Promised Land

[15] Mostly Fluffy Filler, But I Think We All Need This

It's when he realizes that his neck is cramped up and awkwardly angled that he slowly begins to wake up. It's stiff, and it definitely doesn't feel like he's on his bed anymore.

The sound of a bird-- a mourning dove, he recognizes, somehow-- also stirs him awake. He opens his eyes and.

He's not in his bedroom.

Not even in the orphanage-- everything the day before had felt like a dream, no matter how many times he pinched himself and tried to ground himself, it was still real and not a dream. Which was nice, for once, especially after the bizarre dream he had a week ago.

But it wasn't even the new bedroom he had, at his new house, with his new family.

No, he was awkwardly laying on the couch in the living room.

Early-morning sunlight gently cuts through the windows, sending golden rays to the ground. The couch is just too small for him to be lying on, but his legs are tucked up and his head is awkwardly laying atop a throw pillow, and there's a soft blanket thrown over his body.

Ah.

He must've-- he must've sleepwalked, again. But this time he didn't end up waking up outside in the morning dew, or somewhere awkward, like the bathtub, or end up hurting himself. This time, he had been guided-- he assumed-- to lay down somewhere else.

He wonders who did it.

He sits up too quickly. There's a sore feeling in his neck, most definitely from the pillow on the couch he was just a little too tall to be sleeping on. Massaging it gently makes it a little less intense, but he'll probably notice it irritated throughout the morning.

He stretches his arms. They pop a little bit as he does so, but it feels a little better. It helps wake him up a bit more. No one else is in the living room, but he hears someone in the kitchen, and Ranboo awkwardly stands to follow the noise.

"Good morning, Ranboo." Phil greets him. He's got a cup of coffee in one hand, and he's still looking through some paperwork from the orphanage. Sister Agnes was very detail-oriented, it seems. "Sleep well?"

He shrugs, a bit. The rest of the house is quiet. It is a Wednesday-- Tommy and Wilbur were probably at school, he assumes. It was eight. "I guess. I sleepwalked, though."

Phil nods. "Wil said he found you staring at the pantry at about two this morning."

Ranboo wonders why he would go to the pantry first-thing, but he wonders a lot of things. Like, why is there suffering in the world? And, if God forgives all sin, why do we have to go to confession? Especially, what in the world happens when I sleepwalk?

Well, the answer seems to be he's hungry. It's about the time the orphanage would have breakfast together, after all, but he doesn't know how it works at his new home yet.

"Feel free to make yourself whatever," Phil adds. "We've got some cereal, eggs, toast, I can cook up some bacon or sausages if you really want some of those, too."

"Cereal sounds fine." He says. He doesn't want to ask Phil to cook something up if he's already focused on something. Squinting a bit, he can tell it's his school records. Probably incredibly entertaining to read, which is why Phil definitely has the cup of coffee with him.

It's a different mug from last night. This one looks like a frog.

They do have a wide array of cereals, from sugary sweet monstrosities that Ranboo can only imagine Tommy eating, to more boring, stale cereals like raisin bran, which he imagines Technoblade having and he can't help but stifle a chuckle at. There's a box of rice krispies, which as plain as it sounds, is the only option Ranboo can recognize other than the boring ones, so he grabs it and finds a yellow bowl.