Sam falls in love with Bumbleebee, slow and sorrowful like a cricket's song.
He recognizes that there is no hope when Bee stares down at him, one optic closed in a wink. And he laughs, but inside he is dying, because now he can confirm that he is trapped forever. The cage was big and strong just like Bee himself. Then, everything hurt when he wasn't with Bee. Yellow was pure pain- bugs were blind agony- and music was torture in it's most intolerable form. He had to wonder if anyone noticed that he could not listen to music unless it blasted out of an alien anymore. But a few weeks later, he went back to base, and whether it was an escape from his longing or the horror of the proximity that filled him he would never know.
He arrives in his mom's car, a gray SUV that is everything Bumbleebee's not. When the mechs see him, they are all overjoyed. "We've missed you, Sam," they say, a miracle that no one bothered to explain to him. Did they notice that the first and last thing he saw was Bee?
Later they are all alone, like they have not been in quite a while. Sam tries to savor everything, as he convinces himself he will not be that happy for a long time. They talk and talk and Sam does not notice how Bumbleebee looks at him a moment too long. Soon, too soon, Sam whispers, they break apart because he "needs his sleep." Sam starts to walk away and manages to only look back once, while Bee just stares after him with an oddly calculating look. However, Sam does not sleep for the next two days- two, just like the number of stripes on a certain car.
He stays up all night and tries desperately not to let himself gain hope, like he had many times before. He would be setting himself up for disappointment, he finally convinces himself. So this time he refused to let himself- thinking absurdly derogatory thoughts (he will never love you like you love him, stupid, naive Sam) that hurt but he is numb because he must not gain hope again.
Optimus and Ratchet talk to him the next day, presumably because they had realized that Sam had changed into what some would loosely describe as a hollow shell of his former self. "Just tell us whats wrong," they plead, and he politely refuses. They are concerned by how detached he is and notice how his eyes light up when Bumbleebee walks into the hangar and then they start to grasp the concepts of what was going on. And then they are quiet as he walks in.
"Hi Bee," Sam says, staring at him, memorizing features he's already memorized a thousand times over. Bee just grins. They joke around for a little bit, and he is almost back to his old self as long as Bumblebee is in the room. But, then Optimus sadly sends him on a necessary mission and hopes they will both forgive him one day, even though its only for a week.
Sam predictably stays at the base, because it will only be one week/7 days/168 hours/1080 minutes until his life returns, if everything goes all right. He occupies himself by fretting that it will not be all right, until a looming yellow shadow hovers over him, and it is not Bumbleebee. It is just the doctor. Sam asks when exactly the last time they heard from him was and Ratchet truthfully replies seven hours ago and explains he is now out of range. He swiftly starts to hyperventilate and the doctor is forced to tranquilize him. He closes his eyes with visions of yellow that feel like all he has ever known.
Ratchet and Optimus have a meeting that night, because the situation was even more precarious than they thought it ever could or would be. Bumbleebee comes back into range exactly seven hours later, and the first thing he asks Optimus is how Sam is doing, and he tells him what their processors could previously only guess at: Sam is in love with you too, Bumbleebee.
Bumbleebee trusts Optimus and his fellow Autobots with his life- which was the only reason he believed them when they told him he loved him too. Because if they were wrong, they all feared that it would mean the end of him. He knows they would only tell him if they were completely sure. It's hard to believe- how could Sam love him?- but he trusts his comrades with his life. So he believes.
The leader makes a decision and tells the scout to ignore the rest of the mission and come back immediately. His decision did not matter much, because Bumbleebee would have come back anyway.
As Bee proceeds back to base, speed laws simply do not exist.
When he returns, he decides giving Optimus a report can wait until later (Optimus understands, of course) and he goes to see Sam in the med bay. He is sleeping- it was 02 hours, after all. Bee just sits as silently as the promise of impossibility hovering around the two.
He wakes up seven hours later, and the first thing he sees is yellow, so he does not realize at first he is awake because his dream was all yellow too.
"Sam!" Bumbleebee says. "Optimus let me come back early. I missed you too much, buddy." Sam refuses to believe he is awake because it has only been five days and they all told him seven- he had been counting. Bee watches the bittersweet smile come to his face as he mumbles, "what a perfect dream." Bee frowns, and this time his tone is more urgent. Sam needed to understand that he was really back.
"Sam, you are not dreaming. Look at me, Sam." And his eyes widen a bit and he reaches out to touch metal and wakes up from his overactive conscious. "Bee!" he yells, and metal is engulfed in flesh for a few moments.
"Your alive," Sam stupidly says, and just like that, he can breathe easy again. He grins because Bee is right in front of him and had actually said that he missed him. But then his face is sad and torn and he wonders why Bee is lying to him, his knee-jerk reaction to anything that could produce hope being self-consciousness. "What happened?" he asks- and Bee noticed his change and realized what Sam was thinking. They knew each other too well, if only they would believe their own eyes...optics.
"You are the reason I came back early. The mission was not important enough to require me to deal with the pain of being away from you," he explains, praying Sam would believe him. Sam tries to fight the hope but he cannot, it is far too strong now. Maybe if the yellow would leave, he would find the strength because he knew that yellow makes him weak and sentimental and lovestruck, three things Sam Witwicky certainly should not be for an alien. So Sam believes him, not wholeheartedly, but close enough.
"I missed you too," Sam says, and he imagines that his eyes were wider in that moment than they had been when he faced an infuriated Megatron with nothing to lose. More than you will ever know, he adds silently.
Bee just asks, "Shall we?" And they head off to breakfast. He would ease Sam into it- he could tell he had previously rejected the thought that the great Bumbleebee could ever and would ever love him back.
By four o'clock, Sam is convinced that it was the best day he ever had and ever will have. He had just spent seven straight hours with Bee! Bee had said he missed him. And at breakfast Bee said that he would do anything to protect him. At lunch, Bee had told him that he cared for him more than he cared for himself. Sam scoffed at such a silly notion, though the sentiment still made him extremely pleased. Now he sat in the hangar with Bumbleebee as dinner was being made for him and the soldiers. Considering how the other meals of the day had gone, he was suprised his hands were not shaking with excitement. He tried not to think of how much the hope had a hold on him now. It was extremely dangerous- that he knew, but he had stopped caring when Bumblebee showed up two days early.
Sam is silent for seven minutes as he considers the idea that he might just maybe love him the same, because he figured he was past the point of breaking- hope will destroy him either way. The thought of them together just makes him feel complete- in fact, he almost shivers in delight- and he can picture it in his head so damn easily. Some would say its wrong, but Sam would say nothing that is wrong can feel this right. Sam does not even concern himself with how strange their relationship would be and how it would work because he cannot bring himself to care. As long as it works, he thinks.
Then, Bumbleebee asks him what hes thinking about because Bee could not help his curiosity and hope after quite a few minutes of silence on Sam's end. He had never blushed so hard.
"Nothing," he stutters out, after a moment of being so embarrassed he could not speak.
"You can tell me anything," Bee says with that gentle look that fills his dreams. Bee leans closer -Sam wonders if bee can hear how fast his heartbeat is now- and says, "Anything."
And it was all Sam had to not blurt it out then and there, because he was never good at self-preservation. He knew it would be the death of him if he was rejected and that fear keeps him silent for a moment but hope had spread through him like a plague. He would have blurted it out then and there had not Ironhide walked into the hangar. He walks over to them and starts a casual conversation regarding cannons and weapons, how typical of him. Ironhide leaves a few minutes later, embarrassed and mad at himself because he had seen the monumental moment he had interrupted. He played it off very well- Sam and Bee thought he was blissfully ignorant of what he had intruded on.
Next time Sam looks at a clock, an hour and seven minutes had passed and it is almost time for dinner and there is that hope again, because he actually believes that this day could possibly get better. Everyone sits in the main hanger while the humans eat dinner. Sam is perched on Bee's hand and Ironhide sits next to Will. Everyone is shocked when Will announces that he and Sarah's divorce, that he had not even told anyone but Epps about until right now, was finalized. All the humans choke on their food and Sam nearly has a heart attack when Will announces he and Ironhide are a couple. Bee gasps but then pouts because he and Sam would not be the first human-Autobot couple. Although, he does not really care- he and Sam fell in love way before, anyway. It had been a long, bittersweet seven months. But it was okay, because Bee would tell him tonight when they were alone what he should have told him seven months ago.
Meanwhile, Sam tries to breathe normally. In and out, in and out. All of the humans and Autobots are smilling and laughing, all together for this dinner. And Sam just says, "Fuck," and drops his plate and silverware and watches them tumble to the ground and break, but it does not matter because he is safe in Bee's hand. Everyone looks at him and Optimus grins bigger than he has in a very long time because he knows what is coming and half of the other mechs realize it too. Sam does not notice and he looks at Bee confidently and does not look like a deer caught in headlights for the first time in seven months. He breathes in one more time- hopefully not one last time, stupid hope- in and out.
"I am in love with you Bumblebee," and the hangar is silent although they all fought the urge to start clapping. Bumbleebee is shocked. He thought he would be the one to say it, he thought it would be said later tonight, but it did not matter because he had been ready for seven months now. The look on Bee's face is one of pure passion and joy and he practically shouts but does not.
"I am in love with you too, Sam."
The world is right again.
And next thing he knows, Sam is being pressed against metal and it feels like the warmest thing he's ever known, yet it does not burn him. Sam kisses the metal near Bee's spark. They all break out into claps and cheers and "finally!"s and Bee sprints out of the hangar grinning and they have privacy once again.
"You do not even know how much I love you," Sam says. "It's all I am anymore. You are all I think about. I can not see yellow without you drifting into my conscious and I can not listen to music without your songs reminding me of what I feel for you."
"Sam," Bee says as Sam's cheeks already hurt from smiling- he has not done so for more than two minutes straight for seven months. "I will love you forever. You make me so happy. I cannot explain how I feel. I can breathe now."
Sam congratulates the hope because in the end, it won, and he is uncomprehendingly thankful. The gift of hope stays with him for the rest of his life.
Sam eventually falls asleep on Bee's hand after the best day of his life and knows that the world is off his shoulders now, while Bee is still savoring Sam's kisses on his cold metal, which had never felt so pleasantly warm. Sam sleeps for exactly seven hours and sees yellow when he wakes up.
For the first time in seven months, the sight of yellow fills him with joy instead of longing and he is positive that he can finally be Sam again. Optimus will be delighted, he thinks.
Seven days later, Sam and Bee are joking around as usual. "You will be the death of me!" Bee chuckles after he stops laughing after what seemed like an eternity. Sam knows he is joking but he needs Bumblebee to understand so he looks at him, deadly serious, and says just one word that he hopes will convey just how much he loves his Bee.
"Likewise."
Authors Note: I don't own Transformers, unfortunately. Well, my first Transformers fic I posted up here. :D More to come! Please review :) By the way, if you are looking for a GREAT Transformers fic to read, read Cover Me by Black Dragon Queen. Its is seriously SO great... Anyway thanks for reading and feel free to leave a review c: