"I hear you've been having nightmares?" Asked Leonardo, sitting down next to Hope on her bed.
Hope nodded. "How do you know?" She started frantically twirling her hair around her hands.
"Donnie told me. Said he's been rocking you to sleep the past few nights."
She blushed. Yes, it was true, he'd stayed with her every time she had that horrible recurring nightmare. Ironic really. She had to hear those awful words in order to be close to him.
"I think you need to talk about them." Said Leonardo. "If you supress feelings it can be worse in the long run."
Hope nodded again, obsessively pulsating her hair entwined hands.
"I don't actually know where to start."
"How do the nightmares start?" Asked Leonardo, taking her hands and unwrapping her hair from them.
"I wake up in the dream, like I've woken up for real. Then… It happens." She stopped, grabbed a clump of hair and started chewing it. She looked up at Leonardo, who smiled reassuringly.
"What does?" He asked softly.
Hope clammed up. She shook her head and gnawed on her locks. Thinking about it only made it worse. Leonardo clasped his arms around her, pulled her soggy hair from her mouth, and held her. They sat like that on her bed for a while.
"Leo?" Hope said finally.
"Hmm?"
"Have you ever been in love?"
Leonardo shook his head.
"But I think I finally understand what this is all about." He smiled and let go of Hope. Her eyes widened as he chuckled tenderly at her. Surely it hadn't been that obvious? She'd had enough of supressing it. Who better to tell than her sensei?
"I love him, Leo, unconditionally."
"I know."
"Oh."
"Does he know?"
She shook her head and looked down at her hands dejectedly. Then she opened up to Leonardo about her dreadful nightmares. He listened well, as usual, not interrupting, only speaking when she'd finished.
"So that's your fear? That he doesn't love you back?"
"Well, not exactly. I know he doesn't, that he never would. I think it's just fear of him confirming it."
"What makes you so sure he doesn't?"
Hope scoffed. "Come on, Leo. I'm not exactly his type… How could someone as wonderful as Donatello love a simple human like me?"
"I don't think that's it, Hope." Said Leonardo. He put his arms back around her and drew her into a snug embrace. "You'll be okay. Let me explain the complex being that is Donatello. You know the story of how we met April O'Neil when we were fifteen?"
Hope nodded, it was a story that she was familiar with.
"Well, the detail that we left out is that Donnie was madly in love with April."
Hope gasped. Jealousy flooded through her at an alarming rate.
"Donnie and April…?"
"Well, no. She never reciprocated. He did everything he could think of to make her like him. He devised charts and everything, just to hang out with her. It felt like she kind of strung him along for all those years though, then, as you know, she married Casey."
"He did all that for her?" Hope felt even more rejected.
"Hope, I know what you're thinking. Don't. He doesn't need to do that with you. You're always there for him. He doesn't need to ask, let alone make up a chart. The truth is, I don't even think he knows how he feels about you. I imagine he won't let himself think of you that way, because he doesn't want his heart broken again."
Hope mulled this over for a time. Break his heart? That's the last thing she'd do if she had him. She'd never let him go.
"Thank you for talking this through with me, Leo."
"I hope it helps."