Chirping of birds. People talking while they walk by. The cable car passing on the street below. Dimitri wakes up to those sounds. He feels terrible. Last night he had a nightmare. A very bad one.
It was usual, of course, that he has unpleasant dreams. He had them for years, reliving his bad experiences and traumas, as well as the frustrations and anxieties he is thrown on a daily basis due to his inability to cope with himself. What makes last night's dream rather unusual was the person he dreamt about.
He dreamt someone was taking Byleth from him and ghastly murdering her with a butane blowtorch as he could do nothing else but watch, just like those psychopaths did with his stepmother. He gets chills when he remembers it.
As his sleep becomes calmer and he manages to stay unconscious until early morning, he has some time to consider why would he have such a nightmare with his landlady. It was likely that Sylvain drilled him about her last night, and he merely remembered it, but he does recognize that he might feel a little too strongly for her if he has that much ease imagining her in place of his stepmother.
He has not much time, nor mental bandwidth, to reckon with such, as the man's attention gets caught by the open window. He distinctly remembers setting up the radiator before he fell asleep, and he always remembered to close the window when he does that, lest he wastes the guest-house's gas so needlessly.
Sitting up straight, he also notices he is not wearing a shirt. That is strange because he always wears a full set to bed, ever since he was but a little boy. He strokes his bare chest and looks around the room. Then, when he looks to his left, he sees a girl. A girl with green, messy hair and pale skin, facing the wall and sleeping peacefully.
Pacing around the room, Dimitri tries to remember what happened last night. He was not that drunk, was he? He does have a rather strong and particularly unpleasant headache, but that is nothing new in his life. He remembers clearly everything that passed last night, to the moment he turned off his lights and rolled around to sleep. He could not have blacked out after he got home, that is unheard of.
Dimitri has so gone up in his mind that did not notice the slight movement on Byleth's body, but when he sits down back on his bed, debating whether or not to wake her up, he notices that the landlady turned her head, now facing him, even if her eyes were obscured by the matted hair.
At this, the blond man puts out his hands and removes the rebellious strands from the girl's face. Swiftly, as if it burns him, he pulls his hand back as his fears are confirmed. It is her, it is undeniable that this woman is his landlady. The strange girl in his bed is the woman he is in love with.
Dimitri freaks out. What happened?
A knock resounds from the bedroom door. Sylvain walks in. His eyes are sleepy and he is wearing only his pyjama bottoms, despite Jeralt having chewed him out again and again to keep a shirt on at all times. With his eyes half-closed, he falls down on Dimitri's bed. Right on top of her.
"Goddess gracious, what's this?" The redhead mutters with his face in the covers.
Dimitri immediately pulls his friend up and shushes him. The skirt-chaser's amber eyes widen when he realizes that there is someone else in the blonde's bed.
"Who's that? You didn't take anyone home last night, did you? Byleth's gonna kill you if you did." The redhead chuckles.
Dimitri shakes his head and points Sylvain's head closer to the figure with a smooth movement of his arm.
"No way!" The foolish man celebrates. "Nice job!"
Dimitri pushes Sylvain back.
"No, not nice job, Sylvain. I don't know what happened last night! I went to sleep and when I woke up, Byleth was here." The blond whispers in panic. "And that's not also considering the fact I had a nightmare. I don't want anyone here while I'm dreaming, and I certainly do not want her of all people."
Her hands move and Sylvain gets up.
"I don't know what happened either, but I do know that you really should confess to her. There is a reason she is in your bed, Dimitri. People do not do those things for the laughs or sport, regardless of what you think of me." Sylvain says and makes himself scarce.
Probably to tell Ingrid and Annette, Dimitri guesses.
Before the young man can concern himself with any of that, Byleth opens her eyes. She looks up to the blond man, who suddenly feels very naked, for he has not put on clothes and he is very aware of that now. He pulls up his legs and puts his arms around them.
She sits up and push his knees down with a frown.
"Don't hide from me." Byleth says, resolutely.
Dimitri blushes, trying not to stare at the woman, but he fails miserably. His icy blue eyes glide over her body, also rather exposed. Her long, unblemished legs, her feet hidden under the covers, her wide hips, her generous breasts, her thin shoulders, her strong arms. The man takes in every single piece of her absolutely delectable body, to the point he is ashamed of himself for behaving like a boar in heat. He cannot help himself; she is absolutely beautiful and he is not alone in thinking that.
"Stop that." She chides him once again, breaking his train of thought and worsens his feeling of shame.
Byleth climbs over the large man and walks to his closet.
"Do you feel any better?" The woman asks, while putting on one of his sweaters over her skimpy pyjama top. It was rather big, ending by the middle of her thighs, but convenient to cover her body as intended.
Dimitri stares at her, confused about her sudden question.
"What… What do you mean?" He asks with a hoarse voice.
She turns around to face him.
"Well, with the nightmare…" The landlady trails off, her voice getting softer with every word.
Dimitri melts under her caring look. He wants to ask how she knows of them, but all he can manage to do is nod. She sits down on his long legs and place her hands on them. He feels the cool feeling of her touch spreading through his legs, but he does not move.
Byleth, despite her parentage, is a daughter of the south through and through, her body always runs cold. He prefers it so; it feels refreshing every time he manages to sneak a hug or a touch from her.
She points up. "My suite is directly above your room. I can hear everything that goes on in here."
His face paled. "Everything?! For the last four years?!"
The landlady nods.
"Goddess gracious…" The stunned man breathed out. "Why didn't you ever tell me?"
She shrugged. "I thought you'd feel embarrassed about your nightmares."
You'd be right about that, Dimitri thinks with no small dose of irony.
"Besides, if I had you change rooms, I wouldn't be able to hear you struggling with your sleep, and then I wouldn't be able to help you when you clearly need me." The woman weighed.
"So, that's what happened? You heard me and came down to help?" He asks, not knowing whether he feels shamed or flattered.
Byleth nods once more.
"Pretty much, but it was worse than usual. I tried everything I normally do but you just wouldn't calm down." She caresses her still-painful wrist. "Eventually, you grabbed my wrist and wouldn't let go. So, I climbed in bed next to you and you finally fell asleep. I know it's inconvenient, and I'm sorry if I scared you when you woke up, and if I made you uncomfortable with the whole thing."
Dimitri shakes his head, dismissing the notion. It was all his fault, she was only kind enough to lose sleep on his account, to help him wake up, which he was pitifully unable to do, as it stands. Goddess knows how many nights she spent restlessly just to take care of him.
Furthermore, he is relieved, of course, but also a little disappointed. It might be selfish of him, but a little piece of him had hoped that something had happened, that he would be able to stake a claim to this woman, even if fleeting.
Something did happen, the needy boy he carried in his heart thinks. She could have just sat at his bed, kicked him until he woke up, but she did not. She stayed, last night and many others before. Like Sylvain himself said, people do not do those things for a laugh or out of sport.
"No, no, it's fine." He responded, averting his eyes. "Thank you, Byleth. I'll see you at breakfast."
The green-haired woman takes a deep breath, as if she was going to say something but gave up half-way.
"It's no problem, I'll have your sweater washed and pressed." She elected to say.
"Thank you, you can give it back whenever you're ready." He responded, rather chilly.
"I know you usually don't want to talk about your nightmares, and we've all always respected it." Byleth starts hesitatingly. "Me, my parents, Lord Fraldarius, and even the other cubs, we never brought it up before, we never asked anything about them, to preserve your privacy, but this one seemed so bad…"
Dimitri pauses and remembers what Sylvain had said. Should he tell her? He could always just play it off as caring for a friend.
"Yeah, I, uh…" Dimitri begins, rather unsure about himself. "Well, you see, I dreamt about the attack. Those memories are what usually plagues me in my sleep. The thing about yesterday is that… I don't know, it might be because of the booze or because you were here with me, but I dreamt that, instead of them murdering my stepmother, they were killing…"
He breathed out, steeling himself for the unavoidable backlash.
"They were murdering you. There was nothing I could do, there is nothing I can ever do about it. All I did was cry and scream… I thought I was going to lose you, Byleth, and I can't… I just can't stand the thought."