The Things We Do For The Fleet

Chapter Twelve: Orange Peels

💙Eventual Leonard McCoy x fem!reader💙

⚠️: Nightmares

word count: 1,161

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It wasn’t very long before Y/N was being woken up again, except the time on the nightstand read 1:30.

Leonard still had one hand on her shoulder as her heart raced. Y/N looked up at him as she sat up. “What, what is it?” She asked, still a bit fogged with sleep.

“Were you dreaming about soccer or something, you kept kicking. Are you alright?” Leonard asked, a certain soft concern lacing his voice.

“Yeah, yeah I’m fine,” Y/N muttered as vague memories of her nightmare flashed in her mind. She sat up and ran her hands over her face, “Just a bad dream,” Y/N added from behind her fingers.

Leonard looked at her for a moment as he tried to decide what to do in this situation, he wasn’t exactly well versed in bad dream comfort. He finally settled on just asking, “Is there anything I can do to help?” Leonard asked, giving Y/N’s shoulder an encouraging squeeze.

Y/N looked at his silhouette through the dim light of the nightstand clock as she considered whether she could really ask this of him. She knew what would help, it had always helped and it only seemed natural to her, but what if it made things weird between them.

Y/N found herself overthinking everything about Leonard’s offer to help and ultimately worked herself into more anxiety, which her body hid poorly as she began to shake.

“Hey there,” Leonard whispered as he pulled Y/N’s hands away from her face, “It’s alright, there’s no need to work yourself into a twist,” he tried to comfort her, still holding her hands in his.

As she continued shaking, tears began to stream down her face as her breathing started to come only in short shallow breaths of air. “Oh come now, none of that, it’s too early,” Leonard tried to lighten Y/N’s mood as he glanced at the time. He looked at her for a long moment more, sighing he said, “If you don’t tell me anything I can’t help you,”

Y/N paused for a moment, actively attempting to calm her mind and body long enough to speak. “C-could you just, just hold me for a while?” she asked, steeling her nerves as she prepared for Leonard to tell her that she was being ridiculous.

“Yeah, of course, c’mere,” he pulled her close to his side before turning them both on their side as he snaked his arms around her waist, holding Y/N close to his chest.

“How’s that?” Leonard muttered into her hair, trying not to move too much or to do anything that might make her uncomfortable. This was already unexplored territory for them, the last thing Leonard needed to do was make the living arrangements uncomfortable.

“Thank you,” Y/N muttered through a yawn.

“That’s alright, Darlin’ just get some sleep,” Leonard told her as his own eyes began feeling heavy again.

As Leonard’s first alarm went off that morning he jerked awake, only to find he couldn’t go anywhere quite yet. At first he was most certainly confused, but then the memories from much earlier this morning flooded into his mind.

“I’m gonna need you to move just a bit,” he said, hoping Y/N would hear him as he slowly began working his arms from around her.

“Mmm,” Y/N groaned as she lifted herself just enough for Leonard to pull his arm out from under her.

“Thanks,” Leonard said, quite possibly to a girl who wasn’t at all listening, as he swung his legs out of bed to get ready for the day. He yawned, stretched, got dressed and did his usual morning things, but this morning he was struck with the idea to do something else too.

As Leonard thought back to lunch yesterday he remembered something Y/N had said, “I love oranges, but I can’t peel one for myself”, yeah it was something like that, that she said. This was the thought process that sparked him into running down to the mess hall and snagging an orange to bring back.

Leonard didn’t exactly have time to spare at the moment, but he still took the time to stand in the kitchen peeling an orange for Y/N to have when she got up. Leonard left the peeled orange on the counter and tossed the peel in the trash bin before he saw the time and dashed for the door.

I hope that’s not too strange a thing to do Leonard thought as he waited for the turbo lift to open.

When Y/N’s alarm went off she was vividly aware of a citrus smell coming from somewhere in the quarters. She thought that she must have been imagining it as she rolled out of bed.

Y/N yawned and muttered something that was incomprehensible even to her own mind as she headed for the shower.

After washing up and dressing herself, she went to the kitchen for tea, only to stop in front of the counter. There sat on the counter a peeled orange already pulled into pieces. Y/N smiled widely at the sight, quickly forgetting about her tea.

As Y/N reached for the orange she couldn't help the spark of pure, unadulterated joy that filled her. He really didn’t have to do that, I don’t even know what I could do to return the favour, she thought as she bit into her first slice and a smile overtook her features.

This morning Y/N didn’t even bother to go down to breakfast, she walked to the turbo lift with her remaining orange slices in hand and went to the green houses. She mindlessly put another orange to her lips, holding it there for a second as she considered what she had to do for the day.

If nobody else collected my soil samples yesterday then I’ll have to finish doing that, otherwise I’ll just have to check the duty roster, Y/N continued eating her orange slice as the turbo lift door opened to reveal the botany deck. She stepped out, still chewing and made a beeline to see the duty roster.

As Y/N walked her steps echoed through the halls, it never ceased to amaze her how quiet it was this early. Not that she could say she was terribly surprised seeing as she wasn’t typically here this early either.

Y/N stood in front of the duty roster for a moment, searching for her name. Running her finger down the list, she found that her soil samples had not, in fact, been collected. Not that she minded, this was one of the parts of her job she liked better. During this process it was normally fairly quiet and she could just pop on her headphones once more.

Eating another orange slice, she made her way to her own little botany station, where she intended to be until lunch.

I really liked this one, particularly because I also, cannot peel an orange

The Things We Do For The Fleet

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