Archive of Our Own

Little children do this , Eda realizes once she was already halfway to Luz’s room, tip-toeing her way through the cold, dark hallway. Little children go sneaking around in the night to find reassurance, find a pair of warm arms to confide in. And she’s not a child. She’s a fully grown woman, thank you very much, and she can’t do this.




What the hell was she thinking?

Sighing, she turns back towards the living room, dragging her feet towards the couch where she seems to spend most of her time in, these days. Not that she’s proud of it. She doesn’t know if she’s ever really proud of herself in the first place - but that was probably fair.

So this was her life, now. Deadbeat and broken, with a sister she doesn’t talk to and a child she couldn’t protect. Pretty pathetic, yeah. Not that she could do anything about that, either.

There’s papers and pencils all over the carpet around the couch, and Eda doesn’t try to clean them up, not yet. Maybe later, when she feels a bit better - but right now, she wanted to let everything that’s Luz-related stay in its place. Like the glyphs she drew and stuck on the walls of the house, or her cat-ear hoodie, or her socks that’s always one of each and never both pairs (where they all went, it was an ongoing mystery). To remind her that the kid is still here, and she’s safe, and everything is fine - 

“Eda?” 

There’s a whisper coming from the dark hallway towards the stairs, and if Eda was anyone else and not the middle aged woman who’s gone through too much for a lifetime, she wouldn’t have heard it. She wouldn’t have flinched or been alert when the whisper called for her. But Eda did, and now she’s squinting to look better, and there’s a little girl all curled up into herself in the hallway, arms wrapped around herself like she was cold and scared and she was.

“Luz?” she calls back, keeping her tone quiet, careful not to scare the girl away. “ Hey . It’s alright. C’mere.”

The younger girl hesitantly approaches her - footsteps careful and steady, her expression half-asleep but alert. Eda had been through it too many times for too long to know what had happened. Still, she reaches for her and she reaches back, tripping into her arms without thinking twice, and Eda hugs her. She wraps her arms around her and pressed her head into her chest and they were safe, even if it was just for tonight. 

“Nightmares?” She asks, and Luz nods. “Oh.”

“Don’t go.”

“I won’t.”

“Stay.”

“Of course, kid,” Eda murmurs into her hair. “I’m not going anywhere.”

She doesn’t even realize it when Luz has fallen back to sleep. It must’ve been bad, if the girl was willing to stumble half asleep in the dark to look for her arms. And Eda was never a hugger, but damn didn’t that change when the girl comes crashing down into her life. Everything did. And now she’s here. In the dark, beneath the soft, dim yellow glow of the light spell they casted together every night for every corner of the house. With a girl who’s clinging into her like she was her lifeline, and so otherwise, even if Luz doesn’t know it yet. 

(But she probably does.)

I’m not much of a hugger, she told Luz once, but now she wraps her arms around the girl at any given chance as if Luz would disappear if she doesn’t.

Eda drowns her fingers into Luz’s soft locks and gently smooths her stubborn hair out - they bounced back almost immediately, exactly like she does. And Luz leans into her touch, even in her sleep.

It doesn’t feel so dark and empty anymore. Instead, it felt natural, having someone in your arms.

Instead, it feels like home.