Ok so last chapter, this chapter and the next were all supposed to be one, but it would've been ridiculously long! I was originally only going to split it into 2 chapters but I like the end of this one, I think it just signalled the end of the chapter to me, so the next one is going to be pretty short...
By the way I'm not one for writing trigger warnings on each chapter. I don't think this fiction is triggering so I'm not going to write that on every chapter. You should all realise the tone of this by now. Also I read an authors note about ratings which seem a lot stricter in US than here. I'm kind of going for just after the watershed rating by UK standards, but apparently you don't have that in the US..? I'm very confused. oh well.
Chloe opened her eyes, blinked a few times then looked over to her left. She smiled at the sight of Hannah still sleeping peacefully. She looked around for a clock but couldn't find one. She guessed it was about 7 as the sun was fully risen but she could hear little movement around the house. She didn't dare move, scared of waking the 21 year old. Chloe was glad that she was getting some undisturbed sleep, the thought of which made her yawn. She closed her eyes again and fell into a lighter sleep than she had a few hours ago.
Hannah slowly stretched out her aching limbs. She pushed her feet down further into the covers and tried to stretch her arms out sideways but found she was unable to. She turned her head to the left and opened her eyes and was surprised to come face to face with a wall. That explained why she couldn't stretch out that way. She turned her head to the right and saw a mass of red hair. Oh no, she thought. What happened...? She saw the person next to her begin to move and quickly shut her eyes again, hoping to pretend to still be asleep. But as she thought back to last night and tried to work out why Chloe was sleeping next to her, a few memories began to resurface. She remembered Chloe trying to calm her down. She must've had another bad dream. Her breathing began to quicken again causing Chloe to sit up immediately and return to the comforting mode she had spent the previous night in.
'Hannah, it's ok. just breathe.' Hannah opened her eyes. She looked into Chloes bright blue eyes, unsure of what to do. She was so embarrassed that her emotions were so obvious.
'Hey, you're ok. It's just me.' Hannah sat up and pushed herself into the corner of the bed. Her breathing was still getting worse but she managed to speak a few words.
'Why are you here?'
Chloe looked at the dark blonde hair obscuring Hannahs face and gently moved it aside, before moving to sit infront of her.
'I want to help you. You were scared and well, you scared us a bit too. I didn't want you to be alone incase you got scared again.'
Hannah nodded. She felt bad for scaring Chloe and the fact that she must've had a bad nights sleep because of her. Then she realised that Chloe had said 'us'. She vaguely remembered Carrie being there too. She felt even worse.
'I'm sorry.' Hannah whispered. Her default saying.
'Don't be silly, you have nothing to be sorry about. You couldn't help it.' Chloe tried to keep the reassuring smile on her face but inside she was worried about Hannah. She wasn't letting anyone in, signs she recognised from Beca. It had taken her so long to get her to open up, but she could tell that she had needed help. Exactly like the girl infront of her. She noticed that Hannahs breathing was slowing down now, but she was avoiding looking anywhere near Chloe. Her legs were drawn up around her and it was like she was completely cut off from the world.
'Do you want something to drink? I need my morning caffeine!' Chloe decided that getting out of the room to give Hannah some time to think alone might help her to relax. She defiantly was not going to attempt to get her to open up in the state she was in. Previous experience told her that was not a good idea. She went to stand up and looked to Hannah for an answer.
'Can I have tea please?' Hannah was glad that Chloe was leaving. She could spend the time working out a way to convince her that what had happened wasn't a problem.
'Sure thing.' Chloe made her way downstairs and after putting the kettle on, grabbed 2 mugs out of the cupboard. She took a spoon out of the drawer and chucked some coffee into one of the mugs and a teabag into the other. As soon as the kettle boiled she poured the water over the teabag, then some into her own mug of coffee. She was glad that Carrie wasn't up yet after how confused and out of her depth she was last night. Chloe wanted to give Hannah a chance to think but also wanted to be out of the kitchen before Carrie woke up. She looked at the mug of tea infront of her and decided that she couldn't chance waiting any longer and removed the teabag. In the short time she had lived with the British girls she had quickly learnt how to make a good cup of tea, something of a staple of living in the UK. She poured a little milk into each mug and gave them both another quick stir. Carefully she picked up each mug and climbed the stairs back to Hannahs room.
As she was just about to go back into the room she heard movement behind her. She smiled in relief as she saw Beca. Beca just smiled back in reply. The unspoken words between them were understood. Beca was there for Chloe, as was Chloe for Beca. Chloe took a deep breathe and walked into Hannahs room, pushing the door closed behind her with her hip.
Hannah was sat in her dressing gown in her bed. She looked up when Carrie walked in and attempted a smile as she handed her the tea. Chloe saw straight through it but decided not to mention it. Chloe sat down next to Hannah and frowned when Hannah subtly shifted to move a little away from her.
Both girls wanted to speak first but neither knew how to begin. They sipped their drinks in unison before Chloe gained some bravery.
'Do you remember what happened?' She looked sideways at the girl next to her.
'No.' Hannah lied. Chloe once again saw through this, but before she could speak Hannah continued. 'I'm sorry if I woke you. I'm fine. I just seem to have dreams when I'm tired.'
'What was your dream about?' Chloe decided that if she could keep Hannah talking then maybe she would open up more. She knew that Hannah would try and make out that everything was fine but she also knew that pushing her to speak would cause her to shut down. Even if she was lying, she was still speaking.
'Oh, I don't remember.'
'What do you normally dream about?'
'Just the standard, you know... ' She trailed off to think of a cliché common dream. 'Falling i 'spose. You know the one where you always wake up before you reach the ground.'
'Hmm,' Chloe nodded her head. She'd never had that dream and she doubted very much whether Hannah had too. 'Do you get bad dreams?'
Hannah stayed quiet for a little bit. Chloe glanced sideways at her again. 'Sometimes.'
'What happens in them?'
Hannahs answer was quick this time. 'I don't know, I don't remember when I wake up.'
Chloe put her half drunk coffee down on the bedside table. She twisted so one leg was underneath her and she was facing Hannah. She gently placed her hand on her arm.
'When did they start?'
Hannah looked at Chloe with a mixture of confusion and fear on her face. 'When I was a child. Doesn't every child have nightmares?'
'When did they start again though? How long have you been having these bad dreams?'
Hannah gripped the mug hard. She knew that Chloe was reading her like an open book and it scared her. Her answers which she had prepared in response were running out and Chloe was wording the questions to stop her hiding things. 'I dunno, a while. '
'Weeks?' There was no response. 'Months?' Chloe could feel Hannahs arm tense even though she didn't reply. 'Ok.' Chloe let Hannah know that she knew. 'You can ask for help you know. You don't have to do this alone.'
Suddenly Hannah stood up. She couldn't take this anymore. She was tired, scared and just wanted to curl up and sleep.
'I'm fine. There's nothing wrong. I had a bad dream, I'm sorry you were stood with your ear against my door to hear me.' She didn't get angry easily and she knew that afterwards she'd feel bad for raising her voice at Chloe, but right now she didn't care. She looked at Chloe expecting her to be shocked, upset or equally angry but instead she was remaining calm. This didn't make Hannah feel any better. 'I don't need any help. Everyone gets bad dreams sometimes.' She turned away from Chloe and walked towards her laptop on her desk.
Chloe watched her and thought long and hard about what she was going to say next.
'You were screaming.' Hannah shot her head around to face Chloe. Her face showed her shock. She knew that she was screaming in her dream but she didn't think it would convert into reality. She didn't know what to say. She turned back to her computer.
Chloe walked up to her and crouched down beside her.
'I know I've been saying that you're ok all morning but you're not are you.' She said it as a statement rather than a question. ''You're safe, you have people who care about you but you need to let someone help you.' It was the same speech she had given Beca. 'Let us help you.'
'I can't.' Hannah's mind was working so quickly. She was trying to work out what to do. She couldn't drag other people down with her. She had got this far without doing so. But at the back of her mind she knew that things had got worse over the summer. There were constant thoughts that plagued her and even though her nightmares were frequent she didn't think that anybody else would learn about them.
'What are you scared of?' Chloes eyes looked into the dark blue eyes of Hannah. She looked back and this time answered truthfully.
'I don't know.' Chloe gathered her into her arms as for the first time since she had met Hannah she broke down with tears escaping her eyes.
For the first time since she had woken up that morning Hannah felt , she was crying but her mind wasn't racing anymore. She wasn't trying to think of answers for every scenario, thinking of ways to make everything go away. She had just admitted that no, she wasn't ok, but that was ok.
