God, his pillow's really fluffy and nice. He swears it changes—when he's actually trying to sleep at night, and he always ends up staying up thinking about superheroes and stuff like that (like how come Spiderman got bitten by a spider but Batman didn't get bitten by a bat, and isn't it kinda weird to be allergic to your own sun?) his pillow doesn't feel that great. He always has to roll around and think about stuff, tell himself stories. But right now? Right now his pillow feels absolutely freaking great.
Which is why it's not cool at all that Matt keeps yelling from downstairs. Jeez. He's going to college in, what, ten hours? He's got time, doesn't he? Packing isn't that hard. But Matt won't shut up and hasn't shut up for the past quarter hour, so Alfred manages to force his head off his pillow and his feet onto the ground. He stands, stretches, yawns.
Swear to God his brother is more parental than their mom and dad. Ugh.
Alfred opens his closet doors and yanks out about twelve days' worth of shirts. He grabs pants, underwear, and socks to match, and flings everything into a pile at the bottom of the stairs to let Matt fold and pack. Then he takes the initiative in starting the hunt for all his pairs on sneakers…
Eventually he gets everything he needs crammed into – he glances at the pile, to check – four boxes, two long clear plastic containers, and a metal bucket. The only loose objects are a broom, his fan, and… well, himself. All of Matt's stuff is already packed in the other car, but his bro's boxes are covered with red tape. "In case you forget which is yours again, like on vacation." What vacation? Man, he didn't remember that.
Everyone herds into the kitchen and sits at the table for a last family dinner. It's pancakes, burgers, and french fries with gravy, something he and Matt both agree on as delicious. Their parents are pretty cool sometimes, although Mom ends up ranting about how grown up they are. He thinks it's stupidly sappy, but Matt ends up sniffling into his maple syrup and leaning over for a hug, so Al feels obligated to stand and get one too, or else he'll seem rude.
After that, they both trek back upstairs to bed—and it's like he said, his pillow is all uncomfortable again!—and he wishes Matt a good night before climbing under his rocketship-printed bedsheets, which he tried to pack but was told he was going to have to use a plain-color bed covering, which was completely lame, right? The rocketship ones gave him another thing to think about, let him imagine the stars and space, what was out there, probably Spock and Captain Kirk and he wonders if anybody would be able to introduce him to Uhura and…
Alfred fell asleep.