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Aventurine forces himself to sleep early. It's a commendable, healthy and recommended habit. Or at least, that's what the Doctors of Chaos have told him since he returned from Penacony, it's what he's been told by concerned Human Relations professionals when he was making his way up the ranks in the Strategic Investment Department after being sent there by Jade, it's what he's been told since entering this gilded cage.
Today, it's 3 AM, clad in simple linen pajamas, he's leaned against Sugilite's (surprisingly) larger frame, bodies entangled together in such a way that his once-bruised feet are tucked under the taller man's thighs, with an arm around his own imperceptibly shivering shoulders. Aventurine exhales long and slow, sagging against Sugilite further- this kind of physical intimacy was nigh unthinkable for them, rivals that generally detested each other, Stonehearts who were willing to undermine each other for their own goals, unwilling comrades forced to fight alongside each other in that fateful War of the Aeons, two sides of the same coin that couldn't ever be separated.
Considering that last part- perhaps, Aventurine will let himself think, it's not so unthinkable.
There's the low volumed-stream of sound from the television, rambling away about something or the other that Aventurine has long stopped keeping track of perhaps hours ago. Sugilite's body is warm against his own, and Aventurine thinks, he might just fall asleep here. It's too comfortable. He glances at a corner of a room, lips quirking up in a half-smile at the sight.
The cat cakes, little darlings that Ratio gifted him in a bid towards appreciating the smaller yet no less sweeter luxuries of life, are fast asleep in the aforementioned corner of the room. Sugilite hadn't been very fond of them- then again, Sugilite wasn't fond of much. It took a fair amount of time for him to warm up to them, just as it took Aventurine ample time to warm up to Sugilite's intimidating, shadow-lurking jackals. Even now, Aventurine can sense their presence somewhere in Sugilite's apartment, even if he himself is quite unsure of where they might be lurking. But that uncertainty is no longer something that causes him wariness, and instead, it makes Aventurine smile a little now- knowing that they too would be dozing and at peace.
"Thinking about something?" Sugilite murmurs, and this close- Aventurine can feel the vibrations of the rumbles underneath that pleasantly soft-spoken baritone against his own skin. They're soothing. And (not so) strangely (not after all this time, after all), Sugilite himself is too. Aventurine breathes out, something burden-like escaping his body with the air he's breathed out.
"Just....you know." Aventurine says, smile widening at the idea of exasperating Sugilite even a little. And true to his word, Sugilite rolls his eyes, something Aventurine knows without even looking at him, before saying his next words.
"No, my dear Aventurine, I do not in fact know," Sugilite says, drier than sand. "Otherwise I wouldn't be asking."
A little nudge of a broad shoulder against a more lithe one. A squeeze of an arm around those same lithe shoulders. Aventurine feels even more ridiculously at ease, with Sugilite's heavily tactile affection.
"Thinking about how the pets must be sleeping nice and- tight," Aventurine says with a yawn caught at the last word, comfortably drowsy. "We should just sleep here, y'know."
Sugilite hums, a thoughtful sound.
"I don't wanna go to bed." Aventurine adds on, quietly.
Sugilite glances at him, before pressing himself closer to Aventurine's side. "We will have to at some point, I believe. This is not terribly comfortable, sweet thing."
"No, I don't. We can just stay. Who's stopping us?"
"Common sense, the-" Sugilite yawns, rather loudly, and Aventurine presses himself against the taller man out of both a need for lesser space and perhaps just the slightest bit of childish pettiness, something Sugilite brings out often. "-rather unpleasant promise of sore backs in the morning-"
"You don't seem very concerned with that when we share the bed for-"
"Alright, alright, stop yapping," Sugilite says, but the smile in his voice is visible. "We can sleep here, you needy thing."
Aventurine smiles back, victorious, and as sleep gently blankets itself over him, peaceful, for what he is assured will be a lingering sweetness.
