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The nightmares aren’t as numerous now.
He’s getting better day by day, seeing a counsellor, talking more openly about how he’s feeling. Joe’s right he does overshare, but not always the important stuff. The really bad stuff. That he keeps to himself, his pain to bear. After Zoom and his dad, he started to spiral, couldn’t see the light. Kept reliving the nightmare. He’d wake up screaming and sweating, would scream himself hoarse and eventually cry himself back to sleep, what little, broken sleep he could get.
Then Len happened. Len with his sarcastic drawl and puns and his self-deprecating attitude, although that last part seemed to have changed somewhat after spending a few months saving all of space and time. Len, who unknowingly would help save his once would be nemesis, who somehow would fall in love with the hero in fact.
So now when Barry wakes at night, sometimes screaming, sometimes just silently thrashing, he doesn’t wake alone. He hates to wake Len but would hate it more not having someone there.
Len will hold him and they’ll talk and possibly drink some warm milk or something else soothing. Something to relax Barry. Recently though, Len has come up with a different solution. Origami.
Not the most conventional tool but one Barry seems to have taken too. It helps to calm his mind to actively have something to focus on, something for his fidgeting fingers to do. Len was always leaving random origami animals around and one night had suggested it. He kept a stack of paper and the instruction book on his nightstand for when he was also anxious or just wanted to leave Barry something to wake up to.
Barry had woken screaming and almost having a panic attack and Len couldn’t calm him no matter what he tried. He saw the paper and pushed it into Barry’s hands and gently but firmly instructed him to fold it. Barry had and as he focussed he calmed considerably, breathing evening out, heartbeat returning to normal (well Barry’s normal at least). Since then it had become a thing, a sure fire way to calm Barry down. He enjoyed it too; found that using his hands helped as he could focus his energy into something.
The nightmares don’t happen half as frequently now and when they do Len knows the way to calm Barry. And on the rare occasion they’re not in the same bed, he trusts that Barry can calm himself now and he’ll find another paper crane sat on the nightstand.