Jealousy

Disclaimer: Star Trek Voyager, its characters, etc. are owned by Paramount.

Author's note: Something a little bit different that took hold of me while I was working on my current story. Blame/credit goes to Marauder-in-Disguise for her review comment about Owen! Thanks, Marauder!

I watch him when he doesn't know that I'm looking, snuggling her closer to his chest, stroking her hair, whispering sweet nothings in her ear. He holds her every chance he gets, purporting to give B'Elanna and me a "break," but it's easy to see through the façade. When she cries, he sings to her softly, tuneless lullabies I never thought would pass his lips. When she tries to stand, he's holding her hands, encouraging her with his lavish praise. And when she falls, he's there to pick her up and tell her what a brave girl she is. When she is in the room, nothing else seems to matter to him. His eyes and his smile follow her alone.

She brings a light to his soul that I've never seen there before, a light I never knew could illuminate the steely exterior of my father, the consummate Starfleet Admiral.

I watch him and feel something I never thought I would feel.

Jealousy.

It seems ridiculous, sacrilegious almost, to be jealous of my own daughter. But the emotion is there.

I watch the way my father is with her and wonder if he was ever like that with me. Did he ever come home from the office early just so he could spend a few extra minutes with me before dinner? Did he ever patiently read and reread the same holobook just because the pictures made me giggle uncontrollably? Did he ever slip into my room at night after I was sleeping just to watch me breathe and softly brush the hair off my forehead?

I wish he could have been that unguarded, that devoted, to me.

But maybe in a way, through my own daughter, he is.

-The End-