Lee was trying his best to focus on the paperwork in front of him and not on how bad he wanted a fraking shower. He had given up his off shift in order to help Kara and the Chief get those ships back in the air. He should have hitting the head and then hitting his bunk. Instead, he decided to get himself covered from head to toe in engine grease. And now that the broken Raptor and one of the Vipers were out of commission for the next few days, there were flight schedules to fix.

He had just switched Helo to a double-CAP since he would already be out in his Raptor during that time when there was a brisk knock on the door to his office. "Hatch is unlocked," Lee yelled without looking up from the papers.

He heard the door slid open and then shut again, but whomever it was didn't speak. Lee looked up in order to let them know he had things to do and was surprised to see it was Anders standing in front of his desk. "What can I do for you?"

"I wanted to talk to you about Kara."

Lee felt himself tense up as concern for his friend washed over him. "Is something wrong?"

"Not yet, but I think there might be," Anders said. He took a seat in one of the chairs by Lee's desk.

"Please," Lee said, sending him a slightly cocky grin. "Enlighten me."

"She loves me, Captain Adama."

"I have no doubt about that. So what's the problem?"

"I love her."

Lee rolled his eyes. "If the next words out of your mouth are to tell me to keep my hands off of her, I will not be responsible for my actions."

"Listen," Anders said, leaning forward in his chair. "I'm not an idiot. I've seen the way you flirt with her and come up with ways to touch her. I've been that guy before. Hell, I challenged her to a round of pyramid back on Caprica just to have a few minutes alone with her. All I want to point out to you is life is not the same as when Kara left you. She brought me and my men back to the Fleet, and you're just going to have to deal with the changes that brings."

Lee set down his pen and leaned back in his chair. "I understand what you're getting at, but I can't just turn whatever Kara and I have off like a light switch. We have a history."

"Everyone keeps fraking telling me that," Anders screamed. "I don't give a frak if you have a history! She's mine."

Lee stared at the suddenly possessive man before him for a few moments before replying. "You obviously don't know the history if you think a claim of ownership is all it takes to make me back off." He shook his head. "Maybe I'm not the one you need to be having this conversation with. Maybe it's Kara you need to talk to."

"What is that supposed to mean?"

"Has she told you about Zak?"

"Her fiancé that died? Yeah, she told me about him on the flight back to the Fleet."

"How much has she told you?"

"That he was the son of some Battlestar commander who couldn't hack it in the air."

Lee nodded slowly. "There's more to it than that, but I'm sure she didn't want to spring it all on you at once. I'm not bringing this up to thumb your nose in the fact that I know things that you don't know. Kara would have told you when she felt ready."

"Then why are you telling me?"

"Because a lot of the history she shares with me is wrapped up in Zak. No one really knows that."

"Well, then please enlighten me," Anders requested, twisting Lee's previous words back on him.

The words grated on Lee "Fine. I'll enlighten you about the whole situation if you have the time."

"I'm all ears."

"Imagine you're me. You've had this perfect vision of a woman in your head since you started liking girls. This warrior woman with a hard exterior who actually feels more than you could possibly imagine, a woman so beautiful seeing her takes your breath away. She's someone you would do anything to spend just one second more in her presence. She's in your every thought. Seeing her for the first time, you know she's the only one you've ever going to want." Lee bit his lip and let out a self-mocking laugh. "Imagine one day you finally meet this vision of a woman and find out she's the one person you can't have."

"I assume we're talking about Kara," Anders said with clenched teeth.

"Yeah, I'm talking about Kara. I'm also talking about my brother, Zak, the man she loved." Lee let Anders take in the information before continuing, "I met Kara when Zak introduced her to me as the woman he was going to marry. I loved my brother, so I never said a thing. I threw myself into my piloting and tried to forget about her. It wasn't as effective as I would have liked."

Anders felt himself growing impatient. He shifted in his seat. "I'm just going to ask you this straight out. Are you still in love with Kara?"

"Absolutely," Lee replied without apology. "I love her more today than I did all those years ago. I've been lying about that for years, and I'm tired of letting it torture me."

Anders' eyebrows raised in surprise. "Torture you? That's an odd phrase to use."

"Do you know what it's like to absolutely adore someone, knowing that you're completely alone in those feelings? Or how about wanting someone so bad that it's in every breath you take and every word you say? To love someone even if all it does is cause you pain? The night of Zak's funeral, I sat in the cemetery on the fresh dirt of my own brother's grave and held her as she broke down. For years, I've had to check myself like that. I had to hold her close, knowing I felt the way I did and knowing that there was no way I could ask her to feel the same."

"Sounds painful."

Lee laughed. "Yeah, pretty much. Listen, I know you want me to back off, but I can't. It's not like I'm actively pursuing Kara. I'm just not changing the way I acted before you came into the picture. I'm going to keep hoping that one day she catches the way I look at her and realizes what I've been trying to tell her. That maybe if I'm patient enough to tolerate the pain, she'll stop giving me the mixed signals we usually communicate in."

"I don't get it. Why would you want to put yourself through that?"

"It's Kara. She's the woman who has been haunting my dreams every single night since well before the world ended. If you really knew her, you would understand. There is no one else quite like her."

"She's still mine, though."

"I know that. Which is why I'm not going to tell her that I love her. Kara means everything to me. If you make her happy, then I'm happy." Lee stood up and motioned towards the door. "I'm not going to stand in your way, Anders, but I'm not going to move out of it either. I am a part of Kara's life just as much as she is a part of mine. I will never let that change."

Anders looked so shell-shocked from the information overload that Lee wanted to laugh. "Listen. I don't know you well enough to say that I trust you with Kara, but she trusts you. For now, that's enough." Lee sighed and sat back down. "I trust that was everything you wanted to hear."

"And then some," Anders said as he got to his feet. "I'm really not sure what to say to you now."

Lee didn't look up from his paperwork when he answered, "You don't have to say anything. Just go find Kara. She's off shift now. I'm sure she's looking for you."

Anders stared at Lee in silence for a few more seconds before stepping out of the hatchway into the corridor. That conversation had not turned out like he thought it would, and now he was even more confused.