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Another month had passed now...

It’s funny how just a month can turn your life upside down without any drama, right?

No big events happened, no weddings, no lottery wins, no shocking family secrets about ancient kingdoms. My finances were still as stressful as they’ve been since my freshman year...at least I was eating and sleeping properly now, hospital bills continued to roll in like clockwork, and my professors kept piling on assignments and projects as if it were a sport.

I was still juggling classes, running the flower shop, the cafe, visiting the hospital, and managing the everyday weight of responsibilities life flings at you without so much as a warning.

On paper, not much had changed.

But in reality, everything had.

The trouble was, I couldn’t quite figure out when it all shifted. Somewhere between late-night cramming sessions, shared meals, hockey games, and Damien’s relentless habit of being a menace that just got a bit too close, a routine had quietly developed between us.

And that’s what really caught me off guard,.it felt oddly, alarmingly, natural.

Take our...ahem... sleeping arrangements, for instance.

If someone had told me two months ago that I’d end up sleeping next to Damien Lockwood on a regular basis, I would’ve laughed and called them delusional. Then I’d shove back a bit, just to be safe.

Yet here we were.

Some nights we’d crash in my bed. Other nights, we’d switch it up and sleep in his. We never discussed it...there was no formal agreement or any moment where we said, let’s make this a thing.

It just happened, each little excuse piling up until we stopped needing them altogether...first because of a storm, then because I couldn’t sleep, next because he had an early class and didn’t want to disturb me, and finally, well, it just became normal.

Dangerously normal.

And honestly, I was sleeping better than I ever had. I didn’t want to think about that too much, though; putting too much thought into it would lead to questions I wasn’t ready to face before noon.

Instead, I focused on simple facts. Facts were safe. They didn’t require anything from you.

Fact number one: I felt better. Really better. That constant, low-level exhaustion that had been my companion for years hadn’t vanished entirely, some things take longer than a month...but it no longer felt like I was dragging myself through each day fueled solely by coffee and a stubborn will to survive.

I laughed more, smiled more, so much so that even my dad, Joey and Maya noted the change, and even my professors seemed a bit suspicious. One of them even paused mid-lecture to ask if I’d been getting better sleep, which felt a bit too personal for an economics class in front of the hundred students sitting there.

Fact number two: Damien and I were friends...I guess.

Real friends, not just reluctant roommates navigating a shared lease or temporary partners bound by necessity. We had trust, a routine, and an awful lot of inside jokes that crept up on us without either of us noticing.

It still felt odd some mornings, mostly because our friendship revolved around annoying each other to no end.

For fuck’s sake, it was like every day he woke up thinking, What creative way can I drive Oliver crazy today? And as for me? I fell for it every single time, without fail. The guy could even make a single raised eyebrow feel like an attack.

And somehow, I loved it.

Fact number three: Something was missing.

That thought sneaked in, as it usually did...catching me off guard during the quiet moments when I wasn’t prepared to shield myself.

I frowned at the notion. Objectively, things were good. Better than good, even. I had a roof over my head that didn’t leak, my dad was getting better, color returning to his face as he grumbled about hospital food like a man reawakening.

My grades were steady. I had friends...real friends like Maya and Joey, who were loud and ridiculous and undeniably mine. And I had Damien.

Yet, every now and then, usually in those quiet moments between everything else, a strange feeling settled in my chest. Not sadness exactly, more like something unfinished. Like something was hanging in the wings, waiting for its cue.

Whenever it popped up, I pushed it aside.

Not today. Go irritate someone else. Ideally, Damien...he thrives on dealing with impossible things.

I opened my eyes slowly, letting the morning sunlight filter through the curtains. The room was warm and peaceful in that unique Saturday way where nothing urgent pulls you away.

For a moment, I simply lay there.

Then I noticed the familiar weight across my waist.

A familiar arm. A familiar source of warmth against my back. Yep, a familiar Damien.

I glanced down.

There it was.

Damien tended to get a bit more...handsy when we slept together.

Not...not that kind of slept together! Just that we slept on the same bed a–a nothing happened...you know what, I think you know that already.

Holy fuck...

Anyways, sometimes he’d hold me so close, sometimes he’d hold me tighter and sometimes he’d run those big, warm hands up and down my sides...and sometimes those hands found skin...

But he’d take them away pretty quick after that...thank God, I nearly died of heart failure each time that happened.

Oh yeah, I was still bi...it was never a phase. I liked girls, women were unbelievably sexy.

And so was Damien unfortunately.

In hindsight, sleeping on the same bed had become so normal that I probably should’ve brought it up with a therapist at some point, tucked right between unresolved childhood trauma and whatever this is.

I turned my head carefully.

Damien was still asleep, finally. It was such a rare sight that I let myself really look. Somehow, even in his sleep, he looked put-together which sometimes pissed me off. His dark hair fell across his forehead in a way it never did when he was awake and fussing with it. His breathing was slow and steady. 𝙛𝓻𝒆𝒆𝒘𝙚𝓫𝙣𝙤𝒗𝙚𝓵.𝙘𝙤𝙢

One hand lay across my stomach, relaxed and easy. The other was stuck under the pillow, probably from our late-night study session that had dragged into the early morning.

He’d stayed up way past when I gave in to sleep, probably needing this rest more than I acknowledged.

So, I began the delicate operation of extraction.

As it turned out, this was easier said than done. Damien had a knack for holding on, not in a possessive way...I think, just enough to create a real logistical challenge for anyone trying to sneak away before he woke up.