Jean and herself

[x-jeangrey.livejournal.com]

Set any given night in September. Jean dreams...



At the end of her shift, Jean would drag herself upstairs to bed, tired beyond belief. It wasn't the mind fogging exhaustion she had driven herself to for Paige - Jean knew better than that, now, and there was just too much riding on them all staying sharp. Instead it was a bone deep weariness that seemed to go on and on without end.

Sleep was both greatly desired and greatly needed, but the little bottle of sleeping pills she had just to be sure had rested in the medicine cupboard, untouched, for weeks. These days by the time she fell into bed she was too tired not to sleep.

And when she slept, she dreamed.

In her dreams, the world was pushing at her, testing her, driving her to her limits, and she was pushing back just as hard. She found that no matter how hard she pushed, nothing gave. The stress outside her never gave, but also never brought her crashing down, and no matter where she was pushed she would simply stretch farther, keeping hold of everything with care and control. Sometimes it seemed like she was pushing herself, intentionally, looking to see where she would break. When she would lose control.

But she would. Not. Break.

Jean didn't remember her dreams, lost them in the fog of waking and the need to get back to work. And she didn't remember the pair of familiar, dark green eyes watched her from the shadows of her own mind, trapped underneath all the stress the world was throwing at her. Waiting.