WHO: Raven Reyes and John Murphy WHEN: during the flu outbreak WHERE: Raven's house WHAT: Clarke left a note for Murphy. He came over and followed the note and made Raven something to help her symptoms. They cuddle without realizing that's what they're doing. WARNINGS: Mentions of sexual situations. STATUS: gdoc, finished!
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When Raven told him she was sick-- he knew it couldn’t have been the same virus that took out a large portion of the Delinquents back at the drop ship. The virus he brought back. Clarke gave him instructions on the network and said she’d leave him a note. So he wasn’t too worried when he took his break from the greenhouse and headed on over to the townhouse Raven lived in.
The door was unlocked, thankfully (though he could come in through the window), and he went straight for the kitchen. All the townhomes looked exactly the same so it was like navigating his own home. The note on the kitchen counter read:
Murphy,
Thanks for coming in the front door. In the kitchen there’s a NASA mug and some apple cider. Boil it and add honey right after. Pour the shot glass of whiskey into the mug, it’s filled just right. Don’t add more. I want her decongested, not drunk. She won’t taste it.
You can have a shot if you want.
You can also take credit for this if you want. Unless she miraculously comes downstairs, in which case hi Raven put this back.
PS Stop climbing through the window. It’s awkward. We already know.
PPS Switch Raven’s laundry over to the dryer please. Her sheets needed to be decontaminated, along with the rest of her room.
PPP(?)S Thanks for taking care of her. I know she can be a hard headed, loud mouthed baby about it. If she’s worse in the morning bring her to see me, I’ll be at work all day at this rate.
-Clarke
He snorted when he read ‘we already know’ in reference to the fact that he was sleeping with Raven. Murphy knew they’d figure it out. Raven was a smart girl but she was stupid to think she could hide something like that, especially when she was so loud.
He did exactly at the note told him-- however, doing the laundry part first. He switched it around and turned on the dryer for an hour. That should do it, right? Then he went about messing with the apple cider and whiskey. He had to hold the mug by the handle and walk slowly to Raven’s room by the time he was done. Murphy knocked, but then opened the door anyway. Not like she had anything he hadn’t seen before.
The sudden knock on her door startled her more than she would have liked. At some point, after Clarke checking in on her, Raven fell asleep. She didn’t know how much time passed, how long she had been asleep. Everything started to blur together. It didn’t help that she was so congested in that face that she had to resort to breathing in and out of her mouth.
Raven was sitting up by the time Murphy opened the door. There was an odd expression of her face, one someone would have when they didn’t recognize a person. It wasn’t like she didn’t know who was coming in her room, but perplexed to see Murphy entering her room with a ceramic mug in his hands.
“You’re going to get yourself sick.” Raven’s voice was slightly askew, a little gravelly from the rawness of her throat. She took the corner of the blanket, that wrapped around her, across the lower part of her face to keep her germs to herself.
“Don’t look at me like that,” he said with a tone of amusement. He sat on the edge of her bed and easily replied, “I don’t give a shit if I get sick, drink this.” He’d been sick lots of times in his life, being sick was what changed his life in the first place. What would be another flu?
Raven let the blanket fall away from her face. “I really didn’t think you’d actually come over,” she admitted.
Murphy held the mug out to her, “I may have finished off the bottle of whiskey you guys had.” Raven squinted her eyes, eyeing the mug he held out to her. He did have a dopey smile on his face from chugging the bottle. “There’s some in this, it’s supposed to help, I guess. Clarke’s orders. Drink up, Reyes.”
He didn’t move his arm from holding the mug out to her. He was a little over an arm’s length away from her, if she reached out, she’d be able to get to it.
If Raven didn’t feel like her body was going to fall apart on her, she was have taken the mug with a simple reach, but doing that now seemed like a chore. With a drawled out groan, Raven pushed herself closer to Murphy. She pulled her arm out from the blankets, the tips of her fingers brushed along Murphy’s as she took the curve of the cup into her grasp.
She brought it up to her nose to smell the contents that made the warmed drink, but realized her nose was too stuff to actually smell anything. Raven chuckled weakly before taking a sip. “Mmm, tastes like warm water.”
“It’s apple cider, smartass.” He ignored her comment about ‘actually coming over.’ His intentions were clearly set out to everyone else: he cared about Raven’s health because he was her friend. His true intentions were that he didn’t want her to hurt anymore. He felt like he was in charge of her happiness. It was why he agreed to sleep with her, not only was she hot, but he’d make her feel wanted. Because she was-- by him. Win-win, if you’d ask him.
“I can’t smell or taste anything. This could be boiled piss for all I knew.” Raven paused, her gaze falling down to the warm liquid her cup. It did have the same shade as urine, but she knew Murphy wouldn’t even think about doing that.
After six years, Raven still didn’t understand why he was so adamant about helping her. The realization only occurred to her recently, the more they worked together. Maybe this was just how he cared for his friends. Raven just wasn’t used to it. Most of his time, on the Ark, was spent mending things that couldn’t be fixed. For her, Raven was too busy sustaining the Ark in liveable conditions.
“Drink it all, okay?” Murphy stood up and started to pick up clothes around the room, using a t-shirt to cover his hand while he gathered up tissues.
“Yes, Mom,” she muttered against the mug before taking another sip. The warmth, or whatever the drink was made out of, soothed the soreness in her throat.
“See, I’m being careful?” He put everything in a pile near the door, ready to take it out when he left.
“Clarke’s note... just so you know, told me to stop coming through the window.”
Raven was in the middle of taking a sip when he spoke up again, an audible gulp filled the otherwise quiet room. “Why would she say that? And why did Clarke write you a note?”
He stood in the middle of the room, swinging his arms around and stretching a little. He looked tired. “Clarke wrote me a note so I’d know what to do with you when I got here. And she said that they know. What we’re doing.” He shrugged.
Raven was sitting towards the middle of her bed, tucking her legs into a pretzel. Her knees jutting off the edge of the bed. The blanket still managed to keep itself draped over her. She listened to Murphy talk for the most part, it was a struggle to keep herself upright, but it wasn’t like she’d openly complain about it to Murphy.
Murphy moved like an avalanche, sitting cross legged where he stood. He leaned his elbow on on leg and propped his chin up. “So, sorry about that.”
She would have shrugged, but her muscles were too sore for that. “It was going to happen sooner or later,” she spoke after taking another sip from the mug, the warmth soaking into her bones and surprisingly giving her some relief. “Not the worst thing that can happen.”
He felt relief wash over him, she wasn’t upset. He thought maybe she’d call it off. There was a little part of him that he ignored, the part that was happy it was Raven who was here, Raven he kissed, Raven he was sleeping with.
“Is that stuff helping yet? Feel any different?”
Raven pinched her lips together, considering his words before speaking, “I guess. A little bit.” Her nose felt a little less clogged. The warmth of the drink soothed achy bones and her sore throat.
From the floor, he saw a different angle of her. Her hair was pulled back like normal. “How’d you manage to get your hair up while you’re so weak?” He didn’t know how girls did their hair. Clarke always had hers twisted back. Emori always wore a scarf.
Slowly, she was rising up from criss crossed legs and taking a step off the bed to only bring herself down onto the floor where Murphy sat himself. Raven was in front of him now, just within arm’s reach. The blanket came down with her, an arm making sure it didn’t slip away from her. “My hair’s always in a damn ponytail, Murphy.” She rolled her eyes. “And I’m not so weak.”
Murphy held up one finger, “Ah, it’s not always in a ponytail.” There was that smirk returning to his face. When she came down on the floor, he scooted a little bit closer to her. He really didn’t care if he got sick. Raven had a smirk on her face, too and she used the mug to try and cover it.
“It just seems like a lot of effort.” He ran his own hands through his hair before getting up to crawl over next to her. “Do you need comforting, Raven?” He said it like he was speaking to a child, because he couldn’t help but be an asshole. But he meant it.
She didn’t think it was a whole lot of effort, but then again it was something she had always done. “It’s not so hard when you’ve been doing it your whole life,” Raven murmured. She had placed the mug in front of her on the floor. A finger hooked around the handle of the mug and idly spun it around. “I was putting my hair in ponytails ever since I could comb my own hair.”
“I’m just mystified by the opposite sex, is all. Some of the girls here are way more into their looks than the people on the Ark. There we were just happy to have clothes and food.”
Raven did a lot of things on her own, things that a mother should have done. It wasn’t like her to delve into her past, but she was sick and Murphy managed to lead her in the direction. “No.” She shook her head to his question. Raven let her head tip to one side, looking at Murphy who had pulled himself closer to her.
“You sure?” He put an arm around her, fingers wrapping around her shoulder. Gently, he guided her towards him. “Just don’t breathe,” he chuckled. Raven probably wouldn’t put up much of a fight, and he tucked his chin over her head-- where her hair was smoothed back into a ponytail.
Raven did want comforting, but Murphy knew that already even if she said otherwise. She gave in, letting herself be pulled onto him. “Why am I not breathing,” she asked, looking up to his face without moving her head that was tucked under his chin.
“So I don’t get germs on me,” he answered matter-of-factly.
Raven smirked, but said nothing. She went quiet for a little while, feeling his steady heart beat against her back. Her sinuses were slowly loosened to the point where she could inhale through one nostril. “Murphy,” Raven started to say. “Are you doing this because you think you owe me?” It gnawed at her. The worry festered the first time they had slept together and only grew the more they spent together. “You don’t need to do any of this...if you feel bad for me.”
Murphy sighed and dropped his hand off her shoulder. “I don’t pity you, Raven. If anything, I envy you, people need you, people want you. I’m just hitching a ride on everyone else.” Even though he wasn’t holding her anymore, he still stayed close to her.
She pushed herself back, nudging him with her body. “We’re both hitching rides,” Raven was quick to correct him. “People only need me because I know what the hell I’m doing. Someone smarter is going to come around soon and no one will want to go to me.” She kept herself from adding in some adjectives that would describe herself as a gimp, knowing it hurt Murphy still even though she was just making fun of herself.
“Do you think I’m fucking you and bringing you crazy Clarke potions because I feel bad for you?” He sounded incredulous. Seriously? How could and why would she think that? Out of the two of them, Murphy was the one that people would feel sorry for.
Raven went quiet again. For everything she’s accomplished and done, her self confidence just wasn't there when the sarcasm wasn’t there to hide it. “I don’t know. Maybe you’re lonely or something.”
“Are you lonely?” He blurted it out, not paying much attention to whatever else she said. He’d circle back around to that. “We can be lonely together.” So maybe he just admitted that he was lonely, but he was happy to share that with Raven.
You don’t make me lonely. That’s what Raven though, that’s what she wasn’t able to tell him. He started to fill that void she couldn’t remember not having. It was empty, but somehow weighed her down. Murphy was slipping through the cracks, worming his way into places neither would have expected. “We can be lonely together,” Raven agreed solemnly.
“--And you’re not wanted just because you’re smart. And even still, wouldn’t that be nice? At least you have a redeeming trait. People applaud me for being halfway decent, the bar is set very low for me.”
She let herself laugh, even if it irritated her achy bones. They didn’t hurt as bad. Raven couldn’t tell if it was Clarke’s concoction or Murphy’s presence. “Low bar, low pressure, right,” she asked, slowly lowering herself until the back of her head rested on to his lap. Big, brown eyes looking up to his face. “I always feel like I have to be doing something, come up with something relevant in order to stay...well...stay relevant.”
“People are surprised I do anything around here.” Once her head was in his lap, he absently smoothed back the little strands of hair that had fallen out of her ponytail. He tried to think hard, what to say to fix this. Murphy often didn’t try to ‘fix’ things, he put bandages over them, to deal with later. To deal with quickly, to give him time to get out.
Raven liked the small things that Murphy did, things that weren’t supposed to be that big of a deal. They weren’t, not really, but she noticed them anyway. Like when he brushed her hair away from her face, the way he looked at her and not through her. He held her at night after they would fuck. It wasn’t ever supposed to be like that, they just found each other staying in bed just a little longer each time.
“They just don’t know who you are.” A small little smile blossomed along her sick and tired face. Her eyes just as red and irritated as her nose. The color in her face had dulled, losing her shine for now. That smile, though, it somehow brought life into her face for a few passing seconds.
“You don’t have to do anything, Raven. Even if you didn’t have your mind, you’re still nice to be around. You’re kind, you can take care of yourself, but you’re not obnoxious about either of those things.”
“Kind?” She chuckled, shaking her head. “I feel like I drive people crazy because I’m kind of a control freak. You want to trade spots for a day?”
“Kind! You help people without asking for anything in return. You care what people think and feel. I couldn’t give a shit.” Liar. About himself not caring. He cared a lot, sometimes too much. Then sometimes his depression made him feel nothing at all, and that’s when he became an asshole. It was easy to barrel through people and step on them to get ahead when you didn’t care. It doesn’t matter. You don't have to run faster than the bear to get away. You just have to run faster than the guy next to you.
Raven realized he was right for the most part. She never asked for anything, never held herself above anyone else. “You give a shit,” Raven murmured, her dark brown eyes searching for the truth that sat hidden in his mind.
“No, I don’t want to trade spots for a day, I couldn’t handle it.” Murphy was overthinking everything, thinking about her and what he could say to make her feel better. Her smile made him uncomfortable. Made him feel things. He was fond of her. Being fond of people is where you make mistakes. You do stupid shit. If he didn’t care about Emori during the whole ALIE situation, he could have been 20 miles away in a few days.
“I wouldn’t let you trade anyway. I don’t think Clarke could even handle the pressure.” And there was a lot of it. A lot of people were always counting on Raven because time and time again she would figure a solution. She would come up with an answer people wouldn’t have come up with otherwise.
They would all be dead.
Raven knew this and it weighed heavily on her shoulders.
Slowly and with a grunt, Raven rolled onto her side with her face to his stomach. Without really thinking much of it, she rested her forehead against his stomach. “It’s really not fun being me.”
When her forehead touched his stomach, he sucked in what little bit of body fat he had in. After a moment, he let out a breath and his stomach relaxed.
“Clarke needs you. We all need you. No one needs me. I’m just a warm body. A trigger finger.” He was getting down on himself again, it seemed as if he was fishing for compliments. But the people he hung around never gave into that-- so he knew better than to think that.
“Clarke was fine without me for the last six years,” Raven reminded Murphy.
“It’s not fun being me either, Raven. We got that in common.”
Raven didn’t have a rebuttal, no disagreement. Being Murphy wasn’t easy nor was it fun, anyone who’s known him long enough would know that. Murphy went quiet and looked down at her. “While you’re down there…” He laughed, “Sorry, I had to ruin the moment.”
She groaned, but the smirk on her face was unmistakable. “Did the moment get too serious for you,” Raven called him out on his bluff. It was a pattern with him and Raven was always quick to notice patterns. When things got a little too deep, Murphy would say something to steer the conversation elsewhere. Most of the time, though, Raven just let it happen. She tipped herself over onto her back before using her very sore core muscles to get her back into a sitting position.
Murphy gently put his hands on her back, running one down to the small of it to help her up. “Yeah, it sure did. Besides, you can’t breathe through your nose, and what if you sneeze? Fuck, that’d…” He shook his head, looking both disgusted, confused, and pained. His other hand stayed on her shoulder while she adjusted to sitting up again.
“I’m not going to suck your dick so stop thinking about it.” The back of her hand slapped against the same stomach she nuzzled her face against just a moment ago.
“Clarke needs you now, Raven. If she wants to be running this place by the summer, she needs you and Bellamy backing her up.” He wasn’t being completely serious, but maybe a little serious. From the corners of Raven’s eyes, she gave him a very pointed look. “Do you want to lay back down? I’ll come with you.” The last sentence was slightly plaintive and small.
A soft sigh passed through her lips, shaking her head a second later. “The floor is cold and too solid for my sore fucking body,” she complained, but found the little strength to bring herself up onto her feet. All the while making sure not to tip over the remaining apple cider that was left in the mug. It only took a step or two and she was close enough to collapse back onto her bed, a crumpled sick mess in the middle of her bed.
A tone of annoyance when he corrected her, “I meant on the bed.” He stood up too and walked towards the bed. Looking down at her in the middle, he patted her butt and pushed a little, “Scoot over, I’m coming in.”
“I knew what you meant.” Her body wriggled up and over, giving him enough space to comfortably join her without the threat of falling off.
Murphy toed his boots off, they were never quite laced up all the way. He crawled into the bed on his hands and knees, dropping down next to Raven. He curled around her back. Spooning, finally. One of his arms drooped down around her just under her breasts and he tucked his hand under her. “You don’t have to suck me off, this is fine.”
She didn’t know when it happened, maybe it was the first time he even pulled her in to be held, but Raven let him hold her each time; he made a good big spoon. “I’m not going to suck you off,” she murmured, lazily shooting a glance over her shoulder. “Don’t you have work now?”
“I know, that’s why I said this is fine,” he replied matter-of-factly. “I probably have to work, but this is kind of important. People are sick, they know people are going to be gone.”
“People vanish when they’re not sick.” Raven’s tone was sardonic. A handful of people already vanished right out of thin air. No one knew where they went, everyone hoped back home. Raven didn’t want to go back home as much as she missed being in space. Her mouth opened as if she were going to say something, but not words came out, just a sigh.
He pulled his legs up to lay against hers, “You’re really warm, I should have asked Clarke what to do in case of a fever.”
“I do have a fever.” Raven was boiling from the inside out, but her muscles quivered as though she were cold. “She probably would want me to drink that damn drink you gave me.”
“Then I’m one of those people, I’m not there and I’m not sick. Or I could be sick, they don’t know.” He didn’t take his job seriously.
“You’re one of what kind of people?” “The kind that vanish when they’re not sick.”
“The note said it was to decongest you. I don’t know what to do for a fever.” The awkward arm that had no place between them moved up to rest her head on it. “Yeah, your forehead is spicy,” he chuckled at that. “Should I go find her? Does she have any drugs in the house? Maybe a cold compress?”
“My forehead is roasting,” Raven corrected him, even though there was a hints of a smirk curling her lips. Her body become rigid at the mention of bringing Clarke back into her room and she shook her head a moment later. “I don’t need Clarke coming back. I’ll just ride out the fever.”
“You sure? I think you’re going to burn me.” He moved his arm up a little so that just the part of her head with hair touched it.
Raven wanted to turn around, wanted to look at him when she spoke. She didn’t though, and just curled flush against his chest. “You didn’t have to come,” she said again, voice going soft. There was sadness in her words, how she spoke. “I’m glad you came, though.”
“Don’t get all mushy on me, Reyes.” Murphy rolled his eyes, even if she didn’t see. Maybe she could hear it, with how hard he was doing it. “I know you say Clarke trusts me and shit, but you and me… we got history. I don’t want you to die alone, right?” He wondered if she remembered that, when he helped her during that mess. And she asked him that question. Why are you helping me?
An elbow dug into his side, when she jerked her arm back. It was just a nudge, an awkward nudge. “I can get mushy if I want. I’m sick and I feel like death.” And Finn hasn’t even cared to see me, she thought. His other arm, that was just fit snug below her breasts, was wrapped under her arms. She held it much like the first time that they spooned. “We do have history. A goddamn mountain of it.”
“I’m surprised you don’t hate me.” He had no idea why she didn’t despise him, how she could look at him, how she could fuck him. Murphy didn’t say anything else, just let that hang in the air. He wasn’t fishing for her to say something nice. He genuinely didn’t know. This whole time she thought he felt sorry for her, he wondered if she felt sorry for him. Even still, shouldn’t she be mad at him?
A thick silence fell in the room, almost suffocatingly so. She felt her chest tighten and the grip on his arm loosened subtly. After what felt like an eternity she spoke. “Sometimes I think you want me to hate you. That it would be easier for you to deal with.” There was another pause, mulling over the thoughts that came to her. “I’m just tired of it. All that anger. I had a lot of it.” She would have gone on, but she knew Murphy didn’t want to hear about it. “I haven’t hated you in a long time, Murphy. Time to get over it.”
“I don’t want you to hate me, Raven.” He didn’t, but she did have a point. It might make it easier on him. He wouldn’t have to hate himself as much as he did, they could share it. “Maybe I’m just an asshole who doesn’t understand forgiveness.” He shrugged, exhaled deeply. “Okay, I’ll get over it.” It wasn’t that easy, but he’d start trying, at least. “Do you want me to stay until you can get back to sleep?”
Don’t leave, Raven thought to herself. A pathetic one that she kept to herself because Raven Reyes was not pathetic. Raven Reyes could go to sleep without someone holding her. Raven Reyes didn’t need anyone. Raven Reyes was also tired of acting like she had everything under control, tired to pushing people around because things got a little too intimate for her. She wanted it so badly and she didn’t understand her need to keep it away from her. Did Finn fuck her up that badly?
“You don’t have to leave if you don’t want to,” Raven finally answered him. “Hell, you don’t even have to stay here any longer than you want to. I can’t really do much. I feel like shit, look like shit, sound like shit.” Her shoulders shrugged, faintly.
Murphy’s brow furrowed, “We don’t have to do anything.” He was almost offended that she would think that’s why he was staying. “Damn, give me some credit.” Murphy squeezed her gently, as if trying to pull her closer, or prove a point, something along those lines. Just to show her was there?
“I can’t give you too much credit, Murphy.” Raven smirked. “It’ll get to your head and I don’t want to deal with that.”
“I don’t want to leave, I’m fine where I’m at,” flippantly spoken. He moved his head a little, trying to dodge her ponytail. “Your hair needs to get out of my face, Reyes.” The arm around her wiggled from her loose grip and he moved away from her for a moment. His fingers went into her hair, gently pulling on the hair tie, unlooping it and untangling it from her hair.
Raven didn’t say anything, letting him pull her hair free from its usual tight ponytail. It always felt right, letting her hair down. She did it at night, when she was laying in bed. Even then her hair tangled, sometimes wrapping around her neck.
Her head had a lot less pressure, the tension being released the moment the hair tie was guided out of a ponytail. A soft sigh passed through parted lips. “Then don’t leave. I’m not going to kick you out.” There was a pause, a slight hesitation. “This feels nice anyway,” Raven confessed.
Murphy flicked the hair tie into a random corner of the room. He put one hand into her hair again and gave it a little jostle, mussing it about. Raven let her eyes close, another soft sigh tumbling from parted lips. His fingers rubbed her scalp for a moment, “I don’t know how you have this up all day every day.”
“I’m a mechanic, Murphy. I need to keep my hair back or it’ll get caught in shit. It’s that or I cut my hair.” There was only a heartbeat of a pause before she finished her thought, “And I’m not cutting my hair.”
She couldn’t see him smile. It was a real smile, one that didn’t sneak on his face. It came from her saying it felt nice. “Yeah, it does,” he sighed to cover up the sound of the smile in his voice. “When you inevitably get over this and pass it to me, you’ll do the same, won’t you?”
There was relief that washed over her, any tension in her body had left when he didn’t dismiss her confession. “I’m not going to get you sick.” Her elbow nudged him in the stomach again.
He made a small stunned sound. “Careful.”
“But, hypothetically speaking, if you got sick then I’d cuddle your sick ass. I would be immune anyway, right.” She looked over her shoulder, trying to catch a glimpse of him behind her. Only for a second and Raven let her head fall back onto the pillow. “I haven’t had anyone take care of me like this in a long time.” Another confession. Raven seemed to be on a roll tonight.
She was sick. That was her excuse.
It felt good to be wanted, to know he was wanted and helping. “Is that what we’re doing? Cuddling?” He tried to sound as clueless as possible. Her confession made his stomach flip and he mentally scolded himself. Stop that.
“We’re friends, Raven,” he reminded her. He just kept reminding her of that.
He said that a lot. Raven really didn’t understand why because it wasn’t like she had suddenly forgotten they were friends. “I know,” she drawled, sounding suspicious. It was then she noticed just how close they were, how she was holding onto his arm and suddenly Raven let go of his arm, tucking her hands beneath her head. “This isn’t cuddling.”
He got up on one elbow and leaned over her, pressing his chest to her shoulder. “Hey,” he bent to catch her eyes. “It’s okay if it is, Raven.” He didn’t know why he used her name. He liked saying it, maybe. Murphy wasn’t sure what the hell was happening, just that it was happening. He didn’t want her to pull away. Didn’t want her to deny what was going on.
Raven had a whole lot to say in that moment, the words never came out, though. They just sat heavy on her shoulders. She threw a glance at him, looking at his face. “How come you’re the one who gets to say what’s okay and what isn’t? And then why I do something, maybe push a little farther you do that whole ‘we’re friends’ bit.” Her gaze sharpened then, despite being sick, Raven could still pull off a steeled look.”I did want it to be cuddling, but I sure as fuck don’t know what you want.”
“I kept saying you were in charge and you didn’t want that.” He fell backwards back onto the bed and from hovering over her.
“Yeah, when we are fucking,” she muttered, more to herself than to him.
He didn’t pull his arms away from her, still one under her and the other draped over her. The one under her felt like it was falling asleep, but he didn’t care. Murphy had a moment where he wanted to tell the truth and it just fell out of his head, “I just want whatever you want.”
Murphy was doing that thing again, where he was trying to pawn it all on her. “It’s not what we are doing here.” Raven didn’t mean in this instance, in general with what they were doing.
“It’s not all what I want. Her body was sore, her bones ached. That didn’t matter because she was squirming around, turning her her body so she was facing him. “Tell me what you want, Murphy.”
“Why is it not about what you want?” he exhaled, sounding annoyed. He was used to not mattering, used to people using him. If that’s what Raven was doing, then so be it. If she wanted something else, well, she’d have to ask.
He kept his arms around her as she turned to look at him. The moment they made eye contact, he rolled his eyes. “I don’t want anything.”
“You can’t even look at my eyes, Murphy,” Raven pointed out, her tone not masking its annoyance. “Yeah and it’s not what I want. Last I checked, it takes two people to fuck” Raven felt herself talking to much. Maybe that’s what he wanted, her not to talk so damn much.
With her shoulder, she guided her body to roll onto her other side. “It’s whatever. Sure, it’s what I want and I want you to hold me and I’ll shut up.”
Murphy shrugged the shoulder he wasn’t laying on. He moved to lean over her again, twisted so that his legs were still on the bed. “It’s whatever, Raven. I want to hold you, you want me to hold you, why are you wanting specifics?” He leaned on his side for a second to wave his hand, “It’s fine, it’s fine, whatever it is it’s fine.”
“And now you keep talking.” Raven rolled her eyes
He curled towards her as she laid on her back, looping his arm over her waist.
“Because maybe I’m curious as to why you want to hold me?” Raven hadn’t turned to look at him, nor did she try to flip onto her other side. She wasn’t looking at his face and so she felt comfortable with asking questions that started to just sit in her head. “Do you miss Emori? Is that what this is? Just wanting to hold a body?”
After a few seconds of silence, she added, “You don’t have to answer that. I’m sick and I guess I ask a lot of questions.”
Murphy pulled his arm off of her and brought it up to his forehead. He rubbed his temple and and sighed, “You’re not like Emori, you’re very much unlike her, so it’s not that.” Murphy was growing tired of this and wanted to leave-- but he also really wanted to hold her.
“I didn’t mean it like that,” she hissed, leaning herself away from him. “I wasn’t comparing myself to Emori. I was just asking if you missed being able to hold someone.” Raven clenched her jaw, staring hard at the wall across from him.
“What do you need, Raven?”
“I need to not be sick,” she muttered. “I hate relying on other people.” Raven made no obvious move to scoot back into the space she was currently leaning out of.
A short huff came through his nose and he rolled onto his back. “It’s not-- you’re not a body.” Murphy sounded terribly annoyed and he didn’t care if she knew. “I wouldn’t do this with you if I didn’t like you.”
When she said she didn’t want to be sick, he rolled back towards her. Gently wrapping his fingers around her arm and trying to pull her back to him. “Just rely on me for a little bit.”
“Fine, Murphy.” She let herself be moved, leaning back into the space she left between them. “If it means so much to you, I’ll do it for a little while.” Raven didn’t bother to look at him, peering over his shoulder. “It’s not like I get sick like this often anyway.”
“Yeah, you’re doing it for me,” he said while rolling his eyes. Murphy didn’t want to start a fight so he backpedaled, “Thank you, Raven, it does make me feel better.” He sounded a little flat, like it was forced.
“Do you want to try and sleep?” He reached up and brushed her hair back from her forehead, which was still quite warm.
With a sigh, Raven nodded her head. “Yeah, now that I am able to breathe through my nose.” The tea had helped like it was supposed to, a mild relief that Raven was grateful for. “Thanks for coming.” She turned her head slightly, peering at him. “It’s nice to know you got my back.” A smirk curled the edges of her lips. “Kind of literally.”
Murphy rolled his eyes, “Yeah, yeah, I get it.” He smiled anyway. “All right, get comfortable and take a nap. I’ll stay here.” He remembered she said she didn’t sleep-- and it was daytime anyway. He figured he could stay with her until she fell asleep and head off to work afterwards.
“Okay.” There was this urge, a little piece of her heart, that wanted to ask him to stay even when she went to sleep. Raven didn’t know why Murphy exactly. Maybe it was simply because he was the only one who wanted to care for her. Finn didn’t seem to care all too much. She tried not to think about that. Tried not to think about what Finn was thinking about, what he wasn’t thinking about.
“Here’s to hoping I wake up,” she murmured.
Sleep took Raven quickly. The exhaustion helped, but mainly it was Murphy. He made her feel safe. She could go to sleep and not worry.