I woke up groggily a few hours later. The TV was going; the news was on. That meant it was at least five. I could hear a familiar man’s voice coming from my right side, and although I couldn’t see into Alice’s room from my bed due to the curtains on her side of the walls, I could see a rather large man-shape shadow sitting next to Alice’s bed.

I got up a little shakily, realizing I was still exhausted the second my feet hit the floor. I was a little woozy and my head was spinning, but I tried to push it down, figuring those things would go away once I woke up a little bit. I went to the bathroom and brushed my teeth, making sure to splash some water on my face. Usually that helped, but this time it just made me cold.

I went and dug around in one of the bags Tina had brought from the house until I found my old sweater that Alice always used to laugh at me for wearing. She said that even when I’d worn it in my thirties it made me look like an old woman. The memory of her saying that made me even colder, and I put it on as if doing so was necessary for me to go on living.

It didn’t make me feel any better, though. I knew I was exhausted, and the nap, while good, hadn’t done much of anything to help. All I really wanted to do was lie back down and sleep until morning, but seeing as it was only early evening I knew I couldn’t. At least, not until I knew Alice was as okay as she could be. Then maybe I could sleep.

For some reason, it took me a long time to get up the energy to walk to Alice’s door. I tried to play off my physical exhaustion even to myself, insisting that I was moving slowly because I didn’t want to interrupt Charlie’s conversation with his mother. My brain didn’t buy it, but I kept trying to insist anyway.

As I got closer to Al’s room by miniscule steps, I got hit by a flood of memories as I listened to Charlie’s voice. He was speaking softly like he always did to Alice; he was never anything but gentle with her, even when he was angry. It always made me smile, because he had no such qualms about speaking loudly or even raising his voice to me when he was upset. He never, ever did that with Alice, though. It was almost as if he somehow knew that although she was strong, she needed protection, and he was going to protect her even if it was just from himself.