stop. look. listen.

Five weddings where Jim took Bones as his date.

I.
“No,” Leonard says, and he’s pretty sure it’s clear and succinct and to the point, and that normal people would just accept it for what it is: complete and utter refusal to be dragged into insanity that is James Kirk’s latest idea.

Kirk, of course, sees it as an opening. “But, Boooones,” he drawls, as if the nickname he imposed on Leonard had at least four syllables, the vowels dragged into something soft and liquid. The point, Leonard supposes, is to soften McCoy himself, to melt his opposition and bring down his defenses.

The worst part is, it will probably work.

“But, Boooones,” Kirk drawls with his best/worst expression, the one that’s hope and pleading and puppy eyes. If he had a tail, he’d be wagging it right about now.

(When Kirk wants something, he as two basic modes. ‘But, Bones’ is the easy one, up there with the casual sprawl on Leonard’s bed and a warm hand on Leonard’s thigh, slow golden smile gracing Jim’s lips. ‘C’mon, McCoy’ is the other shtick, clipped tones and flashing annoyance, impatience and quicksilver of Jim Kirk on a mission, on the move.)

“I never thought you actually had a family,” Leonard grumbles, lying through his teeth. Not like anyone on campus is unaware of the Kelvin story, but McCoy’ll be damned if he makes a big deal of it. It’s an unspoken deal, and unlike many other deals he makes with Kirk, this one he’ll honour to the end. “My guess would be that you were raised by some very rude and promiscuous monkeys.”

“Don’t you want to go to a monkey wedding?” Kirk asks, pleased as all hell, as if Leonard’s participation in the wedding was now a done deal. It’s not.

So of course, two days later Leonard finds himself in Iowa, under a ridiculously fluffy white tent, wondering how to gently explain to Kirk’s grandmother that he’s not a good dancer.

Four waltzes later he begins to think that those Kirks will be the death of him.

II.

“There’s only one question I want to ask,” McCoy says slowly, crossing his arms. “And I won’t even go for the obvious one, which would be how insane exactly are you, because this is for your next psych eval to determine… but damnit, Jim, why?”

It’s an excellent question to pose to James T. Kirk on any given occasion, of course. Answers vary from just slightly moronic to full-blown crazy.

“It’s the ambassador’s wedding, we had been invited,” Kirk explain in a tone one would use with a child. It’s not a tone Jim uses with children, oh no, that one is up to the point and serious, it’s only with McCoy that he chooses to speak slowly and enunciate.

“Not that part. The other part,” he waves vaguely, scowling just in case Kirk dared to try and play at being stupid. He’s worse at that than you’d think he would be, or maybe it’s just that Leonard had learned all his tells a long time ago.

“Our dear cultural scientists warned us against going to the festivities alone. Apparently the natives firmly believe that one wedding is a perfect lead to another, and I don’t know about you, but I didn’t plan on getting married tonight.”

“Yes,” Leonard mutters. “I knew that part. Everyone knows that part, after the constant ship-wide announcements. What I meant is, how does that lead to me being your date to the ambassador’s wedding?”

Kirk shrugs in a typical Kirk fashion, as if his logic should be evident to everyone. McCoy is pretty sure that Spock would agree with this one: Kirk’s logic is not like normal logic.

“There’s a limited pool of people I can take out on a date, Bones, without seriously going against the regs, and while normally I’m all for it, this is an official Starfleet shindig, what with the ambassador and all. And Spock says he won’t go out with me.”

Of course the greenblooded bastard would find an excuse. Probably hide behind Uhura, too.

“You do realize we will start some wild rumours?” he asks, and Kirk is seconds away from punching the air in triumph but he apparently manages to restrain himself; his arm twitches just a little.

“Not wilder than there are already. I should know, I made most of them up.”

McCoy sighs and gives in. “Fine. But they try to make me marry someone on that damn planet, I’m picking Scott. He’ll have a lot of booze as his dowry.”

III.

This, Leonard has to admit, is not a bad way of getting married, if one does feel the need marry at all, a need Leonard understood very well at twenty-six but thinks insane and suicidal over ten years later.

Jim, of course, is excited. Truth be told, a lot of things tend to get Jim Kirk excited, a fact Leonard has no qualms about exploiting, but those times rarely involve flowery garlands and powder blue dresses. Well, fine, one dress, that one time, but they agreed not to talk about it, ever again.

And it’s the first Enterprise wedding, one that Jim gets to officiate, and he’s been bouncing like a little kid hopped up on chocolate for the entire day. Leonard is this close to threatening to tie him up, but he’s pretty sure he knows what the answer would be to this particular promise.

Counterproductive, that’s what the answer would be.

But he has to admit, his heart does beat a little bit faster when he’s walking Chapel down the aisle, and Jim stands right next to the groom. The excitement must be catching, just a little.

“You liked the ceremony,” Jim accuses him later, after a dozen of toasts at the reception, when Leonard is mellowed and his scowl reflexes are not up to the general standard.

“Christine looked lovely,” he says noncommittally, but doesn’t move away when Jim rests his head on his shoulder.

IV.

It’s not that McCoy doesn’t like New Vulcan, it’s just that the whole thing is fucking surreal, what with one Spock officiating the wedding of the other Spock, and looking very puzzled as he’s doing so, not to mention casting strange glances at Kirk.

Leonard might actually not actively dislike the junior hobgoblin now, after roughly seven times they saved each other’s lives (but hey, who’s counting. Except for Spock, but he probably spends half of his night counting the threads of his sheets while Uhura… damn, not going there), but he still distrusts the old Spock.

“I swear, Jim, it’s like he’s mentally undressing you. And you know Vulcans, if he’s mentally undressing you, he’s really mentally undressing you.”

Jim smirks, taking another sip of a rather fantastic wine Uhura had delivered for the reception. “Jealousy doesn’t become you, Bones. Except that it totally does and you look all kinds of hot right now.”

“Be serious, for once.”

Jim shifts, dragging his arm out from behind McCoy and pointing at his fingers. “If you like it, you should put a ring on it,” he offers with the complete seriousness of someone really, really drunk.

In retrospection, it’s probably the worst proposal ever, so Leonard kind of has no choice but to accept.

V.

“I still think you’d look much better in a wedding dress,” Jim mumbles into Leonard’s ear. It’s not a proper conversation for the first dance of the newlywed couple, so of course they’re talking about it.

“And I’m beginning to think that divorcing you wouldn’t be such a bad idea.”

“Like that would help you. You’re stuck with me, Bones McCoy, so deal with it.”

And as they sway to the ridiculous and cheesy song that James Kirk apparently considers music Leonard thinks: it’s not that bad.

He also thinks that two more toasts with that pipecleaner Scotty considers alcohol, and he might rethink his stance on wearing the dress.