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Ray’s been an insomniac for as long as he can remember. Even his mother claims he hated sleeping as a baby, and that more often than not he climbed out of his crib as a toddler when he was supposed to be taking a nap.
So, he’s very familiar with the feeling of being tired, of wanting to sleep, but being unable to, for reasons he can’t explain. It’s just that usually, he can’t sleep for reasons outside his control. Right now, his brain is going a mile a minute – he imagines the grey matter in his head hitting the inside of his skull like a ping pong ball – and it’s not like he can turn it off. Ray’s often found himself wishing at times like these that his thoughts had an off button, but no, he’s gotta live with his thoughts keeping him awake at ass o’clock in the morning.
He really should not have taken that extra Ripped Fuel dose two hours before they were ordered to dig in, but it’s not like Ray could’ve known they weren’t gonna drive through the night again.
He turns over in his grave.
He turns over again.
He’s lost count of the amount of times he’s rolled over, and every time he scrapes against the sides of the grave, bits of sand tumble on him.
Aside from the occasional artillery noise in the background, it’s reasonably quiet. He’s heard Walt’s muffled talk in his sleep (something about sheep?) but he quieted down ages ago. Now and again there’s a snort from Reporter’s grave. The guy doesn’t snore, not really, but he’s not exactly a quiet sleeper.
Ray rubs his nose, and then immediately regrets it because now he’s got sand up his nostril. He just knows if he tries to blow it out he’ll have snot covering his upper lip (thank you very much, allergies), so he refrains.
If he never sees sand again after this fucking deployment, it’ll be too soon. Ugh.
Ray turns onto his back, and then squints up. Theres a dark shape standing by his grave, and he can tell they’re looking at him by the shine in their eyes. He immediately dismisses the thought of it being an enemy, because he’d have been long dead before noticing. (His awareness of his surroundings is usually better than this, but he’s running on something like fifty hours of no sleep and his eyeballs refuse to take the hint.)
“You’re being noisy,” Brad says, quietly, because of fucking course it’s Brad staring at him in the dark, the creep. Ray doesn’t say I can’t sleep, because he’s awake when he ought to be sleeping, and he hasn’t been nicknamed Captain Obvious yet. Instead he stares back, and yawns, his jaw cracking a little at the widest point. Brad shakes his head, and Ray’s pretty sure he’s also rolling his eyes, but it’s too dark to actually be certain. “Come on,” Brad says. He holds out a hand after he’s crouched down, and Ray lets himself be pulled up – first into a sitting position, and then straight out of the grave.
It’s only three steps to their destination, but Ray twists his body to the berm anyway. “Watch duty?”
“Trombley,” Brad says. He gestures down, a go ahead signal, and Ray slips into Brad’s grave. It’s just as sandy as Ray’s own, but it’s wider so he’s not tumbling sand all over himself. He turns onto his side, staring at the wall of dirt in front of him, and hears Brad step down behind him. The grave technically isn’t big enough for two full-grown men, but they make do. As Marines always do. He can feel Brad’s breath against his exposed ear, and then the back of his neck when he turns a little.
“I think we’re surrounded by worms,” Ray says, the thought so sudden he has to expel it from his mouth immediately.
“Ray.” Brad’s exasperation is palpable, even as he shifts his body closer to Ray’s as he gets more comfortable. His shins are right behind Ray’s feet, because he’s just that annoyingly tall.
“I know, I know. Shutting up.” He closes his eyes and goes to sleep.
Attempts to go to sleep.
(Attempts very valiantly, he might add.)
He settles for pretending to go to sleep, after several more minutes of absolutely nothing close to sleep happening. Now he can’t stop thinking about worms crawling in the dirt several inches from his face. Do they even have worms in the Iraqi desert? Ray’s not sure. Maybe they don’t. Maybe it’s too hot for worms. He remembers seeing them in the dirt and grass at home after a solid rain, and he’s not sure—
“Ray,” Brad repeats.
“I wasn’t talking!” Ray says.
“Your thoughts are too loud. Think quiet thoughts.”
“Jesus Christ,” Ray mumbles. What the fuck even are quiet thoughts. Aren’t thoughts always quiet? They’re inside your head, so they gotta be, is Brad some kind of mind reader that he’s—
Brad puts a hand on his waist, and Ray notes his breath is very warm in the cold air as he whispers, “Quiet thoughts, Ray.”
Now he can’t stop thinking about Brad’s hand on his waist. It was on his side, first, and then snuck around so his palm is facing his belly. Neither of them can really feel much of it, considering the bulk of their uniform, but Ray’s strangely aware of Brad’s presence behind him, and on him.
As a rule, Brad never, ever touches him like this on deployment. It’s not an explicit rule, it’s not one they’ve spoken out loud or written down and shaken hands on. It’s just something Ray’s always taken as a given, because it makes sense and neither of them are idiots.
He’s fairly sure Brad is not being a fucking idiot right now (at least not on purpose), because Brad is rarely an idiot on purpose.
He wishes he could feel his hand against his bare skin. The callouses on his fingertips stroking against the hair on his belly. Brad’s hands tend to run on the warm side, and splayed out it feels like he can cover half of Ray’s stomach with just one of them.
Stupid, fucking MOPP suits making it impossible to—
“Are you getting more worked up?” Brad sounds amused, a little.
“Shut the fuck up,” Ray whispers back. He can feel Brad lean on him more, pressing him against the ground. It feels like a relief. A type of heaviness he didn’t know he needed. Brad’s arm around him is tighter now, and he can feel him inhaling and exhaling, slow and measured. Eventually, his own breathing evens out at the same pace.
He blinks haphazardly a few times, realizing he’s actually drifting off. His eyelids feel very heavy. There are pops in the distance.
Ray stops fighting and closes his eyes.