All that Pain
Partial Recap with my own embellishments and a missing scene from the Dance in Unfinished Business
"Do you want to win?"
"I'm not gonna win."
He really is crazy – admittedly it took her about a minute to figure out just what he was talking about. Then she understood the pain in his eyes for she felt it too. The pain of loss, guilt, fear, frustration; it was all there.
Laura Roslin stepped down of the boxing deck, watched and waited. The first half of the match had been spectacular – the Admiral was swift, the aggressive attacker clearly dominant. The second half had been another story – he was now just taking the abuse and the Chief had plenty to let out. Laura now understood what he meant when he said that hard feelings became grudges and that they all needed to get them out in the open to deal with it. This was his way of healing wounds. At first it was painful to watch, her heart pounded in her chest – all she wanted was to stand up and yell "STOP!!" at the top of her lungs but it wasn't what he wanted or needed.
He needed to do this – he was making a point, albeit a stupid way of going about it but a point none the less. She noticed when the crowd started to quiet, concern rising for their leader but the Chief just kept coming – he was clearly enraged and the President of the Twelve Colonies realized that the Admiral of the fleet knew exactly what he was doing – let them get upset, let them see – let them realize – they're all in pain, no one is exempt, everyone had regrets and would have made different choices but hindsight is always 20/20.
The conflict within her rose from the fact that it was Laura Roslin's heart beating in the chest of the President and she had strong feelings for a certain Admiral. She now clutched his glasses firmly in her right hand while her left rose to cover her mouth as she gasped at the sight of him tumbling to the ground - blood everywhere. Okay, compose yourself Laura her inner monologue kicked in.
It was as if the Chief had come out of a trance and instead of celebrating in victory he bent over to help the Admiral up. The admiral took a few ragged breaths and began to speak. His words rang true for everyone in that room and when he had said his peace, he was done and as he left the deck, he took her hand saying, "Madame President" all she could reply was, "Admiral" she knew it was all the moment required. They had this ability to communicate without speaking and he was telling her to get him out of there. Something was wrong that was confirmed in her mind when he didn't release her hand, he held on for dear life as he stoically walked beside her out the hatch – in any other circumstance he would have immediately released it, keeping the proper distance between them.
They walked in silence to his quarters, Doc Cottle and Tory closely on their heels – he still hadn't let go of her hand. The doc gave him a once over – no broken ribs, nothing fractured and with a gruff, "You may have a concussion you took one hell of blow to the head at the end but I know there's no way I'll get you to agree to come with me. That being said Madame President if you could keep an eye on him…."
Adama cut in, "The President needs to get back to her ship"
Her defenses went up, no one told her what she needed to do, "Don't mind him Doctor, the fight has obviously impaired him – IF I had a need to be back on Colonial One, I would've been there a long time ago."
"Good, get yourself cleaned up then you damned fool and watch him for dizziness or sudden fatigue" that said, he left. The admiral now turned to her.
"You should go"
"No"
"Madame President, I'm fine – I appreciate your concern but…." She held up her hand silencing him, she was having none of this.
"Tory, will you excuse us please; the Admiral and I need to have a word."
"Yes ma'am…ummm Ma'am?"
"Yes"
"Should I….uhhh…wait for you?" Tory had an idea of what was going on between them and was trying to determine if she was going to need to do some fancy foot work with the press. The president smiled at her, "No Tory, you don't have to wait, concussions are a tricky thing, usually it's hours to determine if there's a problem depending on how bad the injury. Since he is refusing to be observed by the doctor, he's going to have to be observed by me. Have a good night."
"Yes ma'am, Thank you ma'am" Tory left amazed at how brilliant the President is, without flinching she gave Tory a plausible story to give the press. No one would question it, they'd all seen the fight they would just let it go, and that made her job so much easier. The hatch closed behind Tory and the President rose from the couch, grasped the handle and locked the door.
"Laura" his voice was angry
"Bill" her voiced dripped with sarcasm
"You should go."
"You've said that and my answer hasn't changed." She walked to the kitchen area, grabbed a bowl from the cabinet, into his bathroom grabbing a facecloth and filling the bowl with warm water before she returned to the couch.
"You should not be here, OW!" he jumped back as she applied a little more pressure than necessary to start cleaning his wounds.
"And why may I ask should I not be here?" She wasn't making eye contact with him; she busied herself with getting all that blood off his face.
"Because, the President of the Twelve Colonies has more important things to do than…." She cut him off again….
"Than what??? Tell me; what is more important than making sure that the Admiral of the fleet that is supposed to be protecting us is alright."
"You could check on me with a phone call"
"Do you think I'm stupid?"
"What?"
"I said, do you think I'm stupid?"
"I heard when you said, I was referring to…damn you infuriate me…..of course I don't think you're stupid."
"Well, Admiral, I guess you should learn to say what you mean than."
"I always say what I mean." His tone was harsher than he'd intended.
"Then you want me to go?" she dropped her hand from his face and looked down at her hands.
"Laura, I…."
"Bill, stop, just stop….I don't understand where this is coming from. I thought we had become more than just the Admiral and the President."
"We have"
"Then why are you shutting me out? Why do you keep telling me to leave?"
"Didn't you hear what I said in there?"
"Of course I did, I even get why you did it."
"You have no idea why." He was trying to convince himself that had to bear his burdens on his own shoulders and not drag anyone else down with him, least of all her.
"The Pain"
"What?" His eyes shifted to her, their eyes locked. She really could see through him.
"All that pain, bottled up inside, you blame yourself for everything, you feel undeserving of anything right now. Let someone beat the crap out of you, let them punish you right? Does it feel better?"
"I can't do this to you, I won't"
"Do what exactly Bill? Let me in? Let me help you? Let me comfort you?"
"I can't drag you down with me." Despair now apparent in his voice.
"Last time I checked, I was a grown woman, quite capable of making my own decisions thank you very much."
"Damn it Laura, I don't want to push you away but I have to, it's the only way."
Tears stung at the corner of her eyes, "Bill look at me, please."
Again, their eyes met and he saw it there – pain – her eyes were tearing, Gods he hated it when she cried, he hated it even more when he was the cause.
"Bill, we made a decision down on New Caprica about this, about us, before the occupation. Didn't we decide to take a chance on finding out what there is between us?"
"Yes we did, but you weren't President then, you are now." That did it; one tear escaped her eye, trailing down her cheek.
"Well then, maybe you can tell me how you can turn off your feelings so easily because I can't!! President or not, Admiral or not, we are still two people with feelings and needs and wants. We decided that we could separate ourselves from our positions that it was worth it, when did that change Bill?" With that she bolted from the couch with the bowl in her hands and went to the head ostensibly to refresh the water. She didn't know how long she was there, didn't realize she hadn't closed to the door and she didn't even try to stop the tears.
Two arms encircled her waist from behind and he whispered in her ear, "It isn't easy; I don't want you to ever think that this is easy. I don't want you to ever think that I don't want this, you, but I can't. This is for the best."
She allowed her head to rest against his shoulder "How do you know what the best thing is for everyone? What if our being together might just be the best thing for everyone?"
"Because I don't deserve it…I don't deserve you" there it was, out in the open the last bit of his pain. His arms dropped to his sides and he turned to walk back to the couch feeling instantly cold after separating his body from hers.
"Bill, wait."
He stopped but didn't turn around.
"You can't punish yourself for this anymore – Yes we lost lives from the occupation but no one could've stopped it – if you had ordered people to stay aboard, they would've hated you – there was no justification at the time it was a reprieve from the cylons, people were happy. Besides, Baltar wouldn't have allowed it and you know that. You want to blame someone, Blame HIM!"
"I am Admiral of the fleet, the buck stops here!"
"Yes, you are the Admiral and do you know what I think?"
"This should be good."
She walked from the sink to stand in front of him. "Give me your eyes" she whispered.
Their eyes locked, she began….
"I think that anyone else wouldn't have come back for us. I think that anyone else would have left us there to die but you didn't Admiral, you came back. You came back and saved us from the hell we were living in. Now you question what you deserve – all right – try this on for size – you deserve our gratitude you deserve our respect and appreciation – you could've died trying to get us off that planet and you didn't care – you risked everything for us."
"Laura..." her finger touched his lips to silence him.
"Do you know when the cylons marched down that street, I was praying that you had left and jumped to safety? Everyone did because we knew you would come back for us – somehow you would do it. We all knew that if you had stayed to fight at that moment, you would have died and we would've been lost. So you see we really owe you our lives. We are alive because of you – and I intend to keep on living – I'm more than the President and you are more the Admiral we're two people, a man and a woman and somewhere in all of this I fell in love with you Bill. I don't know when or how it happened, but it did and I can't change that."
He stood there listening to her speak, her words were sincere, maybe, just maybe she was a little bit right. Enough that he could forgive himself and just like that she washed his pain away – all that pain that had worn on him for so long. He reached for her hands, pulled her towards him and rested his forehead against hers. A whisper escaped his lips, "Gods help me Laura, I love you too."