A/N: I know what it's like to just want a friend some days, on days when it feels like you're impossibly alone, so this is a sorta play on that. I don't know, it's really comforting to think about and it's things like this - some of these familiar thoughts and moments - that make me cherish whatever friendships and relationships I still have. Makes me thankful for the people in my life.

Well, that's enough of a soliloquy for today. Enjoy the read, I hope.

Some days April sits back and considers where she is, what her life is, and a bunch of other existential crap she never considered herself at all worried about before. Despite adamantly arguing against it, she still sits and wonders sometimes – what she's really doing, or what the point is in going to school to get some piece of paper so she can go work at some crummy fast food chain anyways, and what benefit any of it all is having on her. More so, she can't stop thinking what it would be like to stop it all.

Then she stops, takes a few deep breaths, and has to remind herself to stop while she's ahead. Existential worry and college fears are all fine and dandy, at least they're healthy and normal according to the unfortunate correspondence she's had over email with the woeful Dr. Andersson, but she has to bring herself back from a darker brink more than a few times. Sometimes it's so easy and all it takes is asking Andy to walk a little closer to her on the street and other times she wants to sit alone, but that's fine too because he understands and her success rate has gotten so good that it feels almost better. She just likes having him around, almost like some strange companion in her life and for whatever reason that's more comforting than any other way she's ever thought of Andy so she starts to stick with that as her preferred description of them.

Sometime in the morning, her phone seeming so far away and part of her not caring at all how early it is, she's thinking all of this and it all seems and feels so real. Then, inevitably, she thinks what would happen when she can no longer just see the world with Andy. It's a dumb thought, almost needy and dependent which are two things that April loathes more than most, but it's still there but the idea is so thin and wispy – undefined. She doesn't know what to do other than what she's done at least once a week by now.

"Andy," she quietly says in the middle of the night.

It's not that doesn't try, because he definitely does and she knows it, but sometimes it's sort of disheartening watching him snore through that. But it only takes a little encouragement to wake him, only a few choice words, a few taps, or a bit more personal persuasion before he's ready to face whatever it is that's bothering her. She doesn't have anything for him though, and it's a bit embarrassing when she realizes that as he wakes up from a pretty deep sleep.

"Yeah?" he mutters through a yawn and rubs his eyes. "What's up?"

"I don't know," April answers and it's so stupid that she can't help but laugh.

He chuckles too, and it's kind of bewildering why that's so nice. Then he grunts something and rolls over, taking her hand with his and basically pushing her against his back. But it's okay because that position feels so nice and warm, and whatever was bothering her – something so indistinct and far away she couldn't even attempt to name it – goes away instantly.

She doesn't express it in tears, and he knows that's not really her style anymore not that it ever really was something she copped to frequently, and she doesn't say it outright to him – again, he knows. Andy's known her for too long to know anything else, and some part of him is tired of it at this point. He's not tired of being there, or even when he's told to be elsewhere, but he's so tired of seeing her like this. It's defeat, and it's weighty, and it's forced on him when April feels so alone but Andy knows that he's only allowed to support her when she wants it. He can only hope that this day, while she sits up in bed and skips every class to stay in the apartment and think to herself, he can be there.

Even at work, which is still only a few dozen feet away from the door to their apartment above the bar, he can't stop his concerns. She's stopped for an entire year, and he's so proud of her for it, but it's still bothering him to think that she might give in while he's gone. He spills more drinks and screws up two orders in the span of a lunch hour and he takes the threats of being fired in stride because Andy's worries aren't even remotely connected to working in that shitty place. When the clock strikes four and the actual bartender relieves him, Andy just wants to go back upstairs and talk to April. She's still in bed, staring at her laptop screen intently and typing away at something when he flops down on the covers beside her.

"What's up?" he asks, putting his hand idly on her leg and tapping his fingers there.

"Homework," she explains quickly, still typing while she talks.

Andy doesn't know what to say to her without making it seem like he's worried. Despite the evidence to the contrary, April still holds on to the idea that he shouldn't be so concerned about how she's doing but he can't help himself. It's almost an instinct to him at this point and he isn't sure if that's a good thing or not, if there's something wrong with life being so circular and centralized on her, but it's so engrained in him he can't think of her any other way. She says it's gross sometimes when he voices that, or when he attempts to and can't really figure out the words, so he tries not to think about her like that.

Suffice to say, that proves impossible for Andy.

"You wanna do something, like go out or…" April raises her eyebrow because his ideal date has always been going at most five feet away from the bed, "I dunno or we can sit here."

"Stop being weird," she reprimands, but after a second she closes the laptop and looks him over carefully.

"What?" he looks around and for a second Andy wonders what's wrong with his face.

He thinks he's done something wrong though he's thankful that April's saying things and being her usual dry self – things that scare Andy a little bit but only when they sort of fall by the wayside – because she just shakes her head at him and returns to her homework. Sighing, he pushes himself closer to the pillow and next to her. There's no TV in the small room, and to be honest it would be an interesting feat getting one in there, so their equivalent of sitting on the couch huddled around a screen is sitting in bed watching something on April's old laptop.

"Gimme ten minutes," she says slowly, not taking her eyes off of the document on the screen. "I'll finish this first then we can do whatever it is you're talking about."

Silently, he watches her type and delete sentence after sentence. He's not really reading what she's writing anyways but she's frequently writing an entire paragraph and then erasing the whole thing without a second thought before rewriting it and being equally annoyed at the result. When she's finally finished with her revisions, she's met with less resistance than usual when all she wants to watch are bad syndicated shows and infomercial collections on YouTube. Andy's just happy to be right there, and he thinks that maybe he doesn't need to worry about her every single second of his day like some overprotective dog. A bad day didn't necessarily mean a lapsed day, he figures, and finds himself falling asleep in front of the laptop with one arm around April's shoulder and then other slung over the side of the bed.