Infinity Smashed: Through The Dark

[lb_lee]

Through The Dark
Series: Infinity Smashed
Summary: After the events of Red Roses, Old Horses, Grey has nightmares.
Word Count: 500
Notes: A snippet, originally from 2011.

When Grey wakes up at 3AM with Bob next to her, he’s sleeping soundly, and something’s wrong.

 

For as long as she can remember, Grey's throat and chest have been a pressurized, sealed tank, locking sounds and words inside. The more emotional she gets, the higher the pressure and the tighter the seal, so when she breaks, it can't come out in words. It all backs up into her chest and lungs and stomach, until it's forced through her muscles and blood and sweat. There’s no way to get it out except to act.

But she's too injured for that. She can't sweat it out with exercise and work. She can't even clean her apartment, scrub and scour and put everything in order. She's throbbing, groggy from painkillers, exhausted and bleary-eyed, and there's nowhere for the pressure to go--nowhere for her to go. She's trapped in her apartment, which is too close and too threatening, and all she can do is stagger around with one hand on the wall, checking the locks and the doors again and again, ransacking the place for an intruder she knows isn't there but feels must be. Over and over, repetitious unstoppable rituals, like a broken clockwork toy all wound up.

Bob wakes up. He doesn’t talk, just grabs his glasses from the nightstand and watches until he’s awake enough to realize what Grey’s doing. Then he gets up, takes her hand, and coaxes her back into the bedroom through force of personality. Words don’t mean anything to Grey in this state, but the lilts and rhythms of his voice are soothing and familiar, like an old song. Grey is confused and upset, but she still can't resist a direct order, not when Bob seems like he understands more than she does, even if she doesn't know why.

When Bob finally gets Grey to sit down on the bed, the pressurized seal ruptures, and Grey begins to rock and shake. She stopped doing that in front of anyone in childhood, and now Bob’s seen it twice. She'd be humiliated, except she knows that there's no other way for it to come out. She's never been able to cry much; it's almost as hard as talking, and the pressure has to come out of her somehow, before it bursts in her rib cage.

And Bob holds her, rocks with her, babbles words that probably wouldn't mean anything even if Grey could understand them, but it's the tone that matters. The warmth of his voice and hands, that’s enough.

Finally, the shakes run out, the rocking ends, and Grey collapses, shivering in the cold sweat of exhaustion. Bob pulls a blanket over her and keeps talking words at her until she finally loses consciousness.

It’s a long, hellish night. But when it ends, the pressure in her chest is gone, and Bob is still there.