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Jon had given up on asking why can’t I sleep a long time ago.
There were just too many answers to that question, enough that it was pointless to wonder. Like asking, of the entire house that collapsed on top of him, which precise brick had struck him in the back of the head and killed him.
It used to just be plain old insomnia, a childish fear of what he’d see if he closed his eyes, an inability to give up that much control in a life where he already couldn’t convince people he was a boy and they’d all got it wrong.
Then he grew and it was the bumps of coke at the weekend parties, the cup after cup of bitter black coffee, the books he’d buried himself in so he’d have an excuse to live in the university library and keep his life neatly organised and Harvard referenced. So at least the myriad ways in which he was falling apart were tucked away and organized.
When he lost even that small amount of routine, the reasons shifted and became more stark. Suddenly, it was the tangled, hopeless mess between his ears that kept him up. It was the sticky black ink inside him that had soon leaked out and drowned him, no matter how neatly pressed his suit was or how brightly the brass nameplate on his door rang out Head Archivist . He hadn’t slept for days at a time back then, though it had actually been the least of his worries. The paranoia, the concrete certainty that the moment he closed his eyes, the horrors chasing him would sink their teeth in. Rest had been impossible, until his brain had simply boiled over. Sleep caught up with Jonathan Sims so hard he came close to never waking up.
But now that inky blackness had a name, a neat little label and a prescription ticket. Undiagnosed schizophrenia, autism with no accommodations and a healthy dose of the bargain bin insomnia that had been plaguing him since he was a child. He saw a therapist once a week, a couples counselor once a month with Martin, he took the medications they prescribed him and was honest about when they couldn’t keep the bad thoughts out. The horrors finally crystallized, he realised the things he’d run from had been shadows on the walls of his own mind and, more importantly, there were ways to fight back.
But Jon still couldn’t sleep some nights and he’d finally given up on wondering why. But he did know what to do about it now.
They slept so tangled together it was impossible to extract himself without waking up his boyfriend. Sure enough, Martin stirred as Jon squirmed out of his arms, threw his legs over the edge of their bed and felt around blindly for his slippers. He made a noise that was almost his name, one sleep glazed eye opening past the bird's nest of auburn curls.
“I’m okay,” Jon whispered soothingly, putting a hand on his shoulder, “Just can’t sleep, that’s all.”
Martin scrubbed a hand against his face, “Need me? S’okay if you do, I’m up…”
The last part was an adorably obvious lie but Jon had slowly learned to believe Martin when he offered him help. If he asked him to come with him, to sit and watch the rain for a few hours or put the kettle on and talk about the weight on his chest, he would. The certainty of it, the solid, warm presence of his love was enough to make Jon smile as he leaned in and pressed a kiss to the top of those messy curls.
“I’m okay, I promise,” he murmured, tugging the duvet up over his broad shoulders, “You go back to sleep. I’ll come get you if I need you.”
Martin sank back down into the blankets with a sigh, back to softly snoring by the time Jon had belted his dressing gown. So much of him didn’t want to leave that warmth, ached to be back in the safe circle of his arms, listening to his heartbeat against his ear. But the itch had firmly settled into his brain by now, the restless static that pushed him to close the door and pad as quietly as possible down the hallway to their flat’s little sitting room.
Shelley was asleep on the sofa, curled up in her favourite place where the sag in the leather was particularly deep. She opened one golden eye to regard her owner as he shuffled past, yawning and stretching to follow him into the kitchen like he should be grateful she’d deigned to get up for him.
And he was, scooping her up and letting her perch across his shoulders like she always did, scratching behind the one ear she had left until she was purring contentedly.
“I’d feel worse about waking you up too but you have all day to sleep,” Jon murmured softly, smiling when she butted her striped head against his rough cheek.
He flicked the switch on the kettle, wincing at how loudly the old thing rattled, but it was worth it once he had a warm mug between his hands, breathing in the lavender scented steam. He’d insisted stubbornly for years that herbal teas had never helped with his insomnia since he was small until, after weeks of searching, Martin came home with a brand that was almost exactly the blend Jon’s grandmother would give him as a child, the precise ratios of lavender to passion flower to lemon balm. How he’d done it, Jon would never know but after one long inhale, he could feel his muscles unwinding and his nerves settling, if a little begrudgingly.
Machen and Irving were asleep on the rocking chair, the two kittens curled up so close that it was impossible to see where one began and the other ended, just a lump of soft black fur. Jon felt bad, making them move when they looked so peaceful, though their indignant cheeping settled as soon as they could curl up in his lap and dig their tiny needle claws into the terry cloth fabric of his dressing gown.
Jon somehow juggled their two newest additions, a mug of tea and the cat around his neck without scalding anyone, settling back and reaching for one of the books on the side table. Not the books he’d usually turn to, just a stack of dog-eared romance paperbacks from the library closest to their flat, but they were perfect for distracting his brain when it wouldn’t slow down. He could send his mind to some far off beach that didn’t really exist or some quaint little fictional town, bemusedly watch two one dimensional love interests fall in cliched, inevitable love. Hopefully, while it was gone, his body could be free to collapse.
Jon set himself rocking, nudging the chair into a comforting, rhythmic motion, one hand holding the book while the other stroked across Irving’s back. He started to flick through pages, beginning to believe it was starting to actually work, that his eyelids were getting heavy, his limbs getting that lead feeling, his breathing slowing…
Until it occurred to him that tracking his body this obsessively probably meant it wasn’t working at all.
Jon closed the book on the couple’s ridiculous miscommunication before the grand declaration of love, pinching the bridge of his nose with a frustrated sigh. It always went like this, he’d shift all his anxiety from whatever woke him to the act of getting back to sleep, pulling him further away in the process. Whatever had caused his eyes to open, a bad dream or a phantom ache from a long time ago or the new mundane stresses he’d earned, getting them closed again always felt like he was trying to climb an impossibly steep cliff.
“What’s the matter, daddy?”
Jon jumped so hard he sent the two kittens in his lap skittering away like puffs of smoke dissipating. Shelly dug her claws into his shoulder, hanging on grimly and giving Jon a low rumble of annoyance like it was his fault for having a heart attack.
And of course Gertrude Sims didn’t even blink, just staring up at her daddy like she was just waiting for him to collect himself and answer her question.
“You’re going to have to stop doing that to me, darling,” Jon wheezed, only just remembering to whisper, “It’s that or we tie a bell to you.”
“Like the kittens,” Gertie beamed that sunshine smile she had, the one that erased any lingering doubt that she was a clone of Martin.
The only thing she’d gotten from Jon was his eyes.
“I suppose so,” Jon chuckled softly, reaching out and putting his hand on her cheek, “What are you doing out of bed, darling? It’s so late.”
Gertie leaned into his hand, so close her little cheek squished, “Daddy was up so I thought maybe it was time to be up? Time to go to the museum and see the butterflies?”
Jon felt a prickle of guilt, shifting so he could take his little girl in his arms. She clambered up excitedly, sitting in his lap and resting her head against his chest so her fluffy hair tickled his nose. She’d grown so much in the four years she’d been alive, Jon would always miss the days he could hold her in one hand, but his arms had always found a way to fit around her. He’d make sure they always did.
“I’m sorry, darling, it isn’t time to go to the museum just yet,” Jon sighed, “I should be in bed, I just…I can’t sleep.”
“Oh,” Gertie plucked at his dressing gown, “How come?”
Jon hesitated for a moment before deciding to answer honestly, “I…I don’t really know. All sorts of reasons, I suppose.”
Gertie absorbed that, he could almost hear the gears clicking inside her mind. Jon felt the same sense of needling dread he always did when he’d tried to explain the way his mind worked, to teachers, to doctors, to the therapists he’d tried in the past. That feeling of cracking open his chest for them, having to watch the poorly disguised horror on their faces as they examined all the parts of him that were wrong.
There was only one person who he was able to open up to without that fear. And fortunately, Gertie was just like her papa.
“Daddy’s scared?” she mumbled, turning her face towards his.
Jon swallowed, feeling his hands shake as they lay against her back, “Yes. Sometimes I’m just scared, Gertie. And it makes it hard to sleep.”
His daughter shifted, sitting up and craning her little neck to clumsily kiss Jon’s forehead.
“It’s okay to be scared,” she hummed, her voice bright with that sunshine she always seemed to radiate, “I’m right here.”
Jon felt his throat close, a rush of emotion surging up from his chest. It wasn’t constricting like fear, like panic, it was an embrace, something solid and sure that anchored him when he was drifting away. The kind of tightness that said I’ve got you and I won’t let go.
Because how many times had he said those words, kissed his little girl in the exact same spot on her forehead as he pulled the covers up to her chin and tucked them close around her. On nights she couldn’t sleep because of bad dreams or the rain drumming too loudly on the windows or the colic she’d had when she was small, Jon and Martin had dug furrows in their carpet walking her back and forth, feeling her grow heavy in their arms as sleep finally found her. No matter how early in the morning it was, how long she’d wailed, there would always be that twinge of regret as he’d laid her down in her cot or her bed.
So Jon had made that promise for both of them. I’m right here. And he’d meant it with every cell of his body.
“Thank you, Gertie,” he rasped, holding her little face in his hands, “I feel a lot better now.”
Gertie nodded happily, all perfect confidence, “Always does!”
Jon held her tight for a moment, just because he needed to. The kittens came slinking back over, jumping up and curling against Gertie’s side, Shelley began to purr like a busted old engine. Jon rocked them for a long while, listening to his daughter’s steady breathing, feeling his anxious heartbeat slow to match her own. For a perfect half hour, he didn’t need anything more than that.
“We should try and get some sleep, I think,” he eventually murmured, “We’ve got a big day tomorrow.”
Gertie gave a little wriggle of excitement as Jon stood with her in his arms, walking her down the hall to her bedroom, “Going to the museum! See the dinosaurs and the butterflies and the big whale!”
Jon chuckled softly. The Museum of Natural History was their daughter’s favourite place, she’d been looking forward to their visit all week.
“We are…” he settled her back down into the bed, smiling as Shelley immediately unwound herself from his neck to snuggle up next to Gertie, “Sweet dreams, darling, I love you.”
“Love you too, daddy,” she smiled as he kissed her forehead, in just the right place, “And you have sweet dreams too.”
“I think I will,” Jon waited until her eyes were closed, until the rising and falling of her chest settled into something soft, “I’m right here.”
Jon knew he should go back to his own room, leave the door ajar so the streetlight filtering in from the living room windows would soften the darkness. He should curl up in Martin’s arms, relax into the warmth of the people who loved him most, he should be finally, finally sleeping.
But he would stay awake just a little longer, perching on his daughters bed and watching her dream of butterflies and blue whales.
There were plenty of reasons Jon couldn’t sleep. But she was his favourite.