Archive of Our Own ^beta

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“Thanks for… thanks for… um…” her voice cracks but Felicity’s decided she’s cried on Laurel’s shoulder enough for one night. Any more and she’ll owe her a new shirt. “You know, letting me crash.” She flicks her head at the couch in Laurel’s living room.

Folded on the end is the comforter that smells of mothballs and Laurel’s detergent and the pillows Felicity knows from experience are the perfect cross between fluffy and supportive. She’s crashed here before but never in circumstances so bleak. So when Laurel had suggested it, Felicity had jumped at the opportunity – anything to avoid going back to her empty apartment.

“Anytime, you know that.” Laurel smiles and passes Felicity a t-shirt and boxers. “Now do you want to stay up and talk? Or sleep?”

Felicity thinks about staying up and talking. The only thing she can think to talk about is the one thing she really doesn’t want to talk about right now. On the other hand a break from the world sounds really good right now. “I think I want to sleep and just pretend, um, none of this happened for a while.”

Laurel rubs her arms, a firm reality against the spinning in Felicity’s head. “Okay. But if you need me, come get me. You know where I am – I don’t care what time it is.” She leans in and wraps her arms around Felicity. Felicity bites her lip to keep from collapsing in another round of tears.

She hiccups. “Thank you.”

Steeping back, Laurel cups Felicity’s cheek with one hand. “Sleep well.”

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Chasing sleep keeps Felicity occupied for hours – just not occupied enough. She stares at the ceiling, the coffee table, into the pillow but nothing seems to help. Every now and again, despite her best efforts she can’t help a stray couple of tears leaking out from under her eyelids, down her cheeks into her hair. After a while she gets up and pads to the kitchen for a drink of water, noticing the light shining under Laurel’s door.

She nearly changes direction but decides at the last moment she’s caused enough disruption to Laurel’s evening. She slinks back to the couch, gulps back half the glass, sets it on the coffee table and lies there watching condensation bead and worm its way down to the coaster until it blurs and fades away.

Her dreams are indistinct. If asked to describe them, all she could say is that people keep disappearing and the harder she tries to chase them the faster they go. Apparently her subconscious mind isn’t feeling too subtle.

She wakes from dark loneliness into more dark loneliness, trying to gasp past the heavy weight pressing down on to her sternum for oxygen that doesn’t seem to exist. Seconds come and seconds go before Felicity registers the warm depression on the edge of the couch, fingers digging into her shoulder and the last traces of Laurel’s perfume.

“Felicity?”

“Laurel?” She sits up. “What’s going on?” A streetlight shines through a crack in the curtains, illuminating her friend’s profile but not her expression.

Laurel takes one of her hands in her own and starts rubbing her fingers. She’s nice and warm and Felicity hadn’t realised she was so cold. “You were crying.”

Oddly she isn’t now. “Bad dreams.” She sucks in a deep breath, rubbing her face across the back of her arm; Laurel’s right – her face is damp. “You must think I’m the whiniest person on the face of the Earth.” In the last twenty-four hours she must have promised to be stronger fifteen times and regened on each of those promises less than half an hour later.

There’s a huff of air in the dark. “You’ve got a way to go before you have the market cornered on self-pity, believe me.” She stands and pulls Felicity to her feet. “Come on, I’ll make you some tea.”

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As it turns out, Laurel has the most awesome collection of cheesy chick flicks of anyone Felicity’s ever met. She swears Felicity to secrecy and Felicity makes her swear to hold a movie night when everything stops going to hell. They pretend that sooner or later things are going to stop going to hell and that there might just be some variation on normal in their future.

But there’s a moment now with the world outside black and empty and not much else to fill it with so they curl up with their mugs of chamomile tea in front of the television.

“I can’t even remember the last time I switched this on.” Laurel tugs the comforter up so they both can fit under it.

“I don’t even know if mine still works,” Felicity says. She has extra honey in her tea and she has to admit that it was the right call. She takes a deep sip and leans her head on Laurel’s shoulder as the menu screen pops up with what must surely be an illegal amount of pink and mauve. “I already think this this is the best movie I’ve ever seen.”

Laurel laughs. “Wait until you hear the soundtrack.”

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Felicity isn’t sure she’s awake long enough to find out the main character’s name, let alone hear much of the music. She doesn’t finish her cup of tea.

The next thing she knows is she’s waking from a dreamless sleep, a band of weak sunlight slanting across her face. She’s still on the couch, stretched out, an extra blanket from Laurel’s bed on top of the comforter making her a couple of degrees warmer than toasty. On the coffee table there’s a glass of water and two tea mugs, long gone cold. Beyond them, mouth slightly open, neck bent at an angle she’s going to hate when she wakes, Laurel is sound asleep in one of her own armchairs.

As she stretches out aching muscles and rubs sleep from her itchy eyes, Felicity finds – age old adages aside – everything isn’t actually brighter now she’s in the morning.

But at least she isn’t alone in it.

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