sword_chocobro | 43 Unicorn Street; Sunday Morning [08/13].

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43 Unicorn Street; Sunday Morning [08/13].

Gladio had never been prone to nightmares, or even just dreams in general, and, even with everything that had happened, last night was no exception. In fact, he'd slept more deeply and soundly than he had in a while, with maybe just a little bit of snoring for when he'd really gotten into it.

He wasn't usually prone to sleeping in, either, but that, he seemed to make a little bit of an exception for, although it was still fairly early when he eventually drifted out of slumber, and was almost immediately hit with everything that had transpired since two Mondays ago, when he'd disappeared into that house, but especially everything that had happened yesterday. His hand immediately drifted to his chest; if he'd had any dreams last night, it was about that, the moment Enkidu removed herself from his skin and left him, because out of everything the house had done to him, that one stuck, and filled him less with fear as it did just melancholy, although there was some fear in there, too, and the question of who was he, really, without her and everything she stood for?

Thoughts for another time, maybe, because, right now, he was waking up in Nell's (spare) bed (shirt on, of course), looking up at the ceiling overhead as other, more immediate questions started to line up in his brain. And the first one out of all of them? Just to see if Nell had really kept her word to the letter about not letting her out of her sights, and turning his head to see if she was still there.

[[ for Nell. Obviously. ]]

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Nell was still there. Of course. She drawn a chair up to his bedside to watch him through the night. There was something about watching another person through the night - especially someone you cared about deeply - that was very special, very intimate.

She had maintained her vigil, chair touching the bed and turned towards the headboard so she could touch his hand and arm to reassure herself he was still there and to watch his face for, well, mostly just because she could, but partly to look for any signs of distress. It was easy for her to rest her arm on the bed for easy access, but it also meant that in the wee small hours of the morning as he slept so deeply, that she'd succumbed to sleep herself - hand touching his arm, head pillowed on said arm.

So there she was asleep, but as soom as he moved her eyes started to flutter open.

It seemed, to Gladio, that it would have been much easier and much more comfortable if he could have just made a little extra space in the bed for Nell, but he knew that him even being there was probably scandal enough for one morning.

Though he was definitely wondering, just how much he could press his luck there.

And it was only fair, really, for him to take a moment of just looking over at Nell and watching her as she started to come awake, with a soft smile on his face, before saying anything.

"Sorry." It came out as just a low, quiet rumble, that pillowed arm held very still. "Didn't mean to wake you."

Nell lifted her head and smiled at him a little sleepily. "You're here," she said with a smile. "Still."

She sighed contentedly and straightened up to stretch a little - without removing her hand, of course, unless Gladio were to move. "No need to apologize. I planned to stay awake all night, but clearly sleep won out - knowing you were safe and here was such a relief."

Part of her wanted to climb right up onto the bed and hold him - her safely on top of the covers of course - but the rest was just enough shy and uncertain that she just reached out with her free hand to brush back a stray hair from his face

Spoiler: There was no hair to be brushed back, she simply wanted an excuse to touch his face.

"Still here," Gladio agreed, with a smile and a thought that he should maybe start tying his hair back a little looser moving forward. "And'm glad you lost that battle. Yesterday was a lot for you, too. You should get some sleep, too."

Maybe even right here in the bed with him. He wasn't the laze-about all day in bed type in the slightest, but he could probably make a pretty big exception to that. If only he could think of a good way to propose the idea without seeming too...well...you know.

But if he just so happened to shift and reposition himself in a way that might cause an astute mind to notice how, even with him in it it, that bed sure still had plenty more space in nit, well, then. Surely just a coincidence.

Oh, Nell noticed that all right!

"Why Mr. Amicitia," she said with a smile that was still more than a little sleepy. "Are you suggesting that I might come curl up on this bed with you?"

She totally would, even if he just patted the space next to him. Holding him and being held by him was something are very much wanted.

"I suppose I might be persuaded..."

"I might have been working up to it," Gladio admitted, with a faint laugh, since there was no point in denying it if he'd already been called out; he should have figured it wouldn't have been that easy to slip anything by her. "Figured I'd need to make a pretty convincing argument."

Which, at the moment, just seemed to involve making just a little bit more extra room and quirking an eyebrow invitingly. See just how comfy he looked? Did she just want in on some of that comfort?

Nell huffed out a little laugh - see the things she'd picked up from him? - then stood up from the chair and stretched her back out thoroughly before gathering her skirty pants around her and sliding up onto the bed. It took a little maneuvering to get settled next to him, making sure the coverings didn't bunch up as she lay down and all.

But then she was there, moving closer to snuggle right into his arms and rest her head on his chest, one arm wrapped around him.

"Consider me convinced," she said with a little smile. "Much easier to make sure you don't disappear on me this way too."

"Uh-huh," said Gladio, in a tone suggesting that if that was what she was going for to justify it, who was he to argue? He then took his turn in settling in once Nell settled herself, arm around her and hand lightly on her shoulder as he closed his eyes and sighed in contentment. Even if it weren't for the last few weeks he had, this would be nice, but thinking back...as he just sort of soaked it all in, his fingers lightly, idly began to brush circles on her shoulder. "Exactly."

That funny feeling in her stomach started again as he drew circles on her back. She'd never had much understanding of those times in books where the protagonist talked about how it felt to be touched by someone they had feelings for, but this...

Nell closed her eyes for a moment and just let herself feel. If there was a poster child for being touch deprived she would have been in the running. Back home no one had ever really touched her. (Doing her wifely duties didn't count - short and unpleasant encounters that they were.) Leah had hugged her on rare occasions, but she'd died almost fifteen years ago now.

Granted, when she fought with the warrior women there was physical contact and a fair amount of back thumping and hugging after a good spar, but none of that was anything like this.

Gladio was the type of person who was not only completely comfortable with quiet and silence, but he usually preferred it, especially when the alternative was just saying things for the sake of saying something. So he was definitely just kind of luxuriating in the moment, with the added side of relief that Nell had come into it so easily and willingly, too, idly wondering if maybe those soft touches could coax her at least into a little bit more sleep. If it was true that she'd stayed up for a while after he did, she'd need it. She'd more than earned it, and she could just sleep there comfortably with him while he just took the time to sort through all of his thoughts and feelings and everything that had transpired these last few weeks.

If Nell hadn't been comfortable with silence she'd have gone mad living alone in Soulwood all those years and one of the joys of Gladio was that a body could sit in peaceful silence with him.

And right now, curled against him so she could hear his heart beat and feel the movement of his breathing, the warmth of his body, she was totally content. One of her hands moved to rest over his heart and she just let herself relax. It had been a very long two weeks with little sleep and lots of worry, but now all was right with her little world and even as she thought she should force herself to get up so she could make him a big breakfast she found herself sliding down into sleep.

Warm, safe, cared for...

If Gladio had known that a big breakfast could have been in the cards, his stomach would have let it be known that, even if the rest of him was content with silence, it absolutely was not, and would be pretty vocal about its complaints for this unprecedented laziness on his behalf. But, since the thought hadn't even crossed his mind yet, his stomach behaved, and when Nell's hand settled on his chest, he smiled a little to himself and brought his other hand up to join it, giving it a little reassuring squeeze.

Nell murmured something sleepy under her breath and snuggled into his warmth a little closer without actually waking up. She wouldn't doze for long, she was practically incapable of lying in bed too late of a morning, but right now sleeping in Gladio's arms was all she wanted.

Once his stomach made itself heard though, she would certainly wake up quickly.

Well, then, enjoy your nice, long doze, Nell, because a lot of lean years and needing to keep quiet lest one attract the attention of daemons and other monsters meant Gladio's stomach, unless directly provoked, was fairly obedient. Plus, there'd been Cup Noodle^TM Ifinally) yesterday, he'd be pretty good for a while.

And he was definitely good for a while right now, even if he was finding that what he expected to be sorting through his thoughts in the meantime just sort of kept circling around to feeling guilty over some of the things he'd said yesterday. Obviously, both he and Nell knew that it had been more the house than it ever was actually him, but it was still pretty hard to think about it.

All of it was, obviously, but it was over now. And that's what really mattered.

It was probably a good hour and a half before Nell started to wake up. She'd had a delightful dream that she couldn't quite remember except that she'd been happy, almost giddy, and everything had seemed perfect. She drifted up to consciousness slowly and woke to that same feeling of warmth and safety. It wasn't till she stretched a little, eyes still closed that she encountered another body in the bed, opened her eyes on a room that wasn't hers, and made just the tiniest of startled eeps. She froze and it took her a second to remember where she was.

At which point she got a little smile on her face and let herself relax down again. "Never slept in this room - or this bed - before," she said in a voice husky with sleep. "Seems pretty comfortable, though that might have more to do with how tired I was. Or mayhap the company," she added.

"Definitely the company," said Gladio, without missing a beat or even the slightest possibility that it could have been anything else. "Good nap?"

He'd been a little worried, with that little eep and feeling her tense up against him, but it seemed to have settled quickly enough, reassuring him that it was just a little moment of misplaced expectation and nothing like regret or second guesses. Still, the soft circles his fingers resumed now that she was up again he hoped had a soothing quality, just in case.

No regrets, Gladio. None.

"It was," she said, yawning a little, and smiling to herself. "I like that, what your doing there. Feels awfully nice. Though I ought to get up and get my day started."

Not that she was maybe any effort to move.

"How are you doing, feeling?" she asked. "After two weeks in that place... Dealing with... all the nastiness of the House."

"Definitely feeling a lot better now," Gladio said. And while the bar for that was practically on the floor, this was elevated practically to the roof. And if Nell said she liked what he was doing with his fingers on her shoulders, you better believe he was just going to keep doing it. "I'm just glad it's over."

And with it there in the rear-view mirror, so to speak, it was definitely easy to feel like this morning was more than making up for it.

"Me too," she said and made a little face. "Let's not do that again, shall we?"

Nell was quiet for a little bit, but a grin started creeping over her face. "I did kind of like being able to actually do something to help rescue you. Made me feel useful."

Gladio was having his own quiet moment when Nell had hers, after a bit of a wry huff that tried to make light of the fact that he knew, even if he was probably able to put it all behind him better than most, all those things from the past two weeks would still come filtering out every once in a while, to catch him and remind him, and then there was just the fact that she'd only had to deal with those five...six?...things, while he...

But it didn't do anyone any good to dwell on that and his next huff was a bit more amused, the smile on his face a little pleased and proud. "And you did great, too," he told her. "Blazing in there, all eyes on the prize, not ready to take no for an answer..."

Of all the things that he was going to remember from the last two weeks, he really hoped that moment where Nell let herself be known was one that never lef thim.

"You were amazing in there."

"You survived for two whole weeks of nightmares," Nell said. "I was barely there at all and I was scared the whole time."

Her face got stern, "But I wasn't about to leave you there."

Gladio shrugged a shoulder, lightly, hopefully not enough to disturb Nell's comfortable position too much.

"Two weeks is nothing."

And that wasn't modesty, either. Quite the opposite, actually. Two weeks really was nothing, especially compared to the ten years under his belt already.

Although the way he then tightened his arm around Nell in a little half-hig squeeze closer to him might have suggested it was still lingering more than he was entirely letting on.

They didn't have to be in Soulwood soil for her to recognize that.

She'd hugged him tighter too and just said. "I'm here. You're safe and I'm here and if you want you talk I'll listen."

Or they could just stay here like this. Till he was ready to talk or they got hungry or whatever else came next. She didn't have to be anywhere till Monday morning.

And it probably seemed, for a short while, that just stay here like this was definitely the option Gladio was going for, as he was quiet and thoughtful again, sorting through what he might want to say.

"I know," he said, eventually, the pause making it low and rumbling, like his voice needed to warm back up again. "Thanks, Nell. I just...a lot of it's not even worth talking about."

Especially not when they could just have a nice, pleasant, cozy morning together like this.

She nodded against his chest. "Offer stands. Anytime. And we always have the roof."

Enjoy this morning, Gladio, because Nell was usually up and at 'em around daybreak. But today she'd stay here quite happily for as long as he wanted.

As if Ignis didn't even need an alarm clock because Gladio seemed hellbent on beating the sun in getting up every day.

There was a soft grunt of assent at that, with a faint grin at the mention of the roof.

"Think we can spend a little time up there tonight?" he asked. "If you're not sick of me by then, anyway. Not a whole lot of stars in that house."

He added, a snort and a beat later: "Or bees."

Not for him, anyway.

Who knew they'd be well matched in that respect as well?

Nell nodded. "We'll go up and sit under the stars," she said.

"Though the bees will be asleep I'm afraid. And I can't imagine getting sick of you. Certainly not by tonight," she teased.

Look. Sometimes, Gladio maybe just liked knowing the bees were there, snoring their little bee snores under the stars, okay?

"So am I still gonna be on Nell Watch?" he wondered, shifting slightly so he could make sure she could see him grinning back at her.

He was welcome to visit her bees why time he wanted, night or day.

"I haven't decided yet," she said with a smile, shifting enough herself to be able to see his face as she smiled at him. "Do you want to be?"

Gladio's grin grew that little bit more, when Nell looked up at him.

"Probably a good idea," he said, "yeah."

Who could even tell when he might go randomly wandering off into the wood on search of wilderness or Cup Noodle^TM next??

Nell shrugged, though inside her heart beat wildly with joy. "Then you'll have to stay," she said. "Best we stop by and get you some clothes and tell Iggy not to send people out searching for you again."

She tapped a finger on his chest with a smile. "You're under Nell Watch till I say different." Or he decided he'd had enough.

Impossible.

That grin on Gladio's face managed to find even more room to grow with that tap against his chest.

"Yes, ma'am," he said, dutifully, and with the enthusiasm that went along with an order that he was more than happy to be following.

And in that moment, it was also impossible to keep a particular notion from making its way into his head, having her there so close and with that smile on her face, and the hesitation that went with not wanting to push his already excellent luck right now past the point of risking that smile leaving her face.

But, then again, when you were clearly on a roll...

"Hey, Nell?"

"Yes...?"

And now look who's hand was brushing back a hair that may or may not have actually been there from someone's face.

"I should probably warn you," because, again, who didn't love a good callback?, "that I'm thinking I'm going to try and kiss you in about two seconds from now."

"You are?" Nell said. "I've never actually been kissed before."

And that caught Gladio for a moment, pushing him past this alleged two seconds from now as his brow furrowed slightly. "You--" he started, faltered, shook his head just slightly as if brushing back all the questions that came flooding into his head about how someone who'd been married....and all the different ways that it could be unpacked when someone had been married under the conditions that Nell had been, but how he had the sneaking suspicion it wasn't the way you would hope it was, "--haven't?"

A moment of doubt, but then it turned, brows lifting, hopeful.

"Would you like to be?"

Nell blushed, then smiled shyly up at him. "I think I would like a proper kiss... From the right person."

And this was Nell, so she let that hang for a second before saying, "Which I think would be you."

Another pause. "As long as you don't mind that I might not do it right."

At that first pause, Gladio had to laugh. "You almost had me worried there," he said, then shook his head very slightly with a grin. "And that's fine. If we don't get it right the first time, we'll just keep trying until we do."

But she'd gotten her warning, and so now Gladio's hand was at Nell's cheek, his thumb lightly brushing again it, two seconds before he closed his eyes and leaned in. His lips parted just slightly before they found hers and pressed, soft, gentle against them.

Nell shivered as he caressed her cheek, then watched as he closed his eyes and moved in closer. Her own fluttered shut as his lips touched hers and then all she could do was hang on as it felt like the world fell away and all that existed was Gladio and the feel of his lips against hers.

Gladio let out one of his soft, amused huffs with the next parting of his lips, because, hey, so far, so good, right? His hand moved back a little, fingers brushing against her neck and he tried a little more pressure, a little more encouragement. Just a little more everything.

Nell was happy - eager - to follow where he led, making a soft pleased sound as he increased the pleasure. Her hand slid up to his neck and into his hair to hold him close to her.

And now there was a grin mixed in there as the reception was warm and positive and eager, especially after the last couple weeks, all that fear and rejection and pushing him away. And so there was a little more again, but before he let himself get too caught up in the moment, he pulled back, to catch his breath, to let Nell catch hers, and to rest his forehead lightly on hers as well.

"Good?" he asked.

About the kiss? About how she was doing after it? About everything and anything right now?

Yes.

Nell was floating here, so it might take a moment for her to be able to respond and even then it was initial just a very smiley "Mmmmhmmm", and then a quiet sigh as she rested her forehead against his.

Just for that, Nell was getting a quick kiss on her forehead, too, before Gladio's returned against it to just soak in the moment.

"Just let me know," he couldn't help murmuring, "if you're ready for round two."

"Again?" she said, biting her lip as she smiled. "Good thing I'm not standing 'cause I'm pretty sure my legs wouldn't hold me up. But... yes. More, please."

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43 Unicorn Street; Sunday Morning [08/13].

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