after all these years

Six

Amy had her suspicious, when it came to Mark.

She had seen it in her friends when they came home from parties, drunk and alone. She had seen it when they had just gotten out of a toxic relationship. On billboards and PSAs and pamphlets - she had seen it everywhere.

But she never expected to see it in Mark.

In hindsight, she probably should have expected it. How he was acting - it wasn't anything new. Amy was used to waking up in the middle of the night with an empty space in the bed beside her, or calming down the man from a panic attack after she had brushed against his waist.

She just - never put it together like that before.

And she still wasn't, not really. Amy hadn't let herself think about it after the thought first crossed her mind - it wasn't her place, Mark would come to her when he was ready, every excuse she could think of to keep herself from prying.

The bed dips beside her, and Amy snaps her eyes shut. Mark waves a hand in front of her face, she can tell by the small draft he creates, and gets up from the bed.

He's been doing this almost every night. Is it really too much to think that she might be concerned?

A soft click signifies that he left the room, and she slowly opens her eyes again. She's not looking at anything - the wall has stayed the same for the past four hours - but it's easier, somehow, to think with her eyes open.

Would it really be awful of her to pry? It was for Mark's own good, after all.

But then the image of him crying on the floor floats across her vision, and she decides that, yeah, maybe invading his privacy isn't the best thing right now. Even if she's scared (gods, she's so scared).

Mark comes back three hours later, when she's drifting between sleep and wakefulness, and settles down beside her. His hand comes to rest on her upper arm, and Amy almost cries. This is the most he's touched her in days.

With the warm weight of his hand on her and the steady sound of their breathing, she falls asleep.

"Good morning," Mark murmurs, gently shaking her arm. She lets out an inhuman noise - something between a groan and a gurgle - and he laughs. "Didn't know I was sleeping next to Ethan."

"Haha," she deadpans, rolling over to face him. The sheets are the perfect mix of warm and cool, and she can't resist the urge to snuggle into them. "Hi."

"Hi? You can try to distract me by being adorable all you want, but we have to get up." The hand on her shoulder moves to running up and down the length of her arm, and she lets herself relax into it.

"No we don't. We could stay here forever. It's comfy."

It's hard to imagine that the person she was thinking about the night before is the same one staring at her now.

Mark smiles bittersweetly, and Amy feels like she's missing something. "I know, I know. I wish we could stay here, too."

She wants to play along with whatever this weird hidden-messages game is, but she doesn't even know where to start. So, she does the next best thing and moves to sit up. "Alright, I'm up. Whaddya want?"

He sits up, too, and fiddles with the hem of the blanket. "We have to film today."

"Ew," she mutters, but the disgust is diluted by the fact that she's standing up, out of the bed. "Do we have to?"

"Unfortunately."

Shaking her head sadly, Amy just grabs her clothes and begins to get changed. Mark, of course, quickly flees to the bathroom.