"But you.  You’ll be away from it … without control over what’s happening," Tina continued, stroking Bette’s hair, running her fingers softly over the brunette’s eyebrows, rubbing her cheeks, touching her pillow-soft lips.  "You’ll be at work, maybe, but half your mind will be on me, worried, thinking of what may be happening…."

Bette gave her a half-smile, half-frown.   "I won’t be able to help myself."

"I know," Tina said, giving Bette a small smile of her own.  "I know, baby."

She brought one hand up to her lips.  Kissing the fingers.

"You know I was just mentally unprepared last night, when he showed up, then told me what he wanted," Tina started.  "And emotionally, I was unguarded, and I was still thinking about us, and the stupid, petty argument that we’d had earlier that day…."

"I know, T," Bette answered.  "And I’m really sorry about that whole scene with Lauren…"

Tina shook her head, "Bette, it’s me, too.  I just get frustrated when you seem to have less of a handle on things happening around you, like someone being attracted to you and you just let it  run.  Um…"

Bette cocked her head to one side, "What?"

"It’s just that you’re so thorough and in control on other things, Bette, " Tina continued.  "I mean, at times during the home re-construction, this alpha-side of yours would get to me, frustrate me because you were in this mode wherein your thoughts, your needs, your ideas were always right, always had to be on a higher plane, more important than everyone else’s.   It seemed you always had to be. more enlightened, more intuitive, more creative.  I mean I know that you had a vision in your head.  But it was really, really hard on our relationship …"

Bette gazed at Tina with a worried look, "I must have been hideous…I’m sorry …"

Tina shook her head again, "Don’t worry, baby.  It was hard, but we were under so much pressure, and in the end I know you were hearing what I had to say, and were listening to what I had to contribute.  And so many aspects of what I was telling you, even when I thought you weren’t listening, came out in the end.  I mean, even in how you were positioning the special niches for the sculpture –  I know you decided on how those came out based partially on something I’d mentioned months before that part of the reconstruction came up…"