My words could never touch the perfection of this scene so this is more like a fraction of my thoughts in an attempt to explore the way I thought this episode would end when watching it for the first time. Hope you enjoy!
Words that had to be spoken. Words the meaning of which they were both aware of but that, nevertheless, had to be spoken. That's what they were. Mild and weary epiphanies, truths that had emerged from the catacombs of their minds amidst the chaos of the latest events. A line that completes, hooking them around to some kind of homelike feeling.
The conversation felt natural, the words spilling out without much thought and carrying a comforting feeling with them that bathed the entire room in a familiar glow. The two of them being together like that, talking about everything and nothing in particular always felt right. But this wasn't even like talking, it was more than that. A challenge of knowing, a game of confessions, an unguarded dialogue.
They were sitting in Donna's living room but they weren't, really. Mostly, they were in each other's eyes. And although technically their thighs were glued to the couch and their words echoed all over the walls, it was a fooling setting because all they could see was each other and all they could feel was their lingering gazes.
But Harvey got up and the spell broke, throwing them back into a moving reality, too cruel to wait for them to finish their moment. One in which, what they had said was just that - a simple truth, a fleeting moment, perhaps even too vulnerable - followed by nothing more than a simple "I should go" that really meant "I should go because I don't know what will happen next.".
Donna now looked lost and confused, like the disappointment of a child and grief of an adult
had got together and discussed all their sads and worrieds until they arrived at the most intense combination, then bathed her face in the result.
"Why?"
It sounded raw. Like she demanded something she was owed (an explanation), but also like she was softly asking for something (a permission). She was standing right behind him as he turned around and met her gaze, their eyes locking in silence.
"You know why." She did but maybe that fact itself was something unknown to her, too out of reach in her own consciousness. She wondered what it was that she expected him to say next. She thought there wasn't a chance it would be what she wanted to hear. She thought a lot of things as time flexed a degree. She thought, prove me wrong.
He looked straight into her eyes and she was afraid he'd see inside her head too, reading her thoughts that had then, momentarily been coated in a thick frosty layer of hope. She tried shaking her head and realized she felt frozen, a complete inability to move paralyzing her body and letting only a fraction of the movement show, endlessly rippling through her, until the second part of his confession came.
"You know I love you, Donna."
He said it like it was the most obvious thing in the world. Like she should have known, like every action he had taken in the last twenty four hours could only point towards that, like the words had been stamped onto their entire damn conversation.
She watched the words that were made out of glass, fall out of his mouth, on the floor, shattering in a million pieces that she would later have to clean up but would never get completely rid of. She'd randomly stumble upon them, they'd get in her stuff, pierce her skin, all a reminder of what she and Harvey were.
Her eyes widened, mouth opened, all she managed to do was stare. Stare at him as he gave her the saddest look she had ever seen, that was full of understanding but also, somehow, cluelessness.
She stood still. He moved to the door.
The clink echoed in the room as he opened it and just as his foot was about to cross the threshold he heard her voice, low and shaky, calling his name.
"Harvey…" It was barely audible. But it was all he needed to hear.
He turned. And he walked into the room and kissed her, and although it wasn't their first kiss, it was not at all like the other time. That kiss was a deadlock, a single unrepeatable occasion -them. This was the beginning of something, the moment when it felt like their story was beginning.
It was as if her little wish had been upgraded to a prayer and had come true. The intimacy, the affection, the guards that had been let down during the evening, all coming to physically manifest in the deepest and softest kiss either of them had experienced.
Pulling away from the kiss he looked in her eyes and his hands traveled from her shoulders down the length of her arms, reaching her hands and holding them in his. He took her hand and led her to the bedroom, wanting and ready to make everything theirs.