#cromwell

584 words

The rain lashed at the windows. A screaming flash of lightning lit up the night sky, but Scally did not stir. He was already awake. In fact, he had not slept in the first place - not this night nor the majority of nights that led up to it. He lay in bed, his dead eyes staring at the ceiling now plunged into darkness.

He turned over, and then turned back, and then turned over again. Then he threw back the covers and sat up, adjusting and straightening out his pajama bottoms which had gotten tangled by his turning. Yes, he wore pajama bottoms now. They were uncomfortable, but not as uncomfortable as having bare skin with no one to curl up against. There was no point being naked if no one was going to see it.

And there was no point being in bed if he wasn’t going to sleep!

He rolled out of bed, pulled on his dressing gown to keep out the cold, then went downstairs.

He ended up in the kitchen, out of a habit he developed from needing coffee first thing in the morning before he could become a normal person. Now that sleep was scarce, there were no more mornings. Only the blur of events seemingly outside of time, seperated by very sparse and feeble periods of sleep.

Scally made one cup of coffee and then watched the clock turn from 11:56 to 12:00.

Day forty six.

A flash of lightning illuminated the garden. Out of the corner of his eye, Scally thought he saw a figure stanging on the patio.

Now he was seeing things! He shook his head. He took a long sip of coffee and waited for it to kick in.

The sudden jolt of energy ignited his senses. What if he hadn’t imagined it? He waited for the next bolt of lightning, staring out at the garden through the bay windows. The anticipation set him on edge and he jumped when the lightning flashed.

He had been watching the windows, but Scally found his eyes dashing to the left to see - the figure was at the door now, face pressed against the glass but downcast - and Scally leapt from his chair, mostly horrified but partly enraptured by the sight.

He fumbled around in the kitchen drawer for the door key - and then fidgeted with the lock - goodness, his hands were shaking, he almost dropped the key - then the door was open, and in came the rain and the bitter cold, bringing the man with it - and since he no longer had the door to lean on, Axxa fell through the doorway - but Scally braced the fall until he was lying on the ground safely.

The door was still wide open and there was a puddle of fallen rain forming on the tiles and seeping into Scally’s fabrics. The temperature of the kitchen was rapidly dropping but suddenly Scally felt so, so warm.

He looked and watched as Axxa’s cold drenched head turned towards him - frozen, laboured breathing - and when he smiled it seemed to use the last of his energy - for his whisper was almost inaudible under the noise of the violent weather. But Scally was looking at his lover’s mouth, so he didn’t need to hear the words. And anyway, it was a message from one soul to another so perhaps the words didn’t need to be /spoken/ at all.

He said, “I’m home.”

Took me long enough to post something of them together