Right Outside Nonexis Tent, Buttcrack of Dawn, Wednesday

[whenshewasnice]

On a vaguely optimistic note, the unnecessarily vivid nightmare that woke Natalie up in the middle of the night proved once and for all that she didn't need Sam and his ghosts to mess up her sleep. Her own brain could do that for her just fine, and not just that, but it could specialize it for her exact fears and repressed thoughts, producing images of ghosts and gore and Todd and Sam and even the school treasurer she hadn't thought about in a while, and just a little bit of heartbreak, all on its own.

It also made her scramble quietly out of her sleeping bag and out of the tent, because the best thing to do upon waking up from all of that was to get herself to wake up completely. The sun wasn't up yet, so the air wasn't as warm as it would be during the day. That helped. Kneeling right outside the tent, Natalie shook her head, trying to get the last of the groggy fog to clear and take the remnants of that stupid nightmare with it. She spared a fleeting thought to whether she'd woken anyone up in the tent, and whether she should call Sam or something. That idea got scrapped, though. Her phone was inside the tent, and she didn't know where he'd be, anyway. No point potentially waking up people in another tent, too. She could handle this on her own. Just a dumb nightmare.

So now she was going to sit right here in her pajamas until her heart stopped pounding and the rational part of her mind got control of the rest of it. Or until places in town started opening for the day. Whichever happened first.

[ooc: Open for tentmates and random super early wanderers alike! Yes, this is slight method RP. Screw you, random nightmares waking me up in terror at four in the morning.]

Comments

[godgavemecable.livejournal.com]

Yeah, something like that was... hard to miss, when you happened to be a telepath. Not that he'd been deliberately trying to see Natalie's thoughts, it just kind of happened. Especially with dreams.

Snagging a bottle of water from the cooler, he headed outside.

"You oka-?" he broke off, shaking his head. "Stupid question. Would some water help?" he asked instead.

[whenshewasnice]

Oh, this was so not the time to be sharing a living space with a telepath. So not the time.

Natalie did her best not to bristle. "I'm fine," she said, flatly. "I just need a moment."

[godgavemecable.livejournal.com]

"Yeah, okay," Toby nodded, at least managing to look a little apologetic. "Sorry," he added, after a second. "I'm just- sorry."

About the nightmare, about eavesdropping on said nightmare... take your pick.

[whenshewasnice]

"Not your fault." It was about as vague how she was taking that apology, yes. Her talent for utter mildness ddn't help. "I guess."

[godgavemecable.livejournal.com]

"It happens," Toby shrugged. He couldn't exactly stop it, after all. "Sure you don't want that water?" he held the bottle out again.

[whenshewasnice]

Natalie let a moment pass before she reached for the bottle. Everything seemed... really deliberate with her, right now. It was her way of keeping things from spilling out, something Sam would have been far too familiar with.

"Thanks."

[godgavemecable.livejournal.com]

"Least I could do," Toby could deal with deliberate. Especially when it worked to slow down the constant stream of sensory input.

[whenshewasnice]

Natalie was usually pretty good for that. It was just taking a lot of effort, right now.

"Mm." She opened the bottle and took a sip, for lack of a better thing to do. "Sorry for waking you up."

She had so many words, really.

[godgavemecable.livejournal.com]

Another shrug. "Not the first time that's happened," he admitted, making a face. "Probably won't be the last."

[whenshewasnice]

"Great," Natalie replied, dryly. As was her way, but not having slept enough yet made it worse. "Hopefully I won't dream this loudly any other nights."

Though she figured it could have made for some weird cosmic balance if she turned into someone keeping others awake, now that she was separated from Sam.

[godgavemecable.livejournal.com]

Yeah, if it wasn't Natalie's dream, it was sure to be someone else's. "Can I put in a vote for no more dreams like that one, loud or not?" he asked. Because terrifying as it had been second-hand, without context, it had to have been worse for Natalie herself.

[whenshewasnice]

That was usually how it worked. And it had been plenty terrifying. "It's out of my hands," she drawled, and oh how she wished it hadn't been. "The brain does what it wants."

[godgavemecable.livejournal.com]

"Unfortunately," Toby said dryly. "Though I guess there's always lucid dreaming, if you're into that."

[whenshewasnice]

"I'd just prefer not to dream at all."

That was fairly honest, actually. It would have made it so much easier not to think about Todd or anything else that hurt. "

[godgavemecable.livejournal.com]

"Think the only way you can realistically make that happen is to drug yourself," Toby noted. Natalie didn't seem the type to go for that sort of 'solution'.

[withasword.livejournal.com]

Not a tentmate, but Kate did fall under the category of a super early wanderer. Often for very similar reasons. Her solution was generally a good long run, and she was already dressed for just that this morning, tightening her braid as she walked.

"Tent life isn't condusive to lie-ins, huh?"

[whenshewasnice]

Natalie, having managed to pull herself together by now (more or less - she was still sitting out there in her pajamas after all), raised a mild eyebrow at the other girl.

"Didn't really think anyone would be out and about yet."

[withasword.livejournal.com]

"Some people might consider my internal clock defective,"Kate remarked with an idle shrug. "Never have slept much."

"Do get more done, though." Bright side of seeing horrible things when you slept.

[whenshewasnice]

Natalie's gaze moved back to her water bottle. "I know someone like that." Mmm, living with an insomniac. "I don't think he accomplishes much with the extra time."

[withasword.livejournal.com]

"Tell him to take up knitting," she advised. Not that it was something she did with all her extra time. "You might end up with some extra scarves." Bonus

[whenshewasnice]

"I'd just wake up with knitting needles sticking at my side." She wasn't sure why she immediately had the mental image of Sam trying to knit in bed, but there it was and she was going with it. Not enough sleep, see. "Think I'll pass."

[withasword.livejournal.com]

"You're up at ungodly o'clock anyway," Kate pointed out, securing her plait. "You really think he's clumsy enough to stick you with needles in the middle of the night?"

[whenshewasnice]

"I don't tend to get up this early," Nataie pointed out in turn. "This is... an anomaly."

Better saying that than a nightmare.

[withasword.livejournal.com]

Anomaly. It was a nicer explanation, wasn't it?

"And where you might normal faff around your room..." Tent. With four people in. "It's a little crowded for that in these things." Kate wasn't a massive fan of that either. She was the kind of girl who slept with a knife under her pillow. Close living quarters weren't her friend.