warnings: reader can see the hollows, horror imagery, bodily horror, graphic monster descriptions, crying, trauma responses, references to death and corpses, psychological horror, gore, enemies-to-lovers dynamics.
Midnight always finds you. It starts the same way every time.
A nightmare so vivid your mind can't tell where it ends and waking begins. The darkness stretches forever. Wet earth clings to your ankles. Something breathes behind you—not human, not animal. It drags itself through the trees with a chorus of snapping bones and slick flesh peeling against bark.
The Hollow's empty face splits wider than it ever should.
Its tentacles bloom from its mouth like rotten flowers, lined with teeth that don't belong there. Eyes—dozens of them—open beneath translucent skin, each one rolling toward you. Limbs hang from its body that shouldn't exist, stitched together from twisted arms and rib cages. Every step leaves behind organs that continue twitching long after they've fallen free.
It screams, but not with a voice.
With every mouth growing across its body.
The sound tears through your skull until—
Your feet keep moving and your eyes never open. Old floorboards creak beneath your bare feet as you drift through the corridors of the house. Tears slide silently down your cheeks. Your breathing hitches with broken little sobs that don't quite wake you.
Every night. Always midnight.
Miss Peregrine usually finds you before anyone else. She always speaks softly, always guides you back, always waits until the nightmares loosen their grip.
Enoch knows the routine better than he'd ever admit.
He's woken to those same floorboards enough times to stop counting.
He knows exactly when the third creak comes, when your muffled crying reaches the hallway outside his room, when Miss Peregrine appears to collect you.
Most nights he doesn't interfere. He stands with one shoulder against his doorway, arms folded, pretending he's only annoyed his sleep's been interrupted.
He watches the Headmistress lead you away, he closes the door and goes back to bed.
Tonight... Miss Peregrine never comes.
Then silence...so loud it makes his ears ring.
"...Bloody hell." He opens his bedroom door just as your foot reaches for the first stair.
Your balance shifts forward. One more step and you'd tumble the entire flight.
His annoyance disappears before he can think about it. "Oi."
Two quick strides, his hands catch your forearms.
Not enough to startle. Just enough to stop you.
Your skin is freezing. And you're still crying.
Your face is turned toward nothing, eyes half-open but vacant.
Like you aren't really here.
He guides you backwards, away from the staircase, until your back rests against the wall beside his bedroom.
You don't resist. You don't even acknowledge him.
The tears keep coming. For a second, he just...looks at you.
Your lips are raw from biting them in your sleep. Your cheeks are blotchy red. Your breathing catches every few seconds like your body hasn't remembered how to calm down.
It makes something uncomfortable twist in his chest.
"...Ay." His voice comes quieter than he intended. The thick edge of his Scottish accent slips through with the exhaustion. "Ay... wake up."
He glances down the corridor....still no Miss Peregrine.
He looks back at you. "You're dreamin' again."
Another sob escapes you and your eyebrows pinch together. "No..." you whisper, barely audible.
His grip loosens. Not because he's letting go—
Because he realizes he's holding you harder than necessary.
"You are." His thumb brushes absentmindedly against your sleeve before he notices what he's doing.
He stops immediately. "...Come on."
Your head shakes weakly. "It's right there..."
His eyes narrow. "What is?"
"The monster..." Your voice cracks. "I can hear it."
He follows your unfocused gaze into the darkness.
Still...seeing Hollows wasn't something the others could understand.
He'd experienced enough of them himself.
Enough corpses, enough things that shouldn't move, nightmares made flesh.
But whatever lived inside your dreams...
It was worse, because it wasn't real.
Your mind had taken what you'd seen and twisted it into something even more grotesque.
"...There's nothing there," he says carefully.
"It has more mouths now." Your breathing becomes ragged. "It keeps smiling."
He knows Hollows. He knows only what they look like by drawings...paintings
What you're describing...nothing alive should look like that.
Usually he'd have rolled his eyes, called you dramatic, and told you to stop acting pathetic.
The same boy who blamed broken teacups on you...
Who insisted torn cushions were somehow your fault.
Who muttered "idiot" whenever you walked past.
Who pushed and prodded until you looked ready to cry because, for reasons he couldn't explain, getting a reaction out of you had become second nature.
That boy opens his mouth...and none of those words come out.
Instead, it's something beautifully sick.
"...Look at me." His voice is almost awkward.
So he gently tilts your chin upward.
Your eyelids flutter..still asleep. Still trapped somewhere far away.
"It's not here," he murmurs. "I promise."
Promises aren't something Enoch gives lightly.
Another tear slips free. "It hurts..."
"It keeps...looking at me..."
Something in his expression hardens.
Not at you. At the thing your own mind had built.
If your nightmares had hearts. Any sense of life...he'd rip it out himself.
His peculiarity had never bothered him before.
Watching dead flesh lurch upright. Feeling cold organs between his hands. Keeping hearts beating inside empty shells.
Most people recoiled, but he never had.
Not when they left someone like this.
The words sound foreign coming from him.
You lean forward without realizing it. Your forehead rests weakly against his shoulder.
His arms remain awkwardly suspended for a second.
Then, hesitantly, one hand settles between your shoulder blades.
"You can stop cryin'," he mutters, trying—and failing—to sound irritated. "It was just a dream."
Another quiet sob escapes you.
"...Didn't feel like one."
"...I know." The admission surprises him as much as it would anyone else.
Your eyes blink open. Confusion clouds them first.
You immediately step back. "I'm sorry..."
Your voice is hoarse. "I... did I—"
"You nearly walked down the stairs." Enoch mutters.
You stare toward the staircase. "...Oh." You wipe your cheeks with trembling hands. "I'll just go."
Before you can take another step, Enoch sighs. "...Wait."
Without meeting your eyes, he awkwardly shrugs one shoulder.
"If you... can't sleep..." He scowls at the floor like the sentence physically pains him. "...You can sit outside my room until you calm down."
You blink. Certain you'd misheard. "What?"
"Don't make me repeat myself."
He snorts. "...Doesn't mean I wanted you breakin' your neck on the stairs."
His ears have turned faintly pink. "So don't get any stupid ideas."
It's a terrible attempt at sounding cruel. One you both know isn't convincing tonight.
For the first time in a long while...the hallway feels just a little less frightening.
"...Don't get used to this." He adds suddenly.
"As if I'd want to," you mumble, rubbing at your eyes.
He huffs a laugh through his nose. "Liar."
"The one where you're about to start apologizing again."
Your mouth opens. Then closes.
An uncomfortable silence settles between you.
The house is impossibly quiet at this hour. Wind nudges the windows, making the old glass rattle softly in their frames. Somewhere downstairs, a clock ticks loud enough to count the seconds between breaths.
Enoch disappears into his room without another word.
You hesitate. "...I thought you said—"
"Didn't say you could stand there all night."
You blink. "...Are you inviting me in?"
"I'm inviting you to stop looking like a lost ghost before someone else finds you." His voice drifts from inside the room. "There's a difference."
You can't help the tiny smile tugging at your lips. "...Right."
His bedroom is exactly what you'd expect. Books stacked in uneven towers. Jars holding things you deliberately choose not to identify.
Bones. Far too many bones.
A crow skull stares at you from the shelf beside his bed.
Enoch looks at it. Then back at you. "...Only on Tuesdays."
You stare. "...You're joking."
"...That's more unsettling."
"Hm." He pulls a chair away from his cluttered desk with one foot. "There."
He remains standing for a moment, arms folded, looking everywhere except at you. "...You're still shaking."
You glance down. Your hands are trembling against your knees. "I'll stop."
You hate how quiet your voice sounds when you finally ask, "...Does everyone know?"
"About...this." You gesture vaguely toward yourself. "The nightmares."
Heat floods your face. "...Oh."
"They don't think less of you."
"So..." You laugh once, humorless. "It must be exhausting."
Enoch leans against the edge of his desk. "You think you're the first peculiar who's come here carrying something broken?"
Your eyes lift to his and he continues before you can answer.
"One of us can't touch another person without setting them on fire." He counts on his fingers. "One turns into a bird whenever she panics."
Another finger. "One weighs less than a feather." Another. "I keep corpses walking around for entertainment."
His shoulders lift. "I'd say the sleepwalking barely makes the list."
Despite yourself...a tiny laugh escapes.
His lips twitch before he forces them flat again. "There."
You bite back a smile. "It was one breath."
"It does because I said it does."
You roll your eyes. "...You're insufferable."
"So I've been told." The smile fades as quickly as it came.
Your fingers curl together again. "...I was serious earlier."
"It keeps changing." The room stills.
"The nightmare." Your voice is almost a whisper. "Every night there's...more of it."
You swallow. "Like it learns."
Enoch's expression shifts almost imperceptibly.
He wants to dismiss it and tell you dreams don't work that way. That your imagination is getting carried away.
You shake your head faintly. "You don't have to listen."
"I asked." His tone isn't impatient this time.
You look down at your hands. "It didn't have eyes before."
"So many mouths," you continue quietly. "And every night it remembers something new."
Your throat tightens. "It smiled at me tonight."
His jaw clenches, but you don't notice.
The room falls silent when rain begins tapping softly against the window.
Enoch's fingers drum once against his sleeve before stopping altogether.
"...Dreams don't know names," he says eventually.
He doesn't tell you you're imagining it, nor does he tell you you're being ridiculous.
He just stares at the floor for a long moment before speaking again. "...If it happens tomorrow..."
"I'm a light sleeper anyway."
"...If you're going to wander the house at midnight," he mutters, refusing to meet your gaze, "I'd rather you knocked on my door than tried falling down another staircase."
But neither of you misses what they really mean.
For the first time since arriving at the house...you wouldn't have to face midnight alone.
And neither of you notices the bedroom door, left just slightly ajar—
Or the quiet figure in the hallway beyond it.
Miss Peregrine lowers the hand she'd been about to raise to knock.
A faint, knowing smile crosses her face.
"...Good," she whispers to herself.
Then, without making a sound, she walks away.
