Wake Up
The darkness is absolute, not a glimmer of light anywhere, your entire body is pain and somewhere there is a crackle, a scream—
—he wouldn’t have given a shit about you—
And then the darkness clears, lightning flashing across the sky and Jim turns, smiles at you, half of his face a bloody wreck and you reach for him but it’s too late and he falls—
Your eyes snap open.
Daylight, early morning, softened by curtains. The scent of washing powder and shower gel—the sheets, actually smelling nice for once, and your back doesn’t ache or itch and—
—and Jim.
He's sitting at the end of the bed. You breathe out and just look. The shape of his back, the loose curl of his fingers on his thigh, the ruffled hair. It's how you had seen him for countless mornings, after he just woke up. A balm.
You stay quiet, as if somehow by not moving you might keep this vision a bit longer. It's bullshit, though. Any moment now a guard will slam the door, or an alarm will start blaring or any of the other million things they do to fuck with with you, and all this will disappear again. But for the moment, you can just look and pretend to be back there with him and—
And then Jim looks up and raises his eyebrows and says, in his actual fucking voice, “fun dreams?”
It’s real.
You lunge, bury your face in his shoulder, breathe in his smell, feel his warmth. It’s exactly as you remember and at the same time you’d forgotten about this, the way he feels against you, the short hair at his nape against your hand, chest moving with slow steady breathing and the way he smells, he sounds…
It takes a while before you manage to pull yourself off again. “Sorry,” you say hoarsely.
Jim looks mildly surprised. “You didn't do this yesterday morning.”
You run your hands over your face. “I don't think I actually slept last night.”
“And you're going to do this every time, then?”
“I might. Yeah, sorry, it's gonna be a while before I get this out of my system.”
He scrunches his nose. “I prefer my alarm clocks less cuddly.”
You fall back onto the bed, laughing. “You're such a bastard.”
The relief you feel is like—it's not even relief, that's far too weak a word for it. The closest thing is the way you felt when you found him in the gutter after him being imprisoned for six weeks, but it's nothing compared to that.
You hadn't really believed he was alive until you actually saw him. And even now, some part of you still struggles to accept it. It just seems to good to be true, after everything you’ve been through.
“You yell,” Jim says. “When you're dreaming.”
“Sorry,” you say, staring at the ceiling.
“You've been sweating,” he continues. “The sheets are clammy.”
“Nightmares.” You push up again. He looks… His hair is messed up and he's wearing a too-big t-shirt and track bottoms and he's got dark circles underneath his eyes and his mouth is thin in distaste and it's Jim and he's alive and he's there and—
You breathe in sharply.
That sudden strange visceral need to touch, to feel engulfs you again—and Jim is still Jim so he scoots over to you and you somehow end up tangled around him, face pressed into his neck, breathing in his heartbeat.
“Jesus,” you gasp.
And he doesn’t reply. No smug remark, no gloating, nothing. He just holds you, fingers digging into your shoulder and waist, his whole body tense, and it’s fucking mutual in a way it’s never been before and you can’t—
You disentangle and look up at him. “Fuck,” you say, softly, and Jim smirks.
“Maybe later. Come on, I need to talk to you and you need to be coherent for that.”
“Talk?” you say, your stomach sinking.
“Mm. But food first, you seriously need fattening up, dear boy.”
