12 reasons to sleep in
an: tbh it was totally inspired by an old roleplay (kinda) and the song sunday morning by maroon 5.
1)
to hear your heartbeat with my head resting against your chest;
when the early morning streams in through the windows, my eyes seem to open just a tad. that is enough to have me become aware of my surroundings and i become aware of him. he is lying underneath me and our bodies are aligned in a way that makes me wonder if we are part of this gigantic life puzzle and we forced ourselves to fight together. certainly, this was never, ever supposed to happen.
carefully, as to not to wake him, i tilt my head so that my ear presses just slightly against his chest and then i can hear it: it is a slight thud and it is sluggish, but it is his heartbeat and it reminds me that he is strong and alive. this is real; he is real. it takes my breath away in the simplest ways.
2)
morning babble
"sirius, you forgot to close the curtains again"
"i know"
then he shuffles closer, folding that long body of his down in some impossible way and curls into me. without even meaning to, my grip on him tightens and he looks up to me through barely-opened eyes and smiles the most gorgeous smile that anyone could ever manage. i melt.
"if the sunlight is trying to get us, well, it can't touch me"
and as he says it, he pulls the covers up above our heads and the soft morning light fades to a muted darkness that makes me feel like i've just been inserted into a new reality where it is solely him and me wrapped up in the covers with the sunlight forever trying to reach us, but in capable of doing so.
"you don't mind if i sleep for a couple more hours do you?"
no, no, i don't, but i don't find the words because instead i'm too caught up in how his hands are against my chest. i'm moving just slightly so he can nuzzle into the crook of my neck, where i know he likes to rest and right when he presses a chaste, sweet kiss to my neck is when my breath is stolen from me.
"will you make me waffles later?"
"i can't cook"
he chuckles. "we'll figure out something"
3)
chances are he'll be cranky otherwise
"what time is it?"
"six"
i can see it, how his nose is flared in the slightest irritation because it isn't time to wake up, yet his body is telling him that he can get up and start the day now. it is with hesitation that i pull him close and press an open mouthed kiss to below his ear and then to his mouth which he responds to with a groan. i'm in love.
4)
the dreams will stay with me
they are all i have left some nights; dreams and memories of him and the more i sleep, the more i see. for a couple extra hours, i can pretend that his arms are tightly wrapped around me, his lips are pressing into the crook of my neck and trailing down to my exposed shoulder, and that his bare skin glides along mine. i can pretend that i'm still happy and there is no creeping, strangling despair. i can pretend as if i'm not a crushed, shattered thing that is dying with each passing minute. moreover, most importantly, i can forget that i'm a failure and i've failed you.
5)
it is cold without our covers
we've not found the money to fix the heating in our apartment, and by the time morning swings around, the remnants of the heat that the fireplace cast have dissipated. the cold invades the air and our only protection against it is the body heat we share underneath the sheets.
he thinks that maybe he should try to get a better job; i tell him not to worry, but he gets this look on his face as though he is so ashamed of himself and he turns over with his back facing me. he wants to go back to sleep: neither one of us wishes to get up.
the air is cold and i breathe it in slowly, wishing desperately wishing for coffee: strong black coffee with maybe a splash of peppermint because the cold entices something in me and reminds me just how close the holidays are getting, even if the mornings have just started to get cold like this.
and remus: i know he is laying there with his back towards me, just out of reach, because he thinks he is a piece of shit and i would love to let him know that i know he is capable of great things and one day his time is going to come. he isn't a monster. my lover is anything but a monster.
6)
i can trace your scars
with him asleep past the normal hour of waking, i can spend my whole morning tracing his outline, then to his exposed chest, i can trace his scars and count each and every one of them. i can press my fingertips to his side where the skin is wrinkled and mauled: scarred worse than any expanse of skin i've ever seen.
he shifts under my touch, but his eyelids don't flutter, so i think that maybe i'm not doing something entirely wrong and instead i can continue with this innocent act.
i feel in love with a scarred remus and as much as i'd love for him to not have this curse upon him, i wouldn't care to see a remus different from the one curled up next to me. this remus is warm and soft spoken with beautiful light eyelashes that i won't be ever able to count because they are too blond. he is scarred, but he is perfection and he is my home.
i want to envelope myself around him and let him sleep the morning away while i just let my fingers trace every imperfection that makes him even more perfect than he was when he began existing. i just think that if this remus wasn't here, wasn't cursed, then i might be not be in possession of a remus at all. without remus in my life, i think i'm missing the only stability i have.
once i had fallen in love with him, there was no possible way to forget him. instead everything depended on seeing him like this, imperfect and fragile, but so fucking heartbreakingly strong. if i didn't get to wake up every morning earlier than him, or if i didn't get to wake up beside him, then i fear that my life would be much too terrifying.
7)
waking up before him
he snores. it is the most heartwarming sound in the world and i adore listening to it every morning. probably, it is a reason why my internal clock insists on waking me up so early every morning. sometimes he gets upset if i let him sleep for too long, but i can't help it when he makes these small noises and is always searching for warmth and is always trying to pull the covers closer: to pull me closer.
i suppose some days he wakes up before me, but normally he is out of beds on those days before me, which should hurt me, i suppose, but maybe he just isn't someone who enjoys listening to something as mundane as a light snore all morning long.
this is home for me though. he is my home and i have rebuilt my life around him.
8)
because he'll make breakfast
those rare mornings when he wakes up before me, he will creep to the kitchen and i will wake up to the smell of breakfast. my stomach will rumble. he never fails to brew coffee and carry it to me in one hand while balancing the food on his other for us to share because he knows that i think it is awkward when i eat alone and he watches me.
he always sets the coffee down beside me, and then slips back into the bed beside me and waits patiently until I've collected myself and figured out a way to sit up, normally with our limbs intertwined because I can't stand for him to be away for too long.
plus his skin is a blessing against mine.
then we munch on burnt toast with jams of all kinds, and sometimes we have meat, but mostly we just push around crumbs and drink from the same coffee mug until i abandon both of them in favor of connecting my lips with his and kissing him again and again and again. honestly, i'm tempted to kiss him forever, but i know that is impossible because my lungs cry for air.
so instead, i just throw my leg over him and straddle him as i press sweet kisses to his neck, then work my way up to his ear. into his ear, i whisper all the things everyone else is too scared to utter. with him, i feel fearless and something wild and mad pulses through my veins as he whines my name with just the faintest hint of desire and need.
9)
he deserves to sleep
after full moons, he is weary and hurt. his whole body aches. i don't touch him, and sometimes i sleep on the floor because i can't stand being too far away, but i don't want to hurt him in the slightest. he isn't fragile, but there doesn't need to be any more strain on him.
i give him the bed and watch as his shoulders ripple with pain and as he whines, groans, curses, and sometimes he screams. those are the worst nights, when he starts screaming or his skin tears open again and the blood stains the sheets.
then i have to go get new ones before he notices that he's ruined another set of sheets. nevertheless, he always notices and i just pretend like he doesn't, but it doesn't make the look on his face any better because he is ashamed on himself and his weakness. he is ashamed of this fucking curse on him. i see how he just wants to disappear and when he tells me to put him on the couch next time, i easily forget.
10)
to watch him wake up
his eyelids always flutter rapidly, sending shivers down my spine. and then he stretches languidly and his eyes open to watch me with this interest that no one should have before noon, but he eagerly consumes me with his eyes and makes me feel suddenly so awake and alert.
"good morning"
"i love you" he replies.
and when i get to hear him say that every morning, i can't help but to wish to wake up beside him for the rest of my life.
11)
it still feels like youth
we sleep and trick ourselves that it is summer '78 and we are young and invincible. nothing can touch us.
even when i stop waking up first, he still feels like a kid when the first morning sound he hears is my shallow breathing: steady and reassuring after years and months of loneliness, now everything is how it should've always been.
sometimes i wake up first though, and then i get to trace over his scars (he's got so many more nowadays) and i get to feel just how old he is getting, but i can still hear his heartbeat and when the daze lasts, sometimes i'll be brave enough to kiss him again and he responds as though i've never abandoned him.
but i don't kiss him much because i did abandon him and i proved to be a failure.
12)
because he's got someone else to wake up next to
and i should be hurt and mad. i shouldn't hold the knowledge that he is laying beside another sweet-smelling body which subtle curves and wild hair. i shouldn't be able to think about how he touches her just like he used to touch me.
because then it does start to hurt even when everything should've stopped hurting. but then again, after failing him, i just came back to do it all over again. that's all i will ever be to him is a failure, even though i tried to be a friend and a lover. i can feel the first thought in his mind when he wakes up beside her is
'this isn't him'
which has me thinking that i have completely lost everything because i've lost him for the first time. without even given a choice, i was uprooted from his life and now he lays with someone who fits with him quite better although not as though they were made to fit together, but as though they were puzzle pieces that were closely related and trick the person putting the puzzle together to believe that they might be on the right path until they realise that no matter what, those two pieces just aren't meant to be together at the end.
it's a shame that they were and we weren't, because at the end, it was always him i wanted, loved, needed.