Gwen's alarm went off at 5:30 AM, while all the sensible people were still asleep and the light was still a murky predawn haze that barely penetrated her bedroom curtains. She fumbled for the switch to her bedside lamp, knowing all too well that if she turned off the alarm before she turned on the light then she'd only just nod off again, and finally found it on the third try. Then, still wincing from the sudden stab of illumination, she turned off the alarm and unlocked her phone in a desperate effort to find something that would engage her brain.
A few seconds later, she lowered it and looked over at the man next to her.
Gwen didn't recognize him at first; it was a surreal sensation, staring at a man who shared her bed and not having the slightest idea who he was or how he got there. She studied his sleep-tousled brown hair, the slight curves of his rounded pink cheeks, the bare skin of his shoulders that went down under the covers and that Gwen didn't dare investigate further... but none of it rang a bell. It was only when he opened his deep brown eyes and looked at her that everything finally came back to her in an overwhelming rush of recollection that made her gasp in shock and arousal. "Hello, pet," he murmured, glancing at her phone. "Why don't you go ahead and call in sick today?" Gwen nodded vacantly, her jaw slackening as her confusion melted into fascinated bliss.
It was suddenly Friday night for Gwen all over again, Friday night and a seat at a table near the dance floor waiting for her friends to arrive so the evening could begin. Gwen always got to the club early, staking out the primo real estate before the live music started and the bar got crowded so that they could have the best seats in the house... but this Friday was different. This Friday there was already someone sitting at her favorite table, but he beckoned her to join him and said he didn't mind getting up once her friends got there. Only he hoped she didn't mind if he rested a bit longer, because he'd had a hard day and he was very tired.
Gwen thought she could simply ignore him until he left, but he kept droning on about how long and exhausting his day was, how he could feel waves of drowsiness flowing down his body in slow, languid procession until his legs felt too limp and lazy to move and his arms hung down lifeless at his sides and his heavy-lidded eyes gazed vacantly at whatever happened to be in front of him and even his brain became numb and sluggish and confused. And Gwen didn't quite notice when the identifying pronouns dropped out of his sentences and when she began to conflate the stranger's weary lassitude with her own post-work lethargy and when she began to nod along in blank, thoughtless agreement.
It seemed like mere minutes before Gwen was absently repeating his words back to him, the sound of her own dazed and drowsy voice convincing her that she meant everything she said. "I'm so sleepy." "I've never been so tired." "My mind and body are completely exhausted." "I can't stay awake much longer." "I need to go home and rest." "I'm just too drowsy to drive." "I need someone to take me home." Gwen's thoughts got tangled up in befuddled confusion after that, the details slipping away into a fog of dreamy lethargy that swallowed long stretches of the evening, but she recalled being so grateful when she handed the suddenly-energetic stranger her car keys. He helped her into the passenger seat, and then his soothing tones became warm background noise as her eyes finally slipped shut.
Gwen didn't know how they got back to her house. She didn't know why she let the stranger inside. All she knew was that it was so much easier to go along with his gently murmured suggestions than to try to dredge up thoughts of her own from the sticky morass of her own exhausted mind. She barely had the energy to show him back to the bedroom before her eyelids fluttered shut and her body sagged against his and she slumped onto the mattress in a fugue of deep, helpless relaxation.
