(Originally published at https://www.journeymouse.net/ on 1st September 2016)
Laurie never did sleep well - and she always manages to disturb me when she's restless. I've never been sure whether or not she does it on purpose. So tonight is a night like any other, then, with me dragged from the warm and comfortable bed by the creak of floorboards under her pacing feet.
I say nothing, not even wiping the early stages of sleep from my eyes. I just make the two mugs of hot chocolate like I always do and take my usual seat in the over-stuffed armchair I really should get rid of some time.
Laurie also says nothing. She watches my movements with eyes reddened by the need for sleep. When I sit down, she perches, at first, on the chair arm.
Her insomnia is rarely because there's a problem keeping her mind whirling. We never have found out what causes it, in fact, but talking has been known to help. When it's clear she hasn't anything to say, though, it's my turn. So I talk.
I tell her about my day. About how I spilt my first cup of tea and barely had time to make another one before I went to work. About finding out my shoe was no longer waterproof while walking to work from the bus stop. About the temperamental old desktop computer the IT department are vague about replacing. About managing to get served someone else's sandwich in the shop at lunchtime. About missing my usual bus on the way home and ending up walking several miles along the route before the next one caught up with me. All the little things that mean a life shared.
Somewhen about the leaky shoe story, Laurie wriggles on to my lap. I pause for a moment, as much for the memories of all the other times my legs went numb and I felt her breath against my neck. I sip my hot chocolate - carefully, so that I don't disturb her - to disguise the emotion that wells up in my throat and to force it back down again.
Somewhen, her hot chocolate stops steaming and starts to skin over.
Somewhen, the light turns from night to dusky pre-dawn.
I sigh.
And Laurie sighs.
She seems no nearer to rest but gets up so that I can go back to bed and sleep for a few hours before having to go to work.
I leave my empty mug next to her full one.
I crawl back into bed.
"Everything okay?" Brendan asks sleepily.
It's the daylight in combination with my movement that has disturbed him this time. My husband never wakes when Laurie wakes me in the night, just when I return.
"Yes," I say.
And he never stays awake long enough to hear, or at least take in, any answer I'll ever give. I wonder, briefly, if he would ever understand being woken up by the memory of someone who was taken away years before we met.
Tomorrow will be a day like any other. I may even remember to clean up the last traces of Laurie before anyone else sees them. But, for tonight, I'd like to pretend that she still exists.