Laurie wrapped his arm around her chest a little tighter, pressing herself a bit more firmly into him. Their bedroom was a bit chilly in February; that window had been such a big selling point in November - the better to bird watch from - but apparently it wasn't well insulated and let in a winter draft.

She'd woken to the hooting of an owl outside that window and now she couldn't get back to sleep, and it wasn't worth waking Dan over. She tried hard not to wake him whenever he did get to sleep; he slept so fitfully, most nights waking in a cold sweat, tears in his eyes. Once he had even said, clear as day, "No!" and she knew what depths his mind was taking him to in his sleep. The hideous memory he was forcing himself to relive, over and over again.

If she knew how to contact Jon, she would be tempted to do so only to beg him to reassemble Rorschach and put Dan's dreams to rest. Dan blamed himself for not stopping Jon, for not stopping Rorschach, for not stopping Adrian. And Dan missed his friend, the way Rorschach used to be, once.

Jon. She didn't miss him, and that surprised her still. At first she had talked about him constantly, but that was just because she didn't know any other lens for viewing the world except through Jon. Now, she realized, she used Dan's name in conversation just as often as she had ever used Jon's - like a schoolgirl with her first boyfriend, Laurie mused.

And, in fairness, Dan was like a boy with his first love, too. Jon had not held her tight like this since she was a teenager. She could feel Dan's body against hers, the comforting blend of muscle and fat, of hard and soft. Jon was sheer muscle, his body hard like a board. That was, when he came to bed at all. The last several years of their relationship, Laurie and Jon had made love so rarely; Jon spent most nights awake in his lab.

But Dan held her close, and every night made love to her that left them both trembling, and kissed her often. The sweet gestures of romance, utterly empty to Jon, came easily to Dan. He seemed to enjoy them even more than she did. He was like a boy going off to war, never sure if this would be the last time he would see her face. Laurie, at least, had her mother, but Dan was an only child and both his parents were long gone. He'd lost everyone last October - everyone but Laurie, and he seemed determined to hold on to her. All through the night he stayed in physical contact with her, skin to skin, as if reassuring himself she was still there.

Dear Dan, she thought, readjusting her position in the bed. Would she ever adjust to calling him Samuel Hollis after twenty-some years of knowing him as Daniel Dreiburg? Or to calling herself Sandra? Really, her name was easier; she hadn't had much of an identity as Laurie Juspeczyk: maybe Sandra Hollis had a better chance.

Dan obligingly rolled over and she nuzzled her face between his shoulder blades where a familiar scar lay. She wrapped her arms around him, taking care not to scratch his skin with that diamond she never thought she'd wear, and finally, finally, fell asleep.