Sleeping Awake: for brokeharlem

[labcoatgirl]

It was only the second night she was staying over. The day had gone rather well, she had met Tony finally and the three of them had gone for dinner at a place where the prices made her head spin. Bruce even seemed to enjoy himself, though it was hard to tell, Betty knew he did

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[brokeharlem]

It took longer for Bruce to fall asleep.

In the last six years, he'd made something of a habit of getting as little sleep as possible, making sure to keep himself balanced on a knife's edge between too tired to function and too awake to remember his dreams, and that hadn't changed much since he'd started living at the Tower. Not really, not entirely. Maybe his reasons were a little different now, his sleep loss having more to do with late nights in the lab, working on one project or another with Tony and less to do with conscious effort, and maybe he'd been having more nightmares now when he did sleep, that sort of thing common after he'd had an incident, willing or not, but the fact still remained that he didn't really have normal sleep patterns anymore. And why he didn't quite know what to do with himself, now that he had the chance to establish them

[labcoatgirl]

The soft noise he makes prods Betty awake. She half opens her eyes sleepily, wondering if she imagined it. In the dark, she blinks at him on the couch, watching him for a moment or two to see if he was alright.

[brokeharlem]

Bruce remains still for a moment, then curls further in upon himself, his breathing growing steadily more heavy and labored. He makes another small sound in between slumberous attempts to catch his breath, and tilts his head to one side slowly, his eyelids fluttering wildly in the gloom.

Overhead, there's a moment of heavy silence, one Betty may or may not have come to recognize as JARVIS trying to decide whether or not to input his two cents, and then lowly, the AI puts in, "I could attempt to wake him, if you'd like."

[labcoatgirl]

Betty sits up with a worried frown as Jarvis speaks, her hair a bit messy from being against the pillow. "...does this happen often?" she asks quietly, watching him.