The wind picked up and howled again throughout the night, waking him while he tossed and turned, desperately trying to fall back asleep. He continually cycled through sleeping and waking, until at last he awoke one more time and couldn’t sleep any longer.
It was still dark out. He didn’t want to get out of bed, so he lay there in darkness. He pulled his blanket up over his head to shield his eyes from the sharp glare/glow coming from across the room. It was too jarring, too blinding. He had to shut it off. He flung back his warm covers, exposing himself to the cold air.
When he realized what it was, everything went still. It was the computer screen, opened up to another e-mail. No, it can’t be. He looked away, hoping it’d turn off or disappear when he did. He could still see the glow; he buried himself under the blankets to hide from it, hoping that would make it go away. It didn’t.
He couldn’t bear to look. Not this time. Surely he was going delusional. Minutes that felt like hours dragged on by.
The more he stayed in bed, the more he knew there would be no rest, and willing the screen away wasn’t going to make it disappear. He rose from the bed. His legs were jelly.
Much time has since passed. Far too much.
He didn’t know what that meant, but he forgot about it anyway when he saw the plug, still away from its socket and taped to the side of the desk. No plug, no power, and yet the screen was still on.
In a single movement, he swept the computer off the table and onto the floor. The monitor cracked as the computer hit the ground and the light went off. All at once, he was relieved. He left it there on the ground, no more in the mood to clean up the mess than he had been to clean up the coffee stains.
He looked outside. A faint glow of blue rested on the horizon, but stretching across the rest of the sky was blackness. It was still early morning, but there was no way he’d be going back to sleep now.
He merely sat on the couch for nearly the entire day, too preoccupied to even consider doing anything else.