The headache arrived before he did.
It was the first thing — sharp, specific, the particular violence of a morning that had been earned rather than arrived at, pressing behind his eyes with the relentless efficiency of something that had been building all night and had waited for consciousness to make itself known. His whole body ached with the deep, structural ache of someone who had been ill and had then done something ill-advised on top of it.
He lay still for a moment, eyes closed, letting his thoughts reassemble with the careful, unhurried patience of a man who understood that reassembly was going to take longer than usual this morning and was not going to rush it.
Then he noticed the weight.
On his chest. Against his side. The specific, warm heaviness of another person — an arm across him, a head resting just below his shoulder, his own arm underneath her, holding her in the particular way of someone who had done it in their sleep without knowing.
He turned his head.
