[ That certainly could have something to do with it. The Alan Wake from thirteen years ago is very different from the Alan Wake of the present. And there's a certain disconnect from who he was then and who is now that seems to be hanging onto Alan like a weight he can't shake off.

There are moments in which he doesn't even recognize himself, and moments when he questions who he is now and what sort of person he even is. Am I a person at all? I just can't help but ask that. The question keeps coming up by itself.

But he's with her, and he's doing his best to keep it that way. He drifts away enough; he doesn't need to be doing that now. ]

Chinese? Italian? There's a lot of options we could go with. Hell, we could even order a little of everything. But in all seriousness, you deserve a real date, not just takeout. Not that I don't enjoy some good takeout. Or I did. Maybe I hate takeout. I can't remember.

[ He smiles at her in spite of the unsettling realization that he's finding it harder to remember things he might have liked. ]

But you're getting coffee first. I think you need it more.

[ For him, if his injury gets jostled, it doesn't matter. No, he doesn't want to accidentally make it worse, but this moment is worth a little discomfort. What he'd like to do is see both of them lose more of their clothes, to truly be bare around each other, but he finds himself hesitating to even start to indulge that wish of his.

Instead, he moves his hand to her opposite hip as well, carefully sliding it in the space between them (not that there's much of it) and moving his fingers beneath the fabric of her tank top and ghosts them against the surface of the skin there. ]