When I Sleep | ✓

[two] everyday routine

Feels good to write again :) Enjoy weird mistakes and typos, enjoy! Dedicated to @Telluric for the lovely cover <3 x

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|| seven years later ||

1:07 am

My eyes were wide open as I heard the front door slam shut. AJ's head lifted from where it was resting on my covered legs before my only companion jumped down from the bed and slipped through the small opening of the door to meet Archie. I, however, stayed under the comfort of the thick duvet and the security of the bed, just as I do every night when he comes home. My eyes remain on the strip of dim lighting shining through the now ajar door as I listen to the small noises that Archie makes in the kitchen.

Possibly a half hour later, after the running faucet was turned off and Archie called out quietly for AJ, the footsteps grew louder and louder until a tall silhouette was standing at the doorway of our bedroom. I let my eyelids shut and slowed my breathing into even intervals.

Silence.

AJ's dog collar jingled against each other, and Archie's footsteps started towards the bathroom. The door shut and AJ returned to the foot of the bed a minute later. The shower started running, and I sighed to myself, adjusting myself on my left side until I was remotely comfortable. In the time when Archie and I drifted apart and a giant pillow was caught between us in bed, I had trained myself to not turn on my right side, towards Archie's sleeping figure or, in many cases, empty side. It only seemed to worsen the pang in the center of my chest to see how far we've become since Archie decided to throw himself into his work and ignore any conversations that revolved around our current state.

We aren't all right anymore. He knows this. He is, after all, the one pushing me away as much as he possibly can. Every time I try to talk to him, to try and figure out why he's acting the way he is, and to fix our relationship, it's pushed into the farthest corner of the back burner and the conversation disintegrates into nothing.

The bathroom door swung open. AJ's head rose the same time I closed my eyes. Lifting the duvet to get under, a cool breeze brushed against my warm skin as Archie slid next to me. Or, the giant pillow separating us, to be exact. It was a boundary not to be crossed, representing our own Great Wall of China as it separates the same land into two parts. Him on one side, me on the other.

I have my suspicions that Archie knows I pretend to sleep when he comes home, but he's never mentioned it to me before. Never has he ever went, "Elle, I know you're awake. Don't pretend." No, unless it's a life or death situation, our communication has crumbled over the months.

Eyes now adjusted in the dark, I spotted the vague outline of my wedding ring sitting on my bedside table. I'll never be able to forget the overwhelming joy I felt when Archie dropped down to one knee and asked me to be his wife. The crying faces of our friends and families during our wedding will always be engraved into my mind forever. I can still see that look of complete love and fondness on Archie's face when he made his vows, and can still hear crack in my voice as I said mine to him. It was a broken record in my mind.

These memories and more are what keep me occupied as Archie spends morning to night at work with nothing more but an occasional call during his lunch break to ask if I fed AJ.

It's been seven years since he asked me to marry him, and even though we're considered husband and wife, I've never felt so much as a stranger to him. Sleep slowly catching up with me, I closed my eyes for real this time and let myself drift away, allowing the mix of Archie's breath and AJ's heavy huffs to lull me to sleep and push away the sense of loneliness I obtained during the day.

6:17 am

I woke up to an empty bed and a silence I've learned to be okay with. Archie's still home. I know he is. But I also know that he likes to stay as quiet as possible so he doesn't risk waking me up. It's his way of becoming even more distant from me. It's too bad I usually wake up this time, anyways.