strange dream .

[Deleted]

The song changes to one that isn't so slow paced, and over Freya's head Nick glances at the stereo as if it's betrayed him. However, Freya makes no attempt to move from their cosy spot and he's relieved, though as she leans her head on his chest he's worried that she'll be able to hear the thump, thump, thump of his rapidly beating heart. He took a deep breath to try and calm himself. Imaging she's another girl, any other girl, helps him to gain control of himself and feel less like a nervous teenager, though the moment she speaks the illusion is shattered and the nerves come flooding back.  What she says hits him hard. Nick was of course a soppy person, someone very in tune with his emotions. But usually he was surrounded by people less emotionally incontinent, and Freya was the most prime example of this, barring August. Hearing her say something sincere made his throat run even drier, and he gave her a little squeeze of acknowledgement. "Me too, it feels right," he said, suddenly at a loss for words. Everything he could think to say sounded too cliche. He laughs softly, shaking his head. "I really mean it. I'm so proud of you," he says, giving her another squeeze. "I don't... I just don't understand, I'll never be able to understand, how he could have had you and... did what he did."

[Deleted]

Even intoxicated, Freya hates to talk about Rafi. It makes her visibly uncomfortable, her body shifting and her eyes rolling as the mood changes. She didn't know what to say about it, she never did. It made her angry to think 'why me' because she didn't know how anyone could be so unlucky. In her mind there was no way to avoid the events that occurred, unless the man she had married had thought a little more before doing or saying. But that wasn't on her, and the only thing that was was putting up with it for so long. Annoyed, Freya moves away. Her eyes linger on Nick's and she dismisses the subject outloud, "I know he's one of the only things we have in common, but can we put him in the list of things we don't talk about?" Her words are intentionally cutting and she feels bad at once, her lips pouting as if it to ask forgiveness for the harshness of her tone. "You shouldn't have picked Sam! It made everything slow down and now my heart is racing."

[Deleted]

It's frustrating how much she won't discuss it with him. Whilst empathy was something Nick had in spades, his understanding of her feelings clashed with his desire to discuss it, at least a little-- of course it was her who had suffered the worst of Rafi's wrath and he understood that, but it was something he had absolutely no closure on. He had idolized his older brother so vehemently, and had always been firm in his belief that he came from a loving, supportive family... losing all that had cost him dearly, and whilst he 100% blamed his family for their abandonment, he sometimes wished Freya would talk about it with him. He understood her reluctance, of course. He would never, ever discuss the topic with anyone else, even his closest friends, so the defensiveness was something he could relate to... still, some small part of him wondered if she wouldn't discuss it with him because he was still Rafi's brother. She's sharp with him and it cuts through him like a hot knife through butter. Not only was Nick conflict adverse as a general rule, the very last thing he would ever want to do is trigger Freya's PTSD. Not that he ever admitted that he thought she had it. He looked at her after she spoke, his face neutral but his silence speaking volumes. "One of the only things we have in common?" he repeated, managing to keep the hurt out of his voice. He didn't want to argue but he also didn't want to let it go. He knows her next comment is an attempt to smooth things over but he isn't ready to let her comment go. "Well, a racing heart is another thing we have in common. What does that make, two things? Three, if we include Naila."

[Deleted]

Freya knows she's struck a nerve as soon as she said it and she immediately regrets it. Why the hell does she say shit like this? There's an instant reaction and guaranteed hurt when she's sharp with Nick. It's like it's some sort of self sabotage and as though she wants to hurt the person she loves the most. He's so soft but strong and it's perfect, she hates herself for causing him grief. She hopes for quick forgiveness but Nick is holding on. Freya's eyes seem to get larger with sorrow and her mouth opens and closes like a guppy. "Of course not," she feels herself filling up with panic. She's still there with her arms looped around his neck and her head bowing just below his chin. She's drunk and anxious, she doesn't know what to do with this energy. She has a brief moment of insanity followed by regret, as her lips lift to meet his. It's as if she's accidentally bumped into his lips, as her body language afterward is apologetic. "Four, we almost take our coffee the same," her arms slide off of him and she's quick to step away and ignore her accidental affection.

[Deleted]

As soon as he's questioned her he starts to feel guilty himself. However much Rafi had hurt him by betraying his trust, there was no comparing his suffering to Freya's, and he could kick himself for ruining what had been a lovely moment with his need to make things dramatic. Deciding he was over it, he pulled her against him again, closing the distance she had created by initially pulling away from him. It was instantly soothing to have her body against his, her head tucked under his chin... before he can clock what she's doing, her plush lips are pushed gently against his. It's the most intense sense of deja vu he's ever experienced. Why was her response to trauma to kiss him?  His head is spinning, not able to make sense of the gesture - not least because he's drunk. The last time she had done that had been when she was deeply upset about Rafi, and doing so now... he stared at her, trying to work her out. She slips from his grip and continues the conversation as if nothing happened and if he couldn't still feel her lips on his he would be convinced he had dreamed it. Still staring at her, he can't find the words for what he wants to say. Finally he sighs, looking away from her. "It's cruel of you to do that," he says finally, quietly. Not wanting an argument but feeling very emotionally drained all of a sudden, he scratched the back of his neck awkwardly, unsure what to do with himself. "Listen, I'm gonna sort out the pull out bed and get some sleep. I'm tired, which is unusual for me, so i'd better make the  most of it."

[Deleted]

Her heart hasn't stopped thundering. The outpour of affection hasn't fixed anything, but it's made it worse. Freya raises her hands to her face and rubs her eyes with the fat of her palm. She realizes how this must have come off. As if her first reaction to conflict must be to saturate it with affection, like a kiss could heal wounds. Like maybe it could stop the shouting and pushing. But that wasn't what she meant at all and she feels badly that she can't seem to put anything into words. Her mind feels exhausted but her body feels alive. It felt as though she had fast-forwarded the moment and lost anything. When Naila gets upset, Freya takes her as gently as she can and holds her. Smoothing the hair of her five year old and hushing the bad away. She unintentionally tries the same approach here. Her hands take Nick's and her thumbs roll over his dark skin. "That's not what I meant," she doesn't allude to what she did mean or what she thinks he thinks it meant. "I should have thought more carefully about it, I didn't mean for it to come across careless," she huffs a little and wraps her arms around his thick torso for a tight embrace. "You take the bed, okay? I'm going to stay up. "

[Deleted]

The pleasant buzz has started to wear off, leaving behind it a foggy head made foggier by current events. Nick couldn't get himself to think straight, he kept reliving the past few minutes and trying desperately to make sense of them. He could be childlike that way, mixed signals confused him deeply... how could she kiss him straight after telling him off? He supposed she was trying to smooth things over, that it was some weird attempt at damage control. He's embarrassed, he feels that she must have picked up on cues he didn't even know he was sending out, and now she was using them to try and make the most of a bad situation. But he’s not built for holding grudges. As her hand takes his, the smooth pad of her thumb brushing against his knuckles is soothing, and he's a sucker for physical contact. Still confused, he sighs again, torn between letting bygones be bygones and having a confused sense of where they stand and wanting everything to be laid out in black and white. "You're just drunk," he said, letting her know that he wasn't going to make any more of a fuss about it. He's pulling cushions off the couch, preparing to pull it out when he's stopped by her arms wrapped tightly around his waist. It's Naila-like, so much so that he gets a rush of affection. Naila always crept up for a hug when she felt like she'd upset him, her little arms suddenly gripping on to his leg... here her mother was, every bit the same. As if she was Naila, Nick squeezed her back, kissing her on the top of her head. "It's alright, I'll stay up until you're sleepy. I wouldn't have gone to sleep anyway."

[Deleted]

Freya nods, "okay," vocally agreeing with the fact that she was just drunk, but her eyes portraying a look of confusion as they look down to the ground. Nick is easy to put back together, he responds to gentleness and with her maternal instincts, he always felt simple to calm down. He was too good a person and she often felt like she was taking advantage of her situation with him. Like right now he must be reacting in pity, not wanting to shake her up any further. Like one of those fucked up rescue dogs with the blaring teeth; speak calmly and approach with caution. "Okay," she repeats. Her arms slip from around his torso and she moves away from him. She disappears into the bedroom, wanting to get out of the stupid dress and into something that felt more comfortable. She pulls on an oversized t-shirt and loose fitting shorts, she looks as though she's wearing a large ill-fitting dress. Freya takes off her make-up with a wipe and she looks more tired now. Sad familiar black bags appear under her blue eyes. "Can you put something shitty on?" she comments, pulling a throw blanket from the couch and pulling it over herself as she sits in front of the television. Her legs curl under and her head rests on the arm of the chair. She looks more like a sulky teenager than a supermodel now.

[isaac mcavoy]

Her avoidance of his eye contact makes him go from feeling confused to feeling guilty, hoping she hadn’t taken his statement as any attempt to shame her. Of course he was drunk too, and he had been the one encouraging her to drink far more than was sensible - he would never hold such a thing against her, or anyone for that matter. It had been an attempt to make the peace, and a botched one at that. He feels colder when she disentangles herself from him, missing the weight of her arms around his waist immediately. He watches her go into the bedroom, returning the cushions to the couch to busy himself once she’s disappeared from view. When she returns it’s hard not to stare. Whilst she was a knockout in her fitted black dress and perfectly coiffed hair and makeup, she was all the more beautiful when she stripped it all back, emerging bare faced in an oversized tee. Nick resisted the idea of glorifying women in their natural state, knowing all too well how patronising it was when men spoke out of turn about how makeup was a lie, or about how women were their most “real” without it. Obviously this was Freya, just like the tired mom in jeans and a tee was Freya, like how glammed up LBD Freya was still Freya. But it was difficult to ignore just how pretty she was, blue eyes standing out against her dark hair and fair skin. “Mhmm,” he says, flopping down next to her. He rifles through the channels for a while, finally settling on a rerun of a Bob’s Burgers episode he’s seen a hundred times. Wordlessly he slips an arm around her shoulders, pulling her in close to his chest.

[Deleted]

Freya doesn't like being drunk at all. She doesn't like that the moment in between thinking and doing is mostly non-existent. There's an action missing, blurred lines and a general fogginess that she hates. In sobriety she's a control freak who does very little outside the box. She has a routine that very seldom changes. On a normal Saturday evening she would have been having Naila help her cook and letting her stay up "late" before then having to carry her to bed. Tonight is out of her comfort zone, and it's not even a usual twenty-something-year-old's wild. She feels like a fuck-up, though surely not as fucked up as she'll feel in a few hours. Her body feels heavy as a rock as she sinks into the sofa. Her mind is lively though, and she feels so sick with guilt and regret. Stony eyes watch as the colours on the screen flicker through palates before it settles on a cartoon family. Nick pulls her in and she rests on his broad chest. As it rises and falls, she can hear the gentle thump of his heart. It sounds louder than it is and seems to cloud out any other noise. "Stop breathing so much," she smiles a little but shifts her weight so she's laying down and resting her head on his thigh. "I have a confession," she pauses for dramatic effect, "I hate this show."

[Deleted]

Curled up with her on the sofa, Nick starts to calm down. He regains control of his heart palpitations, and starts to churn over the events of the last few minutes with more detachment than he was previously capable of. His initial assumption that she had done it simply to take advantage of his crush on her now seemed like an unfair one; Freya was not a cruel person and she certainly wasn't manipulative, particularly not with him. It was also news to him that his crush was quite so alive and well, so how could she possibly know about it when he himself hadn't? Feeling bad for assuming something so negative of her, he instead tried to focus on why she would respond that way. It occurred to him that this could well be the way that she calmed Rafi down, offering herself up to him... it was a sucker punch to the stomach to think that she'd use the same tactics on him that she had been forced to use on his brother. Was he unwittingly more similar to Rafi than he liked to think?  Of course not. Drunkenness was forcing him into extreme conclusion after extreme conclusion, and it was disrespectful of him to even begin to think that there were any similarities between his relationship with Freya and Rafi's. Would Freya really let him adopt her daughter if there was? Sinking further into the couch, he laughed as she told him to stop breathing. Things felt more stilted between them now, despite their physical closeness. He hated that. Playing with her hair again, he laced his fingers through it, the tips massaging her scalp. "I have a confession.. I'm gonna make you watch it anyway," he said, grinning down at the back of her head. The show rumbled on a while and he watched the screen without really seeing it. His brain was still running at a million miles an hour, trying to work out what had happened just now and what it meant. "You've got to stop doing that," he said eventually, knowing he wouldn't be able to let it go without discussion.

[Deleted]

Minutes pass and her eyes follow the show, but much like Nick she really isn't following. She can't stop thinking about how fucked up he must think she is, which leads her to agreeing with the fact that she is fucked up. She's so exhausted of thinking how fucked up she is. Putting herself down seems to be a constant battle, her therapist continues to tell her to take it easier and to focus on positive rather than negatives. But Freya doesn't know how to make it quit, and unfortunately no amount of positive encouragement from others could make her stop. She spent a lot of her time at work listening to crazy people and sometimes these people seemed more normal than her. She's curled up like a cat with her head on Nick's lap and apart from her brain not wanting to shut up, she's comfortable. She thinks the moment has past until his voice speaks over the tv. His words make her heart hurt and she doesn't know how to reply to then. Does she give an explanation? What if she doesn't have one? She reaches behind to take his hand and link it with hers, forcing him into a sort of cuddle so she has a piece of him to hang onto. "I didn't do it to make it stop," she means that she didn't do it to break tension, that she didn't do it because that's how she made Rafi stop. "I just..." she sighs and squeezes his hand. She doesn't know how to end that sentence but she feels like she owes him something. "I wasn't trying to end something, I just really couldn't help it. I'll stop."

[Deleted]

Her hair is slippy under his fingers, thick and glossy and offering no resistance to his kneading. It's exactly the same as Naila's hair, though the child's was finer, and didn't carry with it the hint of Freya's perfume. It was hardly surprising that everyone they had come into contact with on the West Coast had thought they were a couple, since Nick couldn't keep his hands off her for a second. It's easier to speak to her when she's facing away from him, the intensity of her blue eyes enough to make him lose his train of thought whenever she trained them on him. There's a pause between what he says and her response, a pause he uses to take the opportunity to bundle her up in the blanket that's draped over her, tucking her in more snugly. Soon her fingers are laced with his. Every word she says makes his throat run dry again and he's not sure what she's getting at, only that his heart is picking up the pace again. Bending his legs at the knee, he puts his feet up on the coffee table in front of him, forcing her into a sort of cocoon in his lap. Pulling his hand free from hers, he puts it on her waist, tugging at her to turn around and face him. When she does he looks at her for a moment, studying her face for any clue as to what it was she was getting at. "Sit up," he said eventually, his tone firm. "Sit up and face me for a second."

[Deleted]

Freya holds his hand close to her chest, she feels like she's squeezing the life out of it. She quiets, fearing that her tongue will continue rambling nonsense and perhaps she'll stick her foot in her mouth. Her pries his hand from her trip and he wills her up. But Freya resist. She closes her eyes and pulls the blanket over her shoulders like a child having a tantrum. She doesn't want to sit up, she doesn't want to talk about feelings and what means what. Her tone becomes firmer and she does get up, though she's clearly not happy doing so. Her hair is disheveled from being played with and her eyes look tired when they meet his. "I don't know what to say to you. Sometimes you just do things because you want to and you don't think about it." She looks more shy than annoyed, her eyes avoiding his as she speaks. "I did it because I wanted to, I just really felt like doing it. I couldn't help it."

[Deleted]

He can't help but smile as she buries herself in the blanket, hiding away from the conversation. He can understand the temptation. Despite being someone who liked expressing however he felt at any given time, this was not a conversation he desperately wanted to have. There was always an underlying shyness between them, one that he had felt towards her since the day they first met, and one she started reciprocating around the time her life with Rafi started to start crumbling. They had been taking each turn as it came, bonded together by a mutual love of Naila, never really looking where they were going or stopping to think about what they had become for each other. Finally she does as she's told. When she sits up her hair is dishevelled on one side and he grins, flattening his palm against it, gently trying to smooth it out. She talks and he listens quietly, nodding along, the content of what she's saying causing a spike of adrenaline. Without saying anything he buries his fingers in her hair yet again, finding the back of her neck and pulling her towards him, their lips meeting with more purpose this time. "I wanted you to too," he says as he pulls away, not letting go of her and staying close. "Like fuck, I really, really wanted you to," he says, pulling her into his lap and kissing her again.