Mark awakens still tired. He lies there with his eyes closed, not wanting to get. He feels stiff cushions beneath him that can only mean one thing – he fell asleep on the couch again. Mark sighs. He knows that he should get up before Emily does, because if she knows he didn't make it to bed last night, he will get a lecture about how much sleep is important.
"You can't have a good day if you didn't have a good night," she will say. "The human body needs rest." But in Mark's defense, when he is in between jobs he spends the day at the gym which exhausts him when it's been a while. Not to mention that the family only has one Plex, which is usually in the hands of Stephen playing a game or Macey doing school work or Emily studying. If Mark wants to study, he has to stay up until everyone else is asleep.
Mark feels a weight on his chest and mentally rolls his eyes at his little sister. Stephen has been going through a seemingly never ending phase of indifference at all of them, but Macey loves curling up with Mark or Emily in the middle of the night. When Stephen taunts her, she claims that she sleep-walks.
Still not wanting to get up, Mark just tightens his arm that's around his little sister. His mind wanders to Stephen and all of the trouble revolving around him lately. Just the other week he was suspended for a fight in school. The kid was fine other than a busted lip, but Mark was livid that he wouldn't explain what happened.
Emily claims that their youngest brother is simply going through a phase, but Mark finds it annoying nevertheless. He never pulled any crap like Stephen does. He's always instigating things with Macey, getting into trouble at school, and not pulling his weight around the apartment. Their other Plex died since it was such an old model, but Stephen's the one who dropped their remaining tablet and cracked it when grabbing it out of Emily's hands.
Mark gets excited when he realizes that he may have a solution to one current problem. If Maddy was able to fix Josh's cracked Plex, maybe she can teach him how to she did it so he can fix theirs. He's always worrying that one someone will cut themselves or get glass in their finger because of it. It is just as Mark is still feeling pleased with his idea that he becomes very confused.
Hold on, he thinks. Maddy could help him fix the Plex … Maddy Shannon … Shannons … wait, Mark realizes, he's already started his 'next' job. Then where is he if he doesn't remember going to bed last night? What the hell is going on?
Mark finally pulls himself completely out of sleep to find that he's lying in the dark on his side on a couch, not with Macey, but with Maddy. Crap. Not that he doesn't like waking up with her. On the contrary, Maddy's dark hair is fanned out across her face and she's quite beautiful in her sleep. But she was supposed to be back to her apartment by ten.
Looking at the digital clock on the wall across from him, Mark quietly groans when he sees that it's four in the morning. Look on the positive side, Mark thinks. It could be worse. Jim could be a free man right now. Not that he deserves to be in prison, but if Mr. Shannon saw him and his daughter pressed up against each other as such on the narrow couch, Mark is sure that he would be a dead man.
Mark tries to carefully get up without waking Maddy, but she is evidently a light sleeper. Maddy jumps up in alarm, flailing out, her arm hitting him in his gut. "It's okay, it's me," Mark says quickly. Maddy rubs the sleep out of her eyes, looking around in confusion for a moment. "We, uh … fell asleep watching the video," Mark says awkwardly. He stands there feeling like an idiot, trying not to show how much that punch to his stomach hurt. He makes a mental note to never again let his defense fall like that or underestimate Maddy's strength.
"What … what time is it?" Maddy asks as she stretches her arms out.
"Four."
"In the morning? And no one came looking for us?" Maddy shakes her head and flops back down on the couch.
Mark shrugs and lamely says, "I guess they fell asleep too."
Maddy rolls her neck around and her shoulders back. "I feel bad that you have to sleep there every other day," she says. "That's uncomfortable."
Mark agrees in few words, feeling abashed that last night was the best sleep he's gotten in a long time. Maddy doesn't seem to realize that she fell asleep practically on top of him, which could be seen as good or bad. Less awkward this way, Mark decides. "We should go back over," he says.
"To be open target practice for Laura?" Maddy asks. "No thank you. When you knocked on the door yesterday evening everyone jumped like it was population control. Do you really think that replaying that this early in the morning is a good idea?" Mark thinks for a moment, admitting that Maddy has a fair point.
"You have to get up for school in a few hours," Mark points out. "You should try to get some more sleep."
Maddy rolls her eyes. "I'm wide awake," she says. "Seems unlikely." Instead of going next door or to sleep, Maddy reaches for her Plex and heads toward the back bedroom. "Call me if you need me," she calls before flopping onto the bed.
Mark runs his hand through his hair and watches through the crack in the curtain as Maddy lays on her stomach with her feet in the air, powering up the Plex. Sunlight is just starting to lighten up the dark room via the singular window on the wall next to the bedroom. Through one of the slits in the blinds, a steak of sunlight shoots across the room to Maddy's hair, hitting right on the top of her head and making her appear to have a halo.
Despite her messy bed head consisting of her dark hair sticking out at odd angles, and the fact that it is four a.m., you would never have known that Maddy just woke up if she hadn't punched you in the stomach with all of her might. Her eyes are lit up with interest at whatever she's reading and the slight glow of her Plex illuminates her face. That combined with her halo of sunlight makes her look radiant.
And this is in 2149 sun, Mark thinks. Imagine what she will look like in the full sun light of Terra Nova, a place with sunshine that doesn't have to break through layers and layers of dust and pollution in the atmosphere.
With a shake of a head, as if literally clearing his mind, Mark drops onto the couch and smiles. He has a good feeling about today, no matter what the start was.
Raise your hand if you were confused at first! Hope you liked the Mark and Maddy moments my lovelies! Leave me a review