Maybe it’s a good thing we’ll be separated. Connor and my brother think it’s fucking weird that we both haven’t dated in four months, and I guess we’ll finally have the opportunity to change that.

I steal the bottle from her hands and open it with ease. I put two in her palm.

She hesitates. “You know, I didn’t have night terrors or any other symptoms before I started taking these.”

I run my hand through my hair. “Daisy, you’ve talked to your fucking doctor about this.” For fuck’s sake, I was there when she talked to three different sleep disorder physicians about her condition. She’s taken EEGs. She’s been through multiple sleep studies. They all advise her to take the fucking pills. Because without Ambien, she won’t sleep at all. She suffers from insomnia, post-traumatic stress, and the only thing that can really help her is therapy, which she goes to routinely.

“It’s not really sleeping though, is it?” she says, eyeing the pills in her palm. “I mean, it puts me in a half-sleep.”

Parasomnia, the moments between wakefulness and sleep—yeah, I’ve learned all about it. She hasn’t had anything better than that in over six months. “It’s better than no fucking sleep.”

She nods, takes a deep breath, and throws the pills back in her mouth. She chugs half the water before setting it back on her nightstand. I watch her slip beneath the covers and set her head on the pillow, staring straight up at the ceiling. Her eyes begin to glass.

“What is it?” I ask.

“I’m scared to sleep,” she admits in a whisper. “I don’t want to have a nightmare.” Tears slide out of the creases of her eyes, too tired to hold them back. “But I’ll be scared all night if I stay awake. It sucks.”

I wish I could take away her problems. I’m not used to being unable to fix things, and it hurts, having to watch her go through this while I pretend that my presence is a fucking solution.

I lean over her so she’s staring right at me. “Daisy,” I say her name forcefully, wiping her tears with my thumb. “No one is getting in this fucking room.” I don’t normally do this every night, but she’s worse today. I reach over to the end table near me and open the drawer. I take out a .45-caliber handgun and show her the ammunition. “Okay?”

I watch her breathe out again, and she nods.

Then I ensure the safety is on and tuck the gun beneath my pillow.

She shuts her eyes, and I near her under the covers so she feels my body heat. I’ve been doing this long enough to know what calms her down and what triggers her fear. We’re a couple inches apart, and I already see a layer of sweat building on her forehead.

“Shhh,” I whisper. “You’re safe.” I rub her arm, and she scoots closer to me. We’re no longer a fucking inch or so apart. Her legs intertwine with mine like it’s the most natural position. She turns, her back against my chest, my arm around her waist, my cock pressing on her ass, but she probably doesn’t hone in on this last fact as much as me.

Do you want to know the kind of restraint it takes to be in this fucking position with this fucking girl almost every fucking night without doing one fucking thing?

More control than I even realized I had.

I figured tonight would be a rough one, but I just didn’t expect it to bypass a nightmare and hit on another fucking issue she has. Not sleepwalking. I haven’t caught her doing that yet.

Daisy kicks me awake, which is the normal part. She squirms, her long, smooth legs moving back and forth, up and down, hitting my shins.

I don’t try to stop her. She’ll just be unresponsive until she wakes up fully.

She grips her pillow, her face turned into it, and she moans.

She’s still asleep. This is a fucking side effect of her meds, and it’s happened maybe five times in the past four months. I wasn’t ever planning on telling her that she gets aroused in the middle of the night. She can’t remember it happening, even when her eyes snap open and she looks pretty lucid, like a sleepwalker. I thought telling her that I’ve heard her moan in arousal would embarrass her, so I kept quiet. But during a sleep study, she did it anyway, and so she knows.

Daisy didn’t look mortified when she found out. I forgot that she’s not Lily. She’s a lot less ashamed and a lot more brazen and probably five times as crazy. She just told me that if she does it again, I need to leave her bed immediately so she doesn’t accidentally rape me.

She read that it could happen with sleepsex, and I told her that she’s out of her fucking mind if she thinks she’s going to rape me, asleep or awake.

Daisy tosses and turns restlessly, and then she stays still when her back faces me, one of her knees bent towards her body. She shudders, and then she moans again, the noise high-pitched and full of unbridled pleasure.

I sit up on my elbow and pause to watch her for a second. I start to harden, especially as she clenches the sheet by her waist. Her tank top has bunched to her chest, the bottom of her breasts peeking out.

Fuck. I have to go to the bathroom.

I’m about to tug her shirt down and leave, but her voice freezes me. “I can’t,” she moans softly, and then her noises turn into a series of breathless cries. “Ahh…ahhh…ahh…”

Fucking Christ. I wish I was so deep inside of her right now.

Her back arches. “Ryke!”

At least she thinks I am.

Frustrated, I toss the comforter off my body. Fuck her shirt. I glance back. Her breasts, even small, are killing me. I climb off the bed, my erection trying to burst through my fucking pants. Her body is skinnier than it’s ever been. I want to fucking feed her first, and then I want to fuck her hard. Both of which seem improbable, and the latter can’t happen.

“I…can’t…” she moans. See, even in her fucking sleep, she knows it’s wrong. So there we go. “Ryke…Ryke…” She cries again, feminine, high-pitched, and I lose it for a second time. “Ryke, ahhh!” I have to enter the fucking bathroom before I come right here.

It takes me a minute to unlock the deadbolt, and then I slip inside. I gently shut the door and tug down my drawstring pants to my thighs. Fuck. I find the lotion on the ground, along with hair spray (not fucking needed) and a tube of half-empty toothpaste (same). I didn’t even realize it was fucking messy in here, but I guess it is. We both rarely clean up.

I used to make fun of Connor for masturbating like crazy when Rose wouldn’t give up her virginity, and here I am, going through the same thing. The difference: there’s no endgame for me. I don’t have the girl at the finish. I’m not chasing after her. I’m just helping her, and when that’s done, we’re both supposed to move on.

I stand over the toilet and place one hand on the wall. I shut my eyes and stroke my hard cock that fucking begs to be inside a woman, but I’ve been saying no to that demand for months. Images start filling my head to increase my arousal, and the most prevalent is a girl with blonde hair, with that high-pitched cry and those long fucking legs.

I immediately stop rubbing.

I lick my lips and glare at the wall. Why the fuck do you have to picture her? Anyone else. Goddammit, anyone fucking else. I try thinking about a girl I’ve already fucked before, completely different from Daisy. She’s big breasted, big assed, and big hipped. I like curvy. I like athletic. I honestly like everything. I don’t think Daisy knows this either. I told her I had a type when she was fifteen—describing the complete opposite of her build, just so she wouldn’t get any ideas.

And look where I am now, fucking imagining her. Stop thinking. I’m trying. I want to come, so I start again, and I keep picturing that other girl, my cock pounding between her legs. Fuck…me. I speed up my strokes, welcoming the friction with heavy breaths.