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Storytime

By Cardie-ologist

Garak entered his and Ziyal's quarters muttering unintelligibly under his breath. "Did you have a bad day, Elim?" his wife asked, not looking up from her easel. Ever since he had decided to expand the business, there had been an increasing number of bad days.

He kissed her on the forehead. "I'm simply not cut out for reaching consensus in financial matters, my dear. I'm afraid I'll have to pay Quark some ridiculously high fee to represent me in the negotiations with the franchisees."

"You don't have to do this, you know," she replied. "I don't need very much."

"Some day, however, it won't be just you and I we have to worry about. Once our good Dr. Bashir solves the problem of hybrid infertility, as I have no doubt he will, there will be children, and children always need far more than one can imagine. Or so I understand."

Ziyal was silent. They both feared that in fact there would not be children, but it was an outcome they refused to discuss with each other. Garak hurried on to fill up the silence. "So, how was your day? Any more progress with the little brat?"

She finally looked up at him. "Don't talk about Haran that way, Elim. I've told you what she's been through. If you'd only meet her, your heart would go out to her, too."

"I am hardly possessed of the kind of heart that 'goes out' very often." Garak replied. "And, given her loathing of Cardassians, I should definitely stay far away from her."

Ziyal regarded him with concern. He had been none too happy when she started spending time with Haran, and he had steadfastly refused to visit Odo, Kira and the children. She knew better than to ask why, but that didn't stop her from being troubled by his reluctance. "You know, I don't think she's ever actually met a full Cardassian. All her impressions come from the horror stories Bajorans tell about the Occupation." Ziyal sighed, "I wish I had a knack for telling her stories; I might be able to make her see the truth. Haran has an insatiable appetite for stories, from what Nerys tells me. She's quite taken to Worf because of his tales about Kahless, and she even likes to hear Morn talk about his shipping business."

"My dear, with competition like that, your stories should suffice splendidly," her husband said, giving her another tender kiss, this time on the cheek. "The child obviously has no appreciation of a tale well told."

Ziyal sensed an opening. "Maybe she'd develop it, if she could hear a master storyteller, someone like you, Elim," she said adoringly.

"Oh, no, I'm sorry. I don't intend to go anywhere near the difficult Miss Haran. I feel very uncomfortable around children."

Ziyal stared at him in bewilderment. "How can that be, Elim, when you're so set on our having a family?"

"A family, yes. Composed of ourselves and our own children, our blood. The building block of what holds Cardassia together," Garak said. "That's not to be mistaken for a promiscuous attachment to whatever young humanoids happen to cross one's path."

Ziyal started to cry. "We aren't living on Cardassia, Elim, but I'm still sorry I can't give you a family that would pass inspection there, if that's what you want. And I'm also sorry you consider my affection for Haran and Notar . . . promiscuous."

Garak knelt beside her, a remorseful look on his face. "Please, Ziyal, I didn't mean to criticize you."

"Yes you did. I'm becoming quite good at knowing when you're lying to me."

"It was easier to remain an enigma when I stayed away from all long standing intimate relationships," Garak reflected ruefully. "All right, I don't share your attitude, but I also understand that you can't be expected to see matters the way I do. You weren't raised on Cardassia," her husband went on in a placating tone.

"And you were, and suffered terribly from just such cruel beliefs. Sometimes I simply don't understand you at all, Elim," she shot back with mingled hurt and anger.

"Excellent, my dear. I live in terror of not being misunderstood, as the great Wilde once said," he returned urbanely, although the repentance lingered in his blue eyes.

When he started quoting from literature, all hope of getting anything genuine out of him was gone. Ziyal hadn't taken long to figure that out. On the other hand, he'd never made her cry before. He'd be eager to atone. "You don't have to have a particular fondness for children to deal with Haran," Ziyal observed coyly. "She doesn't say much, just sits there and takes everything in. It wouldn't be noticeably different from regaling Dr. Bashir over lunch, if you were to tell her just one story."

Garak laughed and shook his head. "All right, my dear, you've outmaneuvered me once more. But I must say it alarms me on these occasions to be reminded that you are your father's daughter after all."

She kissed him passionately, neither expecting or receiving an equally amorous response, then returned her attention to her easel. She mixed another color and dipped her stylus. Then she paused with it suspended several centimeters above the painting and glanced over her shoulder at him as he contemplated her work. "You really do have to get over these irrational prejudices you have against people, Elim." She smiled sweetly. "Charming Haran will be excellent practice for dealing with Father."

***

Ziyal wasn't so sure that she could convince Nerys of the wisdom of introducing Haran to a real, live Cardassian, so she asked Garak to come by in the middle of the day, when she and the child would be alone together. He didn't arrive until 1600 hours. She went to answer the door prepared to inform him that this was not her interpretation of the phrase "middle of the day," but then she relented. He had finally shown up, and this was an encounter that he for some reason genuinely dreaded to undergo.

Haran remained in her room, displaying her usual lack of interest in who was at the door. Ziyal led Garak to the threshhold and paused. "Haran, my husband Elim that I've told you about is here to see you," she announced.

The child looked up at Garak suspiciously, then her expression turned to confusion, "'nother big lizard leaving? But where good bumps?"

"Elim isn't a hybrid, Haran. He's a Cardassian."

Haran's eyes grew wide. She scrambled up from her computer console and sat on her bed with her back pressed against the wall and her knees drawn up to her chin, the wide eyes continuing to stare at the mythical monster come to life. "Spoon head scum!" she eventually exclaimed in a voice tinged with both fear and contempt. She leaned forward and spat vigorously, then threw herself flat on the bed and covered her head with the pillow.

Ziyal's relentless optimism sometimes triggered less than satisfactory results when put into practice, but she had never seen one of her schemes backfire quite so resoundingly as this. "I I'm sorry, Elim," she said. "You were right about this being a bad idea."

Her husband, however, maintained his equanimity to a degree that surprised her. "Nonsense, my Dear," he whispered. "I've been called far worse things in my time. After this little drama, I'd have to agree with you that it can do nothing but good for Miss Haran to get to know some real Cardassians. I'm not going to risk coming into the room, but if you would just bring that little chair over here, I'm going to sit down and share a few stories with our young friend."

Haran didn't react at all to Ziyal's entering and retrieving the chair. Garak seated himself and then said in calm, even tones, but loud enough to be heard through the pillow, "Haran, Ziyal is going to go sit on the bed with you. She's very eager to hear some stories I happen to know. You can listen, or not, as you please." He motioned Ziyal to take her place. She gave a reassuring pat to the child's back as she positioned herself, but received only a kick in return.

Garak shook his head and gave Ziyal a sympathetic smile. "Now, to begin . . . once, on the great world of Cardassia Prime, there lived a poor orphan boy who had only his wits and his skills with a needle to keep him from starvation . . ."

***

Two hours later, interrupted by Odo returning with Notar, Garak hurriedly brought his tale of the brave little tailor to a provisional close. Refusing an invitation to remain for dinner, he took Ziyal's arm in his and quickly led her to the turbolift to take them to their quarters three levels above.

"That really didn't go so badly, did it?" Garak asked Ziyal with delicious irony. "It only took half an hour for her to remove the pillow from her head, and, before her father arrived, she had been sitting up and listening most attentively for at least ten minutes. And then, the best part, when Odo insisted that she bid us adieu, she said "good bye, spoon head scum" without spitting."

"I said I was sorry, Elim."

He slid his arm around her waist and hugged her to him. "You only meant the best, as you always do."

"She did seem to enjoy the tales," Ziyal said thoughtfully, "even if she wasn't too fond of the teller. Do you think it was wise, though, to devote so much attention to ogres and assassinations and ships exploding in space? She's only seven."

"Did you see the look in her eyes, once she favored us with a glance? The tailor's adventures fascinated her, no matter how bloody they were.. I would predict that Miss Haran could absorb a detailed account of my most grisly interrogation without batting an eyelid."

"Elim! you will under no circumstances even mention such subjects to her."

"Have no worries on that score. It might give her ideas," Garak replied earnestly.

"Don't be absurd; she's just a child."

The lift doors opened. As Ziyal moved to exit, Garak held her back. "I'm serious, my dear," he said, gripping both shoulders tightly. "Children who are told that they are vermin long enough can become capable of anything. Believe me, I know." He released her abruptly and hurried to their quarters, entering a full three meters ahead of her. He had just replicated a glass of kanar when she found him sitting in the dark in their bedroom. She asked the computer for lights and sat down next to him on the bed.

"All right, Elim, this has been going on long enough. What is it that upsets you so much about Haran? Was your childhood anything like hers? I know it's something you've refused to talk about, but I am your wife. You should be able to tell me."

He downed the kanar in two gulps. "My childhood never lacked for adequate food, shelter, and clothing. No one murdered either of my parents before my eyes nor cast me into a ditch to freeze."

"But?" Ziyal urged gently.

He turned toward her with pain filled eyes, and a small smile of surrender, then reluctantly continued, "But to many Cardassian children born into my circumstances, what Haran suffered would appear quite an enviable fate. Moreover, even if I escaped the physical privations, I did not escape the knowledge that what a few of my schoolmates said openly, most everyone else on the planet was thinking: that I was only a bastard, and thus without any lawful place in our society contemptible, tainted, expendable. When I was Haran's age I was faced either with embracing that judgment and living an existence paralyzed by fear, self hatred, and sufferance of others' condescending pity or with rejecting it and creating a life for myself that depended on no one but myself for its validation. I chose the latter course, quite consciously, when I was scarcely older than she is now. Haran is for me, however, a disturbing reminder of what I almost became. She reawakens very painful emotions that I overcame, but not before suffering from them most intensely. I suppose I lack sympathy for her because she has not yet had the strength to overcome them herself, and I fear for her, because the price of overcoming them is learning to live completely for oneself, without caring to have any significant relationships to others."

Garak had delivered his explanation while staring fixedly at the opposing wall. Then he turned to look into Ziyal's face. "I really can't quite fathom why she doesn't equally disturb you, my dear. You grew up a bastard, and a hybrid, too."

Ziyal felt enormous pity rising in her, just that emotion he so hated. Trying not to let it show, she took his hand and asked, very quietly, "Elim, during all those years before you 'chose your course' there wasn't ever one, single person who showed you that you were special to them and that they loved you, was there?" His stricken expression gave her all the answer she needed. "I didn't think so. You see, Elim, that makes all the difference. I always knew that my mother and my father loved me. I wasn't a bastard and a hybrid to them, so I never was to myself. Even poor Haran had three years with a mother who, whatever her other sins, clung to, loved, and protected her child. And now she has Nerys and Odo and yes me to try to make her realize that it was her mother who saw her clearly, not all the bad Bajorans." She embraced him, fighting back tears. "Oh, Elim, how I wish I could have been there to love you when you were that miserable, lonely little boy."

With surprise, she felt his fingers fiddling with the clasps that secured her dress down the back as she simultaneously felt his lips on hers. After a lingering kiss far more ardent than she had yet received from him during their married life, he succeeded in removing the garment. He tore off his own clothes and reached out for her hungrily. As their bodies intertwined, he pleaded with her in an urgent, emotion choked voice, "Now, Ziyal, love me now."