HUM by Dan Hawley (chromebook ebook reader TXT) 📕

“Actually had a good sleep last night, I guess.”

“Was that before or after you were sleepwalking?” She hadn’t been mentioning it lately, but his sleep problems were affecting her sleep now too. It seemed like every night, Jason unknowingly woke her up. Apparently she wasn’t even safe from it during the day either, if Jason happened to pass out in his office while working. Jason’s smile faded.

“What’d I do this time?”

“Nothing new. Standing with your ear up to the damn wall.”

Concern marked his face, and he raised his hand to his mouth to work on his pinky fingernail, the only one with a small piece left to chew.

“Damnit, babe, I’m sorry. I don’t want to do it. I wish I didn’t. Can’t help it, really.” He paused. “Hopefully, this Dr. Luu can help me sort it out. But I don’t know what I can do until then, though.”

Jason left the bathroom and headed for the bedroom, dressed only in his boxers. He grabbed some sweatpants and a Pink Floyd t-shirt and put them on. Samantha followed.

“I came into the office yesterday, and you had passed out on your desk. Dead to the world.”

“So you must have turned the light off then. I woke up in the dark wonderin’ where the hell I was. I didn’t remember shutting off the light, but then again, I’ve been doing all kinds of shit that I don’t remember doing lately.”

Jason walked over to the bed and sat on its side.

“I put all the stuff in my night table when I sleep now—almost every night. Why the hell do I do that?”

He stared at the nightstand as if trying to figure out a complex puzzle.

Samantha joined him on the bed and put her arm around him, stroking his arm gently.

“We’ll figure it out, Jay.” She smiled. “Maybe you just need more naps on your desk to start feeling better?” Jason let out a short chuckle.

“Afternoon naps, huh? I could be into that.”

* * *

Samantha was sitting upright on the couch, trying to figure out how to make her hands move with the knitting needles in order to create, hopefully, a beanie. On the coffee table in front of her sat her opened laptop with a how-to video flickering away. She paused it, tried to mimic what the teacher instructed, not wholly confident of the result, then replayed the same part of the video again to make sure.

It was a slow process, but she was determined to learn how to knit. It kept her brain and hands busy, leaving less time to think about the insanity that they had been experiencing.

“Hold the work and needle in your left hand firmly,” the video said, “then loop under and back to complete a stitch.”

Samantha did as instructed, entirely focused on the work. In the background, the clackity-clack of Jason’s fingers hitting the keyboard was constant from behind the door. Amazing what a little sleep could do, Samantha thought.

“Ok, that’s enough for today,” Samantha said to herself as she set down the needles and closed her laptop. It was almost 4:30 p.m. Jason would finish work soon and would likely be up for a walk today, she thought.

Samantha pulled out her phone and began to browse her socials. Besides getting groceries, going for walks was their only escape from the apartment. The lockdown in Seattle had been strict. Nothing was open for entertainment: no movie theatres, no concerts or bars. The government shut down everything deemed “non-essential,” which included the space needle and all the tourist traps.

Samantha wondered how these businesses would survive. It had been months of lockdown, and even though businesses had been forced to close, it wasn’t like their bills suddenly stopped. Companies would still owe rent and taxes, utilities, and upkeep. The cost of doing business didn’t stop just because the income did.

Samantha felt sorry for them. She and Jason supported small companies where they could, but there wasn’t much they could do aside from ordering takeout now and then. With a single income and no job prospects for Sam, the couple had to be careful too; their bills wouldn’t stop either. So many people were facing the same and worse. With businesses shut down, the unemployment rate had skyrocketed, and people were broke and scared.

There had been protests and riots, calling for the government to open things up again, the main sentiment being that the damage of unemployment was worse than the damn virus. Suicide and domestic violence rates had increased exponentially.

Whether due to the protests or not, the news had lately reported that the government was looking at opening some things up soon with advanced safety protocols. Samantha was on the fence about how she felt about that, but she did know that a vaccine needed to happen pronto.

The clicking stopped, and after a moment, Jason appeared from the office. He looked over at Samantha. She was bent over her phone, her neck almost parallel to the floor. Her eyebrows were scrunched up to create a deep V between them on her forehead, indicating she was deep in thought and somewhat perplexed.

“You’re gonna hurt your neck all bent over like that.” Samantha looked up, startled. So engrossed in her phone, Samantha hadn’t heard the clicking stop or seen Jason out of her peripherals. She straightened her neck and back in a stretch and set her phone down on the table.

“How was work?” she asked.

“Productive. Got a lot of shit done.”

Jason walked over to Sam and kissed her on the cheek.

“Shall we go for a walk?”

* * *

Samantha and Jason left their building and stepped out onto the sidewalk. The air was mild and briny. Dark, dense clouds threatened rain from above, but so far, the day was dry. They headed down towards the harbor, a favorite path of theirs to take. Some days they would see harbor seals poke their shiny, dark heads out of the water to have a look around.