Expectations
Lee Adama has spent his life trying to live up to other people's expectations of him. To fill the roles they expect him to play. The steady older brother, the dutiful son, the hard-working cadet, the dedicated pilot, the responsible officer, the good husband.
He hasn't always succeeded. There have been lapses, both personal and professional. Times when he hasn't cared about anyone's opinion but his own, has gone after what he wanted without any thought to how it would affect anyone else.
Without exception, these lapses have turned out badly. On a professional level, he ended up a fugitive accused of mutiny and desertion; on a personal level he ended up breaking other people's hearts as well as his own.
He's learnt his lesson well. No more lapses. He does now what's expected of him and doesn't stray from it.
----
When Kara's viper explodes in front of him, he's grateful for it. At least he has a routine to carry out, a script to follow.
It gives him something to do.
When he lands he tells Tyrol he's fine, and calls Cally over when the Chief's composure falters. He pulls Athena off rotation and takes her with him to break the news to Helo. He sits in the Admiral's quarters and lets his father force a brandy into his hand, and looks grateful for his words of comfort. He lets Dee hug him and tell him how sorry she is and pretends he doesn't notice the relief deeply buried in her eyes. He gets Tyrol to call Sam and tell him the news.
He even organises the memorial service. It's the CAG's duty after all.
----
It's at the memorial service that he lapses again. His father sits down after his speech, and Lee gets up to take his place at the podium. He knows exactly what to say – he's been to so many memorial services for his pilots that he could do the speech in his sleep – but as he opens his mouth his mind goes blank.
The autopilot he's been running on since he landed back on Galactica falters, and then judders to a stop.
He stares down at the grief-stricken, expectant faces, and can't think of anything to say. Because this isn't just another memorial service. This is Kara.
He can't pass this off with the routine words they all expect. There's so much else to say, and at the same time so little. Only one thing, really, that matters.
He's still silent and the ranks of mourners are starting to shift uncomfortably. So Lee opens his mouth and takes that rare decision to do what he wants without a care for anyone else. Says that one thing that matters, that he needs to say.
"My name is Lee Adama, and I loved Kara Thrace." And I don't care who frakking knows it.
He steps down from the podium in the stunned silence and walks across to the empty coffin. Takes the wings off his jacket and pins them to the Colonial flag draped over the lid.
Then he turns and walks out of the hangar bay without stopping, past those ranks of staring faces, past his father's shocked sympathy, past Helo's nod of understanding, past Sam's stunned grief, past Dee's trembling hurt. He doesn't have time for any of that now.
At least they all have the sense not to follow him. He needs to be alone.
----
He stops at his quarters for a bottle of ambrosia and the photo he took from Kara's locker before Sam arrived to collect her possessions. Sam can have the rest, but not this one thing. It won't mean anything to him anyway.
He hides away in a storage locker where he knows he won't be found. He and Kara used it as a bolthole after the attacks, whenever they needed a break from being Apollo and Starbuck for a while. They'd get drunk and tell jokes and swap memories of the past until the pressure of the present receded. Later on, after New Caprica, they'd use it when they wanted to be alone for other reasons.
He takes a long swig of ambrosia as he realises it's the first time he's been here alone.
He can almost see her in front of him, laughing loudly over a joke at his expense, hazel eyes dancing wickedly as she tells him to lighten up, and his throat catches. It seems impossible that all that bright vitality can have been snuffed out so quickly and so finally. It's such a waste.
That's the thought that finally breaks him. Such a waste. Such a pointless, terrible waste of everything she was, everything she could have been. Everything they were together.
The tears break through then. He struggles to hold them back but he can't, they're unstoppable; huge wrenching sobs that feel as if they're tearing his body in two.
It finally hits him – really hits him – that this time she's not coming back. This time she's not going to sweep in from nowhere in a captured raider or run down a corridor into his arms. She's not coming back, and he's going to have to live the rest of his life without her in it.
The prospect of that drives him back to the bottle.
He's known Kara for seven years, since Zak proudly introduced him to his girlfriend in that bar in Picon and she looked him over in a way that infuriated and amused him simultaneously. Since then she's worked herself into every corner of his life so thoroughly that he can't imagine it without her.
Of course he's lived without her before. The two years after Zak died, and again in that year while she was on New Caprica. But both those times he knew deep down that it was only temporary, that she'd be back in his life eventually in some way, no matter how much either or both of them denied it.
Not any more. Now life without Kara – muted, bland, quiet – is permanent.
----
He stays in the locker all night, indulging himself with memories of her, the good and the bad. Giving himself this one night to wallow in his grief without thought of anything else. This one night of lapsing.
All too soon the morning shift change will ring, and he'll fold up his photo and hide the empty bottle and go back outside. Be Major Adama again, the way people expect. The CAG's duties don't stop for death; he has reports to write and schedules to plan, and he'll do them.
He'll be Apollo again too. He'll fly CAP and shoot down cylons, but there'll always be that absence at his wing, no voice egging him on to go that little bit faster, to take that turn a little bit sharper, to turn that spiral just for the fun of it.
He'll even be Lee Adama again, for his father's sake, for Dee's sake. He's the only family his father has left, and he's let Dee down enough times already. They both need him, and he'll be there for them. Be Lee the son and Lee the husband to the best of his ability.
But there's part of Lee Adama that he'll leave behind in this locker. The part that painted a helmet with his fingers, that laughed and fought over a hose on Cloud Nine's lawn. The part that used ugly words to cut her to the bone and relished the hurt, the part that found relief in punching her till they could both barely stand. The part that had the courage to stand naked on New Caprica and shout his love to the skies.
He won't be that Lee Adama ever again.
He drains the last of the ambrosia from the bottle and looks down at the photo one more time. Him, Zak and Kara.
Two down, one to go.
The thought comforts him. One day, he'll join them, and then he won't have any responsibilities to carry; any roles to fill, or expectations to live up to.
Then he can finally just be himself.