Re: adrian's room: adrian m/newt p
[Adrian sagged against Newt. That embrace was precisely what he'd wanted, pathetic as it was. He found he craved touch lately in a way he couldn't remember ever wanting it before, but he'd been too concerned with keeping his head up to ask for it.] Thank you. [The comforter was also soothing, in an almost primitive way. Even in his distress, there was a spark of pleasure in watching it lift, invisibly, and settle across their legs together. He grasped the edge and tugged it a little further up.
His skin warmed a little, pressed against Newt, under the covers, and he felt himself flush. He thought about this, sometimes, when he couldn't sleep. He would imagine a ghost next to him, some imaginary weight and warmth with Newt's face, and it sometimes made it easier.
There was no sign of the blackness anywhere in the room anymore. A nameless sensation of something wrong always accompanied it, a leaden veil over everything. That too was lifting, inch by inch. Adrian's breathing slowed, more naturally this time.] That does sound sad. [Still a little drowsy, but getting more alert.
Newt stiffened, then, and so did Adrian, looking at him with growing alarm.] Newt?
[It was only a moment, and then Newt croaked, and he was with him in the room again.] Are you alright? [He'd forgotten about his own distress altogether. Newt explained, at at least no one was dead, and there were no sad children this time around. Curious, not bad, and it had happened so fast Adrian hadn't even had a chance to panic.] So they aren't all terrible. [He leaned against Newt again.] It sounds like something out of the Arabian Nights.
[It was terrible that they were being yanked from their bodies to experience something out of someone else's life. Still, even without his panic fully cooled, Adrian's mind was churning with the possibilities. His voice still crackled with lack of sleep, but he'd become intellectually engaged in the idea.] An evening, all in a moment. That's fascinating. Since it isn't being experienced in real time, I wonder if the memory is being 'written' to long-term memory in the brain like a download in a computer. So it isn't actually experienced - instead it's added to the bank of other memories, and we only feel it so strongly because it's suddenly the freshest and most vivid. [He pondered that, quietly, and then asked:] Were any of them very beautiful? These people you had your fine evening with.