Chapter One – The Sleepy Summer Morning

It was 5:30 in the morning, January 17th. As the warm, summer sun began to peek over the Iowa horizon, a woman tiredly clutched her pillow over her face to block out the rays of the sun that managed to sneak through her curtains.

"Damn it," she muttered. "I did it again."

Laying in bed, clutching the pillow and her blanket tightly over her eyes, she tiredly groaned as she remembered the past several nights that she had spent studying. She had always been a night owl, but ever since she graduated from university her sleep schedule has become even worse.

"It's not too late, maybe I can still get some sleep before my practice exam with Alice," she quietly thought to herself.

But 15 minutes later, she was still no closer to falling asleep than she was when she got into bed. Practice exam questions danced through her brain, and she was too focused on what she remembered from last night's study material to be able to sleep. 

She groaned, glancing at her phone's clock. "Why is the sun rising at five thirty in the morning!? It's supposed to be the middle of winter! The sun's not supposed to rise for another couple of hours!" she muttered, annoyed. She lazily crawled out of her covers and dropped her legs to the floor, nearly tripping over them as she made her way to the door. If there had been other people in her apartment, they'd probably be shocked at what they saw leave her room. She was roughly 5'8", wearing a stained, loose-fitting pink tee-shirt and gray sweatpants. Her brown hair completely covered her face, concealing the deep bags beneath her eyes. She looked awful as she single-mindedly shuffled her way over to the medicine cabinet in her bathroom.

"Fine then," she thought. "I'll just take some diphenhydramine (it's a medicine with a side effect of making you drowsy). If you're not going to sleep, then I'm just going to force you to!"

As her right arm noisily rummaged through the medicine cabinet, she tiredly studied her own reflection in the bathroom mirror. Noting the deep bags beneath her eyes, her disheveled hair, her hunched back and drooping shoulders, she silently regretted having not taken medicine to make her sleep earlier. Suddenly, her hand stopped moving through the cabinet to her right and she signed remorsefully. She almost couldn't even recognize herself. Ever critical of her own looks, she groaned and hung her head down while muttering that her disheveled appearance and glassy eyes made her resemble a walking, still-breathing corpse. She didn't feel… human, and it gave her a headache when she tried to think when she had let herself become like this. She used to have a strict sleep schedule in high school and never had any trouble sleeping before she moved out of her parents' place. What happened?

"Well, it's no use crying over spilt milk, I suppose. Let's just get the sleeping meds and get back to bed," she thought to herself. Sighing, she resumed rummaging through her medicine cabinet until her hand finally stopped and closed itself around a small, white bottle.

"Finally, there it is!" she tiredly muttered, clasping her left hand around the lid before twisting it open. She took one last look at her corpselike reflection before sighing and resolving for the 5th time this week to do something about her awful sleep schedule… then almost immediately groaned and threw her head back in exasperation as she examined the contents of the pill bottle.

Empty.

"God damn it," she said under her breath, peering into the empty bottle earnestly as though she hoped her eyes were somehow mistaken.

"Why do I always put the empty bottle back into the medicine cabinet?" she groaned. She hung her head down in shame and frustration over her countertop, causing her disheveled, messy dark brown hair to fall all around her face and completely obstruct her view of anything except the pill bottle. Her drooping eyelids could barely stay open, and the deep purple bags under her eyes stood as a testament to their inability to do the opposite over the past few nights.

"Whatever," she muttered, using her right hand to push her messy hair back behind her ears while her left hand made a half-hearted attempt to throw the bottle into her trash can behind her. Despite hearing it bounce off the rim of her trash can and clutter against the floor, she turned and left her bathroom, leaving the empty bottle to continue rolling around on the tile floor.

"I shouldn't be using that stuff anyway," she sighed as she walked away. "Apparently frequently using it can lead to Alzheimer's later in life… or something," she muttered, recalling something she read in a magazine a few months ago.

Suddenly, her stomach grumbled. She figured she wouldn't be able to sleep anyway if she was hungry, so she decided to cook some breakfast and take a hot shower to tire herself out before attempting to go to sleep without the medicine.

She continued through her apartment until she reached her kitchenette, setting some water to boil on her electric stove before reaching into her refrigerator to grab the egg carton. After she put the eggs in the pot, she went back to her bathroom before muttering to herself that she'd have to reschedule her practice exam with Alice to a different day. Lazily kicking the pill bottle on the floor as she stepped into the shower, she nearly twisted the handle to turn it on before realizing that she was still wearing the loosely-fitting pink tee-shirt and grey sweatpants she used as pajamas. In her sleep-deprived state, she must've forgotten to take them off before stepping into the shower.

"I really need to start sleeping better," she sighed before walking out of the shower to undress, her foot colliding with the empty pill bottle once again as she did so.

Stepping back into the shower, she kept her back to the wall and recoiled from the incoming stream of cold water while she waited for it to heat up. "Maybe I'll feel more tired after a warm shower and a hard-boiled egg breakfast," she thought to herself as her baggy, deep green eyes glanced up at the showerhead. She paused for a moment, then bowed her head and sighed. "I can't keep doing this every single morning. I have my bar exam coming up in a few weeks. After that, I'll be looking for a job for a few weeks before finally picking up a steady nine-to-five at some law firm." Thinking back on her sporadic sleep schedule, she muttered, "I have… just over a month to fix this. One month. I can't work if I'm not sleeping properly. Maybe if I put aside studying for the next couple of days, I can dedicate myself to getting to bed at a decent hour."

In that moment, she knew what she had to do. If she stayed awake all day today, she could probably reset her sleep schedule and get to bed at a decent hour for once. And as long as she stayed consistent with her bedtime and bought some stronger sleeping meds, she shouldn't have any problems.

With this sudden inspiration, she quickly finished showering before putting on her robe and running into the kitchen for breakfast. While running, she kicked the pill bottle again and it flew through the bathroom door she had forgotten to shut earlier and slammed into her refrigerator door. Paying it no attention, she took the pot of eggs off the stove and drained the hot water before replacing it with cold water to quickly cool the eggs to a temperature where she could eat them. While they cooled, she dressed herself in a yellow V-neck and her signature slim blue jeans, black leather belt, and brown cowgirl boots. Looking at herself in her bedroom mirror, she grabbed the black leather jacket she had bought a couple of months ago before pressing her hair back against her scalp and covering it with a baseball cap bearing her school logo. She didn't particularly want to take the time to dry and style her hair that morning (or most mornings, for that matter), so she kept it out of her eyes by wearing a baseball cap whenever she left her apartment.

Slipping a few eggs into her yellow faux-leather purse, she popped her earbuds into her ears and began listening to yesterday's episode of her favorite news podcast before heading out of her apartment. She knew she had to leave her apartment as quickly as she could that morning before she became too tempted by her soft bed and ruined her chance of resetting her sleep schedule that night. The sun was now almost fully illuminating the street out of her apartment, which she still found to be rather jarring at 6:10 in the morning in the middle of January. What was even more surprising to her was that it was only slightly chilly outside, and that there wasn't a single flake of snow anywhere around her. "Just 3 weeks ago, this street was so full of snow that I had trouble even getting out of my apartment," she thought. She then smiled. "Well, I definitely don't miss that!"

"…meteorologists are completely baffled," said the voice in her earbuds. Listening as she walked, she began peeling an egg as she looked around at all the strange things that she shouldn't normally be able to see during winter. Deciduous trees were covered in bright, green leaves. Children wearing nothing but tank tops and shorts played in the streets while their parent jumped into their cars to go to work without first scraping any ice off their windshields. Hummingbirds, sparrows, and crows that should have flown south for the winter were flying around the trees looking for food or sticks to build their nests with. "It's complete and total chaos!" the voice continued. "It's snowing in Australia, it's summer in Canada, flowers are blooming outside the studio – and nobody on Earth seems to have any solid answer as to why any of this is happening!"

"You're making what's happening around the world sound benign," another voice, this time male, chimed in. "Cities and towns across various mountain ranges around the world were faced with the sudden onset of higher temperatures, causing snow to rapidly melt and trigger landslides and avalanches. It's still winter in some areas, but because of how temperatures have been wildly fluctuating in many parts of the world, residents of many mountain towns are evacuating out of fear that they're going to be the next ones to face an early summer."

"No, no, I understand," the female voice said somberly. "Florida's been hit with a category 4 hurricane already, and Japan's been hit by a tsunami every week since all this started. It's been pretty bad… I just can't imagine how much worse it must be for third-world nations that don't have the resources to respond to these… well, these acts of God!"

As the woman walked into her favorite coffee shop, the male voice chimed in once again. "That's what the street preachers have been calling it," said the voice. "'Repent ye, repent ye, the end is nigh,' yada yada… y'know, at this point, I'm actually somewhat inclined to believe 'em."

"There's one thing that everyone can agree on, though. Ecologists around the world are all saying that this is an absolute disaster for wildlife. Migratory patterns, hibernations, they're-"

The female voice was cut off as the woman removed her earbuds and threw away her eggshells before approaching the barista.

"Jonah? I thought you worked closing shifts!" she exclaimed.

Tiredly, the tall, clean-shaven man whose short hair matched the blackness of his unform turned around before his droopy eyes widened when he saw who had just spoken.

"Triss? Why are you up so early? I thought you slept in until, like, six in the evening! Jeez, you look awful," he grinned, glancing at her messy hair and the deep, purple bags under her eyes.

"Screw you," she said playfully while she dug through her purse for her wallet. "Yeah, my sleep schedule is absolute crap; that's why I'm up so early. I didn't sleep at all last night and if I don't sleep today, I'll be able to fix my sleep schedule tonight." Looking up at the barista who, even behind the counter, loomed over her 5'6" frame, she continued, "So anyways, to make a long story short, I need whatever on that menu over there behind you has the most caffeine in it."

 Jonah turned around and began preparing a large cup of light-brown coffee for the woman while she absent-mindedly examined the brightly-lit screen previously obscured by the barista's towering frame. Struggling to focus on the names of the various drinks offered at the shop due to her fatigue, she decided to strike up some more conversation with the barista.

 "So they've got you working early today, huh?" she asked.

 "Yeah… unfortunately. The person who normally works mornings had a family emergency and now I've got to open the store most days. It sucks," Jonah said as he continued to mix coffee.

 "Yikes, do you know what happened?"

 Jonah silently began pouring the coffee, then paused for a moment before sharply inhaling and turning to face her. He opened his mouth for a brief moment, but then paused before closing it again and shaking his head. "It isn't for me to say. I think… yeah, I think it has something to do with the recent disasters going on across the country." He closed his eyes before continuing, "Waking up early to open up the shop isn't fun, but I'm just lucky that the worst thing that's happened to me in the past few weeks is that I've had to work the opening shift. These disasters have created a lot of hardships and a lot of work for a lot of people." As he said this, he handed her the drink he had been preparing during their conversation.

 "Yeah, no kidding," she said, rummaging around in her purse for her wallet. Forcing a tired smile, she decided to change the subject as she put her debit card on the counter. "So, do you think this will be enough to keep me awake for the next 14 hours?" she asked, gesturing toward the large cup on the counter.

 "Yeah, it's called a 'Kiss of Life,' though we baristas like to call it-"

 "Aww, you're giving me a kiss?" she gasped, taking an exaggerated step back from the counter as she wore the fakest expression of surprise that her tired facial muscles could muster.

 "…ha-ha," Jonah said, dryly.

 "Oh come on, you walked into that one," the woman giggled.

 "I suppose your right," he sighed, a slight smile creeping its way up his lips. "Anyways, the baristas all call this drink by another name." He paused, leaning in for added suspense.

 'The Defibrillator.'"

 She held the large, orange cup in her hand and examined it as she paid. "So, why do you call it 'The Defibrillator?'"

 "Because it's got enough caffeine in it to restart a dead man's heart," he chuckled.

 "Well, I certainly feel pretty dead right now," she chuckled weakly.

"You look it, too," Jonah said.

"Shut up! You're so mean," she pouted. "Anyways, this should do," she said, putting some bills and coins she had pulled out of her purse onto the counter before she turned to leave the shop. "I'll see ya around, Jonah."

 "See ya, Triss!" he said as she opened the door to leave the coffee shop, its bell ringing as if to signal her departure.

 "It's Beatrice, not Seatrice!" she turned and said to him, smiling.

Beatrice smiled as walked away as she sipped her coffee. It felt good to see a friend that early in the morning, as she had expected that all her friends would still be asleep for another couple of hours. She and Jonah had known each other since they were both freshmen, and they got along really well to the point where they even had their own inside jokes. If the coffee didn't work, seeing his face alone was enough to brighten her day and make her forget even for a moment just how tired she was.

 Unpausing her podcast, she started her short walk to the university campus while she pondered what she should do today. She hadn't slept in a while, so her brain was certainly in no state to spend long hours reading and studying in front of her computer. And she couldn't return to her apartment, anyways, since her bed was too inviting. Since her brain expected her to start sleeping at around this time, her circadian rhythm had caused a wave of tiredness to hit her on her walk to the coffee shop. She knew the coffee would help, but it was still best to play it safe and avoid her apartment just in case the power of caffeine wasn't enough to overcome the seductive call of her bed's soft sheets and fluffy pillow.

 "I haven't relaxed much lately… I should take this day as an opportunity to have some fun," she thought. "If the past few days are anything to go by, then it'll probably heat up quite a bit in a few hours. I should enjoy the sunlight while it's still comfortable to be outside. But where should I go… ah! There shouldn't be many people at the University's floral garden right now! Alice and I used to study there a lot during our undergrad years. That should be a relaxing place to visit for a while!"

 And so she walked, heading for the university floral garden. Continuing to sip her coffee, she was as carefree as a small child during the first few days of summer vacation. She started humming a gentle tune to herself, completely forgetting about the podcast she was listening to.

 "…governments around the world are worried that if these random weather fluctuations continue, crops will be affected. If this doesn't stop before the spring planting season, the world's in serious trouble. Is there anything that we can do?"