5 Times Pinky Said I Love You

...And the One Time Brain Understood

The first time, Brain thought he was talking to someone else.

They were in the stables because Pinky had been missing his girl friend, and Pharfignewton really was an excellent one. The two mice strolled easily beneath the stall door and, while Pinky climbed up the mare's side, Brain waited, hands clasped behind him.

Minutes later "I love you!" could be heard from the top of the mare's head. Brain only sighed at the enthusiastic, ridiculous proclamation. He had no idea that Pharfignewton had been giving Pinky advice on sharing his feelings and even less idea that Pinky had taken the words to heart. Brain's ear twitched in irritation.

-8-8-

The second time, Brain was asleep.

The Brain was slumped over his notes and his plans, the pencil being used more as a pillow than an actual writing utensil. Pinky thought his dear friend looked awfully sweet like that, even if worry flared in him. Brain's schemes had been keeping them up longer than normal and even Pinky's usual hyperness was dwindling in the face of such long nights.

So he trotted over quietly, draped the blanket over his friend, and brushed his lips gently over the back of his ear. "G'night, Brain. I love you," he whispered. Brain's ear twitched from the agitation.

-8-8-

The third time, electricity was involved.

"But, Brain! I really have to tell you something important!"

"It can wait, Pinky!" He was trying to attach a long wire to a dingle-switcher, but he couldn't quite reach. Pinky was trying to tell him that the other wire had fallen off the dapple-switcher and hadn't Brain said that was bad?

"But Brain-"

"Pinky! Enough! I just have to connect this last- nyaaaaaaaah!" He attached it alright and even Pinky felt the shocks of it as the power traveled through the area, shorting out the entire system. A very charred Brain dropped down beside Pinky, looking at him blearily. "What'd you want to tell me...?"

"That the other wire fell."

Brain gave a weak nod and collapsed. Smiling, Pinky lifted him to take him back to the lab. "I love you, Brain. You're so stubborn," he whispered. Brain's ear twitched in response.

-8-8-

The fourth time, The Brain was just barely paying attention.

Pinky stood behind him, though it was more dancing in place than simple standing. Brain ignored him and his start-and-stop ramblings while he completed that night's plan. It wasn't until he hit a snag - just how was he going to convince JJ Abrams to direct what would surely end up being a science fiction masterpiece? - that Brain tuned in.

"And I just- We've done all kinds o' things together, so- Narf! I wanted to say I love you! And-and-"

Brain glanced back at him, wondering just what silly show he was quoting from now. He'd gained a recent affinity for silly, overly dramatic soap operas where love seemed to be declared on a daily basis to multiple partners. No one in foolishly named small towns ever seemed to know whose baby was whose and they tended to get engaged as easily and as often as they died.

So Brain rolled his eyes and went back to his plans. "Pinky, enough of your foolishness. I'm trying to work."

He didn't see the way Pinky's tail dropped and shoulders sagged. "Alright, Brain... I'll just... be over here. Poit."

"Yes, yes. Go on." It was a few minutes before Brain realized just how sad his friend's tone had been. Frowning and more than a little confused, he looked up and about to try and locate the mouse. He sat nearby, knees drawn up to his chest, face buried in his knees. Brain's heart began to pound rather painfully as he went over Pinky's words.

Could Pinky possibly...? No. It was preposterous. Pinky didn't understand what that word entailed. He'd just been... quoting and now he was... acting out the scene. Very convincingly acting it out.

But when Pinky looked up, Brain was hard-pressed to deny the fact that his friend's eyes were filled with misery. He had to look away quickly and dove back into his plans. Brain's ears twitched despite his best efforts when Pinky's quiet sniffles reached them.

-8-8-

The fifth time, Brain was astounded by it and needed to be alone.

Pinky had had just about enough! He'd told Brain four whole times and he hadn't had any sort of reaction! He was supposed to have heard it back by now! That's what happened in the movies. He really, really hoped it wouldn't be like the TV shows where everyone lived in their lovely little towns and they all knew each other so well. And they all had babies and all kinds of other relatives that showed up at the most dramatic moment!

But when they said "I love you" it didn't always go so well. Sometimes the person being told didn't believe it. Was that the problem? Did The Brain not believe him? Well! He'd just have to make sure Brain listened really really hard this time and believed every single word! Troz!

"Pinky, what on earth are you doing?" Brain asked a few minutes later, merely annoyed by the way his friend dragged him away from his plans.

Pinky didn't answer right away, instead sitting him down on the floor of their cage and plopping down right across from him, smile bright. "I'm going to talk to you, Brain!"

"Pinky, we live together. There's not a single day where you and I don't engage in some sort of verbal communication."

The taller of the two blinked, but reached out quickly when Brain started to rise and held his hands tightly. "Wait, Brain!"

He sighed, but relented. There were times when it was simpler to just listen to the inane things Pinky wanted to say and be irritated by them later. "What is it?"

"I, um..." Pinky looked down at their joined hands and squeezed carefully. "Brain, y'know how you're my best friend in the whole world?"

There was really no denying that, but Brain's heart was beginning to speed up. "I suppose."

"And am I your best friend in the whole wide world?"

He fidgeted slightly. As much as he detested the admission, Pinky was really his only friend. No one else would stand by him, he was sure of it. "You are, Pinky. Yes."

He blew out a relieved breath, smiling widely. "Oh, good! Zort!"

"Is that all? I need to get back to my plans."

"Not yet, Brain!" The smile died, replaced with a sense of urgency Brain was rather unused to seeing in his associate. He was quickly tugged closer and, to his surprise, Pinky gently rubbed their noses together. "You're my very best friend."

"You said that." His heart was hammering almost painfully now and he was fairly certain he was about to have a heart attack. "Pinky-"

"No, Brain, please! You haven't listened the whole time and, well, narf, it's not fair! I said it a bunch of times and you haven't listened!"

"Pinky, don't-"

"I love you, Brain! Because we have tomorrow nights and you ask what I'm ponderin' and you helped me find my family! Because you're all grumpy and you use all those big words and you bop me on the head!" Pinky's grip was getting tighter and Brain's heart beating faster. "And we sing songs and we play Simon Says all the time... And you never leave me, Brain. You never ever leave me alone, Brain, and even when you make me sad, you make it all better. You came to get me when that mean old Mr. Itch came to get me, you came back for me when Snowball tried to give me a theme park and was all mean. You didn't take over the world on Christmas and you gave me that lovely spell-checker!"

Brain wanted to flee, his fight-or-flight reaction begging for it. He didn't know how to handle this, how to analyze Pinky's words into something he could argue against. "I don't... I don't understand, Pinky."

The mouse screwed up his face, trying to think real hard how to explain better. It hurt his head some, so he rubbed at it to try and get rid of the pain like he'd seen Brain do sometimes. "I just... I love you, Brain. You make my heart go pittery-pattery and my tummy does flip-flops. 'Specially when you call me your friend and tell me I've done something good or at bedtime when it's cold and you let me snuggle close 'cause you're cold too."

Brain dropped his gaze to their hands. Pinky had taken a hold again, but it was gentle. His own heart was going "pittery-pattery" and his stomach was flipping about uncomfortably. "What about Pharfignewton, Pinky? Didn't you just tell her last week that you loved her?"

Pinky looked blank a moment before giggling. "Oh, no, Brain! I was talking to you. I asked Pharfignewton how and she said I just needed to say it! But I've been tryin' and you haven't been listenin' and yesterday you said I was being foolish."

"Pinky..." Brain pulled his hands away and scrambled to his feet. "I need to... Excuse me."

"But, Brain-"

"No!"

Pinky stared up at him with wide eyes that were quickly filling with tears. This wasn't at all how things were supposed to be going! And Pinky had never at all heard Brain shout "no" like he did "yes." Especially not at him. "Y-you don't love me too, Brain...? P-p-poit..."

"I never said that, Pinky. I just..." His tongue was tied, as uncomfortable a sensation as the churning in his stomach. "I need to be alone right now." He walked off as quickly as he could, but it still wasn't quite fast enough to miss the sobs that started escaping his cagemate.

-8-8-

Brain needed two whole days to be alone, it seemed. Not entirely, of course, as they were cagemates and the scientists often liked to run tests on them during the daytime. But each time Pinky tried to bring up the L-word, Brain would shush him and scurry away.

Disheartened, Pinky leaned against the television remote and watched the late-night shows they usually weren't home for. His ears were drooped, his tail wrapped around his body in as close to a hug as he could get. And rather than laughing at the rather witty repartee between Conan and his sidekick Andy, he only sighed.

Brain didn't love him. It was the only conclusion he'd been able to come to, no matter how much he'd pondered. Brain didn't love him and they weren't going to go on anymore fun-fun silly-willy adventures together. With a soft whimper, he wrapped his arms tightly around himself. It was a better hug than he was getting from his tail - though he knew the appendage was really doing its best.

"Pinky?"

At the familiar voice, Pinky spun about on his bottom and began his apology. "I'm s-sorry, Brain!" he wailed. "I'm really, really sorry! It's okay! I'll try and stop, okay? I'll be good! I want tomorrow nights back and bops on the head and going outside to t-take over the world! I want to be your friend again, Brain!"

"Pinky, you were never not my friend. Now dry your eyes." There was something soft and cottony brushed below his eyes, so Pinky lifted his head and pressed into it. He couldn't stop the whimpers entirely, or the sniffles, but the hanky Brain was dabbing his eyes with helped with the tears themselves.

He hiccuped. "I'm still your friend, Brain?"

"You will always be my friend," the shorter mouse replied, and he wrung the handkerchief out with a disgruntled expression on his face. "Do you understand, Pinky?"

"I... I think so, Brain..." The tears filled his eyes again, but he began blinking them rapidly away. "I just wanted you to love me too," he whispered. "Poit... Don't be mad anymore or all ignore-y. I can still be your very best friend." He spasmed, everything in his tummy wibbling. His heart felt like it was doing all kinds of bad things and Pinky considered whether or not you could put band-aids on hearts. He felt like he'd need a whole box of them. "Narf!"

"I wasn't... mad, Pinky. I was merely baffled by the sudden turn in your feelings. I had assumed, based on your attraction to the female gender - albeit of different species - that your feelings for me remained platonic."

"Platonic's the word that means love but not married love. You're not supposed to say chase me unless you're in married love."

Brain looked at his companion with sheer bafflement. "Where on earth did you learn that, Pinky?"

"From mum and dad, Brain." He rose and ran off, leaving Brain puzzled and frowning, until he came back with a postcard from Oxford. The escorts for their year-long travels around the world had taken a detour his simple-minded companion's parents were completely unaware of. And, judging from the messy blocked words on the back of the postcard, they were learning to write.

Pinky discarded that postcard, however, holding up and offering a sheet of rather worn paper. Brain unfolded it, surprised by the scribbled words. Usually Pinky let Brain read all his mail, what little of it he received. To think that he was unaware of a letter of this magnitude was... stunning. "You sent them a letter first?"

Pinky nodded, smile abnormally shy. "'Cause I wanted to know why my heart was going pittery-pattery when you were with me. And it doesn't go pittery-pattery with anybody else like this either. And they explained it all to me." He tapped the page and Brain read it quickly; he would've had it read even quicker had Pinky's family had better spelling capabilities.

They certainly had explained it, in the simplest terms The Brain had ever read. No wonder Pinky had understood so clearly. "What about Pharfignewton?" he asked quietly, hating to repeat himself but finding it necessary.

"I love her like I love Sis. Narf!" Pinky tapped the paper again. "See? She's my girl friend." The word he tapped was two. Girl. Friend. Pharfignewton wasn't his romantic partner, but a friend who was female. "And Mr. Sultana's my boy friend." Another two words. "And Romy's our son, so I love him like a son. And Bunny's like our daughter almost, so I love her like a daughter but also kind of like a girl friend."

Brain trembled, emotions crashing into him like strong waves. They left him feeling raw and tired, so his voice was quiet and subdued. "Where am I on this page, Pinky?"

"You're the rest of the page, Brain... I love you like a best boy friend. And like a married. And like somebody who'll chase me. And it'll be fun because you'll catch me." He looked at Brain and his eyes were starting to tear up again. "But you don't want to catch me and that's okay, Brain. I can be your..." He searched hard for the word that he'd heard Brain use on a few occasions. "I'll be your sidekick."

Brain very carefully folded what he now considered Pinky's guide to love and quietly pondered over it for a few minutes while his dearest friend quivered and waited beside him. "What would happen after I caught you, Pinky?"

The taller mouse blushed and wrung his tail, peering at Brain shyly while his lashes fluttered and his head ducked. "You know, Brain. It's what happens when you're married. Like mum and dad. And then they had me and Sis."

Brain didn't bother to remind Pinky that his sister was an empty wooden spool and not the result of natural procreation between a male and female Rattus norvegicus, knowing from experience that it really wouldn't matter. Besides, there were more important things to deal with at the moment. "And you want to do those things with me?"

"Mum says you should only do it when you're all ready to have - zort - babies. And we already have Romy."

"So... yes."

Pinky took a hold of his tail, wringing it nervously, and nodded. "I think about it and I get all warm, Brain."

The megalomaniac was beginning to feel a bit warm himself, so cleared his throat and changed the subject to safer ground. "Do you think we're married, Pinky?"

There was a long moment of silence wherein Pinky continued wringing his tail, but he looked more sad than embarrassed now. "Sometimes. But we didn't say 'I do.'"

Brain stepped closer to Pinky and very carefully lifted a hand to his friend's cheek. The gentle stroke was all it took for Pinky's eyes to flutter closed, his smile blooming. Just the slightest bit of affection made him so happy.

In a span of about three seconds, Brain went through all the rituals and things humans used to declare their own marriages and how Pinky had picked up on some of it thanks to his extensive television viewing. He also went over the contents of the letter from his parents, the words Pinky had used in his declaration two days previous and the words he'd used in the past few minutes.

He thought of his own reactions, despite his dislike and mistrust of self-analyzing, and compared them to his extensive knowledge of biology and past reactions to women in his life. They fit a self-diagnosis of... heightened, singular attraction. Something that went beyond like. Beyond even tolerated. His heart seemed to flutter in his chest at that realization.

As a sort of experiment, he lifted both hands and gently framed Pinky's face between them. Pinky's eyes opened just enough to reveal the question in them. "Tell me again, Pinky."

"I'm sorry?" he tried after a beat of silence.

"No, Pinky." It was annoying, but on such a small scale that Brain ignored it without any effort. "Tell me that you... love me."

The teary eyes brightened, the drooping ears perked, and the wound tail began to wag. "I love you, Brain. I love you so much that I want to stay with you for always. But what I want more than anything in the whole wide world is just to see you happy!"

Brain let his hands slide down to Pinky's shoulders and around his neck, though he had to stretch up to his toes and Pinky was bent over somewhat. He was quiet for a long time, but didn't move away when Pinky hesitantly returned the unexpected embrace. "Brain?" he finally whispered.

"I do," Brain finally murmured.

Pinky began to shiver all over, the very familiar thrum of hope filling him. "Brain?"

"I have no objection to always being in your presence, Pinky. I also dearly wish for you to be happy. And if you wanted me to chase you, I would always catch you and it would be, in your vernacular, fun-fun silly-willy."

The gentle hug tightened. "Egad, Brain! Really?"

"Really, Pinky. Now I've just said 'I do,' so I believe it's your turn."

"I do!" he exclaimed and Brain was swept up and spun, Pinky giving off the happiest laugh he'd managed in two whole days. "I do, Brain! I do! I love you! Narf!"

Brain closed his eyes, holding on tightly, and let himself be spun about. And his ear twitched when Pinky giggled into it.