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Feb. 4th, 2005 01:21 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
flybywash-- and Wash snaps awake with a yell.
It's pitch black, and his eyes and tongue are still throbbing with phantom pains. One trembling hand moves for the right side of the bed. He's loathe to wake Zoe, but, in the lingering throes of his dream, he's desperate for some reassurance, however small, that she's --
There. Still sleeping. Lăotiān, bù, how can she still be...? Wash's hand fumbles at her shoulder, slides down to her flattened stomach, lingers on her hip as he gasps for air, desperately trying to feeling out the rise and fall of Zoe's body as she breathes; as she lives.
She stirs. Warm, smooth skin shifts underneath his fingers. Wash pulls away, shutting his eyes as he rubs the heel of his palms against his forehead; he remains there for a long while, hunched over and gulping as he struggles to move back toward himself.
"Shit," he whispers at last in a small, half-choked sob. His hands move down to scrub at his eyes. "Shit, shit, shit..."
And when he finally sinks back against the bed and wraps his arms around his wife, chin pressed to her shoulder -- not to rest, but to hold onto something real -- his heart's still thudding out three beats to match each one of hers.
He doesn't even try to go back to sleep.
It's pitch black, and his eyes and tongue are still throbbing with phantom pains. One trembling hand moves for the right side of the bed. He's loathe to wake Zoe, but, in the lingering throes of his dream, he's desperate for some reassurance, however small, that she's --
There. Still sleeping. Lăotiān, bù, how can she still be...? Wash's hand fumbles at her shoulder, slides down to her flattened stomach, lingers on her hip as he gasps for air, desperately trying to feeling out the rise and fall of Zoe's body as she breathes; as she lives.
She stirs. Warm, smooth skin shifts underneath his fingers. Wash pulls away, shutting his eyes as he rubs the heel of his palms against his forehead; he remains there for a long while, hunched over and gulping as he struggles to move back toward himself.
"Shit," he whispers at last in a small, half-choked sob. His hands move down to scrub at his eyes. "Shit, shit, shit..."
And when he finally sinks back against the bed and wraps his arms around his wife, chin pressed to her shoulder -- not to rest, but to hold onto something real -- his heart's still thudding out three beats to match each one of hers.
He doesn't even try to go back to sleep.
