Sara knew from years of experience that there's a point you reach when you're so tired you simply want to die, when every muscle aches and you can barely stand because exhaustion saps all strength from you until you're just a dry husk. She had reached that point by the next night at work. But once you get beyond that point, if you can make it, there's actually a comforting numbness on the other side. You don't feel any of the pain anymore, because you don't feel anything anymore, and a fresh wave of adrenaline gives you a pleasant buzz of energy. It was a nice natural high, and Sara was feeling it by the time she tried to lie down after work.
And so, on the third day she ended up cleaning. Her apartment, neat to begin with, was treated to a ceiling to floor scrubbing. She pulled all the books of her bookshelves, dusted each one meticulously, then put them all back, double-checking to make sure they were alphabetical order. Her bathroom reeked of Pine-Sol and her kitchen of bleach as she scrubbed and disinfected every exposed surface. She hauled out the vacuum cleaner, the mop, the broom, the feather duster and wielded each determinedly. Then she tackled any form of clutter left in the apartment, tossing out old magazines and papers, sorting through her financial files and paper clipping and labeling and stapling, refolding all the clothes in her drawers so that each shirt had crisply folded edges and each sock was rolled and stacked with its mate.
She even pulled out the box where she kept the memorabilia of her life, hauling it from its hiding place in the back of her closet. She opened it and began sorting and stacking and repacking, deciding which stuff she needed to keep and which she could throw away and never miss. Ticket stubs from her first date? Toss. Hawaiian lei from her first and only spring break trip? Toss. Perhaps she should just toss the whole box out. Photo of her and her roommate from San Francisco? Toss. Her first driver's license? Wince, toss, and try to forget the geeky grin and pimply face of her sixteen-year-old self. Term paper from Grissom's class with, "Lucid and insightful. See me before leaving for break" printed neatly across the bottom? She started a new pile to keep.
When she stood from her sorting crouch on the floor, her muscles ached fiercely, and she was deeply chilled despite the warm clothes she had bundled herself in. Work had been more of a struggle that day, but she had clenched her teeth and repeated, "I can do this. I will do this. No, I will thrive on this. I can make it," like a mantra in her mind. Now she turned to the bed with a sense of despair. If she crawled between the sheets, would she be able to get the rest she was beginning to desperately need? Would Morpheus grant her the slumber she was close to begging for?
Sara slept for forty-five minutes that day.