Chapter Text
"The dead don't haunt us, it's the gaps they've left behind that do." - Jodi Picoult
Loras laid on his bed, covers pulled tight over his head, hugging his knees. His breathing was panicked, his heartbeat erratic, and his skin felt clammy with sweat. No tears fell from his eyes, though. They hadn't in a long time.
He felt like he was drowning, panic bubbling in his stomach, clawing at his throat.
He pulled the covers back, gasping for air, the cold making goosebumps rise on his skin. He breathed raggedly as his shoulders shook in silent tearless sobs. He breathed again, and again, and again. When his hands stopped trembling, he reached out to his bedside table and gulped down his remaining dreamwine, wincing at the sour taste it left in his mouth. It wouldn't make him sleep, he knew that. Its effect had diminished after the first six months of using it too much, but at least it dulled the pain and stopped the panic from rising.
He sighed, falling back onto the featherbed.
Years ago, he had taken to sleeping on his side, cocooned in Renly's embrace, and the habit hadn't faded. Loras imagined how it would feel now to lay his head on Renly's shoulder, to have him wrap his arms around him, murmuring kind and soothing in Loras' ear like he used to. Loras could almost see him. He imagined how it would feel to have Renly tuck the stray curl that had fallen over his eyes behind his ear, and to hear him laugh when it fell right back into place. Loras could almost feel the pad of his fingers brushing his cheek as he toyed with his hair. Loras imagined how it would feel to talk with Ren again, how it would feel to share every dark thought that plagued him, every bright dream he wanted to chase.
A single tear rolled down his face, shimmering in the moonlight streaming from the window.
In Loras' mind, Renly's ghost brushed it away.
Loras looked up at Renly's face, carved from moonlight and glimmering motes of dust. He had been the sun, shining and laughing and lighting up Loras' life, but now he belonged to the shadows living in his heart.
"I know you're not real, Ren." Loras said with a broken voice to match his broken heart. Renly's ghost just smiled, taking Loras' hands into his own, as if warming them up.
Loras could almost feel it, and for a heartbeat, he would've sworn he did.
Another tear rolled down Loras' face. He opened his mouth, then closed it again. He felt the ghost his drug-addled head had conjured up put an arm around him.
And Loras knew it wasn't Renly. He knew he wasn't there, and would never be. He knew that his Renly would have pulled him tighter towards him as Loras buried his head on the crook of his neck, he would have murmured kind words that would've healed Loras' heart while he stroked his curls, and he would've done anything in his power to make sure Loras wouldn't suffer again. But the ghost made from the cold, dead light of the moon did nothing of those things. Because it was a ghost. Because his Renly was dead.
He tried to speak again, if only for the sake of letting it out, just a bit, just one time. It wasn't as if the moon could tell anybody. "But I miss you so bloody much," he choked out in a strained whisper.
The ghost opened his mouth as if to answer, but no sound came out. He was made from swirling motes of dust, after all, and he couldn't speak. He hugged Loras tighter.
Loras could almost feel it.
"I miss you so much, Ren," Loras said, tears and grief trapped deep inside him under lock and key as he gazed into those phantom eyes that were looking at him with something akin to sadness. "I miss you so much it kills me a little bit every day I wake up without you by my side. Sometimes I think it'd better if I just—" Loras' voice failed him. The ghost wearing Renly's face, and carrying maybe just a speck of Renly's soul, shook his head as his eyes widened. He cupped Loras' cheek with his hand as he murmured words Loras couldn't hear. Loras smiled ruefully at the ghost's panic, "I know, I know. Margs would never forgive me anyway," he looked away, "But I miss you. And I will kill Stannis for taking you away from me. I know he was supposed to be your brother. But I will kill him." When he turned around, the ghost was no longer there. Only the moonlight remained.