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It’s 1:37 AM, and Therese finds that she can’t sleep.
She shouldn’t be awake, she knows that very well. But she’s been labouring over this gift for hours now, sketching ideas down on scrap pieces of paper and balling them up when she decides they’re no longer good. Sometimes, she even fishes them out of the wastebasket (with a due amount of frustration) and compares old notes to new ones. Stuffs the ones she doesn’t like back down in the trash, packs them down with the flat end of her fist for finality. Keeps the ones she likes, gawks at Therese-from-a-seldom-few-minutes-ago and wonders how she’d been so silly to think they were awful in the first place.
Everything ends up in the trash anyways.
Still, she’s dead-set on the idea of a homemade gift, a little part of her to go with their usual holiday doings. Besides, Therese has already blown money on material possessions. She thinks back to the gift list she came up with before she threw the whole operation in the bin (and missed by a mile).
A live Christmas medley played by hand was her first and most dear suggestion, but the more time progresses, the more Therese realizes that there’s not any time to put it together, much less practice. Their work schedules are similar enough that Carol is almost always home when Therese is, and when she isn’t, twenty minutes is the most she’ll have. No time to practice.
Perhaps a canvas painting. Therese has not bought any paints for a long time, and despite all the sales and price reductions, she knows she’s cut it too close to the line to make any sort of meaningful image look non-rushed. It’s been so long since she’s painted, and her perfectionist complex won’t allow her to give anything less than perfection to Carol. All of her composition sketches would not come to either, so that’s off the table.
She plays with an upturned corner on a stray piece of blank paper. She should go to sleep, she knows. Carol doesn’t like it when she stays up late, worries for her wellbeing. A woman who doesn’t get her sleep can’t focus during the day, silly. Therese thinks of Carol’s fingers that would lazily play with her hair, her arm that would nudge her closer, and the sleepy voice that would say, “Go to sleep, I’ll be here in the morning.”
Therese rubs at her nose and then pushes herself off of the table with a sigh. Sleep deprivation is making it hard to focus, and being stubborn about it isn’t going to get her anywhere. A chuckle, low and familiar comes from the doorframe, and immediately Therese knows. “Carol,” she breathed with a sheepish smile. Someone who knows she’s been caught.
“Now what are you doing, conjuring a plan this early in the morning?” Carol is wearing one of her robes, plaid and somewhat loose at the top, undone somewhere around the middle. Her robe is not loose not because she intends for it to be, but because she’s the kind of person who tosses around in bed a lot and is so preoccupied in her own thoughts that she doesn't think to fix her appearance before checking around. Therese loves that part of her too.
“I’m not doing much.” And that is true, because Therese hasn’t even started. Carol’s eyebrows shoot up with suspicion, though there’s a glimmer of amusement twinkling in her eyes as well.
She leans up against the doorframe, her arms crossed. The smirk teases Therese, though Therese feels the corners of her own lips being tugged upwards as well. She can’t help but to smile when Carol does too. When Carol is free, Therese’s heart is too. “You’re not tired?” Carol asks.
“No.” Not anymore, Therese adds in the silence of her thoughts.
“It’s almost two,” Carol points out.
“I’m not the only one awake.”
Carol sighs dramatically, stretches her arms out. “I woke up because my bed felt empty.” Therese lets out a half-snort, half-giggle. She knows Carol is worried. She knows Carol craves physical touch, the kind of touch that only Therese can give her. Light touches, crushingly soft hugs, kisses that linger and even beyond that.
“I was just thinking,” Therese admits.
Carol pulls a seat from the nearby kitchen table, carries it over to where Therese is sitting, and props herself comfortably against it. Therese watches her smirk turn into a lazy, sleepy smile. A smile filled with both adoration and something that reminds Therese of home. “Thinking of?”
“You.”
“And I of you,” Carol says, reaching out briefly. “Is something up, angel?”
Therese thinks for a moment. The gift can wait, because she has so much time (even though she knows she really doesn’t). “I’m sleepy,” Therese says.
“I should hope you are!” Carol retorts, eyes wild with affection. “Come, let’s get you back to bed, darling.” Carol is the first to stand, offering a hand to Therese as though she’s a princess. It’s a silly gesture, but Therese takes the hand and curtsies, feeling quite silly. They hold hands and Therese leans up against Carol as they walk back to bed.
Her eyes are burning with the need for sleep, and she welcomes both the blankets wrapped snug around her as well as Carol’s arms that snake under her. Therese wiggles closer and breathes out an affirmation, “I love you.”
It’s 1:53 AM. Therese thinks it will be much easier to sleep tonight.