It had been so easy to side with her after the attacks on the Colonies. Her mission was a noble one, and she had appeared to him as a mother goddess trying to gather all her children to her. Also, it went against everything his father wanted him to do. So, naturally, Lee did what any star-struck mortal would do – he placed Laura Roslin on a pedestal with the other gods of his world.
The thing about placing a mortal, finite, life on a pedestal with immortal, infinite gods, is how too easily they slip from those pedestals. It wasn't long before President Roslin ("Laura, please," she'd bade him, though he was loathe to show her any hint of disrespect, and so President Roslin she had remained) had made the decision that sent her tumbling from her exalted place in his mind's eye.
Her voice, it seemed to him, had been as cold as ice when she'd come over the com-link ordering them to fire on the Olympic Carrier, a civilian ship. Starbuck had no qualms telling him they couldn't do it, there were too many innocent lives they were sacrificing on the suspicion of Cylon activity. Lee agreed with her in his heart, but Apollo knew his training and followed his President's command.
He'd been so angry, however, when she summoned him to Colonial One that evening. Angry at what he'd done, what she'd asked of him. She'd anticipated his anger, though, and countered it with a story about late President Adar. It had been a balm to his soul and he came to see how much the decision had pained her as well. Her eyes had shone with unshed tears as she showed him the simple slip of paper bearing the name of her first need for atonement. In that moment, she'd seemed so fragile, so despairingly human, that he'd wanted to take her in his arms and hold her until both their pain went away.
When President Roslin, no, Laura, pre-empted him by stepping from behind her desk and wrapping her arms around his waist, he had reflexively stiffened, then relaxed as her tears wetted the front of his uniform. His control, so thin and tenuous, broke and his own tears began to fall. They stood there for a long time, well past the end of their tears, he noticed, though he did not want to let go of her, or the warmth that she offered.
Finally, she let go of him, stepped back, and smoothed her skirt. "Captain Apollo, thank you. You're dismissed." He nodded briefly and went back to Galactica, not quite ready to consider her President a mere human, but also unwilling to vault her up to the exalted position he'd first given her. It wouldn't be fair to either of them if he did.