The Morning After

Who: Brett and Eris
Where: Their apartment
When: Morning

Eris had an early morning, even if she hadn't intended to. That happened when one was restless, and didn't sleep well often, and in her case, she'd actually stopped drinking after she'd left the Round to go burn down Babylon. So it was well before midnight when she'd had her last drink, and after she'd torched the place, she'd just gone back to the loft and laid down. So, she hadn't slept well, definitely not enough, and generally, she woke early and couldn't get back to sleep. Gathering up a few last little things, and arranging to have her record player brought downstairs and loaded into the cab, she had them drive around a little before she decided she was ready to go back to the other place. The new place.

Home, even if she wasn't sure when she'd start thinking about it like that. If she stayed, even. At the moment, she wasn't sure how long this was going to last. It could all end when she got back. Brett could be gone. He could have left, after she did, and just not come back. He could have left and not planned on coming back, too. It wasn't like things had been especially good when she'd taken off herself. She'd just truly needed to be out of there, at least for a while. The walls had been closing in, she couldn't breathe.

Clearly, leaving, going drinking then burning down a building was what she'd assessed the answer to be, but she wasn't sure she'd hit the mark there either. She felt a whole lot better knowing it was gone, now, and she'd taken note that the street was still blocked off, smoke still rising from the smouldering ashes, firetrucks still outside of the place when they'd been driving around. She'd done a thorough job. Her main issue was that sure, she felt better about having burned the place down, but that didn't alleviate her other anxieties. That was especially clear when she finally had them head towards the new place, and she arranged to have the record player brought up. She only had them bring it inside, though, and she left it by the elevator.

Then she checked doors til she could find where she was going. She found the office first, though, and noticed all of the pages still littering the floor where she'd kicked the wastebasket over. Sighing, she walked over, crouched down, and started properly throwing them away. She might not have noticed anything, but she saw a little fold of crumpled paper that had handwriting on it that wasn't hers.

Without actually hesitating in the slightest, she pulled it open, to see what it was, and found Brett's handwriting. And...what initially looked like a list, but wasn't. She sat down on the floor, back up against the desk, and she read it over. She took her time with it, just reading it, then rereading it, and she wondered what he'd scribbled out, but couldn't decipher it. The bits about her being wrong, and a few other things actually made her smile, very faintly. What made frowns flicker over her expression was more the point of view. She could see a few very key things that he either didn't get, or was looking at from the wrong angle.

In the end, what she drew most from it was he didn't understand her. That there were fundamental things that he didn't get, that he couldn't see the angles on. She didn't necessarily blame him for that, she knew the kind of person she was and the kind of people he was used to dealing with weren't the same things. So, really, she wasn't upset about anything she read there. Even if she did think there was a hell of a lot of anger directed her way. Maybe resentment. she wasn't sure, there. Again, she wondered if he'd left. Sitting there for a few minutes longer, she gathered up the rest of the pages, and put them in the bin, before standing, and she looked over the page again.

It took her a few moments, just reading it over, considering what to do. She could just pretend she hadn't seen it. She wasn't convinced that he wouldn't be oh, incredibly irate over her having found it in the first place, but then, that was why whenever she wrote things down to sort through her head she burned it immediately. Because if she wanted someone to find it and read it, she'd make it possible. Not that she suspected that he'd expect her to go through the trash or whatever. Still, she wasn't entirely sure what to do. In the end, she folded the page, and put it into her pocket, before she headed for the apartment proper. She found it after first hitting a wrong door. She really needed to learn the layout of the place, but that she could worry about later. For now, she headed through the corridor that led to the apartment door proper, and she opened the door to head inside.

Once in there, she noticed that he was there. Asleep on the couch, from the looks of it, which made her wonder how late he'd been up drinking, what with the bottle sat there, and a drink poured and everything and the little fact that he hadn't made it to bed. She was quiet as she toed her shoes off, then walked over, gazing down at him. She could see the tickets for the party on the coffee table as well, just sat there, with the bottle and the glass. Part of her half considered taking the drink, but she didn't. Instead, she just looked down at him. That, before she crouched down quietly, and placed a light kiss to his brow. Motivation for the action she couldn't quite work out, but then, sometimes she just did things with him she didn't overly analyze. Maybe it was because it looked like he'd had a rough night. Maybe it was because she hadn't expected him to be there, and the fact that he was surprised her. She didn't know for certain, and she wasn't of a mind to try and puzzle it out right this second. So, she gave him the little, light press of a kiss, then went to stand, planning on bathing to get the lingering scent of burning building off of her.

Then she'd figure out what to do. What she was doing.

He hadn't been sleeping heavily, vaguely aware when he heard someone come in, and the kiss was enough to wake him. He reached out, grabbing her by the wrist as she looked to move away. He'd expected her to come back, but as he saw that she actually had done, he realised that at least part of him had been preparing for her not doing so. "You smell of smoke," he observed. And it wasn't cigarette smoke, either. It was wood smoke. Fire smoke. "There going to be headlines tomorrow?" He wondered if she had, if she'd actually gone and done it. He thought he'd talked her out of that, but maybe he'd only managed to postpone it.

She hadn't so much expected him to snag her wrist, and she looked down at him, at his hand on her wrist, though she didn't try wrenching it away. "Yes." she answered, since really, there was absolutely no use lying about it, even if she was aware he wasn't going to be pleased. That wasn't the point. And it hadn't been up to him. She'd just made sure he wasn't involved, which was what she'd sort of half plotted previously anyhow. So, he wasn't, it was a purely independent action, and she was still glad she'd done it.

He closed his eyes again for a moment, letting go of her wrist on the exhale and he sat up. Opening his eyes, he looked up at her, nodding very slightly as he processed that. He wondered how long he'd been asleep for - he hadn't meant to fall asleep. A glance towards the window, though, showed it was light out. "Did you go back to your old place?" he asked her, wondering if it had been that, or if she'd wandered the streets all night - not including the stop to make a torch of Babylon. He didn't ask whether she checked first to make sure there was nobody inside. He didn't want to find out if she hadn't, and if she had then the question was needless. God, he hoped she had.

When he let her go, she started towards the bedroom. "Yes." she answered him, again, just going for the single word answer. Her tone didn't suggest she was being short with him, though. That wasn't her intention. She was merely answering, and not offering up anything along side it as an explanation, since she didn't really feel like it was necessary. Why go into something that would likely just be her filling up silence, and answered questions he hadn't asked. If he wanted to know more, he'd ask. Or, that was her story and she was sticking to it.

He slumped back against the sofa, his eyes dropping to the glass as she walked away. It was still there, untouched. He'd poured it, late last night. And then sat and stared at it. He hadn't drunk a drop. He knew that they couldn't afford for him to be hung over today. So, he'd just stared at it, used it as a focus to try and get his head straight. And, clearly, eventually fallen asleep.

He stretched, trying to ease the crick out of his back. Sleeping on the sofa was not good for a man his size. He was never going to fit, but he hadn't felt right going to bed alone, and he hadn't wanted to leave here. He stood, rolling his shoulders and finally followed her into the bedroom. "I have trouble talking about the personal stuff," he told her, when he was a few feet away from her. "I don't find that easy. But that doesn't mean that I can't hold my own the way I'm gonna need to. And I'll be watching myself, working at it. Not gonna pretend that it comes totally naturally to me, the way that maybe it did to you, but I believe that I can do this. And I'm gonna give it all I've got. But I need to know - do you think that won't be enough because you don't want it to be? Or are you just afraid that it won't be enough?" he asked her. He'd chased that one round and round in his head for half the night, wondering if she was truly self-destructive, or just afraid.

If Eris would have had a guess, she would have said that this morning they were going to pretend like their argument hadn't happened, and just go from there. However, apparently that wasn't the case. She shrugged her coat off, and started into the bathroom. "I know you don't have an easy time with it." she said first, pausing to start running a bath. Then she went to stand in the doorframe, looking out at him. "And I know you think it's not important. That just doesn't make it so. And just because you don't understand why it's important, doesn't make it less so either." she said first, tone even. Not pointed. "I also never said it wouldn't be enough, I said you couldn't do it." she added. "If you're going to try, then try. But one thing you might need is a wider understanding of human nature, and people. You're going to need to see the angles. Like..." she drew in a breath, and let it out slowly, reaching up to drag her fingers through her hair. "The kinds of people that we're going to be dealing with, if they get you even somewhat off to have a conversation with you, and sometimes not even then, they will very likely ask you pointed, probing questions." she told him. "If for no other reason than to gauge how you react. To measure you up. It's a simple manipulation. You ask someone something pointed and inappropriate, you do it with a sweet smile, and watch to see what they do with it." She reached behind herself to get her zipper, eyes leaving him for a moment before she added something else. "I ask you because I want to know. I still want to know about you, and everything that entails. They're going to ask you to see what happens when they hit a landmine." She wanted him to know there was a difference. Then she turned to walk back out of sight, into the bathroom.

He followed her, aware that he could probably do with a shower himself. Though a soak in the bath would probably do more to soothe out the aches from sleeping on the sofa. "That's the difference," he told her. "Between you and them. Them, I know I can give a bullshit answer that sounds right, but you? You get the real deal and that's not something I'm good with. And I know I have... anger issues. But I can keep a check on that, when I have to." He paused, looking at her. "Try me - like you were one of them. Show me how it's gonna be." He'd given this a lot of thought, trying to get to the root of the problem. He'd thought about it until late into the night, long after he'd got all his anger out onto a scrap of paper. That had allowed him to think, to process things better.

She looked at him for a moment. "So, we hear you used to be a police officer." she said. "Seems you've been trading up masters in recent history, how's the new one working out for you?" she asked him. She also let her dress drop to the floor, and absently kicked it out of the way, checking the tap temperature, before she dropped the stopper into the bath.

Brett leaned back against the wall, adopting a more casual pose, though not too relaxed. He'd always found it easier to get into the right frame of mind if he used everything, it focused him on where he wanted to be, even if he didn't actively think about it in those terms. "Well, she's certainly prettier to look at," he told her, unable to help the appreciative look he gave her. He didn't add anything more. Years with the O'Malley's had taught him that if you were asked a question, you answered it - but you didn't do anything more. Volunteering information could lead you down a bad path.

Eris sat on the edge of the tub, keeping her eyes on his. "Much prettier than one would expect a dead woman to be. So what is the story on that? I'm sure you know, don't you?" she asked him, leaning forward a slight bit, that natural conspiratorial gesture that was meant to encourage secret telling.

Brett met her eyes, then let his gaze flicker down for a moment - after all, that leaning forward didn't just encourage conspiracy, it get a damn good view as well. He smiled, just a little bit, as he met her eyes once again. "I know you've heard the rumours," he started, talking slightly more slowly, both to suggest that he was falling into that confidence, and also because he was considering what people may be saying, and what would be the best thing to allow out there. "But what it all comes down to, of course, is that she was underestimated. And that's never a smart move."

For just a second, she let the flicker of amusement she felt over the gaze switch show, but then she was back to business. "And what about you, Mr. Trent?" she asked. "Are you underestimated? Is that what happened when you killed your captain?" she asked.

And now they were onto the pointed questions, he knew. That one was quite an obvious stab - and one he'd been dealing with for years. Still, he took a moment to breathe, making sure he was steady with his response. "Is that what I did?" he asked, making sure that he sounded almost amused at the question. As though he'd heard it so many, many times before, and that it was such an obvious falsehood he didn't really need to take it seriously. He knew, though, that this was an easier question in part because she was asking it. He knew that it would be slightly different, if it was the real deal. It would be harder, but he was confident he could still do it.

"That's what they say." she told him. "But then again, they also said you were a hero at one point, didn't they? Seems there's all kinds of room for error." she said. Glancing back, she watched the water filling the tub, reaching out to dip her fingertips down into it. "It'll keep going." she said, tone having changed. "They'll ask you about things, needle you when they can, ask about family, me, your relationships, they'll try to suss out your ambitions, and how solidly you're bound to me, and what that bind entails. They'll want to know if they can flip you later, if they want to. If you can be bought, or if you need other kinds of compensation. Just know that everything is designed to do something. Even if it isn't what the most obvious answer would be."

"I know, Princess," Brett told her, making the decision to go with the change, rather than address her last points before the act was dropped. "I know what I'm doing, even if you're sure that I don't. I know I haven't been doing this my whole life like you have..." He broke off, took a breath and continued. "They'll find out I'm loyal. Specifically, loyal to you. They'll find out there's a huge question mark over my background. if they take enough of an interest - which I fully expect they will, then my history in the police is common knowledge, as is my years with the Syndicate. They'll find out I worked with a lot of the groups over there, know quite a few people, outside of the O'Malleys. If they really dig deep, they'll find out about the DiGiovanni connection. I think we can assume that not everyone who might be looking will be connected enough to find out too many details on too many angles, so that should be enough to really make people wonder. Not that many people in this town can claim connections with both sides of the mob. Especially not when that person is then standing with one of the major neutral players in the city. There's enough there - so yes, I expect people will try and get to the bottom of that mystery.

"They'll find out about who I am. About my history, about what I'm apparently like. I know I can't manage to be charming and whatever else goes along with that, but for anyone digging, I have enough of a reputation that that would immediately come across as false, even if I could manage that. I can manage more than I normally would - I'm not gonna go in there determined to cut everyone off and alienate them. I can manage the middle ground."

Either he'd be able to pull it off, or he wouldn't. And she was aware no amount of preparation would really be a deciding factor in that, they were going to have to see. End of story. Just like they were going to have to see about whether or not she could manage any of this. Reaching out, she turned the water off, looking down a the clear water as the ripples settled. "Alright." she finally verbalized, giving him that cue, at least, that she was accepting things. What he had to say, whatever. She wasn't really of a mind to keep going over it. They'd find out tonight, one way or another.

He couldn't satisfy her, he realised. He wondered if he'd ever be able to. If she'd ever believe in this. And, if she didn't, what he'd signed himself up for. But he wasn't backing out - not now. Not since the moment the decision had been made. For all that this could be a huge mess, it was still the best place he'd been in for a good many years now. He wondered if he'd always be working to prove himself to her. And then he wondered when he became a person who needed to prove anything to anyone again. He'd been that guy, once. That had been another thing he'd thought had died. But apparently not.

She didn't look up, still looking at the water, though after a moment she finished getting undressed, so she could get into the tub. "I saw your notes." she said. That was more on her mind than the other things, even if she was aware it should be the other way around. She should be focusing on the party tonight, all of that, but she wasn't. Not really. Which was also part of why she'd dropped the subject. Her focus wanted to drift elsewhere. Crossing her arms along the ledge of the tub, she looked up at him. "I don't think you understand me."

"No?" Brett asked, though it didn't entirely sound like he doubted her assessment. It was simply a question, a response, leaving a gap for her to fill in what she would. He didn't add any more, again falling back on the habit not to add in things that weren't needed. He knew he did, sometimes, with her. Sometimes he felt the need to offer up things he wouldn't to anyone else. He doubted she noticed. It was possible she didn't really understand him. Maybe she understood where he'd come from, but not necessarily where he was now. but then again, he'd never tried to help her out with that.

She'd thought he might get angry with her, or at least defensive, but apparently not. So, maybe she was meant to find it. Or at the very least, he wasn't actively trying to hide it. She watched his eyes, assessing, trying to find a place to start with. In the end, she went for one of the most prominent things in her head. "What is it you think I want?" she asked. "You seem terribly convinced that you can't give it to me...and..." she frowned slightly, gaze averting, as she tried to remember what else was tacked onto that. "...that you told me? Or something? That you couldn't. So...what is it you think I want?"

She hadn't been meant to find it, but if anyone was to blame for her doing so, it was him. He hadn't thrown it away properly, after all. He knew what an inquisitive bitch she was, he really should know better by now. In any event, he'd vented the majority of his anger onto that paper last night. He knew she hadn't come out well from it, but she didn't seem to be particularly bothered by that, so he wasn't going to raise it unless she did. He certainly wasn't going to apologise for it - he'd been angry. "You'd prefer me to be something I'm not," he told her, focusing on that. "All of this - you think that I can't cope with it, I can't handle it. Because of who I am. How I am. I can't be the guy you have in your head that would be able to do this, and do this easily. The guy that would actually have you believing that this would work, rather than deciding at every turn that it was going to crash and burn. That's what you want. A guy who can carry you through all of this effortlessly. Who can be there, who can handle whatever's thrown at him without missing a step." there was more, he knew, but after that it started getting complicated.

She listened, but it was clear from the light frown on her features that what he was saying didn't quite sit well with her. Though she didn't appear angry, more like she wasn't sure what was going on. "What makes you think that's what I want from you? Or how I would want you to be?" she asked. Because that was definitely the first thing that she needed to know. "I think it's an issue if you can't. But no one ever said that that's how I want you to be. Or that it's a priority to me. And I don't expect you to carry me. I don't expect anyone to carry me. I never have. And...I know I never needed it before and--" she couldn't quite put it into words fully. "--that's changed now, but I still don't expect it. Not from you, or anyone else. As for never tripping up, or missing a step...everyone does. Somewhere, sometime, everyone does. Clearly, I have, on a whole host of things." She looked away, resting her cheek against her arms. "All of this was your idea, Trent. I'm along for the ride because it's what you've decided you're doing, and have seemed uninterested in going through with it without me. But I don't recall you ever asking me if it was what I wanted."

"At the time that I came up with this idea, you were all for slitting your own wrists and having done with it - it was hardly the time to go asking you what you 'wanted'," Brett pointed out. "You told me what you wanted - to go and get a couple of guns, head into O'Malley territory and take as many of them down as you could before they took you down. Has anything changed since then? Really? Aside from the fact that you took down the O'Malleys a different way, and you survived because of it. But it's still there, isn't it? That why you watched Babylon burn tonight? I don't need to ask you to know that's what you did." He paused for a moment. "Is this what you want? Has anything changed?"

"First of all, there's a difference between slitting one's wrists, and doing something that might get you killed." Eris said, before she ticked her gaze back to his. "Like there's a difference between killing and being a murderer." Which was a distinction he had made before, so she knew he'd get that. "And yes, that was then. And things have changed, situations have changed, and you haven't asked me since." she said, tone calm, still. Even, if a touch light. "Burning Babylon had nothing to do with them." she told him. "It never really did. It's personal." And not something she thought she could put into words that would make sense to him. So she didn't try. "And it's a little late to ask me now, if this is what I want. We've got tickets to a party tonight. And I'm going to put on my best dress, and hope I don't fail." She was silent for a few moments, sinking lower in the tub. "You seem to be laboring under the notion that all of this, the job, the whole thing, that that is what drives me, or what my main priorities are. That I view you through that lens. I don't. So you can stop trying to find motivations of mine through that route. You're going to come up with some wrong answers if you do."

"What drives you?" he asked her, since apparently he had it all wrong. He remained there, leaning against the wall, looking down at her in the bath. If he was a normal person, he knew, he might join her. But he wasn't, they weren't. They never would be.

Eris didn't answer immediately, and finally, she looked back at him. "I'll let you know when I figure it out." she told him. "I just know it's not the business. That I'm doing for you." With that, she sat back, and reached out for the soap, so she could start getting that scent of smoke off of her. It wasn't necessarily that she was finished with the conversation, and more that she was aware she'd just made herself vulnerable on that, and she felt the need to busy herself with something, so she could not scramble because of it.

That surprised him. And threw him entirely and it showed on his face, and the way he straightened a little from his position. He bit back the immediate question, though he asked it still barely a second later. It just came out more controlled than it would have done. "For me?" he asked, managing a tone that suggested that he didn't mind overly much about what the answer was.

She didn't look at him because she was still vulnerable feeling, and she didn't know what his tone meant. She ran her hand up her arm, spreading the scented soap there, then treated her other arm to the same. "You heard me the first time." she said. She wasn't overly okay with sitting there repeating herself, or getting into some explanation. Though she was aware he might want one. She just wasn't at all sure what she would say if she needed to explain.

He had done. He just knew that he'd started this whole thing for her. It wasn't just that now, but it had started out that way. He didn't particularly want to go into where it was now. That was straying into the 'complicated' area that he tried to ignore. "Don't feel like you have to. If it's just for me. If you don't want it for yourself at all. It's not too late to back out," he told her. He didn't promise that he wouldn't mind - he would, he knew. But the way she was putting things today, they made him feel like a jailer, like he was keeping her here. And maybe it had started out that way, but he'd hoped it wouldn't carry on like that.

Eris took the opportunity to dunk her head under the water for a few long moments, to give herself a minute. Then she started to shampoo her hair, taking the time to do that before she answered him. "Yes it is." she said, to that last bit. About how it wasn't too late to back out now, because as far as she was concerned, it was. She bit her tongue on the rest of it, though. You just don't grasp what it is you've actually asked me to do, baby, and that's where things get messy for me.

It was the girls - if it had just been the two of them, maybe it wouldn't have been too late. Sure, she'd sunk a lot of money into it, but nothing was irrevocable. But, the girls. If she walked away from this, she'd walk away from them. He didn't know what to say about it all now though. So, in the end, he just stayed silent.

She kept the silence going as well, washing up even if she knew he was standing right there, she never looked back at him again. She just washed in silence, and then stood, reaching for a towel to wrap around herself. At least the smell of burning Babylon was gone, out of her skin, out of her hair. That was something. Or, that was her story, and she was sticking to it. When she went to pick up the brush, standing in front of the mirror, as she looked at him in the reflection, finally giving in to looking at him, she spoke. "May I have my medication, please?" she asked. Vaguely, she wondered how much there was left. There couldn't be that much, unless Brett had gotten her more than she'd had at the loft. But she didn't take care of that, he did. So she didn't know.

He met her eyes, then turned and left in silence, heading for the other room, where he counted out her pills, drew her a glass of water, and headed back again. Again, silently, he handed them over. There weren't many left - they'd have to work something out there. Find someone who could actually be trusted. Thing was, Brett wasn't sure that anyone in this entire world fitted that description.

She took them quietly, drinking the water down, and she set the glass on the counter, next to her brush. Drawing in a deep breath, she let it out slowly, letting her eyes drift back to his in the reflection again. One of them should probably say something here, but she didn't know what it was she should say. She could tell him that she'd brought her record player from the loft, and it was still sitting by the elevator, but she knew that was just a deflection, just something to get him away from her for a few minutes.

"We're going to have to get you some more, sometime," he told her as he watched her swallow down the pills. "Especially the blue ones - you have to take four of those a day, and there's not too many of them left." He wasn't very good at keeping track of the names of her pills, but he knew each one by sight, when she had to take them, and how many she had to take.

"I was just wondering about that." she said, turning to head back into the bedroom. She went to the dresser, and got out panties and a nightgown, because she planned on going back to sleep for a while. "I wondered if I was going to be running low. I can't go to the hospital. Though I probably could use an actual, real doctor's opinion on my recovery." Not that they'd get one. And her tone suggested she knew that that was unlikely as hell.

"If we could get that, it would be good," Brett agreed, though his tone was guarded. The only doctor he'd thought that he could possibly trust had skipped town. And, in Brett's opinion, it was a fucking good job, since he'd found out what the guy had done when his back was turned. Brett had thought he had a deal with Gray - he'd pay the doc in cold hard cash, and Gray would keep Eris, safe, secure, looked after. What Brett hadn't appreciated at the time was that Gray had added in extra 'payments', demanding them off Eris when he wasn't around. And if Brett ever got hold of the doc in the future, he was going to beat those payments out of his flesh.

After getting herself dressed, she walked over to the bed, pulled the covers back, and crawled in, curling on her side. "But we probably won't." she said, tone light. "So, I suppose until I have a massive seizure, or drop from some connection in my head that isn't made right or fucked up, or something else, we'll just have to assume everything's fine." Which she realized was her, putting out there some of the fears she had about her condition. She hadn't talked about it in a while, but that didn't mean that it wasn't still there. Frowns flickered over her expression as her thoughts continued on that track, as she pulled the covers up.

Brett wasn't willing to allow that to happen, but he knew they didn't have a whole lot of options. "We could spread it around. Figure out exactly what each pill's for, then get some of your girls - if they took one each, faked a condition, or..." He said, moving so that he could see her face, lying as she was on the bed, still some distance away, just out of reach. He baulked at actually saying what he was thinking and instead just let it float. "Nobody would need to know that they all keyed together, and the prescriptions wouldn't have your name on them." Of course, they wouldn't have an opinion as to whether they were all needed, either, but something was better than nothing, and he didn't like how she got when she didn't take her meds.

She looked up at him, finally focusing there again. And sure, she could have commented on the plans for getting more medication, but her mind was more on the other track it had gone off on, and so she needed to address that. "Brett, if anything ever happens to me, and I...get worse..." she tried to figure out how to word things, and in the end, she went with the less direct track. "I don't want to wind up in Bedlam." Which would be where she'd be sent if she took a turn for the worse, and her capacity dwindled more than it was now. If something cracked in her head, and she was suddenly landed with the mind of a child, or something. She'd rather be dead.

"I will never let you end up in Bedlam," he told her, his voice firm on that. It was true, he realised that much as he said it. No matter what happened, as long as he was around, he wasn't going to let anything happen to her: and that included anyone locking her up. As long as he was around, he was going to look after her.

She watched his eyes as he said it, and recognized that he believed what he was saying. And, even if she wasn't inclined to trust people overly much, she trusted him on this. She trusted him on a lot of levels, but this was a fairly large one. "Thank you." she said, simply. But she meant it. It was in her voice, and her expression. Clear.

He nodded, just once, not knowing what to add in there. He still felt a little off, he knew. Like he'd fucked up way back down the line, trying to do the right thing. Who knew, maybe now, with that last thought, last comment, that wasn't the right thing either, even though she seemed to take it the right way. It had come from the same place. But, seemingly, one was right and the other wrong. And he supposed he should know the difference. "Should I let you get some sleep?" he asked her, figuring that was why she'd gone to bed. Unless he was really missing some signals here.

"I didn't get much last night." she said. "And I'm going to need to be as on top of my game as possible when we go to the party." she added. Which he knew. And she was still freaking out about somewhere in the back of her mind. But it was quieter, at the moment. Maybe due to everything else she had to worry about going on in her head. "Did you get much sleep? Is the couch comfortable?" Considering the bed had very much been made, and therefore it was more proof he hadn't slept in their room. Which was odd to think about. That they had a room. A bed. They did, together. She'd never done that. Her place had always been her place, and when she'd lived with Brett before, it had been his place, she was just staying there. It had her quirking a faint half smile as she shifted to get comfortable.

"I didn't get much. And no, it's not. I'm not a man built for couches," he told her, wondering what she had to smile about. Possibly at the thought of him falling asleep on the couch, laughing at that, maybe.

"You're really not." she agreed. He was a big guy. Flat out, he wasn't a tiny person. Even when she wore heels she still felt small in comparison. "You could always lie down for a while." she told him. "Stretch out a little bit." Which wasn't her inviting him. It was just making a suggestion. Just putting out there a course of action he could possibly take, should he want to.

He'd actually been considering going and having a bath, but with the stresses of the past couple of days, if she was making anything that could possibly be read as a suggestion, he wasn't going to just dismiss it out of hand. "I could do," he agreed, though for the moment he didn't move.

She pushed the covers down on the other side of the bed, and just left it like that, just in case he should want to lie down. But she knew he tended to ignore her out of principal if she happened to truly ask him to do something, unless it was like getting her meds. But like she'd wanted him to come closer the other night, and of course he hadn't. Not til later, when she'd no longer been of a mind to do things she'd had in mind in the first place.

He left it for a few moments, weighing up the options in his mind, and then he crossed and joined her on the bed, slipping under the covers. It was a damn comfortable bed, he'd say that for sure. The place they'd rented might, in her opinion, need some additions and personalisation, but what was here was of a very high quality. He couldn't remember ever having a bed as comfortable as this one was. He pulled the covers back up over him as he laid on his back, his face turned towards her.

She watched him, vaguely wondering if he was ever going to stop going to bed fully clothed. Then she thought about getting him proper pajamas at some point. Something more comfortable than everything else, anyways. What she didn't do was say anything about it. Instead, she pulled the covers back up, reaching over to put them over him properly too, even if that was wholly unnecessary. Then she laid down again, on her side, facing him. "Sweet dreams." she said.

"Is there any such thing?" Brett asked her, offhand, thinking of the weird dreams he tended to have most nights. Strange dreams, dreams where he was other people, dreams of a different world - or so it felt. Definitely some things that he didn't recognise. But when were dreams ever meant to actually make sense? He shifted, turning onto his side to face her, bunching the pillows to a more comfortable position.

Even if it was likely rhetorical, Eris answered. "I've heard rumors." she told him. "Try for them anyways." Not that she figured she'd have very good dreams either. Even if she was in a better place than she had been last night and everything, she was anxious about tonight, so that didn't necessarily bode well. Still, she needed to try to sleep, so she closed her eyes. Tonight, she'd find out if this was at all doable. If she'd be able to pull this off. She'd see if everything crashed and burned. Hopefully by then she felt ready. Because she sure as hell didn't right now.