MEDICINE

03. thinking of finding nemo

When Luna came back Michael was laying in bed but she knew he wasn't sleeping. She plopped down next to him resting her head against the uncomfortable pillow.

Luna started the conversation, "We're obviously not going to sleep, so maybe we should just talk."

Luna saw the boy's shadow nod.

"If I told you to think of 'nothing' what would you think of?' she asked.

Michael thought for a while. Pondering what he should say. Luna noticed that he always took a long time to respond.

Maybe he wanted to say the right words in the perfect order without messing up. Unlike her who said whatever came to her mind then ended up regretting it later.

"Silence. A black space with no sound nor movement. What about you?" Michael said.

"I think of Finding Nemo."

They faced each other and burst into laughter, only she wasn't joking.

"When Nemo's dad and Dory go deep in the ocean. And it's all black but suddenly there's that scary demon fish thing. That's what I think of. The bottom of the ocean."

Michael let out another chuckle before everything became quiet.

As they faced each other, faces inches apart, Luna could see the bags under Michael's eyes from lack of sleep. She saw how when he laughed his eyes would crinkle, but the bags intruded and made it seem as if his eyes were swollen.

Michael noticed the same thing on Luna, only he thought that she looked beautiful anyways.

Whenever he looked her in the eye she would quickly look away and hoped he didn't notice that he face became red under his stare.

Out of nowhere, Luna hopped out of the bed leaving a gap in the sheets and opened the window.

"I can't sleep without the window open," she apologized, "I like the idea that I have a quick way out of here. An escape route of sorts."

She forgot to mention the fact that she would never actually jump out. She didn't want to kill herself, on the contrary, she wanted to live.

This time, he didn't take as long to reply. Maybe the more comfortable he was around her the quicker his replies would be. Less thought out.

Michael stated, "I can't sleep without having some noise in the background: talking, music, anything works. Could you possibly just talk gibberish to me?"

"Actually, I just got a new book, so I'll gladly read it aloud to you," Luna grinned.

He realized there needed to be more words in the English dictionary to describe Luna's smiles.

"That would be spectacular, Lunar."

Even in the semi darkness he could tell she rolled her eyes. Slowly she picked up a book from the nightstand and began reading.

For how long she read neither of them could remember. All Luna could remember is how at some point he put his am around her and brought her close. She thought his arm made a much nicer pillow than the one provided.

All he remembered is that somehow, he fell asleep for more than ten minutes. Only to be later slapped across the face and woken up by Luna for thrashing her in the gut. But he also remembered how melodic her voice sounded. Even as her voice got raspier she continued reading.

He didn't pay much attention to the book itself. She didn't pay much attention to anything else besides the book.

That was how they spent their first night together. Not asleep. But not fully awake either.

**crappy ending I'm sorry, do you think we could get this to 150 reads?? That would be pretty awesome**