They were fully clothed as they lay upon her bed. Spock was between her legs, his cheek and ear tucked in the valley of her breasts. Uhura’s cool hands slid through his hair and danced behind his ears, making him twitch every now and again.

“You are ticklish,” she said on a tiny chuckle.

“Yes,” Spock replied, though his tone was warm with amusement. It amazed him how they’d come to this. All the years they had worked side by side, a mutual respect transforming into mutual regard, then mutual high regard, then something his upbringing made him uneasy to admit or name. But that upbringing couldn’t stop his hand from sliding up to her side to where her heart would beat if she were Vulcan, letting his thumb draw an arc there.

“What is it, honey?” she asked quietly, still maintaining her caresses.

Spock closed his eyes and let his mind take him back to the days of his early youth. “When I was a child, I would have very vivid nightmares, and I would crawl into bed with my parents and place my head on my mother’s cool chest.”

“Nightmares?”

“Yes. I had a very active imagination and had not yet learned how to order my thoughts so they did not overwhelm. I suspect my human heritage made that more difficult than if I were fully Vulcan.”

Uhura’s hand now gently caressed the sides and back of his head. “I’m sorry, Spock.”

He took a deep breath and nuzzled his cheek against her. “My father did not understand my behavior, but my mother would indulge it, singing a Terran lullaby and stroking me in much the same way you are right now.”

Uhura’s hand stopped. “Oh?”

He grinned a little and kissed the space where his cheek was resting, his eyes meeting hers. “Your touch usually compels a different response; but currently, it is as soothing as my mother’s was.”

Uhura grinned in return and replaced his head back on her chest. “Noted.”

Spock listened to her heart beat for ten-point-three seconds. “One night, after she had finished her lullaby, I did not fall back asleep as I normally would. I had been fascinated by the steady cadence underneath my ear. Admittedly, I had always been, but this night, the lullaby she had chosen had matched the rhythm I heard.”

“Oh, what was it?”

“What was what?”

“The lullaby.”

His eyes softened and his eyebrow rose. “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star.”

Feeling Uhura’s giggle was as pleasant as hearing it. “Oh, that’s wonderful!”

“I will confess it was among my favorites,” Spock said, shifting his head so he could look into her eyes. His closed when one of her fingers trailed along his forehead and down the bridge of his nose until she reached the point.

“Do you want me to sing it to you now?”

“You may after I finish telling my story.”

Uhura laughed again, returning to combing her fingers through his hair. “All right.”

He settled back to his original position and allowed her to do this for a few moments, much too tranquil to determine the exact length of time, before continuing. “I had asked her what was that beating underneath my ear. She had laughed lightly, smoothed my hair from my forehead, and told me it was her heart. I had frowned, placing my hand where I thought it should be, and looked at her, then my father, then back at her before asking why was it in the wrong place.”

“Oh, Spock,” Uhura said on a chuckle, kissing the top of his head.

“If it were not so completely illogical, I would be convinced all Human women shared a brain, for she said and did exactly the same thing you have just done after I posed my question.”

He felt her smile at the crown of his head. “That is because you are too cute for words sometimes.”

He frowned. “Cute?” She had accused him of being such before.

“Oh, definitely! Just as adorable as you wanna be!”

His frown deepened, but then he raised his eyebrows and sighed, unwilling to challenge the point. He doubted he would convince her to alter her assessment, anyway. “Nevertheless, my mother placed one of her hands to my right side where my heart was, then slid her other across my father’s torso to where his heart was. I remember he had been lying on his back and had to shift to his left side to accommodate her. But what had struck me most was the softness in his gaze as he had looked upon her. Normally, he always wore a severely austere expression.”

“He loves your mother, Spock. That was very apparent when they were on the ship.”

“It was?”

“To me, anyway…”

Uhura’s voice had faded away, and Spock had detected its minute trembling before it had disappeared. He changed positions again so his hand could rest right over the space of her heart. She moved her ministrations to his cheeks and granted him a smile.

“She loves him very much,” Spock replied.

Uhura’s eyes softened as she brushed her knuckles against his skin. “I can understand that.”

He wished he could understand as easily as she seemed to, but he was not in his parents’ marriage; and while his relationship with his father was much better than it had been before his arrival on the Enterprise, it was not one in which Spock was comfortable in discussing their union with him. Then again, he could admit his mother had always made his father a bit more…human…

There was suddenly a burst of awareness upon his consciousness. “Hmm.”

“Hmm?” Uhura asked.

He gazed at where his hand rested. “I had been transfixed by the look that had passed between my parents, more so my father than my mother. Eventually, she had dropped her eyes back to me and said, ‘Spock, a heart that beats is never in the wrong place.’ Then I had gazed at my father again, my young mind needing his confirmation. He then had linked his fingers with hers over his heart and his mouth had relaxed and stretched so that its corners were slightly upturned. I believe that was the first smile I had ever seen from him.”

Uhura smiled as well. “That’s incredibly sweet.”

“It seems the right Human female can have a curious effect on a Vulcan male,” Spock commented, sliding his hand up from her heart to her neck before finally cupping her jaw.

Her eyes practically shown like her namesake as her thumbs moved across his cheeks. “And vice versa.”

Granting her a soft smile, Spock returned his cheek to her chest, his right hand over the pulse point at her neck and his left hand back over the space where a Vulcan heart would be.

“You may sing to me now.”

Uhura kissed the top of his head one more time and held him close as she began the song. He was asleep before she finished the first verse.