Heart and Mind

Mike had never been affectionate.
Well, he had, Billie supposed, but in his own way. In a way that only Mike understood, he was affectionate. Usually, all Billie could do was deduce when that was and respond to it. But of course, Mike wasn't very big on responses either.
The simplest way to say it was, Mike did not understand normal feelings. He felt them, surely. He felt love. He felt pain and need like any other human being. But he understood none of it. He was ruled by his mind - that thoughtful, hard-working thing that took up most of his time.
Billie was ruled by his heart, which in some strange way told him that he returned Mike's love. He'd been so initially attracted to those icy blue eyes, that shadow of a hidden smile, that at this point, the reason he'd first fallen in love seemed completely shrouded in Mike's cold, masked eyes. It didn't make sense that this man, considered the embodiment of compassion, could ever love or be loved by another whose demeanor would suggest to most a complete lack of any emotion other than that frightening calm. But then, Mike thought, if Billie couldn't find love in his sweet, oversized heart for Mike, it seemed nobody could.

Mike liked to read. He did it so often, Billie wondered frequently why it took so long for him to finish his books, which so lined his office walls there was barely an inch of that cream color left to assure one they were still there and that it was not, in fact, the dark stained bookcases holding the ceilings up. Mike knew, though. It was his thoughts again. They were so easily controlled when he needed them to be, but when absorbed in the pages of an old volume of a book, he let them wander. And wander they did. A chapter focusing entirely on the subject of love could, in his mind, move quickly to the subject of war. Whether it was worth it. Why anyone would go. What it was like. Similarly, a chapter depicting the most gruesome and adrenaline filled battle could lead back to unrelenting thoughts of love which refused to leave Mike's mind for weeks after. Thoughts of love centering around Billie.
It was in these weeks of loving contemplation that Mike would do something unexpected. The man's face had no change of features an onlooker could see between these extreme thoughts, and sometimes, he could even go weeks without kissing his husband yet still thinking about him... sometimes hours. Maybe, thought Billie, it was this complete unpredictability that held them together. Maybe he stayed through these times of neglect because he knew it would come. That moment of bliss when their lips finally met.
Absence truly does make the heard grow fonder.
But now it had been too much. Too long since he had been hugged. Too long since he had received a comforting kiss. He felt then as if he might as well not have been there at all. And for once, Billie didn't want to wait.
"Mikey," he said to the man next to him in the bed, using that name Mike would never have allowed anyone else to hear.
"Hm?" answered the man with the book, not looking up as the battle in the story raged on. Mike had forgotten not to let his mind wander again. His thoughts were of Billie.
"Why don't you ever kiss me?"
The question was simple. Blunt. And so sad and un-accusing at the same time. Mike couldn't refrain from tearing his eyes from the word on the page on which he had been fixed for the last half an hour. Need.
Billie's jade eyes looked so innocent now, so big and sad, and in some way, fearful. Mike knew now it had gone too long, and Billie repeated the question.
"Why don't you kiss me anymore, Mikey?"
Mike just looked at him for a moment, thinking again. He always had to think first, even when ending with what seemed the simplest possible answer in the first place. In this case, that was a short movement, a small peck on his husband's lips. But when this action would usually satisfy Billie, he didn't even respond this time but for a shift in the opposite direction which only left Mike confused.
"That doesn't count. I mean, really kiss me. Not this little second that you always give. I..." He stopped a moment, composing himself. "I think you love me, but..."
Billie's sentence trailed off there, leaving Mike to finish it. "But you're not sure anymore." Billie nodded sadly.
Please say you do. For once, just say it.
"Billie, I love you. You should know that by now..."
"How, Mike? How am I suppossed to know it when you never even pay enough attention to me to show it? I... I don't know what to beleive anymore..."
Those words stung Mike, though he wouldn't show it. How could Billie think he didn't love him? They were still together, after all. Wouldn't Mike leave if he didn't feel anything? He slowly closed the book and set it on the nightstand to focus his attention on his husband. He wanted to say something now. He wanted to stop the tears in Billie's eyes. But what could Mike say to that, when he knew it was true? What could anyone?
A droplet of moisture fell down Billie's cheek, a being totally separate from himself. This was not Billie crying. Whatever it is, it couldn't be that.
"I love you," came his words in a whisper. "I really do..."
And more tears came, migrating over his face, not even caring when they made his breath come in little gasps or when they stained the whites of his green eyes red.
Even now, all Mike could do was hold out his hand. Just a simple gesture, really, but one that ment the world to Billie, who quickly scrambled up into his husband's protective arms.
And so they sat there. Tears streamed out of green eyes and onto that muscled chest that had become so familiar to Billie, unlike this blissful conciousness of being held so close. Mike's arms very rarely found their way around the smaller man's torso to envelop him in this way, and for a moment, the two were one in a bittersweet fusion of being.
So finally, the sobs ceased, transforming themselves into shallow, calming breaths, and the tears left stains down Billie's cheeks, all the way from his puffy red eyes to his smooth, trembling chin.
"I just want to know you love me," Billie said at last.
Mike continued to stare down at him, staying silent for another moment. Finally, he spoke. His voice was naked, so bare and full of emotion it scared him. "I don't know how to show you."
Maybe the sound of his voice wasn't all that scared him though. It was the emotion itself too. It was the deep hopelessness, the love, the fear which continued to induce more of itself in some terrifying cycle.
Then Billie looked at him, his eyes seeming to break and mend Mike's heart all at the same time as green met blue. Land and sky. Plant and water. And the two were again connected, two halves of the same person, until it was hard for them to tell when one ended and the other began. So different, like a heart and mind, but so necessary to each other. So necessary to life.
"Kiss me," said Billie's frail voice simply. "Kiss me and really mean it."
And so, slowly, their lips met. And it didn't last just a second. It seemed instead an eternity, with all the emotions and understanding that come with it. So sad, so desolate and alone, but then what, wondered Mike, could this moment be but happiness? It was simply perfection.
But no, came Mike's ever thoughtful mind. This was not an emotion like any of those. It was not happiness or fear or loneliness, though it may be all and more. No... what they had here... was love.