Musings of a Science Officer - Personal Log 4

Posted on 27 Oct 2017 @ 2:23pm by Lieutenant JG Gideon Nicols PhD

919 words; about a 5 minute read

“People, fans, certainly can be an interesting bunch…”

Gideon Nicols looked at the clock that hung above the kitchen sink. It was an old fashioned clock, decorative, and the second hand ticked away. The sound buried deep into his psyche, and felt himself becoming mesmerized by it. It was two in the morning, and he had just gotten in an hour earlier. He was exhausted, yet once he changed and gotten into bed, he found that he couldn’t sleep. He tossed and turned for close to a half an hour before he decided sleep was going to be futile.

“Now, don’t get me wrong, these book signings have been pretty good. I have to admit it’s been nice to meet some of the fans of my work. But, I wasn’t prepared for the sheer volume of it all. There were hundreds in the queue and I hated the fact I couldn’t spend more time with each fan…”

As he continued to stare at the clock, he realized his words were just tumbling from his lips as if he wasn’t thinking at all. He didn’t really do personal logs this late in the evening. He only did so when he was stressed or lonely or heartbroken. A personal log was like therapy; at least that was how he viewed it. Sometimes, his personal logs would go on and on and other times it was one sentence:

Computer, begin personal log. The day was just fine, nothing to report. Computer, end log.

Other times, he sat at his desk, he paced, he laid on the couch and treated his personal log like a long therapy secession. He would just talk, and talk, and talk, and talk some more. He had even fallen asleep once while doing a personal log and the end of it was just him snoring and mumbling in his sleep. He could have deleted it, but he didn’t, he figured it was his own log; there was no reason to delete it. His personal log contained the good, the bad, and definitely the ugly parts of his life and psyche. There was no reason to delete the bad and ugly, because all of it made up his thoughts. His life wasn’t all sunshine and lollipops after all.

“I also wasn’t prepared for all the questions. Majority of the questions were harmless, just wanting to know how I came up with the idea for the series or when the next book was coming out… those were easy. However, some people were asking these little nitpicky questions about aspects of the story that were so miniscule that I myself have long forgotten about it. Other questions were more personal in nature, and I had thirty-five people give me their personal information, eleven people who asked me out for drinks, and one marriage proposal…”

At that last bit, Gideon found himself laughing as he finally tore his gaze from the ticking clock.

“Marriage proposal aside, I didn’t realize how famous I was. Marie would just send me messages concerning book sales, how many were in print, how many were downloaded, and whether or not the book had been adapted for the holodeck. The numbers were always high, but honestly I never paid much attention to those numbers. My Starfleet career was what mattered, not my literary one. That was why I kept the two separate. I didn’t want one to impeded the other; science is and always will be my first love. I did tell Marie that once I get a new assignment that I won’t be as available, but I did promise to be better with correspondence.

“OH! Which brings to another thing—the correspondence. See, people are able to write me, to send me messages even though technically they aren’t sending the messages to me personally. According to Marie, most of the fanmail—she calls it fanmail—is just generic ‘I love your books’ and some are questions, some want signed photos, etc. Sometimes, I would get letters forwarded to me, but a lot of times I sort of just put them aside. Marie had told that wasn’t good for book sales, but again I would have to stress that my career in Starfleet as a science officer had to take precedence. However, meeting all these fans, knowing how much they enjoy the books, I figured I could be better about answering people who do take the time to send me letters.”

Gideon moved to the window and looked out. The city was lit up; San Francisco was a city that never seemed to sleep. Sure, the outer suburbs were quiet at two in the morning, but the city itself was alive. It was alive and enticing. At that, a thought popped into his head. He would see if Mark was available to hit up an hours bar or club and then… well, he could just see where the night took him.

“Computer end personal log…”

After he finished up his personal log, he contacted Mark and was in luck to find that the man was available to meet. They agreed to meet up in the Castro District in a half an hour. He moved to the bedroom to get ready, stared at the untidy bed for a few moments wondering if he made the right decision. He shrugged, dismissing the unmade bed and moved to the bathroom to shower.

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