10. #10
The first time he is kissed by Anastasia Dualla, he is lost - for the second time in two days - inside a great battlestar, trying to find the CIC. He's just survived a nuclear holocaust, an EMP burst, and losing his entire family in one blow. Her kiss is hard and passionate and life-affirming. It's also a complete surprise. He knows he stared stupidly after her for a good thirty seconds before his brain kicked itself back on.
The second time is also hard and fast. He is cloudy from too little sleep, and trying to mentally navigate himself to the guest quarters for his allotted fifteen minute nap as the President had banished him from the short meeting she and Commander Adama had been trying to fit in. Dee is compact and efficient yanking him into what looks like a storage closet and proceeding to make out with him for the rest of his time off. His hand ends up inside her jumpsuit and hers up his shirt, so even though he didn't get that nap, he's surprisingly okay.
The third is a hello. Soft and sweet and quick, she greets him warmly in the shuttle airlock. The President is smirking at him, but it's been a long day and he's too happy to see a friendly face to blush. They agree to meet later for dinner.
The fourth time she kisses him is a goodbye from the same trip. The meeting ran long and ended with the President having a minor fight with the Commander where Billy had to blend quietly into the wall because leaving would have been more obvious. They eventually settled things out, but by the time they were trading barbs and saying their goodbyes, Dee's rack time had long since started. He hadn't expected her to be there to be waiting at the shuttle, but the peck she gives him and the squeeze of his hand settles him better than anything else he's ever tried. She is warm and casual in her goodbye, and when he finally turns in after filing all of his notes, he dreams about her eyes and hair and smile. It is a good dream.
When Dee kisses him the fifth time, it is quiet and sad. He doesn't remember why, exactly. He just knows it was after dinner in the mess. Her face was shuttered in the dim light of the Galactica, and she tasted like reconstituted orange. Her hair was soft under his hands, and afterwards, she leaned into him and just held on. Neither of them mention that they cried. Ever.
Number six is long and passionate. It starts slow, like the last one, but has more electricity. Billy remembers it curling his toes. It had been steamy and long and segued quickly into number seven.
The eighth time Dee kissed Billy, it isn't on the mouth.
Nine kisses in, Dee smiles into their kiss. She is stretched up on her toes and leaning in to him in the hall. He is starting to smile back, and thinks if a photographer caught them just right, this would be a picture for the record books. A work in shadow and emotion.
The tenth time is the very first one where he is kissed for an ulterior motive. The tenth kiss changes what they are doing from comfort and fun, into something else. It is with the tenth kiss that Billy will remember as a greeting and an invitation to the couple's lounge, his mind on this Thing that the President has asked of him. Never mind the thing weighing on Dee's. He won't remember her asking "So, why did the President look like she'd swallowed a lemon today." And if he does, he'll think it's just concern.
