For @jamesholden. Inspired by this post.
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Jim rolled onto his back with an annoyed sigh. He’d been staring at the padded wall of his bunk for the better part of an hour. How can you be so tired and still unable to sleep? Sighing again, he was about to throw the covers off when he heard a tapping at his door. Glancing at the time, he frowned. Shoving off his blanket he got up and opened the cabin door. Amos grinned at him, holding two beers between his fingers, the rest of the six pack in his other hand.
“Figured you’d be up. C’mon,” Amos jerked his head in the direction of the lift before walking in that direction. Jim’s frown only deepened in further confusion but he pulled some sweatpants on then followed.
--
“If anyone can keep that engineering clusterfuck afloat it’s her.” Amos had pulled the Behemoth up on the monitors and they’d watched it silently up to this point.
“You still mad at her?” Jim asked, finishing off his first beer.
“Dunno. Haven’t figured it out yet,” he responded with a shrug. Amos popped a cap off a new beer and handed it to him.
“How’d you know I’d be up?”
“Haven’t been right since Eros.” Jim pulled his eyes away from the monitor to look at Amos. “Not eating much. Figured sleep wouldn’t be far behind,” he sipped his beer but didn’t return Jim’s stare. “I guessed right.”
Jim relaxed back into his chair, taking another swig of his drink and returning his attention to the monitor. Naomi had noticed. Hard not to when he’d woken her with his nightmares and cold sweats. He hadn’t expected Alex or Amos to notice, not that much - they had their own stuff going on. Dealing with the fallout of Naomi admitting what she’d done. Alex reaching out to his family back on Mars. Amos spending more and more time down on the engineering deck to get away from Monica and Cohen and their constant prodding. And yet he’d been paying enough attention to pick up on Holden’s erratic sleeping patterns.
“It gets better,” Amos said quietly, pulling him from his thoughts. Jim looked at him again but he was still watching the monitors. “Not better as in you go back to the way you were but . . .” he lifted his shoulder in a half shrug and finally looked at Jim. “The bad days get fewer and farther between.”
Jim’s face softened and he smiled a genuine smile. The first he’d worn in a long while. He held his beer out and they clinked bottles before returning to the quiet of the night cycle and watching Naomi perform engineering miracles from a distance.
