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There was a sense of anticipation in the air that Alex doesn't like one damned bit. It feels too familiar to her, too similar to the way that the world felt after Coralee and Warren, after they'd learned about the Axis Mundae. It had been days since she'd seen Strand, it feels like and Alex missed him. After their fight when she'd gotten back from Turkey, things had been better. Or at least they'd seem better to Alex once he'd gotten his anger out of his system, once he'd used Coralee's name and the nature of his relationship with her as a blunt weapon that was swung whenever the two of them had become too close.

But the thing of it was that Alex hadn't done anything this time. There'd been no fights, nothing that had caused him to pick up his toys and stomp off home as he had so many times before. There was nothing wrong other than the fact that Richard was gone. Her calls were sent to voicemail, her texts and emails went unanswered and even calling Ruby wasn't helpful in the slightest. Not that it ever really was when Alex needed to deal with his broad punk wall of an assistant.

So, she just tried to continue on as normal, as if he was just taking a break outside the room. Throwing herself into her work is second nature for Alex, but Nic had decreed that the studio needed to be empty by ten in order for Alex to get some sleep. It never worked for her of course--Alex just took the work home and spread it on her coffee table. A fresh brewed cup of coffee from her french press had been made and Alex was still sitting on the floor with her back to her couch as she went over everything that she had with a pen in her hand and a heavily filled notebook at her side.

Granted, due to the fact that she was home, Alex was wearing comfortable pajamas: an old and well-loved pnws shirt that had been hers since she’d been an intern (complete with a hole on the collar) and a pair of old boxer shorts that had never belonged to anyone but her—they fit her too well for that. With the heavy makeup that Alex normally wore to hide the dark circle under her eyes, they’re prominent and so is the smattering of freckles across her face. Her hair is still damp from the shower, and tied up into a messy bun at the base of her neck. With Nic gone in Russia and all of her friends having been pushed away due to work, Alex wasn’t expecting company. She definitely wasn’t expecting Richard considering she always went to his father’s house or came to the studio. Oh, she knows he knows where she lives (Alex has pointed out her apartment building more than once) but him coming to her seems entirely laughable at this point.

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[Letting him take the right side, Alex herself takes the left, and she just settles into her bed, pulling the lavender sheet and comforter over her while she's doing it. Giving him a quick grin along with a helpless and embarrassed little shrugs, she adds:]

Well, I don't sleep and when I do apparently I chant the names of demons so.

[She belatedly wonders if he'd listened to the show at all over the past few months, and if he'd heard her say that. Heard Nic say that actually. Alex still doesn't know if she had been the one who was chanting the name of the demon. But she didn't want to fight Nic anymore so Alex had just accepted it as being herself.

Taking her glasses off and just setting them on the nightstand there, Alex shifts forward to face him, laying on her side.]

Do you want the lights on or off, Richard?

[When she says demon his hand snakes around her wrist gently. Holding there staring briefly at nothing before he takes off his own glasses]

There's nothing to be afraid of in the dark.

[Especially now. It's all light, it's all clearer in the dark now but Alex mentioning demons...It's like a punch to the gut and he gently squeezes her wrist.]

I'll hold you if you're concerned. I wouldn't...I'd like that.

[Alex just turns off the lights then, because either lights or shadow don't seem to make a difference in her inability to sleep. Besides, she knows all the shadows in their forms in both situations, so she'd just rather go with what he'd preferred.

And then she slips closer to him, wrapping her arms around him and pressing her face into his chest for a moment. It's a cuddle of course, and the familiar scent of his cologne is still on his skin underneath the smell of the new cotton. Alex wants to hold him, and she wants to be held in return and that's all that there is too it.

Well, maybe not all there is to it, because she lifts her face and presses a little kiss to the corner of his lip before she just whispers:]

Good night, Richard.

[His hand strokes her hair and he-

Pushes himself out of his mind. To roam around the building. Just to experience it. When the morning comes there is someone in his arms, which is like an anchor, locking him back into place. Into his body. She is home in more ways then one.]