Disclaimer: I don't own these characters. I'm borrowing them. Also borrowing the title from David J. Hufford's book by the same name (which I highly recommend).
Inspired by the opening sequence on 11/03/05 (?), the phenomenon of sleep paralysis, and my suspicion that neither of these two sleeps very much.
Sometimes while they sleep his weight will shift on top of her and she wakes thinking she's back in that pit. Buried all over again. For a moment she opens her eyes in the darkness and can't breathe. Can't move. And she lies there wanting to scream, but silent.
Sometimes he feels the nightmares overtake her. She starts spasming, struggling, making incomprehensible noises of terror. And he catches her in his arms and whispers to her that it's okay, that he's here, that she's safe and he wonders what protection he can really offer her. How many nightmares he'll give her in the end.
Sometimes his arms feel like those of an imposter. Sometimes she has to twist and look to make sure it's really him. And then she reminds herself that she can't even trust her eyes. And she wonders how long it will be before she finds out that he's not the man she thought he was either.
Sometimes he wakes and reaches for her. Not to hold her or caress her, just to feel the rise and fall of her chest. To make sure she's breathing. She doesn't know how often he watches her sleep rather than sleeping himself. She'll never know quite how much he's done just to make things all right for her. To make sure she's still breathing.
Sometimes he talks in his sleep. She's never told him. He'll never know. She hears him cry her name in terror, and she smoothes back the hair from his forehead and soothes him softly until he relaxes under her hand. And she wonders what nightmares could still scare this man. This man who seems able to conquer everything. And she'll never tell him how often she sits there, watching him sleep.