Within Dreams [A Legolas love story]

Insomnia--Fifteen years old

With the King Thranduil's blessing to be welcome in his halls, I should have felt better. I did, sort of. But, as always happens, if it's not one thing, it's another. I had stopped having the dreams. The next few days, I barely slept at all. 

I tossed and turned and tried every single sleeping position known to man. I slept--oh, of that I was certain. But it was the feverish, desperate sleep that only happens after your brain shuts down after it's had enough. I grew more and more desperate, panicking when I glanced at my digital clock and it read 1:00 A.M. Maybe Thranduil had been lying? No, I dismissed that. Elves don't lie. It turned into a week, and my heart yearned to analyse our meeting with the Elvenking with Faewyn. My eyes developed shadows under them, and one night they had clearly gotten so tragic that my mother inquired tentatively about my well-being.

"Honey...?" she said quietly from my doorway. 

"Yeah?" I asked, offering her a wan smile.

"Are you okay?" she asked, concern furrowing her eyebrows.

"Of course," I said, a little too brightly. "No, I'm fine."

"Are you sure...?" she pressed, imploringly. "Is it school? Something going o-"

"No, nothing like that," I interrupted. "Of course, I'm fine. Had a little insomnia lately, is all."

 She offered me tea, and I was tempted, but as fate was working these days I would likely just end up going to sleep only to wake up at one in the morning to use the facilities. 

I declined. She smiled, bade me goodnight, and shut my door, enveloping me in darkness after I flicked off my light. It had been a week since my meeting with the Elvenking. 

"Don't panic," I would repeat. "You're just going to make it worse," 

Make it worse...?  taunted my conscience loudly. Worse... 

I sighed and snuggled under the blankets, ignoring the summer heat.