The first few days were as expected.
The first one to get up would make coffee. The second one to get up would make food.
Then whenever people would arrive they'd get to work. Emilie would only talk to Benny when she needed to, and Benny would only talk to Emilie when he needed to.
They would get what work they could do and then eat dinner with the crew before the crew went back to their respective places.
Then they would mind their own business.
Sometimes Emilie would draw.
Sometimes Benny would play chess alone.
Some nights they would play a silent game of chess against each other.
They would then go to sleep.
Benny in his room, warm and cozy in his bed.
Emilie in the living room, cold on the thin air mattress.
They'd never admit it but it was pretty similar to how they lived when they were together, except this time around they were stand-offish with each other to avoid issues.
One night, Emilie couldn't sleep so she turned on the light and tried to distract herself until she felt sleepy. She had been drawing a portrait of everyone in the group, trying to make them as good as she could. Normally it would take her about two tries to get it right, two for Harry's, two for Mike, two for Matt's, one for Hilton's, and three for Arthur's. She had saved her least favorite for last, this was her eighth attempt to get Benny's portrait right.
She had turned on the lights again so she could actually see what she was drawing, and at about two in the morning, Benny got out of his room and asked,
"What are you doing Emilie?" his eyes were still adjusting to the light.
"Oh um I'm just drawing, go back to sleep," she put her sketchbook face down, just in case.
"Why aren't you asleep?"
"I couldn't sleep, too cold to relax," she said with the ghost of a smile on her face.
"You haven't been like this the last few nights,"
"Well I normally just lie awake for a few hours trying to get warm, decided I'd try and keep myself occupied until I felt a bit sleepier tonight," she nodded her head slightly, "I didn't remember it being this cold at night before,"
"Oh I moved the heater into my bedroom, I spent most of my time there so it made sense," there was a guilty look on his face.
"Cool," she went back to drawing, and pulled the blanket higher onto her shoulders to cover more of herself.
Benny rubbed the back of his head, "You can sleep in my room if you want, it's much warmer than out here," he seemed unsure but forced a smile.
"I don't want to make thing weirder than it is,"
"Well it's already weird, you can't fix that so you might as well sleep," he said sheepishly.
"You sure?"
Benny nodded.
Emilie took her blanket and scurried over to the bedroom door. When she opened it a wave of warm air fell over her and she sighed in relief. She walked over to the side she normally slept on. She faced away from Benny and the door. She only knew he came in by the shifting of the mattress. She tried to close her eyes and slept. Emilie fell asleep shortly after.
-
Emilie woke up entangled in Benny.
She slept a lot better than she had the last few days.
Part of her wanted to move away from him because she was scared, but the other part, the one that won over made her curl up and snuggle into his embrace.
This might complicate things.