#comfort reader insert

~*~ ~*~ ~*~

You have not felt normal for a lot of your life. You saw people being able to meet their needs in a variety of ways, and somehow, you were not able to figure out how to meet your needs for yourself. Somehow, people were on a completely different plane from you. Maybe they had a much stronger foundation from which to springboard off of. You were scrambling to find your balance on a constantly tilting floor, and people were already halfway up the walls, scaling them like mountain goats or monkeys. Some were birds and seemed to fly straight to the top. 

All these mountain dwelling animals were doing great. They were supposed to be here.

You have no idea where you are supposed to be.

Tonight, it’s time for your classic delay going to bed shenanigans. For what? You don’t know. You can’t relax. You aren’t purposefully trying not to sleep. But if you go to sleep right away, who is going to ruminate over all the mistakes you’ve made today, and in your whole life?

You’re tired and hungry, and you’re too tired to eat, and too hungry to sleep. Your eyes and head hurt. You’ve been watching youtube, hoping to fall asleep to one of the videos. 

Even though you ate dinner with Bokuto earlier, you ate very little, because you were too nervous and stressed to eat fully. He didn’t press you to eat more than you were comfortable. He asked if you were okay and you didn’t really have an answer for him at the time. 

You are bad at asking for help when your symptoms get really bad. Or even when your symptoms aren’t bad, but it would be nice to have support. 

You aren’t good at relying on people. You don’t know the distinctions of when you should rely on yourself and regulate your own emotions and take responsibility for yourself and when you should ask for help and support. You don’t want to do anything wrong and you don’t want to be a burden. 

Until you know it’s safe, you don’t want people to know your true emotions so you try not to let anyone know what you’re thinking. But you also don’t really have a good poker face. You also don’t like lying for other people’s benefit (when it hurts you). You don’t like the idea that you should suffer in silence while everyone else has fun. It’s not fair. 

There’s some people you can never tell that you’re struggling. They won’t care and they might blame you, and will probably make you feel worse. 

There’s some people you would never think to tell that you’re struggling. 

Bokuto is not like that at all. He is someone you feel very safe telling your stuff to. You used to be stressed about him finding out you were fucked up and crazy, but he keeps loving you no matter what, and that doesn’t make sense to you. You are working on feeling safe and secure in this relationship. It is one of the relationships you feel safest and most secure in. It’s not to have a safe place where you can figure out how to deal with all the other unsafe places in the world that you have to interact with because you are alive. 

Maybe you’re staving off a disaster right now. You honestly don’t know. Maybe you’re bottling up all your problems because you can’t deal with them right now because you might have even more problems to deal with soon. You need to be ready.  

You alternate thinking about a social faux paux and feeling stress from a task you’ve been procrastinating on. And there’s probably other stuff that you can’t grasp right now. It’s so deeply entrenched in your brain that the routes will flash by unconsciously and you don’t even know what it’s about. All you know is that you are stressed, you are under attack, something bad is going to happen, you are the cause of it. You’re well on your way to spiraling. 

And you know there are ways to help yourself. You need to get something to eat. You need to be gentle with yourself. Being embarrassed and ashamed isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but it’s also not going to change the past. And also those feelings in excess, completely disproportionate to what actually happened, by the way, (barely anything happened) is also unhealthy. 

That thing you said in front of your friends—no one’s thinking of it, probably. You’ve said way more embarrassing things before (yikes, oh no), but they just laugh, and still love you no matter what. 

Which. That is the crazy part. That they still love you no matter what.

Even if you can’t truly believe that in your heart, you’d like it if you were able to find a way to relax and fall asleep today. There's no reason to beat yourself up about this.

There’s no reason, but you feel like you need to.

You feel stuck. There’s nothing else you can do. That’s the pasttime you do the most, the thing you're most practiced at.

You get into bed and wait for Bokuto to come out of the bathroom, holding one of your stuffed animals. You stare into the toy’s eyes and tears prickle behind your eyes.

You like being with Bokuto while he falls asleep, but you are probably going to move to another room because you feel like you are not going to be able to sleep tonight. 

He emerges, and crawls into bed with you, enveloping you completely. You keep your toy between the two of you for a moment, and then put him beside you, to then go back to snuggle with Bokuto.

No matter how many times he does this, no matter how “normal” it should feel by now, you are sometimes caught off guard by the opportunity to feel safe in his arms, fighting against the  hypervigilance that has ruled your whole life. 

Tears absorbed slowly between your cheeks and his shirt. 

He pressed a kiss to the top of your head. “Baby?” he asked, softly, uncertainty lacing around the syllables.

You squeeze your eyes tighter. Your body is so tense. You don’t want him to let go (he wouldn't). 

He rubs your back. 

“I know you didn’t want to talk earlier. But is there anything else I can do?”

“I don’t know. It feels disproportionate to the problems I am facing.”

“You’re doing so well. I’m sorry things have been tough.”

“I’m not going to be able to sleep.” You cry more. 

“That’s okay, baby.” He catches tears with his thumb one by one and wipes them on the sheets behind you.

“It’s going to make things worse.” Your voice is caught in your throat, like your words are trying to swim through pudding.

“It’s not your fault.” His voice is so soothing. And you feel like a baby. Why do you have to be soothed? Why can’t you be a real adult that can solve your own problems and not cry about all this stupid stuff? Why can’t you just be normal? 

Why can’t you accept his help?

“Sleep is hard for you and there’s nothing wrong with that.”

Of course he’s going to say something kind and comforting to you. Of course. He’s radically accepting you as you are. Why can’t you accept yourself? But of course you can’t. If you could, then you would be normal, and have no problems, and your life would be completely different. 

“You’ll get through this. I’m here for you and will help you.”

You wish accepting help wasn’t such a sign of weakness (you wish you didn't see it that way). But who cares if Bokuto sees you as weak (he doesn’t)? Bokuto would never talk shit about you (he doesn’t even have anything negative to say about you stored in his brain). If Bokuto is offering help, why can’t you take it?

You’ve accepted his help countless of times before. You don’t want it to run out. You don’t want it to run out when you “really” need it. 

Sometimes your life seems to get worse and worse. You don’t want to be stranded without help when things are much worse than this.

This isn’t even that bad. You’ve been through all of this before. Why can’t you ever learn and grow and change?

“What are you thinking about?”

You press your nose and then your forehead into his chest. You wish you could curl up into yourself and disappear forever.

“Do you want me to watch YouTube with you?”

“No, I want you to sleep.”

“It’s okay, I can stay up with you, baby.”

“No, you shouldn’t jeopardize your health for me.”

To be frank, Bokuto actually can’t even stay up that late, anyway. He’s a battery company mascot all throughout the day, but then he needs his sleep at night. He keeps a much stricter bedtime than you—he’s actually a lot more routine oriented than you, in general. 

“It’s only one night, baby. You don’t have to worry about me. I’m going to stay tough and healthy for us, don’t worry about that.”

Part of you feels endeared, but part of you feels scared. You can’t rely on him. What are you going to do when he leaves or is gone? How are you going to take care of yourself? 

“I want you to feel better. This is going to pass.”

This is so frustrating and awful. Even though Bokuto doesn’t get what you are going through, he is the one who has listened to you the most. He knows more about you than anyone else.  And he knows how to help you more than anyone else. Even if you can’t trust life or the universe, or other people, or your parents, you can trust Bokuto. You know this. He has shown up for you time and time again. 

You don’t want Bokuto to end up on a list of people you can’t trust anymore. 

“Okay.”

“Okay? To which part.”

You shrug. “Just fall asleep when you want to fall asleep, okay? I can tell when you’re sleepy.”

“You don’t have to worry so much about me, baby. I’m so grateful for you.”

“I’m grateful for you too. You worry about me so much because I'm such a mess. I don't want to be a burden.”

“You’re not a burden,” Bokuto says, doing a sweep of the room, trying to locate a laptop. “I love you so much. Thank you for letting me be there for you and help you.”

Bokuto is very disgruntled that he has to untangle himself from you to get the laptop. He cues up your favorite type of youtube video to fall asleep to because he knows you so well but also you are really predictable and only watch one thing. 

He turns off the main lights and turns on the mood lights you keep on for some softer and calmer vibes. He curls around you and you know he is struggling to stay awake. You start massaging his scalp. There’s no reason for him to stay up with you.

“Baby, stop,” he says, his voice extremely sleepy, syllables sticking together and stringing each other along like putty. Actually it’s really hot. You drag your thumb across his eyebrow gently. His eyes are dropping shut.

“What?”

“You know what you’re doing.”

“Go to sleep,” you say.

“I already told you I want to stay up! Why are you sabotaging me.”

“You said you were going to be strong and healthy for us!”

“Are you sure you don’t want any company?”

“I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“You’re really stubborn.”

You continue massaging his scalp as if to say “you knew this and you love me.”

“Do you want company tomorrow?”

“I don’t know yet.”

“Okay. You can wake me up if you want company, okay? Or if you want anything else.”

“Sleeping next to you is company enough.”

“Okay. I’m letting you win this time, but don’t think I’m going to forget this.”

You don’t have time to say that he never lets you win, you win, also there’s no winning, you both are a team, and he would never want to set you both up as opposing each other. He knows he can get away with saying shit like this right before he falls asleep because you’re not going to argue with him as he’s about to drift off (you would never interfere with his sleep). Crafty bastard. Always coming in with the strategies. And for what?

You aren’t really paying attention to the video since the sound of the voices themselves are more soothing. You don’t really care what they have to say, necessarily. You are also calmed by Bokuto’s breathing. He drifts off to sleep, and you think about stuff. You wish you had something to do, but you’re too tired to do anything. 

But you try to make peace with your thoughts. You’re going to have them anyway, so you might as well invite them in. Sit with them. Offer them tea. Show them where the shower and towels are. Ask them what they want for dinner later. 

You switch to a calming show you want to watch. Your brain is going to be occupied, and it’s a little more energy than you really want to exert, but at least you won’t be bored. 

You can pass one more night this way. Bokuto loves you no matter what. It doesn’t matter if you can’t sleep sometimes and that sometimes you don't feel safe and sometimes you overthink things. He loves you no matter what. 

It was a hard night, but now that you’ve settled into an activity, it’s going to be okay. Time will pass. Tomorrow will come. Situations will arise. Things may be solved or they might never be. But at least Bokuto is going to always be there, offering to stay up with you. That’s really sweet of him to offer (even though you both know he’s going to nod off in a few minutes). 

You hold that fondness in your heart, like a molten puddle of golden sunlight. You have to freeze the rest of your body because you don’t want to engage with the unpleasant sensations of your symptoms and stress and hypervigilance. But you focus on the warm fondness for Bokuto as you watch your show, and as the hours of the night tick away into the morning. Bokuto will wake up soon, and he will offer to help you again. And you may feel uncomfortable accepting, but you know that you both want the best for you. 

“I’m here.” He said, kneeling down before your chair so that he could glance up at your face. He removed his leather gloves then took your hand in his much larger one, gently stroking his thumb over your skin. You were cold to touch. You might have been sat here all alone for the longest time, unwilling to move to grab a blanket or a jacket to warm yourself.

He gave a heavy sigh, willing you to meet his gaze as he stared at you. Without taking his eyes off your face he turned his free hand towards the fireplace and shot a flame into the grate. Even without logs or coal to sustain it, the flame would burn for a few minutes or so – enough to take the chill from your bones, at least.

As the magical flame crackled and danced in the fireplace, Axel took both your hands and kissed the knuckles, each hand in turn.

He wanted to tell you everything would be okay. He wanted to tell you it would get easier, that you would smile again in the end. But he knew it was too soon for that. Words could not reach you – in fact they could make you worse, like they were trying to rush you through your grief; like there was a time limit on how long you were allowed to take to heal.

There was no rush. Not for this. Axel felt helpless but he stayed with you, knowing you would tell him what you needed when you were ready.

When the flame died down, he picked himself up off the ground, letting go of your hands. They fell limply by your sides while your face stayed buried in your knees.Slowly, so slowly for fear he was overstepping your boundaries that shifted and strengthened when you were upset like this, he leaned down and tried to take your whole body in his arms. At first he wrapped and arm behind your back, then slipped another below your knees. You did not reject him. When he lifted you up, your limp arms came to life and wrapped around his neck to help him take your weight.

You stayed quiet as he carried you. He held you close and as tightly as he could. He took you through to the bedroom, letting you down onto the bed so that he could find your pyjamas – the comfortable ones that you loved so much. He helped you change into them then got you into bed, tucking the sheets up to your chin before he folded your clothes and left them in a pile on your chair.

He got you a glass of water, an old teddy bear than no one but he knew you still owned and then changed out of his black cloak and into the set of pyjamas he kept at your place. He closed the curtains and turned off the light, then got in bed beside you.

Some time passed before you started to move. Axel waited patiently, under the covers but keeping his distance to let you decided what you wanted. You reached over your shoulder, feeling the mattress and the pillow as you searched for him. He took that as a sign and shuffled into you, melding his larger body around yours like a warm comforter. He slipped his arms around your waist, smiling as his hands brushed the teddy bear clutched in yours before he encompassed you completely.

No words were spoken. No sounds were made but for the soft sniffs as you tried to hold in your tears. Axel held you tighter, pressing his face into the back of your head. He sighed, wishing he had some way to protect you from the horrible things humans called feelings.

He wanted to tell you it would get easier. It would get easier. But for now he was contented to hold you and comfort you in the quiet of your room, in the peacefulness of this moment where communication was not demanded nor necessary.

He would wait until your voice broke the silence and told him what you needed.

–

I just lost my grandfather. Each member of my family is dealing with it in a different way, but we are unanimously sad and grieving. He passed at home surrounded by his family so I can at least be comforted by that.