The BLTS Archive- Melodies
by august (appelsini@hotmail.com)

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cSept 1998

So short, and so . . . strange . .

As SrMaryKath says: In the end, no one will care who owned them.

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I dated a musician once, when I was a cadet. I was too young for it to
be a serious affair, but it was heart stopping nonetheless. He dazzled 
me with his music, and every time I saw him on stage I was convinced 
it was the REAL THING. It lasted for about six months, I think, before 
being Cadet Janeway began to consume my life.

I remember going to his gigs and being captivated by his words. He
would drip emotions onto the stage, painting this unbelievable story 
of music and lyrics that left me breathless. He was an exciting lover. 
He was a wonderful friend.

We parted ways after my first assignment. I had been stationed
off-Earth, and I don't think he really understood my desire to be a 
part of Starfleet. We parted on good terms, and both followed our 
paths in lives. I went on to Captain a Starship, and he became quite a 
famous musician, as I recall.

I thought of him for the first time in -- oh so many years, the other
day. Voyager was on a long-overdue shore leave, and I had taken some 
time out to just walk the streets with Chakotay. We stopped to look at 
a few shops when I was frozen solid by a melody floating through the 
streets.

I spun around quickly to see a busker on the side of the road. He was
strumming some sort of stringed instrument, and for a second the
melody tugged at my memory. I closed my eyes, and it seemed to be a 
song lifted right from my youth. The images flooded back to me, and I 
couldn't help but smile at the recollection.

And then, all of a sudden, the tune shifted and it was gone. I
realised Chakotay was staring at me, and I smiled again. Old memories, 
and for the first time in I don't know how long, I welcomed them.


I met him once again, my old lover, a couple of months before Voyager
left for the Badlands. Mark and I were in town the night his band 
happened to be playing. After much cajoling, I managed to convince 
Mark to accompany me. It was a nice night -- we sat in the bar and 
listened to the music. I made noattempt to re-introduce myself, I 
doubt he really would have remembered me.

The music was a little different than I remembered. Not as
breath-taking, not as moving. But it was still his music. I sat, 
smiling, happy at what he had achieved in life. And then he played an 
old, old song. It was my favourite when we were dating -- it would tug 
at me back then, in ways that always brought me to tears.

And I listened, sitting in that bar, years and so much more away from
who I used to be. He played it, and I listened like it was the first 
time. And it tugged at me again, but in a different way than before. 
It tugged at me because I realised then that for the first time, he 
really knew how to play it. Because age, and time, had let him shape 
the words -- let him  shift and mold and understand what he had 
created. Because, I guess, he seemed to understand it, finally.

I don't know why I'm thinking of this now. Maybe because we're still
60,000 light years from home, because I'm lonely . . . because because
because all those things that I take to bed with me every night.

Because I think of my old musician boyfriend, I think of his songs and
I realise that we're not supposed to know how to play it. That we get
many chances, and it will always be someone else who notices when we
finally, finally get it right.

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The End