Snuggle.

"Do you like to win at board games?"

"I'm not a big board game person but when I am playing one I try to win because that's how games work? I'm not very competitive as, like, a personality trait. Why?"

"I'm doing pretty badly at phone games and maybe it would be better if I could instead do pretty badly at competitive ones.  Since we might be stuck with each other for a long while and I want you to like me."

"Ren has a few board games but they're, like, weird ones, so we'll have to learn how to play them."

"If you don't enjoy winning there's not really a point..."  He shifts to a more horizontal snuggle.  "At first I didn't."

"Didn't what?"

"Want you to like me.  Or, I thought I wasn't supposed to try to get you to."

"...huh. ...I would normally assume you wouldn't bring that up if you didn't want to say more about it but I don't know if that assumption holds."

"Well, the first time I tried to contribute to a conversation at all, I was devastatingly insulted and you didn't push back on it at all...  So I just tried to be kind of... as nothing as possible."

"I'm sorry about that."

"Mmm.  ...You could put on music again."

"Sure. Is the same playlist good?"

"I would be okay with a lot of stuff with words now but yeah, same is fine."

On goes assorted classical.

Yeah, Julien's gonna fall asleep again.  Unless there's Haydn's 94 in here or something.

If it is they don't get to it.

Haru carries him up to bed at a reasonable bedtime hour, after making sure the security system is live (and texting Ren to warn her of this, though he doesn't expect her to suddenly come home from her camping trip).

Going up the stairs rouses him enough to open his eyes, but he doesn't move or speak, just stares.  It's not clear whether he's really awake.

"If you want we can brush our teeth and stuff but we can also just crash. You're almost done."

He blinks, twice, and on the third time his eyes stay shut.

Bedtime, then, snuggled up in the guest bed under the covers.

Yeah.

A bit after eleven there's a hand shaking Haru's shoulder.

"- mmgha yes?"

"We decided I should wake you up.  So I'm doing that."

"Okay. What do you need?"