Alice is tired. Matter of fact, she's exhausted. Bone deep, haggard, weary, and every other synonym her rest-deprived brain is failing to summon. And she can't. Fucking. Sleep.
It's her own fault of course, she failed to start packing until yesterday evening. Which just makes it worse, because now she can't even get properly pissed at her situation. 'I might actually be too tired to hate myself. That's new,' Alice thinks, blinking owlishly when nearby people at the gate give her looks ranging from awkwardly amused to vaguely sympathetic. Alice promptly drops her face into her hands and groans, cheeks flushing red as she realizes she'd spoken aloud. 'Oops. Fuck that's awkward.' At least that was silent.
'Yay, Group 8 boarding. The filthy peasants may now board the aircraft,' Alice thinks sardonically, finally gathering her carry-ons, trudging to the gate, scanning her phone, and shuffling into the line to board the plane.
It's been a long 26 hours for Alice. She woke up at 9 yesterday, pissed the day away in executive dysfunction hell, then spent her evening scrambling to get everything ready for her flight early this morning. So early that by the time she finally got everything packed, her flight was leaving in less than 2 hours.
And now, after struggling through the first flight and the frustratingly short layover, she's reluctantly boarding her second connection—the 6-hour flight from East to West Coast. And the absolute worst part of all this?
'I wish I could sleep on planes. I think I might actually sell my soul for the ability to fall asleep during this flight,' Alice thinks dully, shoving her carry-on in the overhead compartment before sliding into her window seat and trying unsuccessfully to cuddle up with the airplane wall. Something about airplanes has always interfered with her ability to fall asleep. Noise-canceling headphones, travel pillow, melatonin—she'd tried it all and nothing works.
She barely registers anything else prior to takeoff, just a bleary acknowledgment of her seatmate, an exhausted smile at her friend Sarah across the aisle ('Wait, wasn't she—oh fuck, she's been talking to me since the gate and I didn't even notice'), and fumbling her seatbelt together.
Once in the air, Alice continues trying to mold herself around the airplane seat into something approximating comfort, but her long limbs and skinny frame make it a lost cause. Finally, Alice gives up, feeling tears of frustration pool in her eyes. 'I need to sleep, I WANT to sleep. But I can't. Fuck.' Something breaks. Maybe it's her composure, maybe it's Maybelline. She doesn't know anymore. All she knows is that she's tossing, turning, desperately trying to get comfortable until suddenly she turns to the side, throws an arm and a leg over something solid and warm, buries her head against something a rested Alice would recognize as a chest, and falls asleep for the first time at 35,000 feet with a peaceful expression on her face, utterly content and blissfully unaware of her newfound cuddle partner.
