the bones of our past - Lockwood x Lucy

My Covers So Cold (Without You Beneath Them)

A/N: I promised you something soft and something soft you shall receive. (But not without a tiiiiny slice of angst :).)

Also, I wrote the second half of this chapter whilst only listening to "Labyrinth" by Taylor Swift, so do with that information what you want :)

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Lucy was laying in her bed inside the hotel and couldn't quite retrace how she got there.

In her mind, the last few hours were a single rush, moments pressed over one another with no way of distinguishing them. Everything seemed to have happened at the same time; everything had left her without breath to prepare for the next thing.

It didn't help that all the while, she had still been drifting in and out of consciousness, one adrenaline injection not enough to wholly ban the ghost-touch's impact from her body.

So really, when she tried to look back on those few hours, it was a slideshow of stills rather than a continuous stream of events.

There were Lockwood and Mary, dragging her out of the woods whilst George was warding off any shade that dared to get too close to them.

There were green lights shining down on her as they finally reached the town, mixed with Mary's chaotic navigation as she tried to get them to the doctor's house.

There was Lockwood's voice, talking to her with a kind of forced joy, telling her about everything and anything, trying to get her to respond to him, trying to keep her eyes open and mind working.

And then there they were, at the door: There was a loud noise from George ringing the doorbell non-stop until the old doctor opened up, sleep still evident in his features, and ushered them in.

At this point, Lucy remembered that she had needed a few seconds to recall the doctor's name. Doctor Cooke. She had always had to come see him after a case nearly gone wrong. And after the one that did go wrong.

Someone had laid her down on a gurney then, and all she could see was the brightness of the ceiling light.

For a moment, Lucy had thought the sun might've been back.

But no, there were her best friends and her little sister, keeping close to her whilst the doctor administered further treatment.

Lucy remembered the pure relief she'd felt. Warmth had flooded through her, filling her oh-so-cold veins. For what felt like the first time in forever, she had felt her muscles release their tension and her mind relax.

After that, Lucy's memory got a bit hazier again, probably because relaxation had also brought on an age-old weariness settling over her bones as soon as the adrenaline had ebbed down.

She didn't remember explicitly arguing with Doctor Cooke and her friends to not have to stay the night on the gurney in his living room and sleep at the hotel instead, but it must've happened, and she was also fairly certain she had used some choice words while doing so.

And so, here she was: Laying alone in her cold hotel room, the skin of her leg still pulsing from the sickness and its cure.

The only problem? Despite how tired her mind and body felt, Lucy couldn't seem to find any sleep. She didn't know how long she'd laid in her bed by now, painfully awake, but the events of the night were still alive and running wild in her head. It didn't let her find any rest.

Annoyed, she sighed as she rolled over onto her side once more. Maybe, if she did this often and hard enough, she would just knock herself out.

George and Lockwood would be asleep right now in their respective beds - they shared one room with two beds to keep expenses down. Mary had offered to stay with Lucy, but Lucy knew that she had to work tomorrow evening. She needed to get at least a little bit of sleep if she wanted to be functional, and Lucy had already suspected that lying next to her, Mary wouldn't get a wink of it. So Mary had said goodbye to them after they had left Doctor Cooke's and promised to meet up with them first thing in the morning.