Various x Ftm Reader

Wake Me Up For Anything (I Mean It) ||Jake Peralta||

Cw: chronic nightmares

You had learned how to deal with the nightmares plaguing your sleep a long time ago. It was something you learned out of necessity—keeping up your job, your friends, your life all depended on it. And in a way, Jake deciding that your bed was more comfortable than his own was inconvenient for you.

You had learned how to cry silently, even with someone next to you—but reaching for your laptop to watch YouTube, or anything you thought would calm you down was a little more difficult without waking him up. You couldn't get up, turn on all the lights in the house, and walk around or make something to eat just to convince yourself that you were alright without a lengthy explanation.

Sure, all it would take was a nudge or two on the shoulder, and your boyfriend would be wrapping his arms around you in no time, even if nothing was wrong. But you didn't want to bother him. You knew this was inconvenient to say the least—you could barely get a proper night's sleep yourself, so why interrupt somebody else's? That wouldn't be fair on him. Or anyone for that matter, and Jake has been nothing but good to you.

Usually you would just tough it out in bed—laying still in bed next to him, listening to his rhythmic breaths as he slept soundly next to you. He rarely had nightmares, and when he did, he would talk about them. You envied him for that—it seemed so easy for him. But tonight, it was harder for you to do so.

You'd had a particularly bad nightmare—though that would be an understatement. You shot up in bed, your breaths uneven and panicked—it felt like you were barely getting enough air at all. Your hands felt shaky, and you could feel hot tears streaming down your cheeks.

Beside you, Jake stirred—you could hear his voice, but you couldn't make out what he was saying. You couldn't bring yourself to look at him.

You shakily tried to calm yourself down, while looking down at the blankets.

"Hey...hey..." Jake's words finally started to make sense—it's not that they didn't before, or that you hadn't heard him, they just got lost in the noise of your brain. Not that you would've had the energy to respond. You barely did now.

You only hummed in response, anything else seemed too heavy. Too much of a burden.

"Are you alright?"

"Nightmare." Was all you were able to mumble out.

"A bad one?" He asked, feeling a little stupid for asking such an obvious question. But it was all he could think of to say.

You nodded.

"Want—want to talk about it?"

You shook your head no.

Jake nodded. "Alright, that's cool...am I allowed to touch you."

You shrugged, giving it a moment before you eventually nodded.

At your permission, Jake wrapped his arms around you as tightly as he knew you liked. You found yourself closing your eyes, leaning into the touch. It had been a long time since you had someone there to comfort you after a nightmare. And while there were some parts of you that felt embarrassed for still having nightmares despite you not being a child—not to mention guilty for waking Jake up—there was a big part of you that felt relief. And with that relief came tears. The kind of tears you had not cried in a long time because your body wouldn't allow you—the kind of tears that had a weight to them, that you could feel in your chest but that felt good to let go of.

You found yourself sobbing into Jake's shoulder, your fingers digging into his back. Your words were almost incoherent as you ranted about your nonstop nightmares—how no matter what you did, they always seemed to come back. Jake held you while he listened, knowing better than to interrupt. Knowing you just needed to let it out, and leave what was heavy behind.

Not that he would know what to say, anyway, he was still piecing together everything you were saying. He rubbed his hand up and down your back, hoping it was soothing.

Once your breaths became deeper and more even, he could tell you had calmed down, but he wasn't planning on letting you go anytime soon. Not unless you tried to leave. He barely noticed your grip on his back loosen, but he didn't point it out or move his shoulder blades. You hadn't hurt him too much, and he didn't want you to think it bothered him.

"This has been happening for a while?" He eventually asked after several minutes of silence—after several minutes of you doing a breathing exercise you had clearly practiced many times before into his chest.

You nodded—you sunk lower against Jake since you started crying, your body becoming tired. Your head was pressed against his chest, close to his pulse point, but you didn't bother sitting back to look at him.

"Is it the same thing every time?"

You shook your head.

"That sounds...that sounds really difficult to deal with. I'm so sorry."

You nodded.

You were grateful he understood you not speaking.

A hand ran up your spine to your nape, and back down to the middle of your back.

"Listen, I...I can understand why you wouldn't want to wake me up after every little nightmare. But I want to help you. I want you to wake me up, even for little stuff, alright? We're supposed to be a team...a team that occasionally kisses each other and shares a bed. I want to know what's going on and I want to help you through it. We can do this together. Okay?"

You nodded. "Sorry." You mumbled, realizing you hadn't looked at it from his perspective.

"That's alright. I understand it's going to take a while, but can you promise me you'll take baby steps?"

"I think so."

"Hmm, I know you can." Jake kissed your forehead. "You're a great boyfriend, and I'm lucky to be with you, you know. You help me with so much just by remembering things I don't. I want to be able to help you with this."

You felt a heat rise to your cheeks. "Thank you."

"Of course. Now come on, let's clean that handsome face up and get you to some hopefully good sleep. And if not, you can wake me up whenever you like. I'll be here all night."