espionage [h.s.]

FORTY EIGHT

HARRY

"Rochelle, come to bed. You need to get some sleep."

"No, I'm good," Rochelle replies, her fingers continuing to fly across the keyboard of my laptop. She's been sat at my desk researching something for God-knows how long now, and she's either waved me off or told me to shut up whenever I've tried to suggest that she takes a break. Her shift in mood is confusing to say the least, especially because she was having a panic attack only a few hours ago, which she has been denying, and now she's sat at my desk frantically researching something as if she's cramming for an exam tomorrow morning.

Letting out a yawn, I roll over onto my stomach, watching her from my place on the bed between my heavy eyes. It's about 2am now, and I've been been trying to get her to stop whatever she's doing on my laptop and come to bed so I can actually get some sleep too, but it doesn't look like she's about to do that anytime soon. "What are you even researching anyway?" I ask her for about the tenth time now, because she's yet to give me a real response.

"Just about repressed memories and stuff," she replies absentmindedly, the majority of her attention clearly still focused on the laptop screen. Despite the fact that she's been denying that she even had a panic attack earlier, she seems to have had some kind of breakthrough after telling me about her phobia and her experiences with it, which she for some reason can't remember. Unsurprisingly, she hasn't spoken much more about it since, but I can tell it's been the only thing on her mind. After Earl allowed her to leave the infirmary, she returned to training and completed the rest of the sessions today, but it was pretty obvious that she was distracted for the entirety of it.

As soon as training was over, I told her to come sleep at my apartment tonight, which she looked pretty relieved by, but even when we were sat together watching TV after dinner, I could tell that her mind was elsewhere. Her body felt tense as she leant against me on the couch, and I noticed she was incessantly nibbling her lip like she always does when she's thinking hard about something. It was clear that she didn't want to talk about it anymore, because it's clearly still a topic that she finds uncomfortable to discuss, even with me, so I decided not to say anything and instead waited for her to speak first. It took another fifteen minutes before she actually said anything, and when she did she just asked if she could look up something on my laptop, which is what she's been doing ever since.

After yawning again, I pull myself up off the bed and walk over to my desk where Rochelle is sitting. Her body is slumped a little in the chair, her chin resting in the palm of her hand as her brown eyes rapidly move across the bright screen, her brows furrowed low and her lips pursed in concentration. Her hair is down now, dark curls cascading down her neck and perfectly falling past her shoulders which she aimlessly runs her fingers through every so often. Even though she's been denying it, I can tell she's tired by her small yawns and the way she occasionally rubs at her eyes as if that's going to rid her of her growing need for sleep.