whitecollarhc

Title:
A head full of cottonballs

Summary:
You only appreciate it when you can't. Sleep. Neal didn't know he had a serious problem. Until he noticed some health problems.

...

Maybe it was the fact that he lived in a city that never seemed to sleep. But he was wide awake, every night. At least as long he could remember. To be honest, Neal didn't remember when this had started.

But he couldn't sleep anymore, with all that traffic going around. It caused an endless noise. No matter what he tried to ignore this constant buzz. He heard it. It was never completely silent out there.

Neal rested his arms on the edge of the balcony as his eyes wandered over the buildings. It was a mixture of yellow and black because there were always some lights still one, somewhere.

He was never alone.

Some car horns sounded below him, he heard a man yell as he dangerously proceed crossing the busy street. Neal effortlessly watched him disappear into the darkness again. Some cars stopped slightly. Some cars horned angrily at him and hastened away as the green lights changed into orange. A cold gust of wind blew by. Causing Neal to wiggle his bare toes against the freezing floor. The cool wind made his pajama pants wrinkle. And his bare upper body shiver, lightly. He yawned aloud.

All signs of exhaustion and lack of sleep. He knew that…

He knew he wasn't supposed to be here. He needed his sleep. Like everyone else.

But the traffic noises… he couldn't ignore it.

Nevertheless Neal couldn't remember how many times he had listened to it, with a smile on his perfect face.

Deep down Neal found it actually quite comforting.

Knowing that he wasn't the only person awake at night. Unable to give himself over to the blissful unconsciousness. Why not? That he didn't know. Nor bother thinking about it.

It was absurd, though, how often Neal had looked at the traffic like this, here from this balcony. Thinking about the fact that in every vehicle must've been at least one person. One awake person that needed to go somewhere at night. 'Where did they go?' he wondered than. 'What was their excuse?'

…

Anyway, by the time it was morning Neal found himself regularly back in his bed, again. Robbed of memory when he'd decided to give it another try. Nor the memory he managed to catch some sleep.

But Neal only knew one thing. There were no dreams anymore.

When this problem started was a great mystery to him. Maybe Neal really didn't know. Or maybe, just maybe, he didn't want to give it more thought about it than he already had let himself. Because… The more he did, the more Neal realized that he had a serious problem.

…

First there was nothing to worry about. It started quite innocently. At first it started with waking up an hour earlier before he'd sat the alarm. It was actually pretty delightful that he could start his day in peace. It takes time, you know, to get into that self-inflicted armor of perfection. And he wasn't only referring to the expensive classic suits.

Nobody noticed when Neal had and lethargic moment, that was usually around eleven, which was incidentally cured with a bitter cup of nasty coffee from the office. During the more practical matters, in which he played a more active role, it was the adrenaline that kept him on the legs. But mostly he collapsed in his drowsiness afterwards.

And in the end, things had gotten worse. Simple tasks like bringing a file upstairs to Peter's desk or getting his sandwich out of the refrigerator during lunchtime left him out of breath while feeling unbelievable tired and prostrate. Things what a simple cup of coffee couldn't fix.

How long had it been since he had slept all night, were Neal's wordless thoughts, when he caught himself on a blackout during a meeting about a new case, one day. The answer appeared in his fuzzy mind as a stab with a hot knife and this made him feel awful uncomfortable. It was more than two months ago.

…

'Neal! Will you focus on the case, please? This is important! ' Peter grumbled one day. It brought Neal back and apologetically straightened his slouched posture. Peter was one of the few people, that was capable to read his thoughts. In fact, he was the only one who seemed to know everything about him. And a little voice in his mind hoped that Peter saw what was going one with him. Neal hoped badly he didn't have to tell him what was bothering him for a while, now. Because, it was quite personal. He didn't want to talk about it. He tried to ignore this. But things had gotten too far, already.

His blurry eyes were being dragged and swallowed into the brown eyes of Peter. Just a moment they stared at each other, the grinning buzz from the colleagues was just a distant noise like the endless buzz of the traffic, at night. Neal had actually no idea, of what so ever, how long this intense gaze lasted. But at one moment he received a signal. Peter knew. He had understood something.

Maybe, not exactly. But Peter must've register that Neal was hiding something. Not only for him, or the office. But also from himself. Something that wasn't illegal, or anything. But something that lay deeply within himself.

Neal was sick. But whatever it might be, is has to be something bad.

…

AN: I wrote it once in my own language and that didn't work out so well. LOL. So now I will continue in English. Part two is on the way. Please tell me what you think

X

Josie