Insomniac

Andrew awoke with a start. He sat up looking around for his alarm clock in a desperate frenzy, still reeling from the dream he had just escaped. He finally found it, hidden beneath the blanket he had tossed aside in his sleepy panic. Two-thirty am flashed at him in the form of bright red numbers. He ran his hand over his unruly dark hair and sighed. He'd had the dream again...flashes of violence and that cold dark room playing over and over through his brain. Andrew tried so hard to suppress the memories of his past during the day, but the night brought them back so that they were always present, just behind the invisible shield of his sanity.

He swung his feet to the cold floor of his small San Francisco apartment and padded his way to the kitchen, ignoring the sharp cries of his cat, Bart, upset at being woken at such an odd hour of the night.

"No use trying to fall back asleep now" Andrew whispered to partly to himself, and partly to the cat. He did this frequently, and knew that even if sleep failed to evade him, the dreams would only come back again. He flipped the coffee maker switch, and sat down in front of the computer in the living room, Bart fluffing himself about his ankles. Andrew looked at the clock again. It was getting closer, only five 'til three and then she would be there. Maybe not in the physical sense he'd been longing for since their online friendship had begun, but still there, a comfort to his conscience at the very least. Andrew felt a familiar feeling of anticipation began to well up inside him as the monitor hummed to life. The smell of brewed coffee began wafting through his apartment as he typed in the web address and waited for the name to pop onto the screen, telling him that she was there waiting for him.

He pet Bart absentmindedly while flipping through the TV channels, finally settling on an old episode of Family Guy. His previously frightened mood forgotten, he stood up and stretched, walking back to the kitchen area to pour himself a hot cup of coffee. Then the familiar BING! Sounded from the computer, prompting him to rush his task and spill hot coffee all over the counter. That was forgotten however, replaced with stronger feelings of anticipation than before as he made his way back to the computer. She was waiting for him, causing a familiar smile to cover his normally surly face.

-

Charlotte, called Charlie by those close to her, drove down the quiet streets of her small town in the dark. Starbucks coffee in one hand, steering wheel in the other, she felt as though her entire evening had been less than adequate. She had recently started working the night shift at the hospital, and when all the reports had been filed and patients turned over to the oncoming staff, she barely got out by 2:45 am on a fast night. The clock read 2:50, and she sighed.

Pulling into her driveway a few moments later, Charlie slowly got out of the car and stretched. She was tired, but not just in a physical way. She was tired of the monotony that surrounded her every day life. Four days a week, she was working from 6pm until 2am, which threw off her schedule for the remaining three days. That fact alone generally put her in a secluded bubble but she was also quiet and shy, always the wallflower never in the spot light. Normally she liked it that way, but lately she was tired of not having the time to be a normal twenty-five year old, out with friends, shopping, going on dates, having an adult life besides her work life. She'd been on her own since she was sixteen, always supporting herself even before then. She had the attitude of a woman that didn't' need anyone, and that's how she lived her life.

Charlotte unlocked the door of her small suburban house, dropped her bag on the table, and threw a TV dinner in the microwave. She didn't' have the patience for cooking, only one thing on her mind now that she was home. She walked into the den, grabbing her laptop from the desk, and sat on the couch. While waiting for her computer to fire up, she turned on the television, flipping through various infomercials before she found a familiar Mathew McConaughey on HBO. She settled in, and clicked the flagged web page tab at the top of her screen, the excitement welling up inside. She needed to talk to him, more than her own being, she had to know he was there, waiting for her to come home from work. She relished this part of her day, knowing that when she talked to him everything else could easily be overlooked. She heard the beep of her microwave in the distance, but that was soon forgotten when the familiar beep of a new message popped up. She settled into her routine that had been going on for months now, and waited for the conversation to begin.