It’s dark out and it’s terrible. Herb sips his mug of warm milk and glances out a nearby window, its curtain coyly drawn back just enough to grant him a peek at the navy blue of the sky. He can see the stars. He hates it.
“I really don’t know how you guys do this,” he grumbles.
Clover, his head resting on Herb’s shoulder, hums and turns the page in his book. Herb feels the motion ripple through the blanket they’re sharing. “Do what, honey?” he asks.
“Stay. Like. Alive at night.”
Mint grins, turning to look at him from the keyboard. “It’s a struggle!”
Herb narrows his eyes. “I meant conscious.”
“Yeah? And?”
Herb narrows his eyes further. “Mint, you should really find a therapist.”
“Or at least join us,” Clover says. He sets his book on the endtable and snuggles further into Herb’s side, tucking his legs onto the couch and bringing the blanket up to his chin. “Please? Herb needs to get back to sleep or he’ll be intolerable in the morning.”
“I absolutely will,” Herb says over his mug.
“Oh, god—true. Lemme just….” Mint shuts the lamp off, drowning that part of the room in darkness, and then makes his way over to the couch. He settles at Herb’s other side, curling under the blanket and sighing into the warmth. “All right. Go to sleep, Herb.”
“That’s not how it works—hey!” He squirms when Mint pokes his side, the remaining milk in his mug sloshing around.
“Go to sleep, Herb,” Mint says again, but this time it comes with a yawn.
“Yeah,” Clover says. He yawns, too, his jaw working against Herb’s shoulder. “Sleep.”
Herb rolls his eyes, disappointed that neither of them sees it. “Uh-huh. Sure,” he says. “Let me just go to sleep. ‘Cause it’s as easy as just closing your eyes, right? Right?” He pauses, but Mint doesn’t reply with an equally snippy comeback. Nor does Clover mumble at him to shush. He turns his head as much as the bodies curled up against him will let him and sees them both with their eyes closed. Their breathing slow.
Sleeping.
“Oh my god,” he says. “Oh my god. You guys left me here? Rude. I’ll never forgive you.”
But he will. He knows he will. He can’t stay mad while they’re so warm beside him, and so calming, and the blanket is a comfortable weight around all three of them. Even if he knows the milk he’s just finished is going to reach its inevitable conclusion in his body, he can’t bring himself to think of any of this as anything but a blessing.