Srs bsns conversations are imminent. [The actor's suite; Len, Jim, Tina's Bra, De, Bill]

[len_not_spock]

Leonard was notably subdued and quiet as he made his way back to their quarters accompanied by Jim and Tina's bra. It wasn't that his enthusiasm at meeting the newly sentient piece of lingerie in the observation lounge had completely disappeared, but the need to analyze his reaction to Bill's rather impulsive invitation was overriding the novelty

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[canadianbill]

Leonard's arms around him were a comfort and a haven, his safe harbour, his sheltered dock, and all the other ridiculous cliches he would have laughed at if anyone had unironically said them aloud. But here, like this, they were true. It was hard, saying these things, not least because what seemed to make sense in his head so often came out sounding, to his own ears, ridiculous. But Leonard, for all he loved to poke fun at Bill, did not laugh; did not judge. Leonard always knew when it wasn't the time for laughing.

He said, "I love you." And then, because this was really saying nothing at all and had come out sounding curiously desperate, anyway, he went on, half-smiling, "You know, it's weird - when I've just come from our quarters, or I'm walking, or I'm reading somewhere, or whatever, I'm quite happy to be on my own. I just spoke to you. You were just there. And you kind of - still are." He thought for a moment, trying to find a way to say this that wasn't going to sound bizarre. Then he gave up, and said regardless, "But if I'm somewhere without you, and I'm talking to someone else - who isn't De, that is - if you don't know where I am and I don't know where you are, it makes me feel strange, like everything this person is saying is kind of overwriting the last things you said to me. Like they're - I don't know - erasing you. It makes me uneasy."

He pressed his face into Leonard's neck before Leonard could say anything. "I mean, I'm not a stalker, or anything weird like that. If you say, 'Hey, Bill, I'm off to hang with Jim,' and I say, 'Sure, Len, I'm gonna stay here and play Killer Zombie Death Fest 89 on the computer system', my crazy is totally happy with that. But if you're not here, and I don't know where you are, and then I don't get a proper chance to tell you where I am - " He shrugged. "You did realise I was a clingy clinging thing, didn't you? Like, I'm that guy, who if he doesn't get a response to his phonecall will go on leaving messages till you call back because he immediately assumes you must have gotten in the way of a bus?" He laughed softly. "I did that once, you remember?"

He tilted his head up, carefully, and kissed Leonard's mouth. "I think what I'm saying," he clarified, "doubtless in my own inimitably cloudy way, is that I don't want to 'constrain' you, in any sense, but like you said, I like to know stuff. Or I worry. And then my imagination runs rampant and that's when things go bad. When I was married to Marcy, I used to assume she was in a bad mood with me because of one tiny thing that really meant nothing, but I didn't ask her about it so I got more and more convinced till I was hating on her for being an irrational bitch, and then I'd go and sleep with some extra to get back at her." He sighed. "...I think all I've done is make myself sound like even more of a nut than you already knew I was," he confessed, pulling slightly away from Leonard and sitting upright again.

[len_not_spock]

"I don't think you're crazy," Leonard began, struggling a little for an appropriate response. Well. He'd been the one to say it wasn't necessarily always easy, right?

"I think," he said after a moment, "that you have some difficulties with trusting people, and possibly even yourself. Which I do as well, actually, if not as strongly anymore, and which pretty much reaffirms the need for communication." He raised an eyebrow. "I can't promise I'll always remember to tell you where I'm off to if it's just a small thing, but if I forget and it bothers you, let me know. And the same goes for thinking I'm pissed off with you for some reason. Alright?"

[canadianbill]

"You think I'm nuts," Bill said, rearranging his shirt and trying to claw back some shreds of his dignity. "Oh, well. That's okay. You did ask to know what was going on in my head, and if you didn't know beforehand that it would be scary -" he laughed. "Well, you did, and that's all there is to it. I hereby give you permission to go to the bathroom without telling me."

He sighed. "You know, I think a while back this was supposed to be a conversation wherein I apologised to you for being a dick with regard to the Kirk thing, and somehow it has gotten around to 'I am a mad stalker. Please indulge me.'" He touched Leonard's face. "But, you're right. Communicating. Is good. Avoids ridiculous assumptions. The road to hell is paved with assumptions, you know." He paused. "Or was that good intentions? I guess it's both, for me."

And he smiled a little, not quite at full wattage, but enough to reassure Leonard that he was over his minor teeter on the edge of tears.

[len_not_spock]

"How magnanimous of you, to allow me free use of the bathroom." It was said teasingly, no sting to it whatsoever, and he smiled whilst saying it.

"Seriously though, Bill, if you're crazy, then so am I. So is pretty much everyone, for that matter. I think the concept of normality in the society we're from is both highly overrated, and extremely distorted. But that's a psychology lecture for another day, I think."

He got to his feet, offering Bill a hand up. "We're ok then?" When really, it was evident that he was more asking whether Bill was.

[canadianbill]

Bill smiled back. "Yeah, we're okay. If you're okay. I mean, I'm okay." He was babbling. He hoped it didn't matter. He felt better, anyway, and that was all that counted, really.

"Want to go back out there and reassure De that we haven't had a screaming and totally wasteful breakup?"

[len_not_spock]

"I'm okay, and yeah, like that's going to happen." He pulled Bill towards him impulsively, kissing him. "I've waited forty-odd years, you're not getting rid of me this easily now," he murmured against Bill's lips once he'd pulled back.

[canadianbill]

Bill smiled. "You know me, and you still love me. I can't doubt you, knowing that's true." He ruffled Leonard's hair, and tugged him towards the door. "Come on, then."

They returned to the main room to see how De was getting on with the bra.