The darkness slipped through the room silently, unnoticed by the figure tossing within the bed.
What genius said that sleep calms your nerves, anyhow?
I think I'll wring that idiot's neck. If I can ever find him.
After all, this 'sleep' had only gotten him more worked up, far from being calmed – far from his normal cool swaveness. Far from how things should be.
He should have been sleeping peacefully, but instead he was lying with the bedclothes off, sweating, although outside it was snowing. He shouldn't have awoken screaming.
This isn't supposed to happen this way…
The cursed visions wouldn't leave his head. The countless cars and buildings painted with a single message… 'Cast in the name of God, Ye not guilty'. The snow falling unrelentlessly, pounding on his face as he trudged through it, oblivious to the effects of numb and cold. The frozen tears on his face as he carried her… her abandoned body… to the building where some group of spirits sang praise to who-knows-what. The snow, falling on her pale white face, caught in her auburn hair. And the laughter… the horrible, piercing laughter…
The blood.
And thus, he found himself not in the middle of some raging storm, but safe at home in his own bed, screaming out in terror and pain.
Cloaked by the darkness, he crept down the hall to the room where she slept… recharged… sat all night in dysfunction…
I don't even know if she sleeps at night.
He opened the door slowly, glad that it didn't creak. With her heightened senses, she could have heard the smallest noise. He peered around uneasily, bracing himself for her sudden appearance behind him and her far from enthusiastic greeting.
It didn't happen.
Instead, he could distinguish a lump behind the light blue-gray of the canopy. She was in bed, laying down, asleep or no.
He had never been in this room before, even before she had come along. He didn't know WHY he shouldn't go in, but an aura of sadness crept up in his heart every time he came near to entering. He had never seen the ornate vanity in the corner, the extensive closet of fine dresses. He had never before felt the silk of the canopy draping, the soft, smooth feeling akin to the rare emotion of tenderness.
He had also never felt tenderness before, as far back as he knew, and thus was unable to compare it to silk until now.
She was facing him, curled up in a small ball, with the covers barely touching her feet. One arm was behind the feather pillow, the other close to her face, lying face-up on the bed. Her hair was lying on top of her face, covering part of her closed eyes. The white nightgown that she wore fluttered occasionally from the light breeze blowing through the open window. The only sound in the room was that of small breaths, slow but sound.
She was asleep.
He stood there and watched for awhile, feeling strangely calmed by the sight of her small chest heaving up and down with each breath, instead of being stained red with his blood, cold and dead. For some strange reason, it reminded him of someone else… someone who's presence still filled the room, mingling itself with hers and the faint night breeze.
The snow flitted through the room, leaving tiny flecks of white on his black robe, becoming caught in his tousled hair as he reached a hand out to pick up the tiny bear by her side. He studied it closely, and the sight of the well-loved toy stirred something inside him.
He slumped to the floor, holding the bear, and began to cry.