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It was 5am when she woke, and Caitlin slipped downstairs as quietly as she could, so as not to wake the rest of the volleyball team living in the Dig. She took one of the spare balls from down the side of the couch, and headed to the beach. It might not be a real beach - she had given up on those the moment she got her acceptance letter from Samwell - but it was nice to pretend that she hadn’t traded in for indoor courts. Today, she kind of wished she could pretend she had never given up softball, or that she was any good at ice skating. Instead, she walked, dribbling the volleyball as if it were a basketball, to the beach.
She practiced until sunrise, serving the ball time and time again, pushing herself until she had worn a patch of grass down to dirt which her shoes slipped on with every jump. Then she hit it into the bushes and tripped on a branch trying to retrieve it, and at some point she had started crying to match the blood trickling down her knee and the mud-covered scrapes along her arms. She abandoned the ball as lost, and pushed her way out of the thicket. The journey back to frat row happened around her. She almost stepped in front of a car, but noticed it just in time, and an early-morning jogger shot her a concerned look. Caitlin shrugged both incidences off.
It was the Haus that she went to, rather than the Dig. The door was open, just as she had told the boys off for three times already in the month Chris had been living there. Nobody was up yet, so she kicked her shoes off by the door and went straight up to Chris’s room. Only when she was standing by his bed, looking down at him sleeping, mouth open and arms wrapped around his pillow, did she realize how muddy she was. She let out a shaky breath, which was apparently louder than she would have guessed, because Chris stirred. He blinked at her a couple of times, and his lips moved, but she didn’t bother to try and understand them. A moment later, he was stood in front of her, his fingers running carefully across her cheek, and then his hand coming up to rest on her ear. He tugged on her wrist and pulled her through to the bathroom. Slowly, he helped her peel off her clothes, and then his own, and they stepped into the shower together, her shaking against his body under the sudden warmth of the water. She borrowed a jersey and they curled up in bed together.
It was 9am when she woke for the second time. Chris winced apologetically as he closed the door, and then remembered that it couldn’t have been the noise which woke her, and his expression turned to one of concern. Caitlin shook her head, and sat up so that she could take the tray he carried off him. There were two cups of coffee, and a plate piled high with warm pop tarts.
“Are you okay?” Chris signed. He hadn’t picked it up terribly well, but he knew the basics at least.
Caitlin nodded in response, accompanied with the sign for yes. “I woke up early again.”
Chris covered his own ear, silently asking if she was in pain.
“No. Not any more. I think it was just habit, and I didn’t want to just lie there. I’d get thinking.” He frowned, and moved the tray, with his coffee, to the desk so that he could sit down. Caitlin nibbled round the edge of a strawberry pop tart as she gathered her thoughts. “My momma died this time of year. September’s difficult.” She shook her head. “I’m sorry. You didn’t—”
Chris’s hand against her cheek made her stop, and she leant into him as he pressed a kiss to her forehead. He picked the half-empty coffee mug out of her hand, and took the plate of pop tarts off her knee. When he finally settled back down, he wrapped his arm around her, and pulled her down to lie on his chest. The rhythm of his hands on her back, the knowledge that she was safe here with him, and the prospect of the day being one where they didn’t have to get up, thanks to it still being pre-season, lulled her back to sleep before she had even finished her pop tart.