Chapter Text
You were having trouble putting yourself to rest since this living nightmare began. At first there were the new dangers of this world that kept you up at night. The raiders, the super mutants, the disgustingly deformed animals, all of them constantly trying to kill you, all of them were giving you nightmares, are still sending cold shivers down your spine.
When the Settlement of Sanctuary started growing, the pictures of the past were still pretty clear. You nearly could smell the fresh mowed grass again, Codsworths hot coffee. Whenever you closed your eyes all the memories were creepying up on you like shadows, just to slowly vanish again as soon as the darkness fell over them. You thought your old home would give you something to lean on. But then the memories started to fade and were replaced by the sight of destruction, of empty houses and beds, of rusty cars, broken down trees and ruined pavements. It was eating you up from the inside, but there wasn’t time for grief. Always another settlement was seeking for your attention, people you’ve never met before asking for help.
So you put yourself and your pain, your worries, aside, to help the best you could, desperately trying to become a part of this strange new world, where you actually don’t belong.
Your body soon was aching and screaming for sleep, begging for rest, but your mind could not allow it. If you fell asleep now, who could assure you you wouldn’t wake up 200 Years in the future again? Who could promise that history wouldn’t repeat itself and that everything you knew and loved would fade and rot away and die, as soon as you closed your eyes?
So you pushed yourself to the limit, drenched your mind and body, put all of your energy into the search for your son and your efforts to make this world a better place.
Your eyes were red and paining, tearing, your face pale as a ghoul and your whole body shaking and weak when you first met her and everything changed.
What first was black and white regained it’s colours, what seemed hopeless filled itself with hope, what was wrong became right and all the fears this place inflicted faded into nothing.
One cheeky smile and your were mesmerized. Felt bad at the same time for the fuzzy feeling she caused in your head while your husband wasn't even put to rest.
Piper turned your whole world around in just a few weeks. She was the first to notice how you treated yourself since you left the cryo. She was the one who offered to stay by your side, who promised you as much as you wanted and needed to hear it that all of this was real and wouldn’t just vanish when you blinked for too long. She distracted you with stories of the Commonwealth, not the awful ones, but the ones that made you smile and laugh, made you gasp in surprise and painted your cheeks pink, made you feel less numb and more alive again.
She made you mad as well, when she recklessly confronted a pair of super mutants to keep you out of there line of fire. A broken arm and a dozen bruises were the result and your voice was angry and shaking while you patched her up. Piper just laughed it off and gave you this smile again.
She was so bright.
She made you feel things you thought were gone forever.
You were strangers at first, soon companions, then friends.
When you collapsed right into her arms as the exhaustion and the paranoia and the fear became too much, when you were pushing yourself harder than your body could handle any longer, she took the matter into her own hands.
She tucked you into bed, her voice calm and soothing, her words warm and comforting, her hands gentle when she wrapped them around you, the promises purred into your ear honest.
And she was there while you finally drifted off to sleep and she was there when you woke up. To smile this cheeky smile again.
Your body finally rested.
Your resolve strengthened.
Your mind clear and sharp.
Your lips soft when you kissed her.