A/N; Prompt: 2 a.m.

She falls asleep beside Will in the early hours of the morning with the television still on in front of them and her head propped on his shoulder. Will's head is tipped back against the top of the sofa and his legs are splayed open and rest on the table. Mackenzie is curled tight in a ball with her feet tucked under her bottom and her arms tucked tight around her belly. She's resting at an odd angle and as she slips further and further into sleep her head nestles in against his collarbone.

When they'd first started sleeping together, all those years ago – before the warzones and lost emails and the four months she spent cheating with her ex – she'd been amused to discover Will liked to spread out as he slept. Inch by inch his arms and legs would crawl across the mattress and by morning he would by sprawled like a starfish beneath the sheets. Mackenzie, by contrast, would tuck herself into a ball by his chest only to awake curled on or around him, smothered by his heat but utterly too content to move.

Now they replicate that as best as possible. Neither is aware, both lost in the dredges of slumber, but as Will relaxes more across the lounge Mackenzie squeezes herself tighter to his side. In the morning she'll have crinkles across her cheek from his sweater and he'll have tuffs of her hair pressed to his mouth. His joints will ache and her neck will crack and their eyes will be drowsy in the sunlight.

But in this moment, hanging delicately between two and three a.m. and with the television casting them in a neon white glow, their minds are lost to sleep and their bodies mould to memory. Will's hand drops until it clings around her waist, fingers dipping into the crease at her hipbone and Mackenzie curls her knee around his thigh and shifts until her chin is pressed in the curve of his neck.

Before them is spread the remains of a late dinner and scattered amongst the boxes of noodles are documents and reports and charts detailing the story they are chasing. They'd made the executive decision to work into the night and send the rest of the team home when Jim had accidentally walked into the side of Maggie's desk and sent hot coffee splashing across her worktop. At this stage it had been almost midnight and the rest of the team had been so hazy they'd barely responded. Mackenzie had stood at the door to Will's office and watched as her team slowly collapsed with exhaustion.

"All right everyone, go home," she'd sighed regretfully.

Their tired, muzzy faces had turned towards her, perhaps to protest or to insist she join them, but then Will had appeared at her back and nodded his encouragement and when mom and dad were both giving orders they all knew better than to refuse.

Mackenzie had waved the last of them off only to find Will spreading the files across his table and so she'd curled herself into the chair across from him and picked up a report and a box of Singapore noodles without comment. Will had stared at her a moment, ready to send her home, but her look had been a mix between defiant and pleading so he'd shut his mouth and joined her.

An hour later they'd migrated to the lounge with the 24-hour newsreel playing in front of them, and within half an hour they'd been asleep.

Mackenzie had fallen under first, and initially Will had resolved to wake her. He'd gotten as far as sifting a finger through her fringe, trailing it down the apple of her cheek, and then she'd let out an imperceptible sigh whilst shuffling forwards and he'd been lost; unable to move. Entirely captured by the late night lights shifting across her hair and the movement of her tiny body against his chest.

Moments later he'd let his head fall back against the lounge, and as the clock had slipped further past 2 a.m., he'd found sleep.

It scares him a little, how easy it is to pretend this is normal. Maybe it's because once upon a time it was, or perhaps it's the fact that she hasn't changed her shampoo in 5 years. He can close his eyes and hold her tight and in an instance they're back in time with Mackenzie warm and snug against him and Will with the constant, glowing feeling that he's found the woman to spend his life with.

It's an easy dream to cling to, especially with her fingers dug in his chest, and he hates the tentative beat of his heart that insists on keeping her close to him. His heart and his mind and his pride disagree daily and the constant tug-of-war has him exhausted.

He wishes he had an answer – wishes he had a sign. If he knew with certainty that she would love him wholly and forever he'd give no second thought to diving back into this life. But he doesn't know. Mackenzie McHale may be annoyingly ethical, but once he'd believed her to be in love with him only to find her the next day gone from his life.

He trusts her with his career, with his friendship – perhaps even with his life. But not yet his heart, however much it might want her.

It's past 2 am and they're curled asleep under the television glow, lost somewhere in the past and dreaming of the future and Will just wishes he knew.

Because if he knew, it would be a beginning.