Pairing: Polly/Mal
Rating: B

Disclaimer: The author makes no claim to owning the rights of anything to do with Terry Pratchett or Discworld.

Note: In explanation: I had a small problem whilst writing "The Last Day" in that the bed in Polly's room (or Polly and Mal's room) was obviously there. A single bed, in the room they shared. It was being distracting and however many times I deleted it, it would crop up again. People sat on it, bumped into it, and put things on it. I deleted it about 10 times. In the end, I had to write this, to get it out of my head. This is not set at that point - but much later on, once the relationship is well established. er. Anyway. Enjoy.

Ruffled Bedsheets
by Treehugger

What unfathomable power dwells in these words?
I have written them over and again this night.
Written, scored though, re-written, torn up, despaired over and thrown away.

I sit in the window, the smoke from an umpteenth cigarette drifting out into the gentle grey sky. The quiet hours of deep darkness have faded away. The town slumbers on in silence; the new morning struggling to convince the world of its arrival.

No call to slumber pulls me from my vigil. Though in truth, I have slept times, when there was need, but the solitary passing of these quiet night hours has always provided my refreshment.

She sleeps and I lie with her, as long as can be endured. But I was not made to sleep so and having found one at last who does not hate me for it, I may rise and leave her without accusation.

Despite freedom to go I have always stayed.
Found some way to pass the time.

How many nights have I sat here, writing terrible, cringeworthy, embarrassing poetry to my love, the empty street below littered with the torn remnants of my words?

I cannot capture her.

Years I have lived, time enough to develop a vocabulary wide enough to describe all the glories of the disc. But I cannot access it for her. She has struck me dumb.

Frustrated me, denied me, challenged me and infuriated me.

And yet there she lies,
Sprawled peacefully amid untidy bedclothes, brazen witness to our passion.
White shoulder rising from rough blankets, the flush of sleep on too oft pale cheeks.
What does she dream of, the small smile lingering?

This moment I would capture.
This I would put down for permanence,
To be re-read and read again by lovers in all the years to come.
Would they understand my meaning, these imagined lovers, though the paper contains only her name writ fifty times over?

Ruffled bed sheets.
My lover and my beloved.
She is the poem.