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Diavolo can't sleep.
He rarely goes to sleep in the usual biological sense. He's always been prone to insomnia, so it's always been easier to relegate the task of sleep to Doppio. He would wait for Doppio to get tired or, if he became tired while fronting, he would relinquish control of their body. Doppio would lay down and close their eyes and breathe slow and deep and Diavolo would tuck himself right against Doppio's soft consciousness in their mind and they would fall asleep. It was routine, in a way Doppio probably never noticed, and intimate in a way that Diavolo could only pretend.
Maybe that was part of the problem, as well. Diavolo hasn't slept alone in over a decade– closer to two.
Now he is alone in his warm bedroom and his soft bed and he is alone in his skin in a way that makes the room feel cold and the bed feel hard.
He feels empty. More than that, he feels bare.
He would say he feels the way they did before they became Diavolo and Doppio, but that's not true. Back then, they hadn't gotten a taste of what it feels like to press himself into the back of his mind and bump into the sweet thoughts of his other like an insistent cat. They didn't know what its like to twine your soul with someone else's so tightly he can feel it pulse like the second heart he always knew they were supposed to have.
After over an hour of repeatedly closing his eyes only to find himself staring at the ceiling in the dark, he finally gets out of his bed. He walks down the hall and raps his knuckles twice against the other door.
To his surprise, Doppio answers the door immediately. He's dressed in pajamas and he his hair is down– he doesn't know how much it makes him look like Diavolo– but he doesn't look like he's been to sleep, either.
"Can't sleep?"
Diavolo nods.
Doppio sighs. "Me neither."
Doppio never struggled with insomnia before. In fact, he was strangely good at falling asleep.
Diavolo wonders if maybe it's the same for him. If he can sense that emptiness, that gaping maw in his soul where there should be another. Perhaps Doppio had felt those near-nightly caresses of his soul or perhaps he had felt Diavolo's lazy, unfocused stream of consciousness as they fell asleep one night. Maybe he had felt Diavolo curl up in the sensitive spot against their occipital bone one night or felt the tickle of a second breath in his throat. Perhaps they're more alike than Diavolo previously thought, as ironic as that seems.
"May I make a suggestion?" Diavolo asks, feeling bolder now.
"Yes?"
"I believe," he says, "That it would benefit both of us to share a bed tonight."
Diavolo watches as a pretty pink blush consumes Doppio's freckles. He mourns the ability to feel the warmth of Doppio's blushes on their shared skin.
But his grief is short-lived. Doppio nods and lets Diavolo into his bedroom.
He putters about the room for a moment before crawling into his bed. He squirms and shifts for a few moments before ending up flat on his back on the side of the bed by the wall. Once he's as settled as he's going to be– he's still squirming– Diavolo climbs in after him. Doppio goes still as Diavolo settles down on his side, facing away from Doppio. It's a small bed, a bit of a tight fit, but it's comfortable enough and Diavolo counts the proximity as a welcome bonus.
It's nice. It's warm and cozy and just a little bit intimate and Diavolo is starting to feel like themself again. One of Doppio's arms is pressed against Diavolo's spine and he can feel the point of contact in a searing line that pulses through his nervous system like a finger slammed in a door.
"Doppio?"
"Yes?"
"… Will you hold me?"
Doppio is still.
Diavolo feels regret twist like a knife in his gut.
Then Doppio is moving.
He turns on his side towards Diavolo to press his whole body against him. It's overwhelming. His stomach is pressed against Diavolo's back, his legs are tucked neatly behind his, his face is pressed into his hair. He snakes an arm around Diavolo's waist, leaving a trail of sensation behind himself, and he tugs Diavolo impossibly closer.
Diavolo can feel Doppio's heartbeat thundering against his shoulder blade. He counts the thump-thump. Thump-thump.
"How will I ever sleep without you?" Diavolo whispers against his own knuckles.
"Don't," Doppio whispers back, stirring Diavolo's hair with his breath.
"I won't if I can help it." He grins into the darkness.
Doppio strokes Diavolo's collarbone with a warm thumb. His breathing is slowing, the eager thump-thump of his heart is settling down.
It's nice to hear Doppio's breath so close again. He syncs his breath to Doppio's.
Diavolo once read that when you're in love, your heartbeat can sync with the person you love.
Diavolo hopes his is synced with Doppio's.
Then he's asleep.