the blood in our future

Fill My Lungs With Water (I'll Breathe You Just the Same)

A/N: Parentheses in the title - you know what that spells out!! (You probably don't because it's incredibly random that I've kept this trend going)

Besides that, I feel like everything that's going to happen in this chapter will be a jumpscare for you. Have fun!

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Lucy Carlyle could not sleep.

Even though her bones felt weary and every bit of her skin hurt, she couldn't keep her eyes closed for more than a few seconds.

Her bed which had felt so nice when she'd tried it out this afternoon, felt too cold, too hard, all of a sudden. Whichever way she lay - something was always wrong, always itching, always prompting her to jump up.

Lucy gave herself another half hour to try and fall asleep. Then, her feet hit the ground.

With her head still pounding, she was glad to look at the windowsill and find the ghost jar empty of any green glow. Skull had talked to her for a bit just as she'd gotten ready for bed, cackling whilst spewing one dark prophecy after another, only interrupting this cheerful broadcast for the occasional insult.

Then, finally, after he'd mocked her one time too many about how she'd looked with her fringe sticking up to wash her face, she'd ignored his protests, shut his valve, and enjoyed the blissful silence.

Still, even if he was a real annoyance and told Lucy far too often that 'Death was already inside her', she found that she liked having him around.

She would never admit to this out loud, but she'd felt incredibly alone, those nights at the hospital. It had been cold, isolated.

Loneliness had burrowed its roots deep within her, back then. Once everything had been dark, once everyone had gone. When there had been so many sounds outside of her room - nurses whispering up and down the hallway, distant coughing - and yet, inside of it, it had been entirely quiet. Entirely void of anything she might call home.

The last night, yesterday night, had been the worst. It hadn't been a surprise, really: By then, it had been going on the longest. Night after night, loneliness had hollowed her out until she was empty, until there was nothing else left. It had taken root, grown inside her, and now there were its fruits blooming in her throat, too deeply intertwined with her flesh to cut them out.

And Lucy had supposed it was always there, somehow. She had always felt it, had always felt traces of it, had always felt some sharp thorn scrape her insides open, reminding her it was still there, still waiting.

At day, it had been easier to take. Mary or George or even some nice Fittes agent named Kipps had stuck their head through her door and the branches had retreated.

But at night? At night, she had been on her own. She had been at its mercy.

At night, it had threatened to tear her open, to turn her blood into poison. At night, it had whispered into her ear that she was alone, alone, alone, and with its blossoms choking her, there was nothing she could have said against it.

She'd thought about Norrie and the others. All of her friends who had never even made it to a hospital before their eyes had become unseeing.

She'd thought about her mum, staying absent day after day.

And she'd thought about this new life, the one she could not remember living. She'd thought about George, who, although clearly trying his best, could never make up for the fact that her boss and, apparently, former friend, seemingly hated her guts.

Because what good could it have been, that she'd fought so hard to get away from Jacobs only for her to end up in another place of employment where her employer didn't care about her?

What good could it have been, running away to London and leaving everyone behind, if she hadn't managed to change anything?

She'd wanted to talk to herself from before her memory loss. Had wanted to ask past-her why she'd stayed, why she'd done things this and that way, but obviously, she couldn't. She was alone, with no one to relate to, with no one who would understand her. No one who would get why she was so achingly sad.

She'd cried, sometimes, when it had all gotten too much. When she'd felt like someone misplaced, someone dragged into a future she could not fit into.

If she'd felt this way a few weeks ago (her few weeks ago), she could've sneaked out to see Norrie or she could've stolen herself into her sister's room. Most nights, she'd wake up to find Mary already beside her anyway, having stolen most of the blanket, snoring without care and abandon.

But Norrie was gone, asleep forever, and Mary - even though she hadn't said anything about it, Lucy could tell that the year apart had distanced them. Not in a mean, hateful way. Not in a way that spelt out regret, but rather in a way she supposed was normal for people not living in the same house anymore.

And yet, she'd grieved for it. Because she hadn't lived at a distance from her for a year. She hadn't been the person who hadn't visited Mary for a year, for which she'd had to scramble through countless newspapers only to send her a letter. To her, the last time that Mary had crawled into her bed had only been two weeks ago.

Alone, alone, alone, the branches inside her whispered, and now, with everyone dead or at arm's length, it wasn't a lie anymore. She'd lost everything she'd ever known and forgotten the rest.

With no one to go to in the middle of the night, she'd often stared out the window.

She'd watched the carpark below, illuminated by green ghost-lights, and had made up stories about the lives of the people drifting in and out. Just the night before, her last night at the hospital, there'd been an old couple helping each other get into the back of a cab. Lucy had liked to imagine that they did the crossword puzzle together every morning.

Now, in her present-day attic, there was a window, too, with a green lantern just in front of it.

But, then again, she didn't feel half as lonely anymore as she had only yesterday.

Then again, she wasn't isolated inside of a white room anymore. She was home, her two best friends only a floor below her.

And now, she supposed there was someone she could go to in the middle of the night. Someone she desperately needed to talk to one-on-one, anyway.

Still, she cringed at the thought of it. It really wouldn't be fair to wake him. She'd seen the dark circles under Lockwood's eyes. She knew how direly he needed sleep.

She had already walked over to her stairs before she could stop herself.

Because just maybe, he was still awake, too. Maybe he was too amped up to sleep, just like her. Maybe she could simply go down into the kitchen, make herself a cup of tea, and then linger by his door for a few minutes to hear if he was still up. It certainly was a better option than to continue staring holes into her ceiling.

And just when she felt content with this plan, was even looking forward to it, her eyes grazed the surface of the cupboard right next to the stairs, and her heart sank.

The necklace Lockwood had gifted her wasn't there anymore.

She hadn't touched it, ever since he'd laid it down there, and even though she knew George had been in her room earlier to dig up the letter, she doubted he would move it. Which only left her with one explanation: Lockwood himself had taken it back.

Lucy should have expected it. She should've known that, even though he might be thankful to her for getting him out, he wouldn't just forgive and forget all the things that had happened tonight. And still - it was a sharp stab to her chest, the realisation of it: That she'd wreaked whatever they'd once been before they ever had the chance to be something.

She felt off-kilter, close to losing her balance, which wasn't made any better by the increasing pounding in her head. The pain from her injury there hadn't gotten any better, even after George had carefully cleaned, disinfected and dressed the wound. It came in waves, the hurt, and now, she had to put one of her hands on the bannister to keep steady, to keep the nausea at bay.

Maybe she should only go downstairs to get her tea. Maybe she should not linger by any door to listen for any breaths.

She had to talk to Lockwood about it, of course. She knew that. She still had to apologise, to really apologise, and explain herself. And she would do it. She wouldn't put it off. But, with the necklace taken back, she would do so in the daylight, once the stars were gone. At an hour reasonable for two friends and colleagues. At an hour when all those ghosts of what they could've been, of what they must've been, should've vanished.

She would salvage whatever was left of them and make the best of it; try to fool herself into believing that it was enough. She only hoped she wouldn't lose him as a friend, too.

But, first of all: Tea.

So, after slipping into an extra cardigan on top of her pyjamas that did nothing at all to keep her warm, Lucy stepped out of her room and quietly walked down the stairs.

The whole house was dark and silent in these dead hours of night.

She didn't know how late it was, exactly, and the clock in the kitchen did nothing to help her with it - the second hand spun around wildly, progressing far too fast, and she made a mental note to have a look at it in the morning.

Mindful to not be too loud, she closed the kitchen door before she filled the kettle and turned on the stove, the green glow of the lantern outside painting the kitchen so brightly that she did not need to turn on the big light-

It made her pause, the thought of that.

Because she'd closed the shutters only about two hours ago. There should not have been enough light in the kitchen to illuminate it this much, to paint it entirely green.

And yet, as she turned to face the window now, she saw that the shutter was wide open.

Had Lockwood or George opened it again?

Frowning, Lucy stepped closer, and just as she wanted to reach up to shut it once more, her gaze wandered outside - and saw movement, just at the very edge of her vision.

Tensely, she looked closer, tried to see past the shadows, past the darkness, and, yes, there was something. Something that almost looked like a person there, across the road, hidden away, crouched down-

The kettle started whistling.

Lucy jumped, stumbled back with a shriek she chided herself for immediately.

Quickly, she turned off the stove and hurried to the window again. But now, she saw nothing. There was no one there.

And, yes, of course, there was no one there. That person she believed she'd seen? It hadn't been one. Or, well, it must've been one at some point or other, but not anymore.

Whatever she'd seen had most likely been a visitor, haunting the street outside before vanishing. As they tended to do. As she should very well know and expect, given the fact she made her money fighting them.

Still shaking her head about herself, she directed her attention back to her tea.

Only when she turned slightly to her left to grab the sugar did she see it; did she realise that she was not alone.

Because it was only then that she saw the eye peeping in on her through the keyhole.

This time, Lucy didn't jump. She didn't scream.

As if in ghost-lock, she only watched as the eye stared at her, as its gaze flitted all over her face. As it blinked.

"George? Lockwood?" She called out lowly, willing for this to be some stupid prank, one of George's famously ill-timed experiments. But, of course, she didn't get an answer.

Whoever was on the other side of that door wasn't Lockwood, wasn't George. She knew their eyes. This wasn't them.

And with that in mind, movement returned to Lucy in one violent rush. Anger returned to her, diminishing every bit of fear inside her. Viper-fast, she grabbed the still-full, still-hot kettle, opened its lid, and threw the boiling water right at the keyhole.

The eye moved away too fast, having seen it coming. It was gone, the keyhole black again.

But whoever that eye belonged to was still in the house. In her home.

More than that: Someone had broken in, and two of the three inhabitants of this house were still completely unaware of that fact - and completely defenceless.

In one rough go, Lucy grabbed the large kitchen scissors, ripped the door open, and saw the last bit of a black shadow vanish into the library.

"Lockwood! George! Someone's in here!" This time, her voice wasn't shaking. She was screaming, shouting loudly, but even so, no answer came.

Cursing, she took matters into her own hands and chased after the form into the library-

Only to freeze all over again.

In here, too, all of the shutters had been re-opened. It was only due to this circumstance that she saw them at all; that she noticed them: The people standing right outside.

There were people standing there. So many of them. They were staring straight at her through the night, through the glass; all shrouded in darkness.

And then, before she knew it, she saw movement in the corner of her eye, in the reflection of the window. Only this time, it came from inside.

And this time, she had something sharp in her hands.

She whirled around, saw the shadow try to steal past her, and rammed the scissors right into its back.

Yet, even though Lucy could see the blades going into his skin, even though she knew she hadn't missed, it didn't scream, didn't even seem fazed by it. It only tried to shove past her, so she held on, tried to pull it back-

But the shadow was stronger. As she tried to climb his back in an effort to tear it down, it simply let her momentum carry it a few steps backwards and slammed her into the bookshelves.

Once, twice, and Lucy felt her back nearly crack under the impact. Three times, and she felt a dull edge hitting her head, splitting it open all over again. She tried to fight back. To wrap her hands around the shadow's throat, to twist her scissors, but whatever she did, the shadow didn't even flinch-

Four times, and her vision blurred, her breath faded.

Five times, and she couldn't hold on anymore.

Feeling that she was losing her grip, the shadow turned around, grabbed her, and half-threw, half-kicked her one final time into the wood.

There were black spots dancing in front of her, as she slumped down. By now, her head hurt so much that tears stung her eyes.

Still, Lucy didn't stay down for long. She couldn't. She didn't know what had happened to Lockwood and George, why they hadn't come running down the stairs yet. But right now, she could still fool herself into believing that Lockwood, when he did sleep, was an extremely heavy sleeper. That George simply had earbuds in. Right now, she had to get up and protect them.

The shadow didn't stay to finish her off. It ran for the door, and Lucy tried to tear its ankle backwards - but as if it had eyes on his back, too, it jumped right over her outstretched hand.

Rage shot through her, making standing up far easier than it should've been. The shadow threw the door shut behind it, and with a frustrated scream, Lucy threw it open once more, saw the shadow make a run for the stairs-

And vanish into the water that came running down it.

There was water, tons of it, gushing down the stairs, already flooding the lower floor up to her ankles.

And the shadow had vanished straight into it.

This was the exact moment in which Lucy figured out that all of this - the necklace, the people outside, the eye, the shadow - was nothing but a dream.

She was dreaming.

Still a bit lost, still a bit confused, she looked around at the Portland Row her mind had constructed for her. It seemed real enough - everything was at its place as far as she could tell. Only a few of the edges, a few of the corners, were too blurred, too warped, too pulsing.

The only thing that was really any different was the thundering water, of course.

Intrigued, Lucy drew closer. She wasn't scared of it anymore. Not like she had been on that clearing. Not like she had been when she'd forced herself to take a shower earlier.

Now that she knew she was asleep, that none of this was really happening, rage and fear had lost their place in her heart. She didn't even feel any pain anymore. Well, not coming from her head, anyways. The scar on her arm, the one she could not remember getting, had begun to sting painfully instead, her body apparently unwilling to give her a real break even in her sleep.

Still, it wasn't often she got to walk around in her dreams, knowing what they were.

It was almost hypnotic, really, how the water seemed to call out to her. How she walked closer without even realising.

The water roared down the stairs as a monster, out to tear everything in its path with it down into its realm. And yet, she felt almost no resistance as she walked against the stream, as she started climbing up the stairs, step after step, feeling the cold freeze her skin. The rapid reached her hip by the time she'd made it up to the second floor.

It was dark here. Darker than she remembered it being when she'd walked up into her room. The walls had no end, the floor no limit. They faded out into blackness, into non-existence. There was no ceiling - but no real sky above her, either.

There was only a moon. Too large, too pale, too hostile.

Far too close for any comfort.

It was the only source of light in this barren, uncanny world.

There were no stars in this mockery of a sky.

The doors to the rooms were too far away from the middle of the hallway. It seemed to her as if she could walk straight ahead for a hundred days, and yet never get one inch closer to them.

There was light burning underneath Lockwood's door, blurred through the water's lens, but it wasn't what Lucy was focusing on.

Right in front of her, a good few feet away, something was disrupting the black water. Something was sticking out, softly swaying in the waves, up and down, up and down.

Something yellow.

Yellow fabric.

It was a strange thing, something startlingly colourful in this sinister reality.

Lucy walked closer to it. Walked until she could've reached out and picked it up.

Until, much the same as she could feel echoes of the past from objects connected to visitors, connected to violence - she could feel the death radiating off of it.

There was so much of it. So many shouts in her head, telling her to hide, to run, to jump, to breathe, to stay.

They were screaming, begging, pleading.

And Lucy felt so afraid to touch it, that yellow bit of fabric. She was afraid her fingers would reach out and wander over it anyways, without her permission.

If she was feeling this much fear from it without even holding it, what would happen to her if she did grant it access to her? If it sank into her, held her captive?

She had to hold her own hand tightly to keep it from grasping it.

Fear crowded her mind as the shouts grew to a storm. Fear of death, fear of pain, fear of this unbearable... pressure she was feeling in her chest.

Fear of not being alone.

Lucy tore her eyes away from that yellow thing, stumbled a few steps back. She took greedy, gasping breaths of air.

And just when she looked around for any way out, she found that those voices in her head had been right after all.

She wasn't alone.

The far walls of the corridor had vanished. Instead of them, there were now people standing at the far end of the platform.

They were facing her, encircling her, screaming at her with unmoving faces, causing Lucy to wince as their shrieks hurt her ears-

And somehow, a quiet whisper was still louder than all of them.

"Luce," a familiar voice called her home, and gone were the shouts, gone was the bit of yellow, gone were the people.

There was only Lockwood, standing right behind her.

He was wearing his usual attire, suit pants soaked with water up to his thighs, and Lucy couldn't have been happier to see him.

She was just about to smile at him, to press herself against him, when she noticed that something was wrong. Horribly wrong. His face looked too pale, his eyes too hollow. His gaze too dull.

He almost looked as if he was-

"Luce," he murmured again as he slumped against her, unable to keep himself upright anymore.

"Lockwood," she began, and even though she knew this was a dream, she was still so scared. She gently gripped him by his shoulders, pried him off her a bit so she could look at him. "What's-"

And that's when she saw it.

The large kitchen scissors that were buried in his skin, right into his heart. The blood gushing out of it, dripping down his suit, forming rivers of red on his white shirt.

Instinctively, she pressed her one hand onto his injury, but Lockwood gripped her other one before it could join the effort.

"Luce," he said her name again. "It wasn't your fault."

"What was?" she tonelessly asked, attention still fixed on that wound on his chest. On that terrible wound, the one she could not keep closed with one hand, however much she tried.

But Lockwood tilted her chin up all the same, seemingly caring more for the fact that their gazes met than for his blood staying inside of him.

"That you killed me, of course," he said, and it made Lucy unfathomably sad that this was when he started smiling at her. It was soft, forgiving. It was happy, almost.

And Lucy did not understand it.

"I didn't kill you," she said, voice shaking. "I would- I could never do that."

"But you have to. You have to kill me. It's the only way."

"No," she gave back without any hesitation. "Why would I?"

His eyes were endlessly mournful as he cupped her cheek, smearing it with his blood. "Because it's the only way for you to go on. And it's alright. I won't fault you." His hand left her cheek, found the scissors stuck in his chest. Gripped them tightly.

Lockwood looked at her, one last time, and she knew that he loved her, then, in this dream, in this reality. "We were always going to end like this: Me dying for you."

"No!" Lucy screamed, but there was nothing she could do as he tore the scissors out of his heart, as blood came rushing out of it faster and faster, as it coloured the ocean beneath them red-

Lucy tried to hold on to him as he went under, as, suddenly, the water reached her throat and her feet couldn't touch the ground anymore, but he slipped away, slipped out of her reach before she could get to him.

She screamed against the tide, tried to dive under, but in the blackness, she couldn't see him anymore.

Still, she dove further, tried, tried, tried to reach him, but the waves had grown stronger, and she felt so weak-

Against her will, against her struggle to remain with him, the current spewed her back up, and she was no longer inside of Thirty-five Portland Row as she breached the surface, as she took one wet breath after another.

There were lights in the distance, a cloudy sky above her, the loud toll of a bell from somewhere far away-

The waves were mountains now. They towered over her, higher than she'd ever see them, higher than they were supposed to be, and they pressed her down, back under, giving her no break, dragging her down further and further until she couldn't open her mouth, until she couldn't even scream, until she was drowning-

"Lucy!" A hand on her shoulder, and she blinked herself awake.

She startled back, not knowing where she was, feeling totally disoriented.

She turned around, needed one, two, three seconds before she recognised the face of the person standing behind her, lost in frowns and unspoken questions.

It was George.

And she wasn't in deep water, of course. She was standing in the second-floor hallway of her home, right in front of Lockwood's door.

"Are you okay?" George was looking at her with his brows scrunched together, and only then did Lucy remember to breathe.

"Yeah," she gasped, realising all of a sudden how late it must still be. "Sorry. Did I wake you up?"

"No," he gave back. "You didn't make a sound. I needed the loo and saw you standing outside of Lockwood's room, completely still."

She nodded. "Sorry." Lucy was frowning now herself, still trying to fully find her way back into reality, trying to figure out how she'd gotten from her bed in the attic to here. "I think I might've been sleepwalking-"

"Why do you have our scissors?" George interrupted her, his gaze flitting down to her hands.

It was only then that Lucy's eyes followed his. It was only then that she noticed she was, in fact, holding their kitchen scissors still tightly in her grip, blades facing outwards.

Scissors she'd, in her dream, stuck in the shadow's back ages ago.

"I don't know," Lucy began lowly, shaking her head in confusion. Another wave of pain hit her, erupted from her head, and she squeezed her eyes tight. "As I said, I must've been-"

Just at that moment, the door in front of her opened. Lockwood's door opened. And Lockwood himself was sticking his head out of it, smiling at them in that delirious way that told her he hadn't even slept a wink since they'd parted ways.

"Hey, guys," he greeted them. "Everything alright out here? I heard you whispering."

"Yeah," Lucy breathed out.

"Lucy was sleep-walking with our kitchen scissors," George ratted on her instantly, for which she shot him a dirty look.

Lockwood was looking down at her hands now, too. "Kitchen scissors? What did you dream about? Some mean-spirited packaging you couldn't get open?"

She drank him in like a lifeline. "No. I- I dreamed that there was someone inside the house. Someone had broken in."

Lockwood's easy expression turned into one of alarm immediately. "Colby?"

Lucy opened her mouth only to close it. Some part of her was still trying to keep the water out. "I don't know. I don't think so. It was just a shadow."

Lockwood's eyes found George's above her head. "Well, a quick check has never hurt. And we better get those scissors back where they belong, anyway," he winked at Lucy. "George, get those rapiers out of your room. If Colby's in here, we'll find him."

Lucy practically heard George roll his eyes. "Lockwood, she had a bad dream-"

"And I won't let either of you out of my sight before we've checked the house. Get going, George. It'll only take a few minutes."

"Can I at least use the loo before-"

Lockwood grinned at him blindingly. "No."

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In the end, Lockwood proved to be right: The manhunt, true to what he'd claimed, did not take long at all and yielded no surprising results. There was no one inside except for them.

It would've been even quicker, of course, had George not absolutely busted his ass on the water spilt in the kitchen. Evidently, Lucy must have had some control over her body as she'd dreamed, because in real life, too, she'd chugged that kettle empty.

Due to this, things had gotten a little awkward once they'd reached the library.

"What the fuck happened in here?" George had asked, still rubbing his back from where it had gotten acquainted with the kitchen floor only moments ago.

"The shadow and I fought," Lucy had explained, hands drifting over the books spilt out over the floor. "It rammed me into the shelves a good few times."

She'd only barely caught the way Lockwood and George had exchanged worried glances at that, the way Lockwood had picked up a discarded piece of bled-through dressing off the floor.

"You lost your bandages," he'd said to Lucy, tonelessly, holding it up almost as if he'd meant to put it on trial.

"Oh," had been all Lucy knew to answer. "I didn't even notice." Quickly, she had touched a hand to the back of her head, to the spot that hurt over and over again, each time only getting worse, not better. "But it barely bleeds anymore. I'm sure I'll be alright-"

"I'll get the kit," George had already said, apparently not up for a discussion.

And that's how the three of them all came to sit in the kitchen, Lucy's head freshly disinfected and dressed, a package of biscuits split equally between them.

The shutters were still drawn, and Lucy felt safe. Parallel to bandaging Lucy's head, sleep-deprived as they all were, Lockwood made some dumb joke about George's fall, which prompted the latter to retaliate by recounting the time Lockwood had apparently fallen into a pit of mud during a job.

They were all laughing now, George and Lucy a bit harder than Lockwood, sitting around the white cloth scribbled full of mementoes of their lives together. This time, Lucy knew that her handwriting was real. This time, Lucy knew that this - George and Lockwood and Portland Row - was everything she'd ever wanted.

"You sure you're alright, Lucy?" George asked her now. "You've got that absent look again."

She could've lied, of course. Could've kept her fears to herself in an effort to keep a brave face. But because this was everything she'd ever wanted, this time around, she decided to trust. She decided to share with the class.

"Yeah, I'm alright" she began, a bit awkwardly. "But I'm still a bit worried about what I dreamed."

"Well, what exactly did you dream about? You said there was an intruder, right?" Lockwood asked her, snagging himself another biscuit.

"Well, yeah. There was an intruder - the shadow I told you about. But then, there was also water."

"Water?" George had his eyebrows raised at her.

"Lots of it. It came down the stairs. It was an entire ocean by the time I'd made it to the second floor. There was a piece of yellow fabric in there, too, that scared me for some reason - not sure what that was about - but then I saw... something else," she said softly, unsure about how to say the following, throwing nervous glances at Lockwood over and over again.

"What was it?" He asked her, merrily chewing on his biscuit in a completely unworried manner.

"Your death."

By the looks and sounds of it, Lockwood was choking on said biscuit. "Huh?"

"I saw your death," she repeated once more, her voice breaking under a weight she pretended to not feel. "I... You said I'd stabbed you with that kitchen scissors. You said it was meant to be, that you'd die."

"Okay," George said, rationalising. "Sounds pretty... nasty."

"It was."

"But you know what it also sounds like?"

"Like what?"

"Like a dream," he said, no bite in his tone. "A bad one, sure, but nevertheless, a dream. They tend to be a bit weird sometimes. That's kind of their whole thing."

Lucy frowned, still feeling the waves lapping against her throat, trying to pull her under. Still feeling her hands desperately trying to reach for Lockwood beneath the water. "I used to have visions, didn't I?" she asked. "Back in Ilwich? I saw Norrie. I saw the place where Boone held his victims."

"You did," George nodded. "But I doubt this has anything to do with it. I mean, we've searched the whole house, and no one is in here. Besides, back then, that was always due to your Touch. You were touching a source or a connected object when you had visions of the victims. And you were touching Norrie when you saw her. Now, you weren't touching anything." His gaze narrowed. "Unless you've taken up going to sleep with sources again-"

"I haven't!" Lucy quickly clarified. "I can't even remember ever doing it. No, I was... I was just sleeping. No sources involved."

"Well, then the case is solved: It was just a dream. No need to worry about it."

"You've just been through something incredibly traumatic," Lockwood joined in, face sombre. "Even if you can't remember it, your mind must still be reeling from it. I mean, that's the whole reason you forgot in the first place, right? Because whatever happened was too much to remember."

"Yeah, I know," Lucy said, still not satisfied, still panicked, still treading water, "but I sleep-walked."

"Like countless other people do on the regular," George threw in, leaning back in his chair.

"Still, she's right," Lockwood argued, throwing his deputy a strict look before turning his attention towards Lucy again. "That is something we need to keep an eye on. You could've seriously hurt yourself coming down those stairs. Maybe, if you're alright with it, I could stay with you in the attic for the next few nights?"

Only then did he seem to notice George's wide-eyed stare. Only then did he seem to grow aware of exactly what he'd just said.

"Just until all of this settles?" he weakly added whilst looking at George, fighting a battle already lost. "To make sure you're not wandering out?"

"Or," George said, shit-eating grin barely hidden, "Lucy could just lock herself in her room at night. Much easier option, isn't it?"

"Guys, I'm not worried about myself," Lucy intervened. "I threw water that may or may not have been boiling around the kitchen. I ran through the house with scissors in my hand. I woke up with them right outside of Lockwood's room, which is strange in and on itself-"

George snickered out a laugh. "It's really not, actually."

"George!" Lucy shot at him, slowly getting annoyed. "What if I had accidentally hurt one of you?"

"You wouldn't have," Lockwood said, and the pure trust in his voice was a dagger to her heart. "And George and I can make sure we tread carefully after dark. Just in case your love for sharp objects solidifies."

"Lockwood, I'm serious-"

"So am I, Luce," he smiled at her, and it was so gentle she could not find it in herself to speak against it. "We'll make sure you don't topple down the stairs at night, and then we'll be fine. You'll be fine. You need to give yourself time to heal from what's happened, that's all."

"And to do that, you, ironically, have to sleep," George said, slapping his thighs. "Both of you, actually. Although I know you people too well to believe you'll follow any reason concerning that," he sighed. "But if we're done for tonight, I'm going to go up and try to still shut my eyes for a bit. Tomorrow's going to be a long day for those of us who are literate," he said, that last bit clearly directed at Lockwood.

And George wasn't wrong. One of the things they'd planned for tomorrow was an extended stay at the archives, and judging by the way George had threatened to do unspeakable things to Lockwood's suits if he even dared to waterlog so much as a sink again, Lucy could only imagine what had been going down in that building before.

"Well, thank God we have you, then" Lockwood laughed. "Sleep tight."

"You, too," George answered, getting up. One more time, he turned around, eyes finding Lucy's. "It'll be okay, you know? You're safe with us. Try and let the dream fade."

It was a sweet thing to say, but Lucy didn't know if it even could. Fade, that was. The dream had felt so real. Her fear had been real. And even though she wanted to believe that it meant nothing, that it was just her brain trying to somehow disentangle the chaos Wythburn Mill had left her with, something inside of her wouldn't let her.

It was as if the screaming voices from her dream were back once more, only that now, she couldn't hear them. Now, she only felt the imprint their desperation was leaving in her ear.

It wasn't the first nightmare Lucy had had, of course. Far from it, actually. With everything agents saw night to night, they in general were so closely acquainted with them that they could almost be added to the job description.

But this one was the first to bind her thoughts to it so violently. It was the first one that gave her that feeling of unexplainable wrongness, that same feeling any agent got when they went into a house known to be severely haunted and were only met with a waiting silence, with a bated breath.

It was a pressure building in her chest. It built and built and built and Lucy feared that eventually, she'd have to give in and swallow water.

It was that feeling of something horrible yet to come.

But how could that even be?

That's where she hit a wall, over and over again. Because George and Lockwood were right, of course. It couldn't.

So, even though it still felt a bit false, a bit forced, Lucy smiled at George now, wanting to do nothing more than to reassure him, to let him go to sleep without any worry lines on his face.

"I'll do that," she said. "Good night, George. Don't let the bugs bite."

"Don't fight the bugs in the library," he gave back before his attention went to Lockwood once more. "And don't get incriminated for any more murders while I'm asleep, either." Then, his steps were heavy on the stairs, and he was gone.

He was gone, and Lockwood and Lucy were alone in the dim kitchen.

All of a sudden, the silence that stretched between them seemed endless, seemed all-encompassing. It was a bow, strung taught, held by hands too cramped to release it.

It was the first time they were alone, without George, ever since arriving home.

And even though they were both awfully tired and there was certainly an appropriate amount of distance between them, Lucy couldn't help but glance down at his lips, over and over again. Marvel at how soft they looked, how wonderfully alive.

Lockwood cleared his throat all too soon, and, with that, made time move again. "I suppose you'll want to head up, too? George is right, you know. Your head needs sleep. And it is late."

Lucy looked at the clock, which she was happy to see was still functioning perfectly. It was late, indeed. And yet, she knew she would not be able to sleep. Not when she knew what would await her. Not when she feared the waves would be back.

Not when she still felt horribly, terrifyingly worried about waking up right outside of Lockwood's door, sharp scissors in her hand, his death in her dreams.

"No," she therefore said, trying to make a heavy thing sound light. "Still too... wired up from that whole business. But what about you?" she immediately added, concern cracking her voice. "You should still try to get a few hours. You look like you haven't slept in a lifetime."

Lockwood huffed out a laugh. "I'll try not to take that to heart, then. But, no. I gave up on sleep for tonight a long time ago," he said, and there was something wistful in his voice. Lucy had no chance of grasping it before he'd already risen out of his seat.

"Alright, since neither of us seems keen on sleeping, what do you think about tea? I could make us both a cup, and we could settle down in the library. A bit more comfortable than the kitchen."

Lucy laughed at that. "You just want to read through your gossip magazines, don't you?"

Lockwood brought a hand to his chest as if deeply shocked, and Lucy had to will everything within herself to not see blood seeping out beneath his fingers.

"How'd you know about that?" He asked her with humour, and she blinked the scissors and the crimson water away.

"Oh, George told me. You really thought he'd keep something as good as that to himself?"

"What I think is that I need to have a word with my employee about spreading such mean-spirited rumours," he said with false seriousness, preparing the kettle just like Lucy had done only about an hour ago.

"So it's not true?"

"I didn't say that," he answered, his smile growing sheepish as he turned to throw her a quick glance. "I do love those magazines. I know they're nothing but rumours, too, but they're entertaining enough. And there's usually at least a grain of truth to be found in them."

Lucy mockingly gasped. "And now you haven't caught up with them in a whole week!"

"A week and a half, actually. I've counted the days." Then, he was apparently unable to take himself seriously any longer. He laughed, and Lucy knew that she was utterly gone for him. "I'm just kidding, Luce. It's not that bad yet. But they are rather fun, once you get into them."

Lucy watched him for a minute with his back turned towards her. She watched how he made tea for them, how he handled even her cup as if he didn't need to stop for a single second to think about how she liked to take hers.

He looked as if he'd made tea for her a thousand times before, which she supposed he had.

Filled with the sudden urge to know just as much about him as he knew about her, the urge to be able to make him tea, too, she watched attentively how he prepared his own cup.

"You want to be in them someday, don't you?" Lucy asked, thoughts lingering. "In the papers, I mean. In gossip magazines."

Lockwood turned towards her once more, seemingly surprised at her question. "I mean, yeah, I think I'd like that. I've always wanted to be known, to be recognised. I've always wanted for this agency to make it big."

"Your parents were admired researchers," Lucy connected the dots.

Lockwood froze for only a second before he gave her a tight smile. "Yeah. Yeah, I suppose that plays into it a bit. I suppose I've always tried to take after them. Make them proud, wherever they are."

Even if she hadn't doubted it before, Lucy knew then that not letting Lockwood go to prison had been the right call. Not letting the whole of London call him a murderer had been the right call. They could prevent whatever was to come, she was sure of it. She and George could stick right by him, never leave his side, never leave a window open during which he could be framed.

But had she let Barnes take him in? She wouldn't have been able to prevent those headlines.

"I think they would be," Lucy said now, eyes never leaving his. "Proud," she clarified. "I think they would be very proud of you."

The kettle whistled, the moment broke, and Lockwood shook his head, shook the tension away. "Well, I suppose I'll only find out about that much later, if even then. And we've still got to make it big."

"They would be proud now, too," Lucy insisted, feeling that he wanted to shut that topic down, but needing to get this one point across to him. "They should be. You're wonderful."

He didn't look at her, but she could see him freeze up clear as day, could hear him curse as he spilled hot water on the countertop. She could see the blush creeping over his neck.

"And we'll make it big. I'm sure of it. How could we not?" she quickly added, gaining back her light tone, giving him an out.

And he took it. "I'm not doubting it," he said, wearing that soft smile of his again. "I never have. Not when we have the best researcher in the country, the best Listener in the country, and, ah, yes, an all too handsome, all too modest rugged leader-"

"The whole company's under your name, Lockwood. I would hardly call that modest."

"Now, come on, Luce, be fair. I gave you that 'Co.', at least. That's more credit than Rotwell or Fittes ever gave their employees."

"Yeah, but Fittes and Rotwell have hundreds of employees," Lucy teased him further, raising her eyebrows at him. "You've only got two."

"I suppose that's true," he mused. "But, to be honest, right before we went to Ilwich, I was actually contemplating adding another agent to our team."

"Seriously? Did you have anyone specific in mind?"

"No, and I still don't. I only considered it because our caseload these last few months has become quite much. Too much for three people to handle without two of them complaining all the time." He threw Lucy a look which immediately let her know which group she'd belonged to. "I thought it might help us out a bit if we had one more agent here to support us."

He finished preparing their cups, took them in his hands and walked over to her. "I suppose that'll have to wait, though. Until after this whole thing with Colby."

"What, you don't think being hunted for sport by a serial killer is a good incentive?"

Lockwood laughed. "Yes, that. Also, with what he's pulled so far, I wouldn't be surprised if he tried to sneak someone in."

"Oh, you can bet on it." Lucy accepted the cup Lockwood handed her gratefully, wrapping her cold fingers around the hot ceramic. "Thank you. Not just for the tea. For staying down here with me, too."

He looked at her intently before turning his gaze away all too quickly. "It's no bother, Luce. I told you, I wouldn't be able to sleep anyway. Now, library?" There was another smile plastered on his face, and she hoped it would never go away.

"Let's go."

------------------------------

The library was dark, illuminated only by echoes of the green light falling in from beyond the sheer shutters. By default, the ghost lamp outside only lit up every few minutes, plunging the room into darkness during the time in between. And yet, when Lockwood went to switch on the ceiling light, Lucy held him back.

"Could we... Sorry, could we keep it off, maybe?" she asked him, eyes fixed on the window. On the shutters that, if they weren't thick enough to block out the light coming from outside, wouldn't be enough to keep their light - and their shadows -  inside, either.

Lockwood followed her gaze. He must have understood, then, in that way only a person who's been watched before can, because he nodded.

He moved away to turn on the skull lamp in the hallway, instead, its glow barely bright enough to allow them to see - and dim enough to never reach the shutters.

"Better?" Lockwood asked her, concerned, and Lucy shot him a grateful look.

"Yeah. Thanks."

"Anytime, Luce."

"Sorry," she tried to explain herself. "It's just that, just for now, I really don't want to be-"

"I know," Lockwood said, eyes locked onto the window now, too, and Lucy supposed she didn't need to explain to someone who'd lived through it alongside her.

More than her, actually. She didn't even remember Ilwich.

Lockwood walked into the room ahead of her, but instead of letting himself sink into one of the armchairs, he sat himself on the ground right in front of the furthest one.

Lucy huffed out a strained laugh. "I don't think we need to go that far. No one will be able to see us from the outside even if we do sit on the actual furniture."

"I know, and you're welcome to actually take a chair," Lockwood said, grasping for words for a second, "but ever since I was a kid, I've found it comforting to just... sit on the floor sometimes," he admitted. "It's... different."

"It's a different perspective," Lucy provided. She didn't take the chair that Lockwood had offered. Instead, she sat herself down on the floor right next to him.

He kept his eyes on her as she did so, smiling softly when her leg grazed his as she shifted to pick up her cup again. "Yeah. I guess so. It's oddly grounding."

"Well, we are sitting on the ground," Lucy quipped, and Lockwood let his head fall back against the seat cushion as he laughed.

"You know that's not what I mean."

"I do know," she assured him. "I did the same thing back home. And I suppose I must've done it here, too. Just laying down on the floor sometimes, stretching my arm up in the air, seeing what I can reach. It feels good, to be disconnected like that. Reflective."

"Yeah, that," Lockwood muttered, turning his head to look at her, suddenly sombre. "We should've done this more often. Sitting together in the library."

Lucy smiled. "On the ground and in the dark?"

His smile was a mirror of hers. "On the ground and in the dark."

"You know I can't really comment on that, but... why didn't we?"

"It was my fault, really. I pushed you away sometimes, when you got too close."

"Like you did up until this morning?"

"Something like that," Lockwood tried to play it off, and now it was on Lucy to turn her head to look at him.

"Why did you?" she asked. "I mean, you told me why you did it this past week, but why did you do it back then?" Then, trying to not let the hurt of the implication of it all show, "We were in love with each other, weren't we?"

"That was kind of the issue," Lockwood replied. "I was in love with you, sure, but I thought you'd never feel the same way. I thought that if I let you get too close, I might never be able to move on. No matter the fact I was already damned back then, anyways," he admitted, huffing out a tired, weary laugh. "But I wasn't in a good place when we first met, either. For a long time, I thought death might be... thrilling. I thought I'd rather be... gone than alive."

It was a quiet confession, but it was startlingly loud in Lucy's ears anyway. It made her blink.

When she looked at his chest again, she saw the scissors buried in it once more. Saw his own fingers desperately grasping to pull them out.

She thought of her own voice tape, of her own words she'd listened to only hours ago.

'I think he might want to die,' her voice had said. 'I'm in love with someone who not only doesn't love me back, but never even could. Not when he's in love with death already.'

"Do you still feel that way?" she asked, trying not to sound as choked up as she felt.

"No," he replied instantly. "I haven't felt that way in a long time."

"That's good," she said, letting her leg press into his more firmly. "I hope you never feel that way again."

"If I did, I know that I could talk to you and George."

"Yeah. You always can. We'll always listen."

"Speaking about talking," he said, diverting the topic, nursing his cup of tea instead, "you're still worried about that nightmare you had, aren't you? It's why you don't want to go to sleep."

It wasn't a question, and she supposed he could read her so clearly it didn't need to be.

"Yeah," she still replied, water running down her throat again.

Normally, she wouldn't have told him about the extent of it. She would've made him believe that she was alright. That she wasn't someone who could be so deeply rattled from a mere dream, even if she'd been a bit more active than usual during it.

But something about the dark made her honest. Same as him, she supposed. Something about it made it feel all too contained, as if what she said now would leave no dent in their world. As if there would be no bite marks left behind from words she was scared to release from their cages.

"It just... it felt so real," she admitted. "The water, finding you with those scissors-" Lucy shook her head. "It almost felt as if it wanted to tell me something. As if I was supposed to get something from it."

Lockwood must've noticed how much she was still trapped inside of that dream, inside of that ocean. That her hair was still wet from its water, and her hands from his blood.

He reached for the latter now. Softly, he first took her cup from her and then grabbed her hands tightly to hold them still.

"It was just a dream. They want to tell us things all the time. It's our brains, trying to work through stuff. And, as I've said before, you've just been through something unimaginable-"

"Yeah, I know," she answered, frowning. "Well, actually, I don't, but my point is- So have you, haven't you? So has George. And neither one of you is running a marathon through the house at night."

"Neither one of us was alone with Colby for as long as you were. Neither one of us has forgotten that this whole ordeal ever happened."

"Still, this nightmare - It felt like nothing I've ever had before-" Lucy interrupted herself, letting her voice fade out into the dark corners of the room, because just at that moment, she did remember a nightmare that had been scarily similar.

A nightmare she'd dreamed exactly one week ago.

"No, I'm wrong. I've had something like this before," she said, trying to find Lockwood's eyes in the dark, only barely succeeding. "I sleep-walked during my first night at the hospital. Only a few metres as far as I'm aware, but still. I dreamed of you dying, too. To my rapier, then. I didn't stab you, of course, it was just... in there, somehow. And I didn't even know you back then."

"But you did," Lockwood tried to calm her, rubbing circles into her hand. "You do know me, even if you can't remember me. Listen, Luce," he told her, tone even, grounding, "back in Wythburn Mill, after I was shot, I was dying, right in front of you. And even though I know you've forgotten all about it, your subconscious might not have. Back then, you did care about me a lot."

The ghost lamp outside the window had stuttered back on again while he'd been speaking, and now it was painting his face green once more, illuminating just how close they were to one another. Lucy couldn't look away.

"I care a lot about you now, too," she corrected, but he didn't seem to hear her.

"I imagine it must've left a lasting impact. Something your mind is still trying to recover from. Maybe that's what you're seeing in your dreams: Attempts of your mind trying to work through watching me die."

"By making you die in a thousand different ways? By making me the one who kills you? And still, for everything I did see, I never saw you being shot," she said, voice breaking. "I never saw you die in that cellar."

"Dreams are complex. They aren't clear-cut." He closed his eyes for only a second before raising his voice again. "After my sister died, I often had nightmares about it. Saw her die in a thousand different ways, too. And nowadays, especially after Wythburn Mill... I see George and you."

Lucy held her breath and only managed to squeeze his hand more tightly. "You see us? Die?"

"Yeah. I see George vanishing into that fog, his walkie-talkie malfunctioning." His gaze met hers, now. There was sorrow there, barely contained. "And I see you in that cellar, over and over again. I see you lying there, but this time, Colby kills you before I ever make it down. I see you leaning over me after I've been shot, only to see you're dying as well." He hesitated for the barest of moments. "I see us with our roles reversed: You bleeding out on the floor and me begging you to stay."

His eyes found the window again. "The moon was shining in my face, when I was dying. It blinded me so much that I sometimes couldn't even see your face. Since that night, I can't sleep when the moonlight hits me. Or when I'm too aware of it existing."

And yet, even after admitting to all of that, even after leaving Lucy totally lost for words, he still had the nerve to look shocked as he registered the clear horror on her face.

"I didn't want to worry you," he apologised immediately. "I'm alright. I'm working through it. I just wanted you to know that you're not alone. With your nightmares. With still needing to heal." His words were so soft she almost mistook them for a gust of wind. "With seeing your friends die."

"I'd rather I'd be alone in this," Lucy whispered. "I'm sorry you're going through that. I'm sorry you're alone with the memory of it all. I'm sorry I forgot."

Lockwood tucked her head gently into the curve of his neck. "Don't be sorry about that. Please don't be. It wasn't your choice. And if you had to forget all of last year, then I'm glad you at least blocked that cellar out, too." A small smile crept over his face again after he stole a quick glance down at her. "And stop being so worried about me. I have to buy better curtains for my room, and then I'll be fine."

"But what about your nightmares-"

"Exactly, Luce. They're only nightmares. Just like yours. Stealing sleep is the worst they can do," he said, running his fingers through her hair so carefully Lucy thought she might break under his touch. "Sometimes, bad dreams are just that: Bad dreams."

And with him so close, she could feel the water leave her lungs. She could feel herself stop gasping for air. "Promise?" she asked him, which, with everything that was still to come, was unfair, really.

But she didn't know that then. In that moment, she was only a seventeen-year-old girl, looking for reassurance from the boy she was all too quickly falling in love with.

And he gave it to her.

"Promise," he answered her, because he didn't know that this was an impossible thing.

Because he was just a boy, trying to make the world okay again for the girl he loved.

That didn't mean it wouldn't haunt him forever, saying this. It would haunt him forever that she trusted him enough to believe him; that she trusted him more than her own intuition.

Lucy let herself lean against him now, sinking further into him instead of the waves, and with his warmth around her dizzying her, she felt like she might be allowed to breathe again.

That's when she felt it, skin to skin, arm to arm: The scar on his biceps. He was wearing a T-shirt now, so really, it wasn't difficult to feel at all.

"You have the same scar I do," she voiced her thoughts, a bit confused.

He let go of her briefly, frowning as he looked down at her arm. She shrugged off her cardigan so he could see hers, too. It was still very visible, even only in the bare light the skull lamp granted them. It was a small thing, just like his, but still angry, still too stubborn to fade away.

"Colby must've done it," Lockwood said tonelessly. "I woke up with it in the hospital with no memory of getting it. He must've done the same to you."

"Yeah," Lucy said, wondering again at the jagged way both lines went, at the amount of fresh bruising both cuts seemed to have around them. "He must've." She shook her head. "Mine has looked better. I didn't have all of those bruises this morning."

"Mine has, too," Lockwood mused. "But we were flung around by a poltergeist only a few hours ago. I think I have bruises in places I didn't have places before."

Lucy chuckled lightly before she fully turned around to face him, no longer touching any part of him. As much as she just wanted to be near him - she had to do this now, before she lost her nerve. She had to give him the option of whether or not he still even wanted her close after the night they'd had.

"I just wanted to say - I'm sorry about tonight. About ruining our date," she began, looking directly at him now, the green light colouring the confusion on his face, his hand twitching towards hers at his side. "I'm sorry for not trusting you right from the start. For actually believing that letter. For threatening you with a rapier, for God's sake. I should've known better, and you can't imagine how sorry I am that I didn't."

Lockwood seemed more and more confused by the second. "But you couldn't have known," he said. "You couldn't have known better. And that was my fault."

Lucy felt herself reeling from the bewilderment coursing through her. "How could that have possibly been your fault?"

"Well, I was the one who ignored you for a whole week in that hospital-"

"Lockwood, I-"

"No, let me finish. I avoided you for a whole week while you needed me. I tried to push you so far away you would quit and leave, even," he said, his eyes clinging to hers. "It wasn't your fault you believed that letter. It was mine. I never gave you a reason not to believe it. I never proved to you that we are friends. I never let you in on any of the closeness we had before."

"I had a rapier to your chest," she argued, emphasising it because even if it ripped her own heart apart, she needed him to understand this. She needed him to understand just what a hurtful thing she was. "I nearly killed you."

"You really didn't, Luce. You wouldn't have hurt me," he stated as if it was an unshakable truth. "I knew that, even then. And I was right. You didn't, even though you thought me a murderer."

"But what if I had?" Lucy asked, her thoughts once more caught on her rapier, on those kitchen scissors stuck in his chest.

His gaze softened. "You wouldn't have," he repeated, his smile growing into a grin now, apparently out to chase those storms in her eyes away. "Your stance was shite, anyway. You wouldn't have been able to hurt a fly like that."

And, well, Lucy couldn't help but smile at that, too, which, judging by the way Lockwood looked at her, was just what he'd wanted. Still, she hit him gently against his shoulder. "You're a right tosser, do you know that?"

He only laughed harder. "A tosser that knows how to fence, which cannot be said for both people currently present in this room-"

This time, her fist hit his shoulder a bit harder. "Oh, excuse me," she grinned. "But I believe this version of me hasn't yet had a year of training under the great Anthony Lockwood, child prodigy-"

"Oh God, you've read the newspaper clippings?"

"They're hanging on our walls. How was I supposed not to?"

He grinned, shaking his head. "I really need to take those down."

"No, don't. They're impressive. I'm sure any potential intruder will be shaking at the knowledge that even eight-year-old-you could've absolutely clubbed them in your sleep."

"We actually had an intruder during the Annabel Ward case," He shared with her then, voice turning conspiratorially, "but I doubt she found time for any reading material. Was rather busy searching for a necklace you'd already stolen."

Lockwood looked quizzical for a second before he spoke again, his mood now shifted into something serious. "Now that I think about it: Our real-life break-in, the intruder you dreamed about - maybe that's what your nightmares are? Glimpses of your old memories?"

He spoke on before Lucy could stop him. "I mean, the intruder didn't deck you in the library, but it's close enough. And that ocean you saw in your nightmare? Well, you told me that back when you were so closely connected to Annabel, you dreamed of the both of you floating in an ocean. Woke up in the bathtub one time, even."

Lucy frowned, rather critical of his theory. What she'd seen had not felt old. "And did I also stab you with the scissors?"

He huffed out a laugh. "No, but I suppose you might've wanted to. There was a bit of... tension between us for a second there. My fault."

"But we made up," Lucy said. She didn't need to ask, already knowing it to be true.

"We made up," he repeated nevertheless.

A beat of silence stole its way in between them as the ghost lamp outside shut off again. But it was a beat of silence Lucy didn't plan on letting linger for long.

"You know, you were right. I really would've loved going on that boat trip with you," she said, and Lockwood smiled at her.

"I hoped so. We talked about it in Wythburn Mill. When I was dying, I mean. I told you about the date I had always wanted to take you on."

Her mouth felt too dry all of a sudden. "And I wrecked that-"

"Luce," he interrupted her, "the actual date never mattered. Truthfully, there were a million dates I wanted to take you on. It only ever mattered that we'd be there, together. And we can always just repeat it."

"Repeat it?" she asked, not daring to sound hopeful.

"Yeah, why not?" he laughed, but something about it was wrong, all of a sudden. It sounded wrong. It sounded distant, tortured. His arm drew away from her side as if she'd burned him. "We could repeat the whole thing," he continued. "It doesn't have to be a date," he said, and she could feel herself freeze over, could feel her heart still.

Of course, he wouldn't want it to be a date anymore. Even if he was too kind to say it directly, too kind to shut her out completely - she'd destroyed that avenue thoroughly.

"We could just go as friends," he said.

"Friends?" she asked. Even to her own ears, her voice sounded weird.

"Yeah. You know, what we've always been. What we've always been good at."

"Why?" she asked, and was afraid of his answer.

He avoided her gaze again, and Lucy was glad of the darkness flooding the room. Was glad he couldn't have seen the exact expression on her face even if he'd wanted to.

"Isn't that obvious? It was only due to my choices that Colby's letter had any chance of you believing it to begin with-"

"That's not true-"

"But it is. Tell me: If I'd spent as much time with you in the hospital as George did, would you still have believed it? Or would you have come to talk to me about it?"

"I did come to talk to you about it," Lucy argued, unwilling to follow Lockwood's line of thought. "It was just a rather aggressive way of talking."

"You know what I mean."

She shifted, uncomfortable. "Yes, I do. And we don't know that. We don't know what I would've done if I'd known you better."

"But I do," he said, voice quiet. "Because I know you. I was supposed to be there for you, and I wasn't. You were scared of me, Lucy. Tonight, in that park. You thought I would hurt you, all because I never actually let you get to know me before this morning."

He huffed out a bit of air, let a tired hand drift over his face. "And, God, even without all of that, it must've been so scary - going on a date with someone who knows so much about you, whilst you know next to nothing."

"But I did know you. I do know you," she repeated his earlier words back to him. "Somewhere in my mind, I do know you. And I wasn't scared of our date, back before the letter. I was looking forward to it," she said, voice aching.

But he wasn't listening to her. "I never should've agreed to take you out in the first place. Not when I should've known better," he said instead. "Not when what you really needed, what you really wanted, was a friend."

"I didn't - I don't - want a friend. I want you."

His breath caught, but he didn't back down, eyes settling somewhere behind her. "I never meant for you to feel pressured in that regard. I never want for you to feel like you have to want or agree to something. Especially when maybe, you wouldn't feel this way under different circumstances."

"What do you mean?"

"I know you feel sorry about tonight. I know that, with Colby after us, you're especially bound to me. You might only feel... drawn to me because of that. And I don't want to accidentally take advantage of that. Maybe it's best if you give it time. If you focus on your recovery and see if you even still want this after you've gotten to know me better."

"You're not taking advantage of me," Lucy whispered. It struck her as unbearably sad: That all this time, whenever she'd tried to get closer to him, he must've thought that it was only due to some warped attachment. "How could I not want this?"

"Luce," he sighed, speaking her name like an accusation, like a plea. "There's a lot you don't know about me yet. You've apologised countless times now for tonight, and yet, you don't even remember all the instances in which I've hurt you."

"Then tell me," she said. "Tell me the worst of it."

"Well, I talked you up on national TV even though you told me not to," he began. "I called you an asset once. Our most important one, but still," he shook his head. "I used to constantly drag you with me into needless danger. Still do that one sometimes, but it was far worse shortly after you started here. Back when I still kind of... liked the idea of dying. I mean, one time, I nearly got us both killed because I wanted to win a bet."

"And I forgave you for all of it back then, didn't I?"

"Yeah, you did, but now-"

"If you're so bothered by it, I'll do it now, too. I forgive you," she declared gently.

"You can't do that," he answered, sounding strangled. "You can't even remember."

"Lockwood, it's fine if you did hurt me, back then. And it's fine if you hurt me now or in the future. Well, not fine, maybe, but normal. There's no way around it. I'll hurt you, too, from time to time, without meaning to. We'll hurt each other, and we'll be better for it."

"You might not think that way in a few weeks. After we've dealt with Colby. After you don't have to stay close to me anymore."

Lucy threw her head back against the chair in stifled exasperation. "I don't have to do anything. Why are you so convinced I'll change my mind about this? About you? I don't think you could ever hurt me so badly that I would turn away from you. I don't think you would. I wanted this, us, before I forgot. And I did so again today before that whole mess with Colby started up."

Then, as he took too long to answer, a different thought came to her. A different, horrible possibility.

"Or is it that you don't want this anymore," she began, willing her words to remain steady, "and you're just too polite to say so?"

He laughed, and it sounded like the saddest thing she'd ever heard. "No. Never. I want this - I want you - so much that it hurts. It's just that someday, you'll wake up and realise how much of a mess I am and how unfathomably much better you deserve-"

And this was where Lucy drew the line.

The ghost-light outside pulsed back to life, colouring the room entirely in green, and now, finally, she could see him clearly again. She saw his tense jaw, his flitting eyes. His lips that were all too close.

Briefly, she thought about what George had asked of her this afternoon. To not promise Lockwood anything she wouldn't be able to keep. To only give him as much of her as she was sure about.

But here's the thing: Whilst looking at him now, whilst tracing his face over and over again, whilst seeing the way his eyes desperately tried to read hers - she knew. She knew, without the shadow of a doubt, that she was sure about this. As sure as she'd never been about anything in her life.

So she breathed out tentatively, watched her breath fan over his face.

And then, in one quick movement, she put a hand on Lockwood's cheek, tilting his face towards her. Silently, she searched his wide eyes for permission; felt his words end abruptly, felt his breathing still.

She gave it one, two, three more seconds. Enough for him to pull away if he wanted to, not enough for her to lose her nerves.

And then, she pressed her lips to his.

She kissed him.

Lucy hadn't had any great expectations as to how it would feel, to kiss Anthony Lockwood, and yet, their first kiss managed to disappoint every single one of them.

She didn't feel any fireworks going off. She didn't feel happy, didn't feel dizzy from it. She felt... nothing.

She felt nothing because he wasn't kissing her back.

So Lucy drew back, and, now, she did feel something - embarrassment and shame and guilt and so, so much sorrow - but it was all overruled by the need to get away, by the weight of stinging apologies on her tongue.

"God, Lockwood, I'm- I'm so sorry," she began, getting further and further away from his touch, his warmth, making to stand up now, to back away. "I shouldn't have. I'm sorry. I thought you-"

She would never get any further.

Right then, Anthony Lockwood's grip around her wrist tightened, and he pulled her down to him once more.

The unexpected force of it made Lucy stumble, made her land in his lap rather awkwardly, but she'd never get a chance to mind.

Because now, just as the ghost lamp outside went out, Lockwood's mouth found hers again in the darkness. And this time, he wasn't still, he wasn't rejecting her. This time, he was kissing her with fervour, with the desperation of a dying sun - and she melted right into it, right into him.

Her world shifted on its axis, then, as she felt it. As she felt everything.

Feeling was all she could do as all of her thoughts, all of her doubts and fears and dreams left her mind, as they were violently pulled from her, and the only thing that remained was his lips on hers, over and over again.

She felt how his hands cupped her cheeks, grabbed her neck, were everywhere at once, pulling her closer and closer and closer and yet, never close enough.

She thought he might bruise her, just from the sheer force of it, and yet, she wished he would hold her tighter, still. Yet, she thought she might bruise him all the same in all of her rushed efforts to cling to him, to keep upright, and she found she liked the idea of it - more blue marks joining the ones they already shared between them on their arms.

Their kiss wasn't a soft one. It was urgency given form, given freedom. It was harsh and wild and searing and fervent, and Lucy didn't think she would've been able to bear it any other way.

And just when she'd thought it impossible to feel this any more intensely, Lockwood deepened the kiss - and it consumed her, devoured her whole, left her with no sense of up and down. He set her aflame with it.

She knew then that she was irrevocably his. Whatever came after this, there was no going back for her anymore. Maybe there hadn't been for quite some time now.

And yet, it didn't scare her, the thought of it; the powerlessness that came with this admission. She wasn't scared of being vulnerable when he was the one she was being vulnerable to. Not when he was kissing her like this. Not when he was holding her as if he never meant to let her go.

She was left a panting, gasping mess by the time Lockwood had to break their kiss to, evidently, catch his breath. Chest rising and falling heavily, he laid his forehead against hers and cupped her face.

And even breathless as she was herself, she was made even more so by the smile - no, the grin - Lockwood gave her. Enraptured by it, she could do little more than return it, bask in it, try to memorise every single thing about it.

"Sorry," he apologised, voice rough, still wringing for air. "For freezing up at first, I mean. I had no idea you were going to kiss me. I didn't think you would ever want to."

That statement had Lucy open her eyes wide in disbelief. "After I've told you a million times now that I want this? That I want to date you, be with you?" Her brows rose higher and higher. "After I've stared at your lips as if they were the morning newspaper?"

A pretty blush coloured his cheeks as he laughed. "I think I was too busy trying to not project my feelings onto you, too busy trying to do the right thing, to notice that last bit."

Lucy grew confused at his words, however. "What right thing?"

He sighed, seemed to gather all of his strength to draw far enough away from her to be able to look at her. "You know, if I were any kinder, I'd still try to make you understand that this," he gestured between them, "is something you might come to regret in a few weeks. When I'll still be madly in love with you, and you'll... know me better. Know your own mind better."

Lucy looked up at him and saw the boy who had been left over and over again. The boy who, inadvertently, she'd left, too, when she'd forgotten. Who had thought she'd leave him again just this evening.

It was no wonder he didn't dare to believe her now that she wanted to stay.

But beneath all of the fear in his expression, there also lay hope. Hope that she would argue, that she would disprove his words, that she wanted him even with a sound mind. It gave her the push of courage she needed.

She pulled him right back to her, wrapped her hands around his neck. "And if I were any meaner, I'd hit you right over the head for saying that," she answered tenderly, her intentions far from the content of her words. "Lockwood, I want this. Not because I subconsciously feel like I need you to beat Colby. Not because I feel sorry for you. And certainly not because I feel pressured in any way."

She took another breath to tame her nerves. "I want you because you're you. Because you're kind and brave and good and, most of all, because I'm falling further and further in love with you."

His sharp intake of breath made her smile, made her repeat herself. "I'm falling for you. I think it might be impossible for me not to do so, actually. I even fell for you when I thought you were a murderer. When I really didn't want to, when I thought it might even kill me."

She took his hand, pressed a quick kiss to the inside of his wrist. "About what you said before - I won't ever wake up and think I deserve better than you. I don't think I even could. I actually think you're the one who's a bit out of my league."

She sensed that Lockwood wanted to argue, but quickly spoke over it. "And I won't change my mind about this, either. About us, I mean. Colby has never had anything to do with my feelings for you in the first place. Neither has this cryptic pressure you keep going on about. Given the fact I've kind of had a thing for you since that first night at the hospital, I think I've had too much of a headstart on any of that."

Lucy felt him grinning against her now. "You've had a thing for me since then?"

"Yes," she admitted. "Don't tell Mary. She'd judge me, given I'd known you no longer than five minutes at that point."

"You know how sorry I am about that. How much I regret it."

"I know, and, again, I've forgiven you for it. I didn't mean it like that. I only meant to say-" Frustrated, she let out a huff of air. "I only meant to say that there's very little you could ever do that would make me reconsider this. Going off of the recordings I made for Norrie, I don't think I'd do that in a lifetime. Not unless you go out and start pushing old women into oncoming traffic, I suppose."

"Goddamn it," Lockwood laughed, "that's my favourite pastime gone."

Lucy sighed exasperatedly, but couldn't keep the smile out of her voice. "You know what I mean. I'm saying that I'm really not as easy to get rid of as you assume." She stroked his palm, felt his fingers close over hers. "I'm saying that, even if you're a mess, that's just fine by me. You'll be in good company, even, because I'm one, too. We can be disastrous together."

"Are you absolutely sure about this? That you want this?" He asked her, gaze cautious, imploring.

"I am," she nodded. "It will take a while until I can give you everything I would've been able to had I not lost my memory. I'm still in the middle of falling in love with you." She smiled. "But I will get there. And I have a feeling that it will be a quick process. So," she began, gathering all her bravery for this last question, and finding out that it took far more than any threshold before ever had, "will you let me? Be with you, I mean?"

She was able to take the silence that followed her question for a whole two seconds. "Of course, I'm not saying that you can't take your time, too, and if you want to wait to take things further until I'm back where I was before I lost my memory, that's completely okay-"

"Lucy-"

"If you want to remain friends until then, that's fine-"

"Luce-"

"I really didn't mean to make it sound like I wouldn't be okay with taking it slow, or like I was leaving you no choice-"

The longer her nervous rambling continued, the less she was able to stop it, so she was grateful to Lockwood for taking the initiative by kissing her again and thereby silencing her effectively.

"Will you shut up for just two seconds?" He asked, smiling against her, huffing out a breathy laugh. "I'm trying to tell you that I've been desperately in love with you for a year, so of course, I very much would like for you to be with me, but you're not letting me."

"Sorry," she answered, blushing. "Is that a yes, then?"

And even though the way Lockwood kissed her next - with crinkled eyes, grinning into it, a loose hand on her neck - was already enough of an answer, he still said it.

"Yes," he laughed. "Yes, of course. I know you still need time, and I'll give you as much as you want - but we've already wasted so much of that, Luce," he said, and only for a second, his eyes grew sad as he stroked a stray piece of hair behind her ear. Only for a second, she thought he might be seeing a ghost in her stead.

"If you're willing to try this, if you think that, someday, you might be able to love me back - then yes. Of course, yes. I want to be with you, always. Have wanted to for as long as I've known you. I'm yours, anyway. I love you, no matter how long you need to feel the same way. If you ever feel the same way."

"I will," Lucy whispered, unable to keep the smile off her face. "I know that I will."

She went to kiss him again - now that she'd gotten a taste, she seemed to be starving for it - but right in the last second, Lockwood held her back, his expression changed all of a sudden. Worried. Eyes flitting over her.

"What?" she asked him, still reluctant to let her easy smile go.

"You're shivering," he said, concern etched into his voice.

Lucy only noticed it then, really, how badly her whole body was shaking, how her teeth were nearly clattering. How cold it had gotten in the library.

"You're surprised at that?" she joked. "It's absolutely freezing in here."

But Lockwood's frown didn't lighten up. "It's really not. It's perfectly normal in here. A bit toasty, even." He inspected her closer, touched a hand to her forehead. "At least you're not burning up. Your skin might be a bit too cold, actually, let me just get the thermostat-"

"Lockwood, I'm fine, I promise" Lucy insisted, and just like that, they'd both made promises they wouldn't be able to keep. She pulled him down again as he tried to get up. "I'm just a bit cold, that's all. That can happen if you haven't slept well in some time, as I'm sure you're aware. Stay here and I'll be better in a second."

For a few seconds, Lucy thought that he might argue, but then, finally, he relaxed as she leaned into him. Finally, he put his arm around her, pressed her closer, dropped a kiss to her hairline.

"You know, if you want to," he began, "I could get the blankets, and you could try and get a bit of sleep. I can wake you up if you start wandering again."

Lucy's shivers grew more violent as she slowly warmed up again, and she tried her best to suppress them so as to not worry him. Instead, she looked at his profile, illuminated in green once more, and tried to trace it with her eyes. "What if you're asleep, too?"

"I won't be," he smiled weakly at her. "I don't think I'll be able to sleep, with or without the moon."

Lucy could see the bags underneath his eyes clear as day, of course. He needed sleep. Direly so. But if he couldn't find it here in the library, where not one sliver of moonlight was salting the ground, she supposed he wouldn't succeed anywhere else, either.

But even if she was so tired she could feel her mind grow hazy, she did not want to leave him alone.

"It's the same for me," she therefore lied. "I think my mind is still too restless from everything."

A small silence ensued between them, then - a silence in which she burrowed into him further, drinking in as much of his warmth as she could, whilst Lockwood played softly with her hair.

"Any better yet?" He asked her after a while, and she nodded into his shirt.

"Yeah, a bit. Still cold, though."

"Then why don't we get you warmed up a bit quicker and empty that mind of yours at the same time?"

Lucy smiled. "What do you have in mind?"

Lockwood stood up, held his hand out towards her, and, curious, Lucy took it.

"Well, I told you your fencing stance was... bad," he explained as he pulled her up. "As bad as it was back when you started here, naturally. And we have about two hours left before it's reasonable for any person to be up. So, how about I teach you how to do it right in the meantime?"

"You want to fence? Now?" Lucy asked, but couldn't keep the excitement out of her voice. "I thought with how you hounded George whilst he re-did my bandages, you would surely bar me from training for at least a week."

He huffed out a laugh. "I'll correct your form, Luce, not beat down on you with a rapier. Besides, with Colby after us, it would be a disservice to you to not teach you as much as possible." He intertwined his fingers with hers, already leading her towards the basement, their cups of tea on the floor long forgotten.

"More importantly," he continued, that teasing tone she loved so much back in his voice, "We have to make sure that next time you accuse some poor, innocent bystander of being a serial killer, you can at least hold your weapon in a way that's actually threatening-"

She did smack him over the head then, chasing him down the stairs as he ran from her, laughing all the while.

And who could've blamed them? They did not know what was yet to come to pass.

They were teenagers in love, and the starlit sky spanned wide above them, untouched yet by the rising tide.

No dream could have disrupted that.

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A/N: Those cups of tea were neglected, I tell you. Meanly abandoned.

The entire last scene was actually written from Lockwood's POV first before I decided to change it around. But, because I was actually already done with it, I can let you in on the three highlights:
1. Lockwood didn't kiss Lucy back at first because he was this 🤏 close to fainting
2. His inner monologue whilst Lucy was kissing him was basically the nuke going off in Oppenheimer
3. He was the first to break the kiss because he'd stopped breathing a good while before her

Also, sorry for the long interval between updates! I'm nowhere near losing motivation for this (I actually have too much), I just currently have to study for my biological psychology exam, and it sure is fighting back! But I'll try and shorten/split up the following chapters again so I can update more often.

By the way, did all of you hear about Locklyle officially being canon now?