Tourniquet

“Who’s there?”

“Fucking hello, Mal, look alive! Dwyer’s coming!”

The sound of a shoe hitting the underside of a desk seemed to echo as its owner lifted her head from her arms, breathing heavily and blinking to clear her eyes of their sleepy film. Disorientation was nothing new - especially in the last few weeks – but she had never fallen asleep at work. After a moment or two her brain worked out the hissed words of her nearby coworker and she nearly tipped her chair over with how quickly she sat up. And apparently just in time.

“That doesn’t look like working to me, Hogan.” the short, stocky shape of her boss stalked by, his lofty eyes flashing to the screen of her computer gone black from disuse.

Mal cleared her throat and nodded. “Sorry. Just…” her attempt to explain herself fell flat as he continued on his way and she sighed, pressing the heels of her hands against her eyes. A faint ringing continued in her ears and her heart was still thumping wildly in her chest. There were dreams every single night, but they never had any dialogue. It was difficult for her to remember the sound of the voice the longer she was awake. Female, raspy, almost frightened.

“Seriously? Do you want to get fired?” The top half of a head appeared from in the next cubicle, a pair of frustrated eyes peering over at Mal.

“Maybe a little bit.” she mumbled and allowed herself to hunch once more over her desk. The voice was gone.

Her bespectacled neighbor snorted quietly. “Going to sleep was a great idea, then. You’ve been doing that a lot lately. You sick?”

“I don’t know.” admitted Mal. She certainly didn’t feel like herself.

“You should see a doctor. My sister’s best friend started falling asleep all the time and the next thing you know she had a heart attack.”

Honestly, Mal couldn’t come up with a valid connection between this sort of fatigue and heart problems, but she just nodded with a somewhat polite smile. Olivia always knew someone who’d suffered from whatever issue you could pull out of a hat, but Mal was quite aware of what caused her problems. She was terrified to go to sleep at night. Most evenings were spent in the recliner in front of her TV, drinking coffee and staring at the screen with aching eyes, unwilling to revisit the nightmares that came from seemingly nowhere. But there was only so long she could run. She had to sleep sometime.

“Are you coming out with us tonight?” Mal flinched when Olivia spoke up again, apparently still watching her. Her coworker sounded apprehensive and Mal couldn’t blame her.

“Yeah. Yeah, I’ll go.” It had been a few weeks since she accepted the invitation of the others in the office to go and get some food and drinks Friday after work, and acting like everything was alright seemed increasingly important. “I’m fine. Really.” added Mal as an afterthought, aware that she was anything but convincing.

Pursing her lips, Olivia nodded once before her head disappeared back into her cubicle. “If you’re sure. We’re going to Eddy’s.”

“Great. I’m starving.”

Mal looked up at her blurry matte reflection on her computer screen, scowling in frustration that she couldn’t just sound normal. Being so fucking tired made it difficult to remember what normal was. With a massive inhale Mal ran her hand from chin up to forehead, swiveling the mouse to wake up her computer and try to finish something before seven o’clock.

“You ready?”

Thumping her foot under the desk again, Mal huffed and looked first at her computer and then up at Olivia, now standing beside her with her purse. Looking concerned. “Uh…” Mal shook her head a bit, glancing at the time. Five after seven. She couldn’t remember anything.

“I’m…hold on.” she murmured, trying to wake up. Though Mal was positive she hadn’t actually been sleeping. The screensaver wasn’t on. In fact there was an open document. Blank besides a word. Or half of a word. Fairp. That didn’t make sense. Maybe she did doze off and her fingers pressed into the keys. But Mal could have sworn her eyes were open even when Olivia startled her.

“You alright?” The unease was back in Olivia’s voice and Mal knew if she didn’t suck it up the news that she was losing her marbles would spread through the office like wildfire.

“Just…really ready to get out of here. Let me log off.” Mal laughed stiffly, and without any real idea why she saved the document as ‘Untitled’. As she logged off she started to stand, reaching under her desk for her purse. The computer went back to its generic teal login screen and Mal grinned at Olivia. “Okay, let’s go.”

Olivia looked anything but persuaded. Nonetheless she smiled back and started chattering as they walked together for the parking lot. Mal tried to appear engaged despite how profoundly unsettled she was. Falling asleep was one thing – losing time was something else entirely. Maybe it was time to call her doctor, because narcolepsy or whatever the hell this was had never been an issue before.

“Do you want me to drive?” asked Olivia as they stepped into the chilled night air, still looking rather anxiously at Mal.

Pretending everything was normal was alright. Risking falling asleep at the wheel didn’t seem like a good idea. And she could take a taxi to get her car in the morning. “Sure. I’ll give you gas money.”

“Don’t be stupid.” Olivia may have been a bit of a gossip but she was always generous. For which Mal was grateful as she climbed into the passenger side of Olivia’s van and buckled herself in, taking deep breaths to try and keep calm as well as stay in the moment. Yes, driving how she felt sounded like a very bad idea.

As Olivia drove them Mal immersed herself in listening to her coworker’s stories and managed to feel at least a little bit better, even joining into the conversation. Though that wasn’t always necessary with Olivia. There were a couple of other people from work getting out of their cars when Olivia parked on the street in front of the small bar and Mal decided she was glad she came. Surely she was blowing things out of proportion. Everybody had their off days. Or weeks. Whatever. It was fine.

“Hey, look who showed up!” a voice called, its owner climbing out of the truck parked in front of Olivia.

Mal smiled at Jordan and tried not to look embarrassed when she got out of Olivia’s car. “Yeah, it’s me.” It was challenging not to be awkward considering how many times Olivia avowed that Jordan had a ‘crush’ on her. Mal was of the opinion that as a group of people in their early thirties they were past ‘crushes’, but it didn’t make her sweat any less around him. She was sure she didn’t feel the same way but it was still nerve-wracking.

“We missed you the last couple weeks.” continued Jordan as he approached her, clearly wanting an explanation for her absence.

“Oh, well…I’m here now. Should we go in?” she glanced at Olivia, who wasn’t trying to hide her smirk. That just irritated Mal and made her face feel warm.

“Right, yeah. It’s cold out here.” Jordan held the door open for them and Olivia touched the back of Mal’s elbow. She gritted her teeth so she wouldn’t jerk her arm away.

The people who went in ahead of them were already pulling chairs toward the table they commonly used and Mal could hear someone ordering the first round. She tried to wait to choose her seat so she wouldn’t be beside Jordan, but Olivia had other plans. ‘Fucking Christ, are we in fifth grade?’ thought Mal as Olivia pulled her down so she was in the middle.

Jordan cleared his throat to make small talk and Mal crossed her arms to wait uncomfortably. At least she wasn’t worrying about sleep now. “So, are you still thinking about interviewing for that assistant coach job at West?”

And of course he would talk about work. Mal tried not to seem frustrated or tired as she shrugged, rarely looking back at him. “Maybe. You know how likely it is for Hogan to put in a good word for anyone so…”

He laughed a bit louder than Mal felt was required. “True. I don’t think he wants any of us to advance because he’s had the same job for half a century.”

Well, that was an exaggeration, but Mal knew she was supposed to laugh back so she gave a halfhearted amused breath through her nose. The beers arrived and that caused a distraction enough for Mal to cast a glare in Olivia’s direction, only growing more annoyed when the woman just batted her eyelashes innocently.

“Whoa!”

Mal turned her head sharply at the sound of breaking glass and several cries of surprise. The waitress looked at the tray in her hand before blinking and starting to apologize. There was beer spilled on the table and several shards of the dark brown bottle in front of Jordan, who was grabbing napkins to stop the liquid from flowing onto his lap to the laughter of their workmates.

“Jesus, I’m sorry. I swear the fucking thing just leapt off my tray.” their puzzled server was trying to explain, but only Mal heard her over the commotion. “I’ll go get another one.” she hurriedly set down the rest of the bottles before scurrying off.

“Hit him next time, Rachel!” shouted another man after the waitress, and the incident was overlooked. Mal glanced at the bar where the woman acted fairly shaken as she talked to the bartender, but then she too forgot about it.

____

Mal’s apartment was in a part of town that Olivia called ‘questionable’. She didn’t care what Olivia thought in the first place, and it was a nice bonus that Olivia drove away as soon as Mal set foot on the cracking sidewalk. After being ready to leave by ten and being made to stay well past midnight Mal was glad to be home, still thinking with exasperation of Jordan and his unwanted advances and Olivia taking so much delight from her distress. She wasn’t worrying about going to bed just yet, searching in her purse for the ring of keys somewhere inside.

Walking through the front door of the aging apartment building smelled like old carpeting and heavily seasoned food. It seemed doubtful anyone was cooking, the scent apparently soaked into the walls over time. The light bulb above the stairs up to Mal’s floor was dim and yellow, softly buzzing under the sound of her shoes on the creaky wooden steps. Somewhere in another unit someone was watching TV, and Mal could hear Mr. Costello talking to himself because his wife was dead and his son didn’t visit. Maybe she would bring him donuts in the morning.

Her door was painted an unpleasant green unlike the rest of the brown doors, a sticker with a fading black D on it beneath the peephole. Mal used her thumbnail to try and flatten the corner of the sticker as she put the key in the lock. A habit that she didn’t even notice. The sticker’s corner was folded over long before Mal ever moved in. With a counterclockwise turn and a slight jangle the door was unlocked and Mal stepped inside, sliding her hand up the wall to turn on the kitchen light.

She kicked her work shoes into the open hall closet and set her bag on the yellow laminate kitchen table, glancing with distaste at the dishes that had been piling in the sink since Wednesday before robotically starting to make coffee. The sink gave a sputter and Mal prayed it wouldn’t back up again. Anything so she didn’t have to give her landlord a call. Maybe Olivia’s husband could take a look if it did. Olivia was always saying he was a licensed plumber after

“Who are you?”

The pot slipped from Mal’s hand as she jumped. She started again when it clanged in the metal sink. As the sound calmed to resounding silence Mal gripped at the edge of the counter, not able to remember putting her hands there. Something told her the almost inaudible voice Mal was certain she just heard was the same one from her dream earlier. Cold prickles ran up her spine and she was sure that turning around would mean seeing something she didn’t want to.

The fear was paralyzing. ‘Out of body experience’ popped into her head amid the racing thoughts of what she should do. Logic dictated there was someone in her kitchen. She just heard them speak in a breathy, almost imperceptible voice. It was impossible to decide if standing there with her back turned and waiting or spinning around to see it was worse. Terror like what she was feeling hardly seemed real. But she couldn’t stand there forever.

Starting to sweat, tasting her heart in her throat, Mal held her breath and whirled to press her back against the counter. There was nothing. Nothing but the kitchen table and its two mismatched chairs sitting there harmlessly. Mal released the air in her lungs and started to pant, her brow furrowing. She knew the difference between a voice in the next apartment and a voice close behind her. She would have heard footsteps leaving the room.

“Fuck.” Mal whispered to herself, closing her eyes.

After taking a few moments to catch her breath and convince herself she was being ridiculous, Mal reached out and turned off the coffee maker. If an auditory fucking hallucination wasn’t enough of a sign that she needed sleep Mal didn’t know what was.