I'm even sure what I'm going to say. "I know you don't feel the same, Jon. I know you don't love me that way, and I should have just left it alone when you ordered me to. I wasn't going to tell you, but for awhile there I thought maybe."

He trails off and shakes his head like he's resigning himself to the fact that things are finally over between us. Our friendship, our working relationship, everything. Like we can just sweep it under the rug and go our separate ways, like that would be possible even if we weren't stuck floating through space together. My mind keeps going back to the word 'love', the way he said it and the way his voice cracked just a little before he caught himself. "You love me?"

I might never figure out in what universe it's possible that Trip loves me, but when I look up at him again he's nodding. His eyes are flashing with anger, probably at me for making him admit it when I still haven't said anything about how I feel. He's not backing down, though, and I can tell he's determined to see this through no matter how it ends. I smile at that thought; I can't help it, but it fades as soon as I remember how much time we've wasted. Before I know it I'm on my feet and moving forward, and when I stop in front of him I take hold of both his shoulders and look straight in his eyes. "You love me."

"It's not like I planned." That's as far as he gets before I cut him off, finding his mouth again and swallowing the rest of his sentence in a hard kiss. It takes him a second to catch up with me, but when he does his hands are in my hair again and he's kissing me back with an intensity that makes my knees wobble. And I don't think I'll ever get tired of kissing Trip, but too soon he's pushing me away and taking a step backwards, his eyes wide as he pants for breath. "What are you.what are you saying here, Jon?"

I know I must be grinning like an idiot but I can't make myself care, not when everything I've ever wanted is standing right in front of me. "I love you too, Trip. Probably since the day we met."

"But that night."

"I thought that was all it was - that one night. You were drunk, I thought you were just offering me one night. I wanted to take it, but I knew if I did I couldn't keep you as my best friend."

"You mean all this time."

"I guess so," I interrupt, smiling as he shakes his head and runs a hand through his hair.

"We're a couple of fools, you know that?"

"I could have told you that before tonight," I answer, smiling even more when he laughs. I step forward again and reach out for him, and this time he meets me halfway.

"I can't believe Malcolm was right," he says. I do my best not to scowl at the sound of that name, telling myself it's over now and I can't hold it against Malcolm. After all, I can hardly blame him for being attracted to Trip. "He said you were crazy about me."

"He's a smart man." I lean forward and press a soft kiss to his lips, pulling back to smile at him again. "Can we talk about him later?"

"Whatever you say, Captain," he answers, smirking when I frown at him. "Maybe I should have a talk with Travis, I have a feeling Malcolm's not as right about him as he thinks he is."

"Malcolm and Travis?" I raise my eyebrows as he wraps his arms around my waist and starts backing me toward the bed. When my legs hit the edge of the mattress I sit down again, pulling him with me and reaching for the zipper of his uniform. "I guess that makes sense in a weird way."

"I'd agree with you, but we're not talking about him right now," he says. I just have time to grin at him before he covers my mouth with his again, and I'm more than happy to let the subject drop for as long as he wants.