Work Text:
December 2023
It’s dark when they get back, but the lights stay off. Maybe it’s because the light gives Ben headaches and they all remember that, maybe it’s because it’s far easier to be vulnerable when they’re plunged into darkness, maybe it’s because they’re all too tired to think about something so mundane, but either way, the lights stay off. They know the way around the Watering Hole anyway, know every scratched doorframe and wall stain, every painted doodle marking this as a home that could only belong to them.
In the terrifying jungle of foliage-shrouded mystery, they’ve learned to look for the subtleties: a patch of scales a slightly different colour than the rest of a bush. A rustle of movement out of sync with the wind blowing. The moonlight outlining someone’s arm. The subtlest squeak of floorboards on either side of them. They know what to look for. They know their way around each other, and they fall into place as Ben and Kenji get settled, and the other four drag another mattress into Ben and Kenji’s room.
(It does not cross any of their minds to sleep alone.)
They cling onto each other as they move. Maybe they’re not as sure-footed as their instincts would like them to be, maybe leading each other reassures them (or maybe, they can’t bear to let go). But either way, they cling onto each other, and don’t stop.
It’s them, and their footsteps, and the silence of the house. Everything else fades to a far-off thought, a distant echo of polite civilization they dropped like flaming coal on Nublar, and have since let drag along beside them. They barely get into clean clothes, and don’t even think to brush their teeth before settling down. It’s not even late, but the sky is inky-black outside, and there is nothing today to stay awake for but the promise, perhaps, of a happier day.
In the meantime, the darkness swallows them in a wash of peace, and it takes almost nothing to lull them to sleepiness. They burrow into duvets and blankets like nesting compies, complete with their legs tucked around them like tails.
And, like compies, like pack animals, they sleep in one giant, protected pile.
Sharing a bed isn’t the fun you’d think. They clamber over each other, and accidentally kick each other in the stomach, and elbow each other in their sides, with whispers of “you’re elbowing my face” “your breath smells gross” and “who’s fucking snoring that loud” floating from their pile. It takes a full minute of shifting around and “is this okay”s for everyone to be comfortable, and there’s the occasional disturbance when someone fidgets and shifts positions.
It didn’t start fun either. This was strictly for survival; to endure the cold winter nights on Nublar. And if it helped them all feel less alone, so what? They could do with all the comfort they could get. It became a habit after a while. When they got back to the mainland, they just... never stopped. Sleepovers became a time-honored tradition of dragging mattresses onto the floor to make a huge bed, where everyone would sprawl across it in a watercolour wash of blankets, legs, arms, and bodies.
It wasn’t usually all six of them on the island; usually someone was on watch. Usually that someone was Ben.
Tonight, the camp fam place him in the centre. Darius spoons him from behind, as Kenji slots into place, cradling Ben with one arm, and Sammy with the other. Yaz squeezes into place, wedged between Kenji’s back and Sammy’s stomach, and Brooklynn curls into a ball, her back pressed trustingly against Darius’s shoulder blades and her legs tangled into a sheet.
No blanket could make them feel this warm. No locks and alarms could make them feel this safe. Nothing in the world, not a single feeling, could come close to the unrivalled warmth they find in each others’ arms. Not romantic, not platonic, something so raw the lines are shredded with claws and stitched up with each others’ clumsy, inexperienced hands to make a patchwork of something better than any of them could’ve hoped for, that keeps them warm through the coldest nights.
They’ll never feel alone. Not when they have each other. Not when they’re home.