The whole damn time

Wordfind

It wasn't the first time that she'd cried out in her sleep. Nor was it the first time that she'd wrapped herself in her blankets so tightly that she resembled a caterpillar with a human head. And it wasn't the first time that he'd heard her screams and come into her room to comfort her.

But it was the first time that she had responded to him in quite that way, throwing her arms around his neck and holding him so tightly that he thought he was being strangled. She sobbed into his sweater and he patted her back rather awkwardly, feeling her nails dig into his skin.

"Shh, shh, it's okay."

"No," came her weak cry. "No."

"I'm here, it's okay." He said softly.

She didn't say anything, but her sobs quietened a little. It was then that he realised how cold she was in his arms, and how she was shivering and shaking with every unsteady breath she took.

Fitz moved one hand off her back and clumsily grabbed her duvet, wrapping it around them both. She stopped sobbing and buried her head in his chest, but tears were still leaking out of her eyes. "You all right?" He asked, concerned, and she nodded. Fitz sighed and held one hand on her back and the other in her matted brown hair.

"I'm sorry, Fitz." Those were the words she spoke only a few days ago and he felt worried that maybe she was having second thoughts about things, but he kept his face still and buried it in her hair instead.

"Don't be. It's okay."

"I'm sorry to wake you up." So that's what it was. He let out a breath that he didn't even realise he was holding.

"Do you need anything?" He asked her softly.

She lifted her head from his chest and looked at him through red-rimmed eyes. "Just don't go. Please?"

"I won't, I promise."

"I just don't want to lose you." She whispered in a voice that broke his heart. She sounded so vulnerable, weak and scared, a far cry from usual perky Jemma, and he hated seeing her like this.

"You won't. Beside you the whole damn time, remember?" He reassured her, and she stopped crying, sniffing a little and wiping her nose on a tissue he offered her.

"It was a nightmare. Not real. Silly Jemma, getting all worked up over a dream." She said, the ghost of a smile on her pale face. "I'm okay now."

Fitz scoffed. "You're not silly, and you're definitely not okay. Is there anything you need, blankets, tea, snacks?" He asked again.

"Tea would be lovely. Thank you, Leo." She smiled up at him as he left the room.

A few minutes later, they were both sitting on her bunk with steaming mugs of tea in their hands and blankets around their shoulders. Some of the colour had returned to her face and she had fully stopped crying now, and the only hint of her breakdown was the slight tinge of red around her warm brown eyes. She had run a brush through her hair while he was gone and had put some pajama pants on, which she thought was more appropriate given the circumstances.

"Do you want to talk about it now?" He asked, and she nodded her head.

"You know how when you do a wordfind, you search really hard for one word but find another?" She said, and he wondered where this was heading. She had been known to have bad dreams about incomplete wordfinds and cryptic crosswords, but the way she had cried earlier was well too extreme for just a missing word.

"When I accepted the opportunity for us to go on the BUS, I was searching for an adventure. A life-changing experience, an exciting tale to someday tell. I got my adventure, plenty of it, actually, but I found something else along the way. Or, should I say, I found someone.

"Sure, we were best friends before the team was put together, but that was all we were. Just plodding along, content with ourselves and our status as friends. But now, after we've almost died several times, and Skye has too, I realise that life really is too short to just stay as we are. And I know that I would never be happy to see you with anyone else, living another life, or even gone before I had the chance to tell you how I really felt." She paused for a moment, tears springing in the corners of her eyes, and Fitz gently wiped them away.

"That's what my nightmare was about. It's my greatest fear, losing you, scarier to me than dying, or getting blown up or something. If I lose you, I lose myself, Fitz, because if you were gone, I don't know what I would do."

"I feel the same way." Fitz said, taking her hand. She felt his thumb tracing perfect circles on her palm, and somehow he took her fear away just by being there and looking into her soul with his crystal blue eyes.

Simmons shuffled over on the bed until their hips were touching, resting her head on his shoulder like she usually did. "Don't ever go."

"I wouldn't dream of it."