Wear your love on a shoestring.
Wear heart exposed and unaware.
Wear a promise so it calls me,
And I follow.
For the silence of my mind is deafening.
Come and find me here.

************

"Why are you lost?"

The question startles me badly, although I suppose I should have seen it coming. Yes, Michael is quiet, but he's also tenacious. And he's also, almost without exception, incredibly tuned in to my feelings. So I shouldn't have made a statement like "I'm lost" and not expect him to pick up on it when we had the time.

He repeats the question, more gently this time, brushing my cheeks with the backs of his fingers. "Why are you lost, Nikita?"

"I'm not sure I can put it into words," I reply honestly.

He looks at me, not without compassion. "Try." The "please" is unspoken, but not unheard.

Of course. Try. Typical Michael. The classic man of action. I idly wonder if he ever fails at anything, until some of the more ugly examples of his failures run through my mind. I push those away, but I owe him an explanation, considering that he brought me back from my own private hell.

"I feel...adrift. Like I don't have any kind of anchor, and I'm just floating through this life...I wouldn't even call it my life." I sigh heavily, feeling the familiar weight on my shoulders. It seems like I've been carrying it since the mission to take down Adrian. "Maybe it's a residual effect of Gelman's modification process. I don't really know."

His hand hasn't stopped touching me, and it moves now to rub soothing circles on my back. I wonder if he can feel the tension and frustration there.

"When I was...altered, it was like I was lost in my own mind. There was a part of me that was so sure of my actions, so sure that everything I did was right. And there was another part of me..." I sigh again, remembering the horrible battles in my head--battles that never even really made it to the conscious level of my mind. It was like a huge gray blanket, fighting to smother every spark of life, every movement that I made. "Another part of me was like a lost child. Confused. Sure that I had done something wrong, but completely unable to understand what it was."

He pulls me into his arms then, and we lean back together into the cushions of the couch I convinced him to buy what seems like years ago. His lips touch my temple, and I know he wants me to go on. He knows that I have to talk it out before there's any hope of moving past it.

"Then there was the mission with Helmut...He really was a good man, you know?"

"I know." He speaks quietly, but without jealousy.

"He reminded me of myself, so angry at the sacrifice of lives to the 'greater' good. So passionate about what was right. And as I shot those operatives, I wondered where my passion had gone." Even now I hear the gunshots echoing in my empty head. Four shots. Four dead operatives. People who had once had lives, and loves. But not in Section.

"They were already dead."

He doesn't answer, but I can tell he doesn't understand.

"In my mind, they were already dead. We're all dead. He was alive, and I had to keep him that way."

I feel him nod in agreement. "You had to make it appear that Helmut was ruthless."

I remember a long-ago lesson, hear him speaking similar words to me. About me.

"But that doesn't make it right, Michael." I clench my jaw against the rising tears.

"There isn't always a 'right', Nikita."

I shake my head, not wanting it to be true. "There has to be. For me, at least. I need that, maybe more than I ever needed it before."

It's his turn to sigh, although he does it discreetly. But he must know I'm right. We may be in love, but we're different people. Different types of people. He needs a sense of control in his life. I need firm ground to stand on, or something to cling to. An anchor.

"What do you need?" he asks, almost as if he's reading my mind.

"I'm not sure."

The hand on my back stills, then moves up to thread through my hair. "Do you need me to go?"

The offer stuns me. "Would you really back off like that? Again?"

"If you need it."

The tears are back, and this time I lose the battle. They spill silently down my cheeks and soak into the soft cotton t-shirt he's wearing. "What...what about what you need?"

The answer is a while in coming, as if he has to think about which words to use. "I need you to be well. I used to think that...it would be enough if you were alive."

But not any more, I realize. Not since Madeline stole my heart, and Michael won it back for me.

"You asked me how I did it. How I managed to keep my feelings sorted out."

I'm momentarily confused by the shift in subject, but realize what he's referring to. "How you lived split into two people."

"Yes," he breathes. Another edged moment passes, and I marvel at the fact that I once thought him emotionless. "I guess the answer is 'poorly.'"

I push myself up and look at him in puzzlement. "What does that mean?"

"Yes, I was split in two. But what do you think were my two halves?"

I've thought this over many times, and I answer quickly, without hesitation. "One half was your life with Elena and Adam, and the other half was your life in Section."

He closes his eyes, but not before I see the blue-green fill with pain. "No," he whispers. "Don't you understand yet?"

I feel stupid and dull, because he's clearly trying to tell me something important, but I don't know what it is. "No, Michael. I don't understand."

His eyes open, and although they are still pained, they are also deep with love. "There was you...and there was everything else."

Oh, God. More tears, and I can't tell through the blur if he's crying, too.

"You're not the only one who needs an anchor," he whispers, and I feel it, I feel him latch on to me and pull me to shore, and I weep, because I truly didn't understand, and I hold on to him, fearing to be swept away again.