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John wakes in the middle of the night.
At first he’s not sure what’s woken him. He usually sleeps like the dead: he loves sleeping the way the dead love being dead, unable to be ripped from it, no matter what strange rituals anyone attempts to wake him, fists at his door or cups of tea under his nose or (twice, George) a boot chucked at his head. He’s always been that way, Mimi’s told him, even when he was a baby: You’d scream like a banshee all the day but at least you slept the night through, thank the Lord, she’d say, and John would preen, especially if the others were in earshot, Paul beside him at the breakfast table after spending the night post-gig, as if to say, hear that? It’s in me nature. And Paul would roll his eyes and smile and ask him to pass the butter.
Not that he was alone in his love of rest. What with sleep being a rare and precious thing in their touring days, early call times and rickety flights and cramped hotel rooms in strange foreign lands, they all perfected the skill of sleeping at the drop of a hat, sometimes quite literally, cap pulled down to shield their eyes from the afternoon sun, or as Paul was fond of doing, a coat draped over his head completely, like a shroud.
But they didn't tour anymore, and didn’t really fly anywhere, and showed up to the studio on their own time, when they could be bothered. And, in their newfound mundanity, the others had acquired more permanent bedmates that they didn’t want to disturb— save for Paul, who was embracing bachelorhood with a vengeance, if the papers were to be believed— so they had adopted more reasonable sleep schedules, adjustments made for benders and dalliances with lysergic or other chemical one night stands— but still John slept, just the same. Perhaps the only thing that hadn’t changed.
Because for the first time since he was maybe nineteen, John has found himself sleeping alone, back here on English shores.
It hadn’t required much readjusting, surprisingly, to this new wife-less life. Like he said, he loved sleep too much. And now there was no more need to keep to half the bed, no more crushed-lilac smell of Cyn’s hair prickling in his nose, no toddler babble floating up the stairs with the sizzle of bacon to rouse him. John could sleep the whole day away, really, in his little cave at the top of the stairs, and not even notice. The whole world could disappear, pick up its skirts and move on without him, and John wouldn’t even stir.
So what had woken him now?
The house is silent around him, seemingly undisturbed. His eyes are still blurry with sleep, so he strains his ears to listen, but no creak or whisper or ghostly moan permeates the darkness. It must’ve been something in his dream, then, though he can already feel the pleasant haze of fairyland dissipating, taking its memories with it. He sighs, and resigns to settle back in to chase it.
But then a shadow shifts at the foot of his bed, and panic grips his heart in scaly bogeyman claws. Paul’d had that break-in not too long ago, and George had reported some scamps sniffing ‘round his garden recently— maybe it was John’s turn at the helm of home invasion. He tries to think what he has within reach to defend himself, but all of his possessions have recently migrated down from the end tables and bookshelves and taken up residence on the floors, like a little minefield with a John-sized clutter-angel in the center for him to sprawl in his few waking hours.
The intruding shadow must have noticed the change in John’s breathing, or his subtle frantic glance around for viable weapons, because it stills a moment, then curses.
“Shit, sorry,” the shadow speaks, hushed, and John’s heart gives another leap, but this time in recognition. Yet he’s no less confused.
“Paul?”
“Shh. Go back to sleep.” It’s too dark to discern, but there’s a familiar rustle— of clothing, probably, as the Paul-shadow shucks its trousers— and then the mattress dips as it climbs in, knee-walking up from the baseboard to avoid the land mines on the ground altogether, and maneuvering under the covers in a decidedly ungraceful way. It lays down heavily beside John, but prods at his shoulder when John doesn’t move his arm from its sprawl. “Shove over.”
“Thought I was supposed to be going back to sleep,” John grumbles, but obeys, retracting the arm and shifting over to allow the Paul-shadow enough space to manifest solidly on the mattress as he settles in. When he finally stills, John turns his head to face him, and there he is: Paul, lit pale grey in the moonlight streaming in through the curtains. His dark hair falls unkempt around his ears, in stark contrast against the white of the pillow, and there’s the shadow of neglected stubble at his jaw, and his eyes are wide open and colorless as he stares back at John. It’s unsettling, for such an ethereal being as Paul to suddenly appear here in these creepy-crawly witching hours, and John almost wants to close his eyes and turn away again, pretend it’s just a dream, but he keeps staring, too. His heart is still doing double-time in his chest, but for different reasons now.
Because he's had dreams like this. You can’t dream up a thing you’ve never seen, right? And what has John seen more than this view here, Paul’s face inches from his across the sheets? If it weren’t for the ample space on the mattress around them, John might almost believe they’re back in Mendips, up in his room, in John’s twin-sized bed. Especially with how close Paul is, despite the lack of need, now.
There’s even less need, John knows, because Paul has his own giant, comfortable bed in his giant, comfortable house back in central London, quite a ways away from Weybridge. He wants to ask why Paul is here, and in the middle of the night, no less, when they haven’t seen each other outside of the studio in— in John can’t remember how long. He wants to ask why that is as well, what happened to them, where Paul is these days, not just physically but mentally, the careful blankness he keeps behind those eyes whenever he looks across a guitar at John, where they sit surrounded by the shifting tides of people they always keep around them now— but John knows he’d have to endure Paul’s questions in turn, of where John has been these days, and John doesn’t have that answer.
“Didn’t hear the rocks,” is what he whispers instead, because he decides he wants to pretend this is just a dream, for just a little while longer. Paul has keys to Kenwood, naturally, as John has keys to Cavendish, but this Paul, in John’s too-small twin bed, would’ve tossed pebbles at the window till John poked his head out, playing Juliet, or Rapunzel, and came down to unlock the back gate.
“Didn’t want to wake Mimi,” Paul answers, just as quiet, playing along without a moment’s hesitation. John bites down his pleased smile.
“Best leave before sunrise, then,” he replies, but then immediately wishes he hadn’t. He doesn’t want to put ideas of leaving in Paul’s head, make-believe or no. Paul’s eyes soften across the pillow, as if he can read John’s thoughts.
He hums. “Wouldn’t want to turn into a pumpkin,” he says, and they’re mixing up fairy tales now but John doesn’t know what to say that won’t break the spell completely. Mercifully, Paul saves him the decision.
“I couldn’t sleep,” he whispers, in answer to John’s unspoken query, and finally Paul looks away, shifting onto his back to face the ceiling, one arm behind his head, the other bent for his hand to splay on his chest, elbow ghosting against John’s arm to do so. The contact has John’s breath snagging in his chest again, but he stays where he is, staring at Paul in profile: the ski-slope of his nose, the waterfall of his lashes, the sand dunes of his lips with the little dry patch they sometimes get at the cupid’s bow. Paul’s face is a nature topography, spanning whole biomes in mere inches of soft skin, and John’s made a study of it for years now. Could navigate it in complete darkness, if he thought it wouldn’t give way beneath his touch.
And sure enough, under his inspection he sees the deep, dark pools beneath Paul’s eyes, betraying his exhaustion, the kind of tiredness not even sleep can touch. John wonders what’s keeping him up, then wonders if he’s even allowed to ask, anymore.
“Was doing just fine, me,” John tells him softly, and Paul huffs a laugh, but it doesn’t get very far before petering out into a sigh.
“Sorry,” Paul says again, but he doesn’t sound very sorry. “Good dream?”
John can’t remember a speck of it now, but he shrugs a little, knowing Paul can feel the movement on the mattress even though he’s not looking. “One of the better ones.” He does wonder that, sometimes: if he wouldn’t love sleep as much if he had more nightmares, but for some reason he’s usually spared those, in his unconscious state. It’s the waking hours that have him jumpy, hairs prickling on the back of his neck, the feeling that there’s something right behind him, about to grab him, only when he whips around there’s never anything.
They’re both wide awake now, and the house is still empty save for them, but neither of them raises their voice above a whisper, as if not to disturb the fragile little bubble that surrounds them. An old reporter’s question springs to John’s mind, unbidden: what will you do when the bubble bursts? But he can’t think of how they used to answer, what clever quip or veiled insult they’d volley back just to keep from going mad in those mind-numbing press conferences. Right now, he doesn’t know what waits outside the bubble: if it’s staving off the monsters, or if there’s a sunrise, somewhere.
“Was I in it?” Paul asks, his tone ever so slightly wary, and John has to think back to what they were discussing. Right: his dream. He doesn’t know for sure, but figures it’s safe to assume yes, because Paul is usually in all of John’s dreams.
“‘Course,” he says, then cringes, because that’s revealing too much, isn’t it? That’s an old-John answer, not a now-John, with a now-Paul. For Paul to still be in his dreams, even when things are so tense between them— it’s showing the bone beneath the wound, dug down deep. He closes his eyes against Paul’s silhouette, not wanting to see what reaction he’s garnered, but the blackness that meets him behind his eyelids is almost worse, the starbursts there painting images of Paul when he squeezes them tighter, the naturescape of his features in vivid technicolor.
Paul doesn’t say anything to that, and John doesn’t know if he’s grateful or devastated.
Paul doesn’t say anything at all, in fact, for a long while, leaving John to wonder if he’s maybe fallen asleep, or maybe he really was just some spectre this whole time and has vanished just as soundlessly as he had appeared, but when he finally dares open his eyes again, Paul is still there, and his eyes are still open, staring fixedly up at the ceiling. It’s only then, as if sensing John’s attention again— as if it had ever gone anywhere else— does Paul speak again.
“Place could do with a housekeeper,” he says, faux-casually, and a corner of John’s mouth ticks upward despite everything, because even here Paul can’t help but nag, just a bit.
“A woman’s touch?” John clarifies, perhaps a little bitterly, Cyn’s name an unspoken sour note between them, and the pillow shifts as Paul shakes his head.
“Not necessarily. Just a bit of care.” He’s still not looking at John, but it seems deliberate now. “Goes a long way.”
“Didn’t think it was me who stopped caring,” John says before he can think better of it, and now Paul does turn to look at him, and John is suddenly pinned like a butterfly beneath those eyes, because it’s not Cyn he’s talking about now, and they both know it.
And yet again Paul doesn’t answer— though maybe that in itself is answer enough. John looks away guiltily.
“‘Sides,” John continues in a mumble, in a pitiful attempt to redirect, sidestep the scrutiny he himself introduced to the conversation. “‘M usually sleeping, lest the bugs show up and start their buzzing.” He flicks Paul’s elbow at that, lightly. “Don’t notice the dust if you’re asleep.”
Paul only hums vaguely, and they lapse into silence again. It’s all too glaring, suddenly, how they very much aren’t in Woolton: John truly is usually fast asleep, so he doesn’t ever take stock of it, but there are no distant city sounds outside the window, no car tires crunching on the pavement outside, no dogs barking or old pipes groaning or radiators popping. There’s just the vacant countryside, the quiet as pressing as the dark, like the suffocating pressure of an ocean outside a tin-can submarine and just when John thinks he’s going to go mad, or break down in tears, or start swinging, Paul speaks.
“Could come stay with me, for a bit,” Paul murmurs, and John looks up. Paul’s still watching him; John doubts he ever stopped. “If you want.”
It takes a minute or two for the words to register, but even then, John can’t quite believe he's heard them. But it’s a sincere offer, he can tell, because Paul’s tone is the same as all those late evenings outside the Cavern or leaving practice at Pete’s, Wanna crash at my place? And his expression is the same, too: maybe there’s still the careful mask from the past weeks, but there’s the old hope under there, too, peeking out, like the curtain helpless against the moon. The doe-eyed boy looking up through his lashes at John, waiting for John to say yes.
In the moonlit-dim of John’s bedroom, the color of now-Paul’s eyes is still unplaceable, some shifting silver— but John still knows every fleck of gold and green that’s hiding there, could paint them for you in exact replica, because John’s always been watching back.
“I’m not a very pleasant houseguest,” he says.
There’s a small laugh. “I’ve woken up with your toes in me nose more times than I can count, son. Think I don’t know this?”
John laughs too, a little threadily, because Paul’s answer implies that were John to come and stay, he’d sleep in Paul’s bed, with Paul, rather than sequestered off in some guest room. But, as he thinks of it, he supposes that is how it would end up, more often than not, even if John had a room of his own— because he and Paul would stay up late into the wee hours, over guitars or spliffs or just themselves, talking and playing and talking some more until they dozed where they sat, sometimes mid-word, fighting sleep. It was the way they always did when they’d crash the night at each other’s places, before the world opened up to them, and they’d in turn closed off to the world.
Paul’s the only person John would give up sleep for. No, that’s the wrong way to put it. Paul is the only person John wants to stay awake with.
“Alright,” he says, and Paul’s eyes widen in surprise, just a fraction, before his face breaks into a smile like the dawn come early, and John smiles back.
“Alright. In the morning, then,” Paul replies.
“In the morning,” John echoes.
When John finally wakes— in the morning or afternoon or evening, he couldn’t tell you— he wakes before Paul. Another abnormality, but Paul clearly needed the sleep, just from sheer exhaustion— or maybe in the same way John needs sleep: as an escape, for a little while. They’re tangled together just like they always would be when they woke in Mendips or Forthlin, but John doesn’t move. He just lies there and watches the rhythmic rise and fall of Paul’s chest, the slight part of his lips, the pronounced curve of his cheek, puffy in sleep, skin gold in the light sneaking past the curtains.
He’s not sure if they’re still in a dream, or a fairy tale, but he knows he wants to kiss Paul more than he wants anything else in the world— the way he always wants to kiss Paul, really, but also because that’s how you wake a sleeping princess, isn’t it?
So John shifts just a little closer, and Paul snuffles, stirring, and when his eyes open to the light they’re kaleidoscopes again, the color returned. And when he sees John, still so near, he smiles, tightening his arm where it’s slung around John’s waist, and tugs him in to close the distance.