His phone buzzes, very far away. Everything is very far away from the perspective of being half asleep on your bed, on several textbooks and a pile of flash cards.

Time swims a little. The phone buzzes more. Someone really wants to talk to him. But Katie doesn't have that number, so it can't be her, so how important could it be?

He falls asleep, probably. Time expands and contracts like a pupil. Sometimes you can't tell how long you've been asleep, though Jonathan is usually an awake at 5:30 a.m. on the dot every day kind of guy. This time, he doesn't know. The phone just finished buzzing, or maybe hours have passed — the room is dim, one light still on, everything is the same, except someone outside or on a TV in another room is having a fight. An argument. Not all that strange for this part of town, but some details filter through, slowly accumulating like so much sediment of awareness:

An unusually protracted argument. Going on and on.

Violent, somehow, in sentiment if not in sounds of actual fighting. No sound of that, not exactly?

(Time twitches, straightening out.)

Familiar, one of the voices? But not his roommate, no, he's heard enough of Emil's arguments to know the rhythm of them. The rise and fall of the voice. This fight is all fall.

What a strange thing to think. He's not really thinking, though. He's asleep. Breathing smooth and even, not like he's choking at all.

What a strange thing to think. Stutter-thoughts, repeating themselves, echos fighting echos. Very strange things to think. Jonathan doesn't think like this. Does he? He's thinking it now, so this is how he thinks. Ontologically correct.

The fight seems to be coming closer (or the scene on that hypothetical TV is getting more intense). Almost right outside his window. Maybe he should get up. Maybe he needs to call the police. Katie would say to be careful. Don't get involved. Don't let them know it was you, and don't let them know they can hear you — no, don't let them know you can hear them, that's the thing.

Don't let him in.

What kind of argument is this? He feels so secure and drowsy, alone on his bed. He falls asleep. He doesn't remember he was already asleep. The fight is still going on, but in the morning, the real, waking morning, there's no sign that anything happened out there, and Emil said he didn't get in til real late so he doesn't know. Jonathan never gets around to asking the neighbors. Why should he care? Why would anyone?

As for those crazy texts, well... someone is pranking him, that's for sure, and he has to give them credit for that shit, he felt a distinct chill. A real, full body shiver, the kind he hasn't felt since he was a kid.

It must be because he just feels so off this morning. Everything feels heavy, his head most of all: impressions of the world come sluggish and strange, his peripheral vision is oddly clouded, and there's a headache brewing right behind his eyes. Silence in his head so big that he can't hear his own thoughts. There's a word for that kind of silence. Anechoic.

As a good medical student might, he tries to diagnose himself. It takes hours for him to realize that the same mental faculties necessary to do so are themselves affected. He should see a doctor, though he's not sure what he would tell them. He doesn't have the words the describe what he's feeling.

Perhaps, all he really needs is rest.

His phone is buzzing, very far away from his bed. The phone with the number Katie does have. But she'd forgive him, if she knew how tired he felt right now. She'd want him to sleep peacefully, Jonathan is sure.