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Post by Geoffrey Montgomery on Aug 15, 2009 10:28:01 GMT -5
"I hope so," he replied softly.
Right now, everything felt very far from OK. Yes, the worst of it was over, but it was like the aftermath of a hurricane or a tornado--there was debris everywhere and all he could see was the work it would take to rebuild. Now was the time to put the pieces back together, but Geoffrey was having a hard time summoning the strength to do it. It just seemed easier to sit amongst the rubble and lament over the ruins of his old life. He couldn't yet see that, when he finally did begin to rebuild, the foundation would be stronger than ever. He would be a stronger person for it, his relationship with Alison would be stronger, and his friendship with Riley would be stronger, too.
He sighed and pulled away from her then. "I'm glad you came," he said simply.
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Post by Riley Neves on Aug 15, 2009 11:06:38 GMT -5
Riley understood the feeling of being in the wake of so much destruction. She felt it everytime she looked at someone who had been affected by this. But she had to believe that this was going to get better. She would fight for it, even though she had no fight left in her.
"I'm really glad I came too," she told him, smiling softly. "I'll leave whenever you want me to, though."
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Post by Geoffrey Montgomery on Aug 15, 2009 13:47:53 GMT -5
Geoffrey sighed. He didn't really want her to leave, not yet. Maybe not at all. He wanted to lean on her, to let her hold him up for a change, but he strangely wasn't sure how. He was already letting Christine support him, and even that felt odd to him. But he needed Riley right now, even if he didn't even know what he needed her to do.
"I'm not asking you to leave," he replied quietly. "I just don't know what else to say. Maybe we don't need to say anything..."
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Post by Riley Neves on Aug 16, 2009 17:13:01 GMT -5
"We don't have to say anything. I've just missed you, and I want to stay, all right? But you can make me leave whenever you want."
She took his hand in hers again, her eyes locked with his, and it was okay. As wrong as everything felt, there was very little she could do about it, so she was okay. And he would be okay too. They would make things work out. Right now, she just wanted to concentrate of getting Geoffrey out of the hospital. It wasn't helping him to be here.
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Post by Geoffrey Montgomery on Aug 17, 2009 14:42:18 GMT -5
He squeezed her hand, partially for comfort and partially to reassure himself once again that she was really there. "I really missed you," he said again. "I'm really tired... would you mind staying with me until I fall asleep?"
Maybe it would be easier to sleep, knowing that she was there and by his side. Maybe, now that he had seen her with his own eyes, he wouldn't have the nightmares anymore.
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Post by Riley Neves on Aug 17, 2009 15:17:34 GMT -5
"Yeah," Riley said, nodding. "I'll stay." She climbed off the bed that she had been perched on the edge of and pulled a chair close to him, taking his hand again when she was settled. "I'm not going anywhere," she promised him, leaning forward and resting her elbows on the edge of his bed. Geoffrey looked like he needed the rest, and she certainly wasn't going to leave him alone. Merlin, she hoped he would pull through this. She would be there for him while he did.
She ran her free hand through his hair affectionately. "Get some rest."
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Post by Geoffrey Montgomery on Aug 17, 2009 16:39:06 GMT -5
He squeezed her hand again and settled back down on the pillow. Closing his eyes, he whispered, "I love you." He'd said it to her many times, and she'd said it to him, but it wasn't until that very moment that he realized that he meant it. Not just as a friend, not as an adopted sister.
He loved her.
Maybe it wasn't a romantic love, exactly; not like what Roland felt for her. He loved her, but he couldn't exactly say that he was in love with her. It was different from the way he felt about Alison. He knew Riley so well; she was almost an extension of himself. It was just a deep, undying devotion. He would do anything for her without question. And right now, he needed her to do the same thing for him.
Alison was different; she was a mystery he hadn't yet solved. He wanted to know her the same way he knew Riley.
"Talk to me," he said, opening his eyes to look at her. "About anything. I need to hear your voice as I go to sleep."
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Post by Riley Neves on Aug 17, 2009 17:02:42 GMT -5
"I love you, too, Geoff. More than anything."
Riley nodded and squeezed his hand again.
"Close your eyes and rest, Geoffrey. I'm not going anywhere." She felt like she needed to keep assuring him. But she understood why. Many times, she needed to reassure herself that Roland was indeed alive.
"When you get out of here," she started, no hesitancy in her voice because she knew it didn't matter what she said, as long as she just kept talking. "We're going to go do something completely random, just you and me. And it will be better because we'll get real food, and things will start to go back to normal."
She kept talking for a while, telling him how things would be, and she didn't mention Roland or Alison. Her future plans, while she spoke to Geoffrey, were just about them."
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Post by Geoffrey Montgomery on Aug 17, 2009 18:30:49 GMT -5
Despite the tiny voice in the back of his head that whispered, you don't love me more than Roland, Geoffrey was soothed by the sound of her voice. He was able to close his eyes and drift slowly off to sleep. He was able to sleep for about two hours, which was pretty good for him. His sleep was mostly peaceful for a while. He started out well enough, his dreams floating through some of the things Riley had been talking about. He even went into a deep, dreamless sleep for a while, but the nightmares soon returned.
Once again, he dreamed that Riley was dead, and he was at her funeral. Roland was there, too, casting accusing glances his way. Geoffrey walked up to the coffin, seeing Riley's beautiful face. She looked sad in death, like the face of one who had been betrayed. He looked down at her, tears streaming down his face. One dropped onto Riley's face, and suddenly she sat up and looked at him angrily. "It's all your fault..." she said.
Geoffrey let out a scream and sat straight up in bed, his heart racing. For a moment, he couldn't see anything at all; his mind was still cloudy from the dream.
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Post by Riley Neves on Aug 17, 2009 18:41:41 GMT -5
Riley stayed. The words 'until I fall asleep' didn't mean anything to her. She was going to stay until he woke up again, because she knew what it would like to wake up and have her missing. There were a couple days even here when she woke up, and Roland was walking around the hospital, or home, or wherever he was. She remembered falling asleep with him, and then waking up to find him gone... she questioned her sanity several times. She wouldn't let Geoffrey go through the same thing.
She couldn't say that she wasn't expecting him to wake up the way he had, and she barely even blinked as she squeezed his hand, getting out of the chair and pulling Geoffrey into her arms.
"Shh," she whispered. "It's okay. Whatever it was... it's okay." If he was anything like her, it would take him a minute to even register her presence, so she just kept repeating that everything was okay.
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Post by Geoffrey Montgomery on Aug 17, 2009 22:35:13 GMT -5
He clutched her blindly, not really noticing that it was her or that there was anyone in particular there at all. Christine was usually there when he woke up from a nightmare, and even then, he didn't really acknowledge that she was there. When still in the fog of sleep, the dreams were still there, just out of reach, and his mind wasn't clear enough to recognize one person from another.
"I'm sorry... I'm so sorry..." he whispered over and over again, like a desperate chant.
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Post by Riley Neves on Aug 17, 2009 23:02:00 GMT -5
"I know, Geoff, I know," she whispered, holding him close. How many times in her life had he done this for her, just held her and comforted her after one of her nightmares? Did he ache this badly when he was with her? She would give anything to take this away from him. Anything.
"Shhh," she tried to sooth, gently rocking both of their bodies back and forth. "It's okay, Geoffrey. It's just you and me right now. The nightmares can't touch that."
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Post by Geoffrey Montgomery on Aug 18, 2009 23:24:05 GMT -5
It took a few minutes for the terror to subside. But slowly the nightmare's power faded and his heart rate began to return to normal. Awareness began to seep into his waking mind, and he realized that he was holding onto someone. He pulled back and looked at the person, expecting to see Christine. Instead, it was Riley.
"You're here," he said simply, looking at her as if he were looking at a ghost.
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Post by Riley Neves on Aug 18, 2009 23:54:45 GMT -5
"Yeah, I'm here."
What else could she say? Things were messed up, and it was going to take a while to fix them. So she was going to be here, as he put it, every step of the way from now on. No more asking him for support. She has asked too many people for support through this, even if she tried being there for them. So from now it, none of it was about her anymore. Geoffrey needed her, and she was going to do everything she could to be there for him.
"Are you okay?" she asked. "It's okay not to be."
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Post by Geoffrey Montgomery on Aug 19, 2009 21:56:23 GMT -5
He blinked at her a few more times, then let out a sigh. "No... no, I don't think I'm OK," he replied.
Flopping back down on the bed, he stared up at the ceiling with a bleak expression on his face. "How have you managed to live like this all this time? The nightmares.... I feel like they're killing me slowly. I can't do this anymore, Riley. I just... I just want them to stop..."
He squeezed his eyes shut, and a tear leaked from one eye, trickling down the side of his face.
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Post by Riley Neves on Aug 20, 2009 2:40:25 GMT -5
What could Riley do but cry with him? Maybe now he finally understood all the times he'd held her after a nightmare... but she didn't want him to understand. She didn't want him to know what this was like, or the agony, the sense of not knowing what was real and what wasn't. She wanted him to be happy and innocent again.
She brushed the tear away with her thumb and gave him a smile that was more motherly than she'd ever know.
"I know, Geoff. And they'll stop. We'll figure out how to make them stop. Have you asked your doctor for any potions to help?"
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Post by Geoffrey Montgomery on Aug 20, 2009 19:15:22 GMT -5
He just nodded. "I've taken the dreamless sleep potion a couple of times... it works, but it makes me sick to my stomach. The Draught of Peace helps me to sleep through the night, but I still have nightmares. If I take them both together, I spend the whole day drugged out and listless."
He was starting to get desperate and he didn't know what else to do. Nothing seemed to work completely. "Did you have the same problems with the potions?"
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Post by Riley Neves on Aug 22, 2009 18:38:40 GMT -5
"I did," Riley told him softly. "You know I don't eat when I'm stressed, and the dreams would already stress me out. They both made me sick because I was always on an empty stomach, and I could never take them both together. I don't really know how they would work for me now. I just thought, maybe, they would help you. There has to be something that helps."
For him. She was used to the dreams now, and she had Roland. He helped sometimes.
"Geoff... maybe it isn't a potion that will ever do it for you. Maybe it's the support. How close are you and Alison?"
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Post by Geoffrey Montgomery on Aug 25, 2009 23:52:20 GMT -5
He did need the support, from as many people as possible. And even Geoffrey was pretty sure that this would pass in time. It was just that right now, it was all still fresh in his mind, and with so many other things going on around him, it was hard to make sense of it all.
First Sam had died for a few minutes, then was revived. Then Roland died for a few months and returned, just as smug and arrogant as ever. And now... after what had happened with Riley, he was having trouble being sure what was real. Maybe he was lying in a subconscious state right now, in a world where Sam and Roland and Riley were all dead, and this part was really the dream.
"I don't want to burden Alison with my problems," he said, crossing his arms over his chest. "I'm too messed up right now... maybe she's better off without me."
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Post by Riley Neves on Aug 25, 2009 23:58:34 GMT -5
"I think you should probably let Alison decide that for herself," Riley said softly, but then she smiled. "I guess I don't have much room to talk, do I? Do what you need to do, Geoff. I'll be here no matter what from now on... whatever you need, please ask." She wanted to do everything in her power to make this all better for him.
It wasn't fair. He should have never been targeted. She should have never brought him in on this. But maybe she'd be dead anyway. Maybe she was close to it, somewhere, she reasoned, her thoughts about the waking world in a similar place as Geoffrey's.
She ran her fingers through his hair, sweeping some of it back from his eyes. "It gets better, Geoffrey."
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