Pillow Talk
Disclaimer: I don't own a thing, this text was written for the purpose of entertainment only.
*A/N* This turned into a bit of a monster because I incorporated themes I hadn't planned along the way. I've got a bit of a problem with my portrayal of Merritt, but well...
This fits in with my other fic "In the End, I'll Always Catch You".
Please excuse my British spelling and word choice and enjoy!
"Hey Henley."
She looked up, more than surprised to see that man standing in the doorway.
"It's half past two, Danny," she stated lamely and waved at her alarm clock.
"I know. You weren't sleeping, I saw the light from under your door." He held up two steaming cups. "Here. I made tea. Tastes horrible, but… anyway."
"Is that because you can't even make a cup of tea or because Jack can't do the shopping?"
He shrugged, placed the cups on her bedside table and sat down at the other side of the bed, throwing her a grin. "Probably a little bit of both."
She nodded, suddenly very aware of the fact that she was looking nowhere near presentable with her tousled hair and no make-up. There was a tomato stain on her t-shirt.
The second thing she realised was that he was pretty damn rude to be walking in and dropping on her bed like it was his room, without the decency to knock or ask to be invited in.
But hey, it was Daniel, what else had she been expecting?
She sat up a little straighter and wrapped her old sweat jacket tightly around her. Strictly speaking, it wasn't even her jacket, it belonged to an ex-boyfriend of hers - not him, thank God. The shame would have killed her.
He was of course running around well-dressed like he always did, no matter what time it was. Dark trousers, white shirt, lately he'd added a rather expensive watch to the ensemble.
"Well then, Danny. Nervous?"
He snorted and took a sip of his tea. "Right, dream on. Why, are you?"
"Nah, I even miss it. I'm glad we're finally back in the game."
"Oh God, yes," he threw her one of his haughty smiles and made an exaggerated gesture, "I mean, not even you are impressed with my tricks anymore, I'm dying to get those admiring looks again."
She shook her head, trying to look appalled at his arrogance, but she didn't really manage. Probably because she knew most of that arrogance was not genuine.
Daniel was suffering from something she liked to call the opposite of performance anxiety. Somewhere deep down there, she could still see that little boy afraid of the whole world.
But then somehow, that guy she would have never looked twice at on the street became someone very different in the spotlight. Even on these tiny dusty stages where she had first seen him he had been gorgeous. His posture was different, that shy smile turned to a lofty, self-assured grin, his voice seemed louder and even his ridiculous haircut looked good on him as long as there were people who couldn't take their eyes off him and his cards.
Over the years, he had learned to maintain that effect in-between his shows. Every now and then, it slipped, though.
Most people called that "his true self showing", but she didn't believe that was the right way to put it. His arrogance wasn't strictly pretence, it was partly a character trait that was elsewise suffocated by his insecurity, and partly his very own protection from the world that had proven so cold and unwelcome when he was a kid.
She sipped at her tea and almost spat it out again. He'd been right. It was disgusting.
"Next time, stick to coffee, alright?"
He stared into his own cup and grinned. "Yeah, that's probably for the best."
"Really, though. Why are you here, why aren't you sleeping? Big day tomorrow, the way I know you you've got rest scheduled from ten to six."
Of course, he didn't miss her sarcastic tone, but just raised an eyebrow at it. "I couldn't sleep, that happens. There was nothing on TV, finished my book - it's good, by the way, you should give it a read. So, well, that's that."
Obviously that didn't explain what he was doing in her room, but she gave up.
She could hazard a guess at that. Being around Merritt always seemed to wind Danny up (she liked to believe that was because he was being possessive and Merritt shamelessly flirting at her) and Jack was pretty much insufferable before a show - they were all nervous, but their youngest was all sorts of whiny and jumpy and incredibly annoying.
Being around her, however, reminded him of old times, seemed to calm him down. She didn't mind one bit - if she was being perfectly honest, it was helping her, too.
She happily suffered from his questionable beverage-skills if that was what it took.
"We're gonna be good tomorrow."
"'Course we will," he answered. "We're the best. Can I count on my assistant?"
"I'm not your assistant!"
He threw her an affectionate look. "Yes, you are. But you're very good."
"Shut up!" Henley grabbed her pillow and whacked it on his head. Laughing, he raised his hands in mock self-defence, hastily crawling away from her. The bed seemed to be shorter than he'd expected, though, and he almost fell off. Waving his arms like crazy, he fought to regain his balance, then sat up straight, trying to scrape his dignity back together, and teased:
"You're far too easy to wind up."
She tried to fight it, but couldn't help laughing too.
"When it comes to pride, you're not really one to talk."
He shrugged, dropped back on the mattress and fell silent for a while.
.
"You recognised me in less than a second, after six years," he said suddenly.
"'Course I did. We used to work together, remember? Takes quite a bit of faith in someone to let them come at you with saws and knives."
"You make it sound like you were having no fun at all." There was a touch of actual hurt in his joking.
"I was having fun, when you weren't terrorising me with your lectures about something I'd already done a few hundred times."
"I wasn't terrorising-"
She turned her head to look at him. "Yeah, you were. You still are."
A embarrassed smile appeared on his lips for a moment. "I'm trying not to."
She knew that - he was clearly not lecturing her as much as the others, even though sometimes he looked like he was going to burst with it. "I appreciate the effort."
"Consider it my attempt at saying sorry."
Again, she turned to look at him, stunned. J. Daniel Atlas, apologising? Realising he'd hurt her in the first place, and then admitting it?
"Are you drunk?" she burst out without thinking.
"What?"
"You seem a little… off."
Now it was his turn to be staring at her, looking for something to explain her question. "I am completely sober. I mean, I couldn't get drunk in this house if I wanted to - Merritt downed it all more or less the second he bought it." He hesitated. "What'd you mean, off?"
"You never apologise."
"That's not true."
She sat up a little, looking down on him. "Of course it is! You were giving me a hard time before, during, and after the shows, and you never - not once - said sorry. Or thank you, for that matter."
"I-"
"Not to mention you got me drunk, you used me, and then you left," she added very quietly.
"I was drunk, too, I-"
"That's not an excuse for leaving."
"It wasn't me who left town just because of one drunken night I bet you barely even remember," he replied hotly.
Oh, now it was her fault, was it?
"I remember. Besides, what was I supposed to do? Come back to work and be all like hey Danny, shall I take the rabbit for you or is that too much intimacy for you to handle? Act like nothing happened?"
"Well, not blaming me for everything would be a start, it's not like you didn't have your part in it!"
"I was hurt, Danny, do you get that? Being your one-night-only entertainment program wasn't such a great feeling."
"Henley, you were never my entertainment program," he said pointedly, suddenly very quiet.
"Then why'd you leave?"
He closed his eyes and sighed. "I thought you'd hate me for it. I'd not meant for this to happen," she snorted, but he went on like he hadn't heard, "not… not like that, not that way. Not saying I'd never thought about… Anyway, I liked to believe we were friends, that was obviously ruined. I knew you'd be furious and the situation scared me and so I, well, ran for it."
She stared at him, surprised both about his honesty and about his reasons.
"You were always so… disgusted by, what's that you call them?"
"Groupies?" she suggested, waiting for him to comment like he usually did, but he just nodded.
"Right. I knew you'd tell me I made you one of them, which wasn't my intention, and-"
"You made me one of them because you left in the middle of the night and never got in touch again!"
He sat up, too, a pained smile on his lips. "Yeah well, once I'd realised that, it was a bit too late."
Suddenly, she had to laugh. Oh God, now it all made sense to her. She'd always thought he was just being territorial, but… "So, you were feeling guilty, but instead of apologising, you stalked me and left `anonymous' comments on my website?"
He didn't say anything, but even in the dark, she could see him blushing.
"Good method. Should get you any girl," she teased and he let her. Wow, that really had to be nagging on him.
"And the flowers? For my first big show, in Chicago?"
"You should have appreciated those, Henley, I barely had enough money to pay the rent."
She shook her head, leaning back into the pillow. "All that, just to shut up a guilty conscience?"
He shrugged. "What else was I supposed to do?"
"Call, tell me you were sorry?"
"What for? You would have hung up the second you'd recognised my voice."
"No, I would have yelled at you for an hour straight," she answered, grinning.
He laughed. "See, I had reason to be scared."
.
After a while she asked tentatively, staring at the ceiling to avoid his eyes: "Are you trying to say you actually cared?"
"About what?"
"About me, about what I think of you?"
"I've always cared, Henley."
She wanted to argue, tell him she'd never really had the impression he gave a damn, but for once, he sounded so honest, even slightly hurt she'd ask - she had to believe him.
What was wrong with her, falling for that guy again and again?
She fell silent, pondering on how they'd met and parted and met again and her lonely years in between.
He seemed to be deep in thought, too, or maybe too embarrassed about that heart-to-heart to say any more.
.
.
When the creaking of her bedroom door woke her, the display on her alarm clock read seven thirty.
"Here you are, Danny-boy! Fully dressed, thank God."
Merritt stood in the doorway, wearing a stained shirt and an unbearable smirk on his face.
"I was getting worried because you were neither in your room nor up and about trying to make us rehearse 24/7."
She stared at him in confusion, then suddenly realised what he was talking about: Atlas was still lying next to her (alarmingly close), still somewhere between waking and sleeping.
He sat up, blinking in the bright light, and answered slowly: "It's hard to get sleep in my room, your snoring could wake the dead."
"What's going on here?" Jack appeared behind Merritt and eyed the scene with a grin.
"Well, first of all, not what it looks like," Henley bit back slightly annoyed and got to her feet. "None of your business, actually, Jack. And now out, damn it, all of you!"
"Right," Daniel muttered. Apparently finding his way back to J. Daniel "Control freak" Atlas, he shoved the other men out of the room and ordered: "Find something clean to wear, Merritt, we've got a show to prepare for."
Then, he stopped, turned to look at her and said, throwing a sideward glance at the others: "You better get dressed. Don't take all day."
When they had finally disappeared in their respective rooms, looking for something Atlas would let them leave the house with, he added quietly:
"Hey, about what I told you last night-"
"I won't tell them," she replied equally quiet and smiled at him.
"Thank you," he muttered, returned her smile briefly and set off to his room, to fetch a deck of cards to play around with all day, no doubt. Henley grinned.
Some things never change.
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