Still Sleeping Next To Me

ten

They fall into a routine.

Lennon's body still doesn't expect Harry to stay in bed with her. She wakes up at four, sometimes five in the morning to the nightmare of a cold, empty bed, to the not so distant memory of the smell of someone else's sticky sweet perfume, and to the phantom sound of the door creaking open and then softly shut.

She's up and showered while the sun is still rising, blinking tiredly at her pale reflection in the mirror when it's half-six and the working people of Paris start to wake up, too. They're pattering through the cobblestone streets below her, and Lennon watches silently through the window.

At seven o'clock, Harry starts waking up to the smell of smoke and the scent of breakfast from Cafèothèque, maybe to the slowly increasing sounds of pedestrians. It's hard to tell in the shadowed light, but Lennon can still see the bruises under Harry's eyes, the tell-tale signs of too little sleep.

Harry's gone after breakfast. Lennon deletes all of her voicemails without listening to them, deletes all of her texts without reading them. She reads endless amounts of books and picks up bits of French from Amelie in the afternoons. The only difference between now and before is that Harry always comes back.

He's home by nine or ten, usually, stumbling and clinging to Lennon for support. Sometimes he smells like an old bar or sticky sweet smoke or maybe someone else. Either way, he always ends up sleeping with Lennon, so tangled up that sometimes she doesn't know where she ends and Harry begins and if there was ever any difference at all.

Lennon would be okay with her life following this routine for the foreseeable future, honestly, because as much as Harry being gone hurts, he always comes back now. It's a routine of sadness, it's a routine of sleep, but it's a routine of Harry.

That's the thing. Lennon can feel Harry's hand pressed against hers. If she reaches out her fingers, cups the delicate skin around his wrist, she can feel his pulse, steady and quiet and thumping. That's enough, to feel that, to know Harry is here and his skin is still sleep-warm and soft.

That's enough, for them.

* * * *

They sleep together every night, drifting off with pinkies clasped tight, curled in the middle of the bed. It's so close to being everything Lennon has ever wanted that it's almost a physical ache in her chest.

* * * *

The routine breaks on a Thursday. It's a misty morning, a cold morning, and Harry wakes up with a frown. Lennon catches it in the window reflection, tired and pronounced. She blows a final puff of gritty smoke out into the cool air before turning to face him. "Sleep alright?

"Yeah," he says. He keeps his voice quiet, keeps it down to match the stillness of the street outside, the muted hush that's settled in the hotel room. "'M not, like, a patient. You don't have to check up on me or whatever."

Lennon breathes out. Ignores the way her fingers tremble slightly, how her pulse jumps. "I know," she sighs. She pulls another cigarette out of the pack, just to give herself something to do. "I don't know what to do. With you, I mean. I keep messing up and I don't want to anymore."

Harry pulls the comforter tight into his chest so all Lennon can see are swallows and collarbones. Shadows she doesn't know. "You're not," he says finally. "You're not messing up. Or maybe, like, the whole situation is pretty messed up, isn't it?"

Lennon quirks up her mouth. "A bit. I just don't – "know you, she almost says, but that's not true, because somewhere underneath all the unfairness and anger and big sweaters, she knows that isn't true. She finally settles on, "you can tell me, like, if I am messing up or something."