At The Door | Hear
Despite not having been to the family's countryside mansion in the last couple of years, Sansa Stark has somehow managed to make herself right at home.
Once the taxi driver had dropped her off, and even quite happily taken her things into the main hallway for an extra tip, she'd settled in.
Her heavy bags still remained unpacked in the grand entrance, blocking the door to the cellars. She wouldn't be needing to go down there just yet, only if she ran out of wine or blew a fuse or something that seemed unlikely to happen.
She'd bought a dozen bottles of her favourite cheap wine before setting off on her trip, and they were safely spread out in her bags. Though her father's taste in liquor was quite rich, and if a feeling of solitude overtook her than she may need something stronger, older.
She would only be here for a couple of weeks, just enough time to clear her head, set some clear-cut, fresh goals to strive for, and forget cheating ex-fiancés. Joffrey wasn't worth her time. No.
Instead of spending her holidays with his entitled family and having to feign laughs at his uncle's drunken quips, as she had done for the past several years, she would be taking long baths and reading chapter upon chapter of those novels she collected over that time.
The idea of spending Christmas with her own family had not appealed much to her, either. They always spent the holidays in the mansion, but for the last few years, it became too far for her elderly grandparents to travel out to, so her parents had decided to pass the festivities down at theirs instead. It was a good three hour drive from here to home, but Sansa needed the space and quiet.
She was finally where she wanted to be in life, with a healthy career as a researcher, with a nice fiancé who spoilt her, with an apartment of her own.
But, while her job was great and she had everything she thought she had ever wanted, reality hit her hard when she'd thought it a good idea to surprise Joffrey on his birthday two weeks ago.
She'd gone around to his house with the spare key he'd afforded her, gotten dressed up and planned out a fancy surprise dinner. She'd even taken cookery classes for it, fool that she was.
Only when the key had turned in the lock and she'd almost shouted out a seductive Happy Birthday!, her fiancé had stumbled through the front door with a blonde hanging from his arm and his pants undone, unzipped with the blonde's hand shoved through the opening.
Instead of apologising, he had only tried to brush off the situation, feign nonchalance and pretend she was a friend who got too hammered over drinks earlier at work. But Sansa wasn't a fool, and there was lipstick on his collar, and she was done.
Before leaving, she'd picked up one of the candles lit on the dining table and dropped it on the floor, watching as the corner of his expensive rug went up in flames. She'd stalked out with pride, head held high, but arriving home was a different matter.
She'd been speeding, tipsy on cheap booze from a nearby liquor store, almost crashed into a car with a baby-on-board sticker adorning its rear window. Her license had been revoked, she'd spent the night in a grungy cell, and her brother Robb had been less than amused when she called him to pick her up the next day.
So, here she was. On a break from work, twenty-three and single, with no license and a mansion all to herself, with all the booze she could manage.
"Alright." She licks her lips, pulling on the hair tie from her wrist and tying her long red hair into a loose ponytail.
The house was dark, only lit by the cracks of sunlight reflecting from the sea outside through the curtained windows. It wasn't far off the coast, so she could get a clear view of the beautiful seaside from one side of the villa. The other side of the house was mostly just the grounds, all forest and all green.
She spends a good amount of time wafting the old curtains in the air, brushing off the accumulated dust and watched it float through the foggy air. She'd opened virtually every window in the house to try and air it out, try and rid the house of that musty, rotting smell.
Her old room, the one she used to share with her sister Arya on the third floor, was locked, as were all the other kids' bedrooms. She figured her parents had locked up most of the house the last time they had been here.
Unwilling to go find the keys, she told herself she would do it another day, when she was cosy and high on energy, and instead struggled to drag her luggage bags full of clothes up to her parents' room on the second floor. The other bags, the booze and food and book filled ones, could wait.
Once she's finished hanging her clothes up in her mother's wardrobe, shoving the older woman's dresses to the side, she pulled open the first drawer on the chest beside the wardrobe.
Picking up a pile of underwear from her bag, she drops them in the wooden drawer, her fingertips tracing the edge of a piece of paper lay flat against the dark oak. Sand coloured and tearing at the corner, she picks it up and admires the envelop. Was her mother supposed to send this to someone years ago?
There was no address, no sender, even. But it was sealed shut by someone's lick, and Sansa frowns at the realisation that it mustn't be her mother's, seen as she always refused to lick her envelops and instead sealed them with sellotape.
Setting the letter on top of the dresser, determined to read it when she gets a chance, she finishes unpacking her stuff, shoving a couple dozen thick pairs of wooly socks into the bottom drawer.
She pulls on a cardigan, grey and falling apart at the seams. It needs throwing out, but it's her favourite and she can't bare to part with it. Then she goes back downstairs, tossing the empty luggage bags near the main door.
Feeling an ache begin to tug at her stomach, she goes to lift the bags of food into the kitchen, freshly cleaned with bleach and smelling like flowers. But it's heavier than she expected, so she drags it across to the room instead, through the hallway and the large living space.
She can't help but huff at the pull on her arms, and she has to keep blowing on her falling hair to keep it from blocking her eyes. Her back stiffens when she feels a cold shiver shoot up her spine then, as though a running of ice cold fingertips up her back. Her breath catches and she drops the handles of her bag, letting it drop on her feet. "Ow! Damn it!"
Glancing around, she brushes off the feeling as a sign that she should probably close the windows now that the air was cooler. It was still winter, and she wasn't in the mood to be catching a cold.
Hurriedly dragging the bag into the kitchen, she stops by the fridge and unzips it, emptying its contents into the fridge and cupboards. She probably hasn't brought enough for a couple weeks, but she will just call a taxi to take her to the shop if she has to. Vegetables and crisps and water and booze will have to suffice for now.
She plops the empty bag down with the others after that, and goes off to shut almost all the opened windows, safe for the one in her bedroom and the one in the study. She swaps out the bedding on her parents' king size for a fresh black and white floral set, scrunching up the old sheets and duvet and pillow cases and throwing them aside into the corner of the room to be washed another time.
After a few hours, when darkness falls, she is settled in the comfy chair by the fireplace with a book in her lap. This kind of peace is one of her favourite feelings in the world. The blanket covering her legs somehow still faintly smells of her nana and she basks in the musky scent, reminding her of her childhood. The novel she'd been reading is dropped onto the floor when she begins to fall asleep, head pressed against her shoulder, feet slipping off the edge of the seat.
She wakes herself up when she hears a clank and, glancing down at the floor, she checks to make sure her now cold cup of tea hasn't tipped over.
"Oh." It hasn't spilt, and she looks around the floor to see if anything else has dropped from her body. There is nothing besides the book and mug on the floor. Standing up, she stretches her arms out, brushing the noise off as the wind outside batting tree branches against the window. She'll remember to close hem tomorrow. Placing her book and cup on the table, she drags the blanket against the cold floor as she makes her way up the stairs to bed. Cleaning and settling in has knackered her out.
Once she's in her room, she sends a quick reply to a text from Arya, seeing how she's getting along in her 'recuperation', as she calls out. She smiles, signs the text with a the kiss-blowing emoji, and places her phone down on the bedside table.
Shrugging off her cardigan, she tosses it down at the end of the bed and slips beneath the fresh covers. It's snuggly, wonderfully warm and she quickly drifts off to sleep, too tired to wash up or brush her teeth.
Sansa awakens around six o'clock that morning, oddly strange considering how tired she had been the night before. But it isn't an active brain that wakes her, rather her sense. Through the thickness of her duvet and blanket, she swears she can hear the handle to her bedroom being turned, the rusty metal clicking as it opens.
Her eyes flicker open just then, and she quickly sits up in bed, covers pulled up to her chin.
The door is still, closed, and the handle isn't moving.
Blood rushes to her face at the realisation of what she imagined. Nobody was breaking in. She was fine.
But the illusion has her on edge, and she can't fall back to sleep after that. Her eyes refuse to stay shut and her brain won't shut up.
So she gets up and starts her day around eight, after she'd showered and eaten her oatmeal breakfast. She takes a flask of coffee with her outside. She's gonna fix up the garden today. That'll calm her soul.
She plants some flowers with seeds found in her grandpa's old shed. She cuts weeds that have been growing for years on end. She trims down the roses bushes but keeps them large and flourishing.
She doesn't stop for dinner until it's around nine o'clock at night. She makes herself a vegetarian platter, a mixture of chopped up veggies. It's healthy. Healthy is good for a cleansed soul. She needs it.
Unhealthily, she eats her food in front of the television, a bottle and a half of red wine empty by the time she feels about ready to pass out.
Her life is a mess, try as she might to deny it. She'll accept this fact, one day.
When she makes her way out of the living room, shutting off the shitty reality series marathon still playing on the tv, she glances at the clock on the wall. Four. Great. What a schedule she is living by.
Sansa heads into the hall, stopping beside her unpacked bags. She digs through them to find her migraine pills. The wine is having a lousy side effect on her fatigue. She feels restless but not tired.
It's dark outside, but through the hallway light reflecting on the window, she can scarily spot the shape of a man down at the bottom of her garden, his hands swinging about. Daringly, she passes through the door, stepping into the breezy night. Forgetting her shoes, she takes a couple steps forward until she can get a clear view of the man. Probably not a wise decision.
Running barefoot down past the rose bushes, distant sounds of whispering could be heard at the bottom of the garden. She couldn't make out any people, however, only noises and the crunching of leaves beneath feet. She runs back into the house, letting the outside door flap behind her and swing into the night. Damn the wine.
Back in the entrance hallway, she shivers beneath her cardigan, shames herself for only wearing a thin nightie beneath it. Her nipples ache from the chilly air and she shivers away the goosebumps creeping up her skin as she flicks off the light switch.
On her way to the staircase, she stops outside the kitchen. Her heart seems to come to a halt at the sound, blood refusing to pump through her veins.
Making out a small murmur, either a melodious harmony of echoey voices or simply one through the glass panels, she backs away from the sliding doors leading into the kitchen. What the fuck?
It was already strange that she could hear people lingering nearby outside, but that could be easily explained by the distant neighbours on a long walk around their premises. This however? This was wrong. And it wasn't the wine.
There was someone, or rather multiple people, in her kitchen. She could only faintly make out the shapes of bodies walking around the counter. But everything was dark, and the voices weren't speaking. They were humming, muttering, alternating between the two.
Sansa can't quite make out what the voices say, but the thought alone of somebody being within such close proximity to her, to the house even, when she was supposed to be here alone, was frightening, terrifying.
Hurrying up the stairs, she runs down the long corridor, chest heaving, panting, until she reaches her bedroom. Sliding across the floor in her socks, she almost whacks her head against the doorframe, but her hands reach out to steady herself and she pulls herself upright.
Slamming the door shut behind her, she turns the key in the lock twice over, double locking it to make sure it stays closed. Slides the latch over the wooden door, too, thankful that her parents' were so desperate for privacy once upon a time that they thought of these measures.
Running across the room, she forces herself into the corner where the old bed sheets lie, sitting with her shoulder-blades pressed up against the adjoining walls. She feels stiff, almost unable to move. What the hell was all that racket? And why the hell was it so loud?
She likes to think herself a strong woman, brave, capable of defending herself. But there is only a certain extent she is willing to reach before danger becomes evident.
And strange murmurs and the odd clanging of metals tools in the kitchen is setting off her deepest nightmares. What if somebody has broken in and wishes to harm her? Worse, what if it was multiple somebodies?
Or perhaps they didn't even know she was here and instead only set out on robbing the place? It was a mansion, her family had money, it would obviously be a robber's paradise.
But what if during their raid they stumbled across the pretty, alone, drunk, scared redhead in the corner? There wasn't even anything in here she could use as a weapon, she thinks. A candlestick, maybe. Or the heel of a shoe? But no knives or guns or, hell, even, pepper spray to throw them off for a second or two.
Glad she had thought to grab her phone from the kitchen earlier, she makes quick work of dialing her father's number. Ned Stark may be a retired but he was almost quick on the ball back when he was working.
She had twenty percent battery left and no charger, so she slides down her brightness and keeps her volume to mute, as though that'll change much, before pulling the phone up to her ear.
Thank fuck there's service.
But service proves futile, and her dad doesn't pick up the damn phone. So she tries her mum instead. No answer. They're probably out, at one of those lush holiday parties they enjoy attending so much, where they spend all night getting drunk and talking shit with old friends. Goddamn them. She tries twice more.
Robb will surely pick up. He's always there for his siblings. It's that protective big brother complex he has, Sansa reasons.
She scrolls through her contacts to find him, hitting the call button before she can even make sure it's his new number. But it is, and the phone must ring for a good minute or so before she realises he isn't going to pick up. It's late on Christmas Eve, for fuck's sake. He's probably in bed early with Talisa and little Ned.
Early? It's half four in the morning, she reminds herself with a shaky breath. Who in their right mind would she know who would still be awake?
Oh, yes, her social media, news, world politics addicted sister. Arya was a freelance journalist, meaning she always needed to be ready for action.
"You're always on your bloody phone, Arya. Come on. Pick up."
She hears herself mumbling, voice low, biting her thumbnail as she waits for her sister's voice to sound on the other end, keeping her eyes peeled on the door, watching it. It doesn't even ring.
Attempting a last resort, she calls Bran, her younger brother but not the youngest. Rickon was the youngest, but he was off in Europe on some course so it would be utterly ridiculous to call him for help. Besides, he was fifteen, what could he possibly do? But, while Bran was wheelchair bound and unable to drive, he could maybe get his girlfriend Meera to do it, or at the very least he could get through to Robb… or someone.
Bran doesn't answer, and she is left alone in a room lit only by a nightstand lamp because she refuses to get up and go towards the main light switch.
She has twelve percent left, and almost nobody to call. Her friends were probably all pissed, and wouldn't even acknowledge what she was telling them? "Sansa, you're drunk, shut up,", they'd say, "You should be here." Margaery would surely brush it off as the wind.
Practically everyone she knows lives at least a couple hours or so away anyhow, so by the time they got here she could already be lying in a pool of her own blood.
Tugging on the sleeves of her cardigan and wrapping her arms tighter around her stomach, she pulls her knees up to rest beneath her chin before making one final call.
No matter how much she once despised him, Jon Snow remains her last option.
Robb's best friend of ten years, Jon only lives twenty five minutes away. He'd moved further up North when he'd come home from the military three years ago. He'd been roommates with Loras back then, Margaery's brother.
And, thanks to their unknowing relative friends, they had somehow been paired up on the worst blind date of Sansa's entire life. Brooding, mysteriously dark and handsome men were not her type, but somehow Margeary had ignored this detail when she'd set them up.
Unaware that Sansa had known him since she was a teenager, the young woman had been amused to find out they already knew each other and apparently didn't hit it off romantically. She'd laughed over how the pair had spent the time getting drunk, making small talk about Robb, and then going home separately.
There had been little to no attraction there, only mountains of awkwardness and an agreement to never speak of said 'date' ever again.
He wasn't her type, but he was in her contacts because Robb told her to have him there for safe keeping. Maybe he had been right in doing so. Jon was a soldier, after all.
And she'd heard from Arya that he'd been dealing with PTSD for some time now so there was a good chance that he was still awake. Insomnia was a side effect, wasn't it? Or no? She thinks herself quite selfish for even using his mental illness as her escape goat, but if he's awake and within relatively close distance to her, what would be the harm?
She glances out the bedroom window as she calls his number, on her knees and shoving the edge of the curtains to the side to see if there was anything going on outside. She could get a clear view of the front of the mansion, but there was nobody and nothing there, not even the stray cat that used to bring dead mice to their front door.
"Hello?"
"Oh, thank fuck!" Sansa exhales a breath she didn't realise she has been holding, her chest suddenly lightened. "Jon?"
"Sansa?" His voice is calm, but not at all sleepy or sleep-deprived. He takes a moment before speaking again, and she hears the noise of his laptop shutting off in the background. "What's up?"
"I'm… Are you- Are you at home?"
"Uh, yeah." He sounds confused, if not baffled. "Why?"
Sansa flicks her gaze back over to the door. "Do you remember my grandpa Rick's old place? The one by the sea?" She whispers, biting her tongue as she finishes, waiting for his reply. He only mumbles a 'Yes', and she proceeds, "Can you come here?"
"Sansa, what are you doing?" He sounds somewhat annoyed now, though he remains calm but she can picture his brows knitting on that solemn face of his. Jon breathes out a sigh, "Look, I know you're lonely and all… Robb told me. But-"
"Jon. No." She grits her teeth, "I'm not lonely. I am alone. Alone and freaked the fuck out because I am in this huge house, in the middle of the night, and there are people downstairs. And outside." The redhead takes a deep breath, keeps her eyes focused on the door, refuses to blink. "At least I hope they're still downstairs."
"Wait, what? Sansa, that isn't funny. Have you been drinking?"
"I'm not joking, Jon." She pulls the phone away from her ear and taps on the FaceTime button, waiting for him to answer. Eight percent. Wonderful.
His face pops up on the screen before she can figure out how to store her battery, and she takes in the confusion on his face as he runs a hand through his dark hair.
"Jon." She whispers through her teeth, ice blue eyes wide and lips dry, "You are my last option. How far away do you live?"
"I don't know, like half an hour or something?" His eyes seem to darken, and notices him taking in her surroundings. "You aren't kidding, are you?"
"No." Her voice falters, and for some reason she feels tears welling up in her eyes. What if it was all fake, a trick the wine had played on her? She doesn't want to fall into paranoia, but nor does she plan on dying tonight. "Can you-"
"Yeah. Yeah, I'm coming."
Sansa nods, a couple times with her eyes downcast, before she glances back up at the screen. Five percent. She can only see the ceiling of his apartment on the screen, but she can hear him rummaging around his room, obviously getting dressed. "Jon?" She gulps.
"Yeah?" He voices rapidly, and then she sees him again, all messy-haired and clothed in a leather jacket.
"My battery's gonna die." She swallows, shifts her eyes to the door again, "I have to hang up now."
He nods, picks his phone up and she can hear his keys rattling in his hand. "Stay there, okay? Don't move."
"Okay."
"Right. Stay alive, Stark. You're gonna be the one paying for my speeding tickets." He jokes, walking through his door and slamming it shut behind him.
Sansa can only force the smallest of smiles in reply, her nose sniffling from tears she refused to spill. "Thank you."
He hangs up after that, and she clutches the phone tight in her hand then, against her chest, the dying battery her only life boat.
Time moves slower than she would have liked from then on. She counts the seconds as they pass by, hearing them tick away on wall clock above the dresser. Seconds turn to minutes, and minutes pass to moments. And her phone eventually dies, when it's been twenty two minutes of pause, of silence, of her checking the battery life. It's ironic, almost.
She can see the early morning sunshine begin to rise outside. A fresh five o'clock start to the day, she would usually say. But she has not slept, and she is not calm, and she only wants to curl up and cry at this point.
The optimistic her would assume that since the sun was up, whoever was downstairs had come and gone. No intruder would want to be seen in broad daylight at the scene of the crime.
The only problem with this notion is that there are no houses around for miles, only woods and small wildlife. Nobody would see an intruder. Nobody would know.
Her ears suddenly perk up when she hears gravel shifting beneath the window at her side. A car. She gets on her knees again, dragging the edge of the curtain to the side to check.
Breathing a heavy sigh of relief, she leans back against the bedroom wall, finally dropping her phone, feeling her hand burn from clutching it tight for so long.
It takes a good while before Jon even enters the house.
It's about thirty minutes after he arrives that she hears him, banging loudly against the front door downstairs, forcing it open. He shouts her name once, twice after a moment, "You can come out!"
Slowly, she makes her way across the room, tentatively sliding the bar of the door open and turning the key twice to unlock it. She grabs the doorknob and pulls it open swiftly, deciding to force herself into action until she is beside him.
Walking fast down the corridor, she keeps a hand against the wall, shifting it to the railing when she reaches the top of the stairs, but her eyes keep shooting glancing behind her.
"I had a quick run around the house." Jon tells her, at the bottom of the stairs, hands in his coat pockets. His hair is pulled back into one of those buns he pulls off so well, and she feels herself nodding along with his words. "Nothing." He lifts a brow when she rushes over and throws her arms around him, in a hug that doesn't feel familiar.
"I swear, there was-" Sansa pauses, moving away awkwardly, brushing her hair behind her ears and pulling on her cardigan to cover her bare legs. "There was talking, and… and moaning. And they kept banging stuff. It was cutlery or something, I don't know." She feels shivers run down her arms and up her legs. She places one leg in front of the other when she reaches the floor, looking over at Jon. "I'm not crazy."
"I didn't say you were." He shrugs, licks his lips. "But you know, maybe you're just a little tired. Robb said you haven't been yourself-"
"I don't care what the fuck Robb said, I'm not crazy." Her eyes widen to get her point across and he takes a step back. "Yes, I almost set my fiancé's apartment on fire. Yes, I was briefly arrested because I like cheap shit wine and shouldn't take the wheel when I'm pissed. I'm not crazy. I'm not unhinged. I'm not drunk, not anymore. There was somebody here and I know it."
"Okay. Alright." He holds his hands up before moving to slip his jacket from his shoulders. He folds it over the old banister, rolls up his sleeves. "You wanna leave? I can help you pack."
"No. I-" She hadn't considered leaving. She hadn't considered much of anything, if she was being entirely honest. "I want this shit to stop happening."
"What do you mean 'stop'? Has it happened before?"
Sansa peers over at him through long lashes, "The other night, I- I couldn't sleep. Well, I woke up because I thought someone was at my bedroom door. It was stupid, really. I brushed it off, thought I dreamt it."
"Sansa."
"Obviously, I didn't." She mutters, "That means they came back. If they were here before, and didn't get- They knew I was here. They know I'm here."
"Sansa. You need to leave."
"And let some weirdo steal from my family? No."
Jon sighs, closes his eyes. "If they even want to steal stuff. You don't know what they want." He tries to reason.
The possibilities are endless, she gathers. And he doesn't want to bring them up, the obvious ones, but she knows that they are.
"You mean me? You mean what if they don't want to steal from me, they want to rape me instead?" She holds his gaze when his eyes flick upon, and she takes a step toward him. "I would like to see them try."
"You can't stay here alone."
"You can't leave me here alone, you mean." She corrects him with a determined stare, "I would like to see someone try and harm me when you're around."
Jon rolls his eyes, moving away from her, "I'm not your knight in shining armour, Sansa. We agreed on that."
He heads into the kitchen, sliding open the doors. The room was clean, tidy, no cutlery or tools in sight. He shoots her knowing glance.
"I'm not crazy." She repeats, and he is becoming and more convinced that she actually is crazy. "You might not be my knight but you're the closest thing I've got to family right now because nobody else seems to be answering their phones. You're my last resort, Jon. Not my prince."
"But you expect me to keep you safe?"
"Yes."
"Well, then, you know what? You should leave. That's the safest option." He informs her, pulling open the fridge door. "Jesus, do you eat anything other than carrots?" He pulls out a bottle of water.
"No." Sansa sarcastically retorts, forcing the fridge door shut, almost trapping his fingers in it. Jon gives her a strange look when she gets in front of him. "I eat carrots, sometimes meat. Hell, I may even carve up an intruder or two when we catch them."
"We? Oh, no. I'm not staying here. First of all," He holds up a finger, takes a swig of water, "I didn't bring any shit with me. Second, and most importantly, I'm not helping them build up a murder tally."
She presses her palms against the wooden countertop, breathing in deeply. "Jon… I need you." She tries, "Help me."
"Help you trap some potential murders? It's not a game, Sansa. This isn't Mouse Trap. There's no cage that's gonna slide down and catch the bad guys. If there were people here who wanted to harm you, you don't hang around and wait for them to come back. You get the fuck out and stay far away."
"You keep saying 'if'. As if you don't believe me."
"Well, you do have a flair for the dramatic. You always have."
They have done this for years. Managed to get along for a short while before it all turns to shit and the petty arguments begin. It always happened, no matter how many times Robb or Arya intervened.
"Did you just drive all the way out here to mock me? Because you sounded pretty concerned on the phone."
"Yeah, well, you looked pretty scared."
"I am scared, you idiot! I'm fucking terrified, and I called you because, despite the fact that I hate about 90% of your guts, I thought you were decent person who would help me."
"I am decent, Sansa. I was concerned. Did you think I came here for my benefit? I came for you," he tells her, sliding his bottle across the counter, "I came because you asked, and you looked terrified and I didn't want to find out that you had died here all alone."
She doesn't reply, only stares him down, an icy intensity to her gaze.
"I didn't realise however that you had a fucking death wish. But, hey, you know what, if you'd rather stay here and risk your life, then feel free. I'll tell Robb I tried."
"Fine."
"What?"
"Fine. I'll leave with you. I'll leave." Her shoulders drop and she shifts from one bare leg to the other, ignoring the way his eyes drop to her legs. "Help me pack."
"Thank you."
"Yeah." She bites her tongue, opens the fridge again and begins to pile out some of the food. "Can I nap though? For a little while?" She asks, suddenly quiet.
"Yeah." He nods. It's like six in the morning. Surely they can find time to nap and eat. "I'll make us something to eat after." He dares to reason, and she can only nod in reply before spinning on her heel and leaving the kitchen.
He almost collapses against the counter after that, his hands turning to fists around the edge of the sink in the island. "Fuck."
He runs a hand over his face, deciding to follow her lead and take a much-needed nap. A couple of hours will surely do just fine. They'll still have plenty of time to pack up the house and leave.
Based on a Tumblr gifset I made. I'm not sure I'm sticking to the whole supernatural aspect of the story I originally planed, but we'll see what happens as it develops. It's a three-shot. PS: It's AU so I don't wanna hear any 'What does this have to do with GoT?' Okay? Cool.