Rage Against the Night
Some nights, Cal stays awake. He sits on the floor of the narrow hallway with this back against the wall and listens. Sits and waits, sits and dreads: who will cry tonight?
Mature beyond her years and endlessly perceptive, his daughter is a wonder. She often seems to him more adult than he and Sarah combined. But after bedtime, Kira is just a little girl. As sleep takes her, all her wisdom abandons her and she is overwhelmed by the things she doesn't understand and terrified by the things she does. A child in sleep, she buries herself deep under the blankets and cries.
Sarah is rock solid in the daytime, strong and unafraid. She is unflinching in her loyalty, unflinching in her drive. But her dented armor of leather and attitude doesn't follow her into her dreams. In sleep, Sarah screams for the things she's lost and the people she still stands to lose. Unprotect and unarmed, she thrashes in the night.
Cal does his best to comfort them. Alone for so long before his girls crashed back into his life, he fumbles along (calls his father in the middle of the night, broken, desperate for advice). He rubs their backs and murmurs peaceful thoughts into their ears. When they scare him enough, when he can't bear their unconscious terror any longer, he gently shakes them awake. He arms himself with cups of warm milk and hot tea, with kisses and wishes of sweet dreams.
And every night, without fail, they deny their sleeping terrors. Every night, they shake their heads and refuse the steaming mugs he offers. Like mother, like daughter.
"Daddy, I'm fine. It was just a dream. Go back to bed," Kira whispers, her cheeks still wet and her hands still shaking. Sometimes, with a brave smile, as she pushes his hands away, "Maybe you were having the bad dream, Daddy. It really wasn't me. I'm fine"
"God, Cal, I forgot how sentimental you can be. I'm fine. Go back to sleep," Sarah scoffs, her voice still hoarse and blankets still tangled around her legs from her writhing. And as she rolls away from him, she laughs an empty laugh and lies, "It was probably that old dream about walking into school with no pants. Don't worry so much. I'm fine"
But they aren't fine. He knows this, because he has nightmares too. And he isn't fine, he isn't fine at all. Some days this family is trapped in a waking nightmare, eyes wide open.
So he chooses to stay awake and listen, to comfort them as they battle their darkness and demons. He chooses to stay awake, to rage against the night.