"Thanks," Poe said again, his hand feeling cold the moment Finn dropped it. He waited until the man came back, took the blankets, and gave some sort of lame joke about it all before he watched the man disappear.

As soon as he was alone, the whole world shifted.

He let out a long, slow breath as he stared at the ceiling.

He'd done really well for the last several hours deflecting everything he could think or feel onto Finn, but now the rest of it was crashing in and he didn't know what to do with any of it.

He curled up onto his side and shut his eyes and just told himself to sleep over and over and over again.

Eventually his exhaustion finally took him, and his dreams welcomed him with thorned tendrils.