AN: 3 Naomily, so much that I'm writing again for the first time in quite a while. Hope you enjoy, I know its short but hopefully have more very soon.

Know Better, Learn Faster

She didn't think that silence could be so crushing. She'd always appreciated it, it had been almost invisible most of her childhood when her mum opened the door to cult and collective alike. But now, with so much silence, such deafening silence, she cursed it.

Emily hadn't said a word to her all day. She would get the occasional nod of shake of the head but no eye contact, no real acknowledgement, no comfort at all.

She'd had this gnawing feeling in the pit of her stomach since the affair. Even when she was with that other girl, the Naomi she wants to be, really is deep down, was weeping. She knew what she had just done to her relationship, her Ems. Since that open day, the gnawing was her constant companion. And it had been growing steadily bigger and stronger until now when she is so sure its going to swallow her up.

It would get worse as the night went on, as her hope for the day disappeared. In the morning, she'd wake up and think 'maybe today'. Maybe today she'd get some words, a conversation, maybe even a small hand in her own. But maybe had consistently failed her and when Emily went to bed, firmly on her own side and simply turned out her light and went to sleep her hope went dark.

Naomi couldn't climb into that bed. She wanted so badly to feel Emily's warmth, her back brushing an arm or a fellow back, a foot entangled in her own. But that distance between them on the very bed they struggled so hard to leave each morning until the unveiling of her betrayal, that distance threatened to kill her.

It felt like her ribs were collapsing down around her heart. During the day she could hold back that lump in her throat most of the time but at night, in that silence, looking at the red hair of the girl she loved, that she betrayed and thinking of the girl she misled and used, she couldn't hold them back. She had never cried so hard in her life. It hurt, hurt like she deserved. They were like tidal waves, so forceful, so suffocating she couldn't even have made noise if she had tried.

Most nights that was her routine, she'd sit on the sofa adjacent to the bed, watch Emily's sleeping form and she would cry and think and get caught in that cycle until the dawn light began to filter in and she would swallow back the pain and fear that consumed her in the darkness and pray to whatever Deity she could think of that today would be the day.

By the time Emily awoke she was showered and making their breakfast.