A loud exasperated groan filled the air, cutting through the almost painful silence of your bedroom and echoing off the walls. You rolled to your side with an irritated huff before reaching over to turn on your phone, hissing out a curse as the screen's light stung your eyes.
3:37
It was 3:37 in the goddamned morning! The bold white numbers on the screen seemed to openly mock you and you avoided the temptation to throw your phone as you rolled back over for what felt like the millionth time that night.
This had been going on for hours. You were exhausted; physically and mentally, but sleep just refused to come. Your body begged for rest but your mind just wouldn't shut off. Everything that happened the day before replayed in your mind on a never-ending loop. Then just when you finally got your brain to shut up you found a multitude of other reasons to keep yourself up. The room felt too bright so you hid under your covers, but then you felt like you couldn't breathe. Then you were too hot, but if you ditched the covers you'd be too cold. Hell, it even felt like your heart was beating too fast. It was contradictive, it was torture, it was maddening; it was the painful affliction of insomnia.
After coming to the conclusion that sleep simply wasn't on the menu for tonight you detangled yourself from your sheets and left your bed with a sigh. Insomnia wasn't something new to you, infact it happened more often than you cared to think about, but no matter how many nights you laid in bed tossing and turning it never became any less of a pain to deal with.
You dressed yourself in tight lipped silence dutifully ignoring the thoughts buzzing in your head a mile a minute and grabbed the bag that you kept outside your closet door for occasions such as this. Granting your bed one last wistful gaze you left your room and walked to the front door, snatching your keys off the kitchen counter before locking yourself out.
A light mysterious buzzing sound was the only noise you heard as you walked down your apartment building's hall taking a path often overlooked by others but all too familiar to you. The end of the hall led to an unmarked door, that door led to a darkened hallway with lights that the super never bothered to get fixed, and at the end of this hall was an old stairway leading to a door marked 'oof'. Like the lights in this hall the stairs, door, and sign were rarely seen or used and so had been left to quietly fall apart out of sight and mind to anyone who didn't frequent the area. The stairs creaked loudly with each step and the door required a hardy shove to force its rusted hinges to give but once they did you were greeted with the small piece of paradise that you'd claimed as your own.
As you stepped out onto the roof you were met with the bright lights and gentle roaring of the city, maybe not the most peaceful to some but it was your self-proclaimed Eden. The nippy night air easily broke goosebumps across your arms and cemented the fact that you definitely weren't going to be getting sleep any time soon. You allowed yourself one more sigh with that in mind and walked to your spot at the edge of the roof.
It was nice to have a moment to just take in the view. Watching all the lights, cars, and people that brought life to the city even at such an ungodly hour. Reaching into your bag you pulled out a canvas already covered in a multitude of colors and abstract shapes and leaned it against the concrete wall before you. It was soon joined by an array of obviously well used bottles and cans of paint as well as stained brushes of varying shapes and sizes. You carefully put down an old, and in your personal opinion, tacky looking coffee mug and emptied what was left of an old water bottle into it. After coming to the conclusion that everything was where you wanted it, you fished your phone from your pocket, turned up the sound, and played a playlist of songs you'd created just for nights like these.
It was becoming somewhat of a tradition for you to find yourself like this; alone on the roof unable to sleep at some horrible hour of the night listening to music and painting. It was an almost calming ritual that, while not helping you to fall asleep, somehow helped to make you feel a little less spiteful of having yet another wasted night of unrest.
You stared at your painting thus far; it was of nothing in particular just an abstract creation of thought and emotion. There was no set point for when it would be finished except for when you decided not to add more. You closed your eyes, breathed deeply, and listened to the sounds around you as you tried to decide what color best described you right at that moment. Your music softly flowed through the air barely whispering over the sounds of the city but still managing to be clearly heard as you came to a decision.
A finely tipped brush was dipped into paint and hovered almost hesitantly over the canvas. Your hands started off a little shaky before picking up speed and confidence with each stroke and you soon fell into that quiet peaceful place where only you and your art existed. Your mind finally became blank, your thoughts silenced, and your body lulled into a calm peaceful trance.
It was tranquility.
It was beauty.
It was-
SLAM!
Ruined.
Your body leapt and your heart pounded against your chest as you instinctively turned to find the source of what you were sure almost gave you a heart attack. The door to the roof loudly bounced against the wall before slamming back shut as the force responsible for the disturbance practically sprinted to the edge of the roof and gripped the ledge. It took a moment for your panic induced mind to recognize the towering blonde mass as the man who'd helped you just over a week ago. What was his name again? Stan?
You watched him in a mixture of curiosity and confusion briefly wondering how he'd managed to find his way up here. One of your favorite things about your oasis was that because it was so tucked away very few people knew about it, let alone visited it. It was the perfect place to find solace and drop your guard and the least likely place for someone to just barge in… or so you'd thought. Despite nearly being scared to death you were finding it fairly difficult to muster up any amount of justifiable rage at the intruder. It was difficult to be angry at anyone who looked like he did at that very moment.
His face was pale and ashen, his body was stiff as a rod yet visibly trembling, and his breath was coming out in short fast pants. You could even swear that the part of the ledge he was clutching was cracked! But that was obviously a coincidence or trick of light. The only way you could think to describe the man before you was that he looked like he had seen a ghost. It was a disturbing visage that left your insides churning. Feeling suddenly very uncomfortable you tried to quietly turn yourself back to your painting. The moment you moved, however, his entire body snapped towards you clearly just now noticing your presence and for some reason seeming to almost take it as a threat.
Trying to ignore the warning bells in your head, you attempted to be casual and give him a small friendly nod, "Hey."
The blonde's posture seemed less defensive but clearly still on edge as he tried to quietly clear his throat, "Hey."
Out of discomfort, though you chose to think of it as politeness, you turned back to your painting and tried to give Stan some privacy. This proved horribly difficult to do, however, seeing as you no longer knew what you were painting. The serene air of the night had been thoroughly destroyed. The once pleasant ambiance was now filled with tension, your calming quiet music just felt annoying, and your once peaceful mind was once again churning. Everything felt awkward and uncomfortable, which may have been what caused you to do that thing that always made matters worse; open your mouth.
"Bad dream?" It took you a moment to realize that the voice that had just echoed across the rooftop was infact your own.
It seemed to take Stan even longer to register that you'd said anything at all, "Something like that…"
"Ominous," you muttered just managing to contain an eye roll as you focused back in on your canvas.
Another silence engulfed the two of you, this one longer and no less uncomfortable. Stan seemed content on just ignoring you and focusing on whatever it was that had him clearly shaken up and you tried to make yourself content with returning to your painting. You told yourself that you should leave him alone. In your experience very few people liked it when others butted into their business especially when that person was a stranger. You should just tune out your strange blonde neighbor and go back to minding your own business. It was the most logical choice, it was the most normal choice, it was possibly even the most polite choice. But despite knowing this you couldn't shake that tiny nagging feeling that made you feel like it was almost your duty to comfort this tall blonde stranger. Maybe it was because he'd burst onto your rooftop sanctuary, maybe it was because he seemed like a nice guy, maybe it was because you were pretty sure you'd been through similar nights; hell, maybe it was just the sleep deprivation! Whatever it was, it's what caused you to set up a new canvas beside your own with an almost resigned sigh.
"Have you ever tried painting?"
"I'm sorry?"
Evidently it sounded like he had thought your conversation was over, you were almost always happy to prove people wrong.
"Painting? Have you tried it? Not just like in general, but as a way of de-stressing."
There was another pause before he responded, "Um… No, I haven't."
"You should try! It can be really soothing to just get all your thoughts and emotions out of your head and onto a canvas."
Stan gave you a look that you had a hard time reading before turning back to the city without a word, leaving you back in the heavy silence that seemed so fond of polluting the air.
"I draw," his voice was quiet, not nervous but almost unsure.
"Really?"
"Yeah… Not as much as I used to, but yeah…"
A smile crossed your face as you, quite happily, noticed that this lapse in conversation was lacking much of the bloated awkwardness the previous ones had held. With a small nod to yourself you came to a conclusion.
"Here," you called, holding a brush out to him.
You raised a confused brow as he seemed almost hesitant to take the brush, but as he quietly sat down to join you, you fixedly turned your gaze back to your canvas. It wasn't the easiest thing to accomplish, but you forced yourself to stay as relaxed and casual as you could beside your new painting buddy. Despite his size and obvious strength you felt slightly fearful that too much attention could make him uncomfortable and potentially scare him away. And you didn't want to risk doing that to the man you were slowly deciding to become friends with. As time passed you found yourself no longer feigning relaxation and were once again able to lose yourself to your painting. You were pleasantly surprised to find yourself even more at ease painting with your new companion than when you were alone. A smile twitched its way onto your lips when you glanced over and noticed that Stan's posture was much less tense and he seemed entirely focused on the canvas in front of him. As the sun began to peek its way past the surrounding buildings you leaned over to take a quick look at your phone.
5:09
With a stretch you stood from your spot and gathered up all the supplies that Stan wasn't using before allowing yourself to acknowledge his curios gaze.
"It's five," you said with a smile before realizing that that probably didn't answer much, "I've gotta go get ready for work. Feel free to keep painting if you like. Just leave everything in the hall when you're done. Ya know, in case it rains."
"Oh, right, thanks."
"Anytime, Stan!" You called over your shoulder as you quickly made your way off the roof.
"It's Steve, actually!"
His voice made it to you just as the door slammed shut causing you to stop mid step, "Steve? …Where the hell did I get 'Stan' from?"