Credit goes to: http://sadeyes-badguys-whitelies.tumblr.com
You opened your eyes to find the sun already streaming into the bedroom. You didn't know what time it was, and you didn't care – it was the first morning in months that you had both been afforded the luxury of a lie-in.
Michael was breathing shallowly beside you, his body curled up on his side. You wrapped your arm around his waist, thinking he was still asleep, but then you heard him mumble. "Good morning kitten."
You tucked your body closer to the warmth of his back. "Morning baby."
He brought one of your hands up to his mouth, kissing along your knuckles before he spoke. "How did you sleep?"
You kissed along his shoulder. "Good," you said. "Really good."
The apartment wasn't exactly ideal: it had a leaky tap in the bathroom and a kitchen window that would only open if you pushed on the frame a certain way, but none of that mattered to you – you would live anywhere as long as Michael was there with you.
He worked three jobs to pay the rent: the morning shift in a coffee shop, afternoons in a record store downtown and most nights in a dive bar a few blocks away. You wanted to help, you had begged him to even let you get a part time job on the weekends, you wanted to take some of the pressure off him. But he was determined that you graduated, you only had three weeks left of school and he was adamant that he could support you until you finished; he wasn't going to let you sacrifice your education – you had already made enough sacrifices to be with him.
*
You made it almost a year without anyone finding out, almost twelve whole months before your lies finally caught up with you.
You didn't mean to fall asleep that night, you had just meant to rest your eyes for a minute; that had been at 9.30pm – when you opened your eyes it was 1.05am.
"Oh fuck," you yelped, jumping out of Michael's bed and scrambling around to try and find your clothes on his floor.
"What's wrong?" Michael mumbled from the bed, his eyes still closed.
It's 1am," you said, unable to fight the sick feeling in your stomach as your hastily put your underwear back on.
"Shit," Michael said, rubbing his face with his hands as he sat up. "I thought you set an alarm?"
"I did," you said, pulling your dress over your head. "My battery died."
"Fuck," Michael said, getting out of bed and grabbing his discarded clothes from the floor.
"I'm dead," you said. "I'm actually dead."
You felt Michael's hands on your shoulders. "It's OK baby," he said. "It'll be OK."
You closed your eyes and allowed your body to sink back into his grasp; you needed one more moment for it just to be you and him, one more moment before it was all snatched away from you.
"I need to go," you said reluctantly, wishing that you could just stay in that room with him forever.
Michael nodded and followed you out of the room as you walked in silence to his car.
When you pulled up outside your house you could see that the living room light was still on, and you knew the game really was up.
"Shit," you sighed, dropping your head into your hands.
You felt Michael begin to rub gentle circles onto your back. "Do you want me to come in with you?"
You shook your head – you knew that would only make things worse.
