Alan (Leave Me To Dream)

Chapter 7

Trigger Warning: mild sad/unreality/dissociative thoughts

---timeskip to 17 days later, it is now around midday on a Friday---

Dan slowly opened his eyes, blinking away his blurry vision. His head throbbed, a symptom of oversleeping he had become used to. He sat up, taking a moment before heading out into the kitchen to get himself a glass of water. The front door shut loudly, causing Dan to flinch.

"You skipped again? Dan, exam block starts in a week, what are you doing?" PJ walked over to Dan cautiously, a worried look on his face. He didn't want to cause tension between the two of them but he needed to say something to Dan. He was seriously starting to worry about him skipping so much class and even going so far as to cancel work.

"I've been really tired recently, I can't do exams if I'm falling asleep." Dan yawned, leaning against the kitchen counter lazily.

"Dan how can you be tired, you've been sleeping twelve hours every night or more!"

"Well maybe I happen to enjoy sleep. I've been feeling great since I moved it to the top of my priority list, you should try it some time." Dan tried to act normal but PJ wasn't buying it. Dan was going to bed at nine at night and sleeping until midday, subsequently missing everything in his usual schedule that didn't fall within those time parameters. Granted he spent several of the hours between nine and twelve either trying to get to sleep or trying to get back to sleep but PJ was right, he had been managing about twelve hours a night for the past eight days.

"Look Dan, I'm just worried about you. I don't think you should be forcing yourself to sleep so much, it can't be healthy."

"Well it makes me happy. Most of the time at the cafe I struggle not to throw hot drinks at grumpy customers. Sleeping sure beats getting up at half past five in the morning for that nonsense." Dan couldn't tell PJ the real reason for him wanting to sleep so much, he'd just think he was crazy and band together with Louise to get him locked up in some asylum.

"Well last time I checked sleeping didn't pay bills. What are you going to live off if you keep cancelling your shifts at work just because they 'start too early in the morning for you'?"

"I have savings."

"And what happens when those savings get depleted. I can't pay your half of the bills for you Dan, I'm just as much of a broke uni student as you are." Dan panicked as the tone in PJ's voice moved from concerned to frustrated. He was right, his evading work wouldn't just affect him, it would affect PJ too. But for the past week he had no longer been able to find it in himself to set alarms, to get up early and to interrupt his and Phil's shenanigans in the dream world. They always ended abruptly if he set an alarm. The only way they would come to a natural end was if Dan allowed himself to awaken naturally. Even without Phil being there he wondered if he could set an alarm, the place growing more fantastical and more stable by the night. Each time he journeyed into his dreams it became closer to reality until now it was becoming difficult to tell the difference between being awake and asleep. Dan's only real clue being his lack of abilities in the 'real world'.

"Dan... Dan! Are you even listening to me?" PJ snapped his fingers in front of Dan's face, drawing his friend's attention away from his thoughts.

"Dan, you didn't even hand in your last assignment, the one for marketing. You're going to have to get at least eighty-five percent on the final exam if you even want to pass the subject."

"Last time I checked you weren't my mum. I don't have to deal with this from you." Dan walked huffily into his room, shutting the door behind him loudly. Once inside he slumped down onto the floor and closed his eyes. He took deep breaths and tried to relax but it was no use, he wasn't going to be able to get back to sleep for a while now. So he sat in his room, staring off into space. The past few days for him had just felt like hours of waiting for sleep to come. Everything inside his dreams was so vivid, so lively and full of life. He could do anything, see anything, battle armies or traverse mountains, visit fantasy lands, battle super villains, giving himself any superpower he could imagine to defeat them. And he got to do it all with Phil by his side, smiling his big, beautifully crooked smile, making dorky jokes and adding yet more moves to their super secret handshake known only to them (and Buffy). If Dan had disliked waking up before he despised it now. It meant leaving that world and all its wonders behind only to find himself stuck in this wasteland for another twelve or so hours before he could get back again.