InsaneJournal

Tweak says, "Hey."

Dean Thomas (artistdean) wrote in finnigans_rpg,
@ 2015-01-12 12:07:00

Entry tags:

character: dean thomas, character: seamus finnigan, status: complete

(Not so) Sweet dreams are made of this
Who: Dean and Seamus
What: Interrupted sleep (Dean has a nightmare)
Where: Granada, Spain, their hotel room
When: Middle of Sunday Night/Monday Morning
Rating: SFW for now

Dean and Seamus had arrived in Spain and got themselves settled after Battlescars had finished on Sunday. They'd done a little exploring of the area around their hotel and had some food and headed in. Dean, at least, always felt tired after travelling any particular distance, whether it was by a muggle or magical method so they hadn't stopped up very late.

Dean had taken the bed nearest the door after some thought. Usually when he slept at Seamus' he slept against the wall, but since that wasn't an option he preferred to be away from the window. Despite being in a strange bed he'd managed to drop off relatively quickly, which possibly should have been a warning sign. That and how hard the bed was.

He cycled through his sleep, shifting slightly from time to time until suddenly his mind dropped into the place he hated. He was lying on the hard ground under a starry sky just visible through the cover of trees. He'd been dozing as one of the goblins kept watch from outside the main glare of the fire, but his body was suddenly on alert. He could hear something in the trees. A sound too loud for an animal, too specific. He couldn't move, he couldn't speak. The sound was coming nearer and he couldn't move, couldn't defend himself. Then there was a voice, a horrible growl of a voice which he knew could only be bad news. It uttered spells, spells that must be killing his friends, his travelling companions, killing them or hurting them. Nobody to come to his aid.

Outside of his mind, his body in the bed was unnaturally still, breathing hard but little more than small whines and whimpers coming from him. Trapped in the snare of a nightmare where he could do nothing.

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openbottle
2015-01-12 02:29 pm UTC (link)

Seamus hadn't managed to fall asleep as quickly. He couldn't have said whether it was the unfamiliar surroundings, overexcitement from travelling or anxieties about leaving his pub for nearly a week but something kept him up long after Dean's breathing had evened out. In the dark, he listened as the rest of the hotel seemed to settle for the night. After a couple of noisy parties had found their rooms, there was little enough other noise to bother him.

Seamus trusted Dominic and Susan and the rest of his staff to look after the pub, he really did, but it was strange to think Finnigan's closing and opening without him there. What if Susan got ambushed on a case, and Dominic came down with dragon pox and Bryn got food poisoning? Seamus wouldn't even know until he got back.

Something snapped Seamus out of his contemplation of the million-and-one unlikely ways things could go wrong without him there (what if the duelling club accidentally set fire to the loft?). He blinked his eyes open, but nothing in the room had changed. He was about to close his eyes and make another attempt at going to sleep when he heard it - a low whine from Dean's bed. A whine that he recognised. Seamus sat up, swinging his legs down so his feet rested on the carpet. "Dean?"

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artistdean
2015-01-12 02:55 pm UTC (link)

The noise came closer, Dean's heart beating wildly in his frozen body as footsteps approached. They were definitely footsteps now. He wanted to get away, move, run, flee, but he couldn't move still. No twitch of muscles lower than his throat. He whimpered and heard the steps crunch in a turn at the noise.

He wanted to scramble away, push up and out of his paralysis, flee. Hell even twitch his wand in a spell. Anything.

He heard his name on the wind. It was a trick. They had made his companions tell. Tortured them for names. He could hear their screams rent the air. He whimpered.

It was Hermione's scream. Always her scream. The cold stone of the Malfoy cellar at this back as the scene changed.

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openbottle
2015-01-12 03:03 pm UTC (link)

Seamus peered across the darkened room at Dean, his wand already in his hand. "Dean," he said again, more loudly this time, since he hadn't managed to wake Dean before. "It's Seamus. It's alright. You're safe, we're in Spain." He stood up, moving towards the bed but not close enough for Dean to catch him with a flailing limb if he did wake up. Sometimes just talking was enough to wake Dean and sometimes it wasn't. He wouldn't shout - he couldn't imagine that someone shouting at you was a good way to wake from anything.

He lit his wand, thinking the light might help too. "Come on, Dean," he said, keeping his tone conversational. "Wake up or else I'm going to get in bed with you and then you'll probably elbow me in the stomach - again - and feel bad about it."

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artistdean
2015-01-12 03:37 pm UTC (link)

There was a voice, the voice was breaking through the screams and the cold. It was his name. He knew that, and it was Seamus' voice. He knew that voice. That voice had nothing to do with Malfoy Manor. Only in his worst nightmares. That was what this was. A nightmare.

He woke with a yelp, arms and legs flailing out in the motion he couldn't make in his sleep. He scrambled up to the head of the bed, movements hurried and slightly uncoordinated. "Shit," he said with quiet force, wavering at the edge of both anger and tears. His eyes flicked around the room, landing on Seamus with a silent plea before examining his knees where they were folded up in his encircling arms.

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openbottle
2015-01-12 03:55 pm UTC (link)

As soon as he was sure Dean was awake, Seamus wasted no time in joining him on the bed. He sat cross-legged on the mattress in front of his friend, leaning forward slightly. "Hey, it's alright," he said, smiling. He much preferred dealing with a Dean who was awake and knew what year it was, no matter how emotional. "You didn't even get me this time." It was a weak joke, but Seamus was just trying to normalise the situation, bring Dean back to here and now where there was nothing more dangerous than his own windmilling limbs.

"Everything's okay," he said, more seriously. "I haven't even been to sleep yet." He could have added that if anything had wanted to get into the room he would've noticed, but didn't want to put the idea of things lurking in the dark into Dean's head if it wasn't there already. "You okay?"

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artistdean
2015-01-12 04:59 pm UTC (link)

Dean's mouth twitched slightly at the joke, and because he was pleased he hadn't managed to hit Seamus. Sometimes he flailed out in his nightmares, sometimes just when he woke up, but it was something any friends he'd stayed with had been dealing with for years. Didn't help that he was stronger than he looked and had long limbs.

"Sorry. I... I should have taken my potion," he said, mentally kicking himself for his idiocy. He looked up and sighed, the tendrils of nightmare letting go of their hold on him slowly. "I'm...not okay, but I will be?" he said, not sure. "We can't have candles can we?" he said, trying to remember the rules about the hotel. He could do with something. Something from his travel kit, a hug from Seamus. Something to help the feeling leave. At least he wasn't having a panic attack. Always a good sign.

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openbottle
2015-01-12 05:39 pm UTC (link)

Seamus shrugged. "Couldn't have known you'd need it," he said. "And it's not like you've done any damage, as long as you'll be okay." He looked around at their bags - trying to see if he could spot a candle. He could have rifled through Dean's things, it wasn't like he'd have minded, but since he had his wand in his hand already - "Accio candle." He caught the small candle that came soaring towards him neatly enough. "Who's going to know?" he asked. He was far from the only Gryffindor with a certain disregard for rules, but really... as long as they didn't go to sleep with the candle burning what harm could it do?

He lit the candle with another spark of magic and floated it over to the table on Dean's side of the bed. Not that the single bed was really big enough to have sides. "Budge over," he demanded, wriggling under the covers on Dean's other side. "Cold," he added, by way of explanation. It was true, too. They hadn't bothered with heating charms on the room and wearing just his thin t-shirt and boxers Seamus was going to make use of the covers that were provided.

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artistdean
2015-01-12 07:26 pm UTC (link)

"Strange bed, weird smells. It's a pretty good bet," he said, his face twitching in annoyance at himself, at the situation. He was so used to managing his PTSD he sometimes got lax. Apparently that was what had happened. He smiled when Seamus set about creating a environment for his self-care. He loved that his friends knew how to do this for him. "Fire alarms?" he suggested, starting to shiver slightly. It was one of the effects of his nightmares sometimes.

He shuffled over immediately Seamus asked. Not that there was very far to go. They were two grown men trying to fit into one fairly small bed, but they could make it work. It's not like they had many compunctions about personal space with each other. And snuggling down like this was familiar. Safe. Seamus was right, it wasn't exactly warm, although warmer than England. He kept quiet as they arranged and rearranged themselves until they were something resembling comfortable.

"I brought it. I'll take it the rest of the week I think," he said quietly into the dim room. The flickering candle providing light and fragrance.

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openbottle
2015-01-12 07:59 pm UTC (link)

Fire alarms. Seamus hadn't considered that possibility, but he studied the candle carefully and it wasn't producing very much heat or smoke. If he could have been bothered, he would have figured out some kind of shield charm but it honestly didn't seem like it was going to be an issue.

As they rearranged themselves, Seamus did his best to wrap around Dean. It wasn't easy, especially given he was the shorter of the two of them by quite a way, but he could feel Dean shivering and he knew it wasn't cold enough in the room to merit that so he figured a little extra contact wouldn't be unappreciated. "Think you'll be alright tonight?" he asked, pillowing his cheek against Dean's upper arm. "Because you're not getting rid of me now, and if I'm going to be woken up by you bashing me around the head I'd like some warning." He was only kidding and he hoped Dean knew it. Seamus would never - had never - asked Dean to take the potion just for Seamus's sake. He didn't much like the idea of Dean suffering, but he'd always let him make the choice for himself.

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artistdean
2015-01-12 09:28 pm UTC (link)

Dean's tendency to sleep naked only extended to when he was in his own bed, but he was only wearing boxers and an old tshirt and the warmth of skin was far more comforting than it had been when Ophelia had tried sleeping over. It was familiarity here. "Don't want you to go," he said, curling his free arm over to squeeze up to Seamus more.

"Dunno," he said. "What time is it? Because I'll sleep a minimum of seven hours once I take it, I don't know whether to skip it for tonight." The you're here hung vaguely in the air. He bit his lip and considered Seamus in the fuzzy light before looking back at the generic hotel room art on the opposite wall. It probably didn't matter if they slept in late. It was a holiday after all. All it might mean was that they had to buy breakfast.

He was definitely feeling more relaxed now than when he'd first woken.

"I think it was the bed being hard didn't help," he said, kicking it faintly with a heel. It wasn't all that hard really, but Dean had slowly but surely come around to wanting a soft bed to remind him he wasn't stuck in the place where most of his nightmares had been born when he woke up again.

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openbottle
2015-01-13 09:15 am UTC (link)

Seamus smiled at that. "Always nice to hear." Though, obviously, if he'd thought Dean was likely to kick him out of bed he wouldn't have snuggled up quite so comfortably, nor as quickly. Still, there was something comforting about being explicitly told that he was welcome. As for what time it was, Seamus wasn't sure. "One or two o'clock, maybe,' he hazarded. "So you could still be awake by nine, at the latest. M'not planning on getting up earlier than that anyway." Seamus was not an early riser even when he was working, let alone when he was on holiday. Despite all this, he made no attempt to move. If Dean wanted his potion he could either shove Seamus out of his comfortable position or summon it over magically.

After thinking quietly for a few minutes, Seamus blinked his eyes open once more. (He didn't remember closing them...) "Tomorrow we can... enlarge one of the pillows maybe. Put it down on top of the mattress. Might make it feel softer. Just have to remember to undo it before we go or they'll wonder why we brought a massive pillow with us. And where we put it."

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artistdean
2015-01-13 03:40 pm UTC (link)

Dean hummed vaguely in agreement. It wasn't like he particularly liked early mornings, they just happened because of how his sleep cycled and was terrible. "Thought it was later," he muttered. And he had. Nightmares were pretty disorientating time-wise and he usually had a clock with glowing numbers for just that reason. "'Kay, watch your head," he said, shuffling his arm out from under Seamus' head so he could reach his wand. He summoned the small case of individual vials he'd brought with him, massively thankful it was magically warded against breakage as well as having unbreakable vials. He caught the soft box and flipped it open. He had a full week's worth of his calming potion and the sleeping one, as well as a couple of the emergency vials he hadn't used in months. He pulled out one of the appropriate vials and set the box aside.

He didn't want to take it until they were both comfortable since it knocked him out pretty quickly once he took it. Then he realised Seamus was nodding off already and smiled softly when he twitched properly awake again.

"Yeah, we'll work something out. Always do," he said quietly. He broke the seal on his vial and swallowed the contents. He didn't even make a face at the slightly odd taste. It was just one of the lesser reasons he wasn't the biggest fan of taking it. "Go to sleep. I'll be there in about three minutes," he said, setting the vial down and letting Seamus resettle himself as he wanted. He could already feel the pull of the potion as he let his head fall to the side and vaguely hoping he wouldn't snore or jab Seamus somewhere important as his last thought before he fell into magically, blessedly dream-free sleep.

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openbottle
2015-01-13 04:24 pm UTC (link)

As Dean moved, Seamus resettled himself against the actual pillow and pulled the blankets up higher on his chest. He felt almost as if he'd taken a potion himself - sleepiness hitting him out of nowhere. By the time he managed to murmur "Candle," Dean was already dozing. Seamus reached for his wand, glad he hadn't thrown it to the floor as he'd been tempted to while they were rearranging. He doused the candle and - luckily - the slight line of smoke it sent up didn't result in blaring noise from any kind of muggle device.

Satisfied that the hotel room wouldn't burn down, Seamus extended a hand to the table on the opposite side and dropped his wand there. He spent a few minutes listening to Dean's regular breathing beside him, thinking about their plans for the next day - and the day after that, and the day after that - and how amazing it was to have an actual week off work. That was all it took to send him off to sleep at last.

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