chapter 5

Having worked for almost nine hours nonstop, Stella was relieved to finish with a last sentence for that day and shut off her laptop. She really was looking forward to watching TV for a little while, just to relax a bit before calling it quits and going to bed. Making herself comfortable in her favorite chair, she watched a news reporter relating some minor incident in a company, then started zapping through her channels. Five minutes later, she sighed and switched it off again, finding the trash being sent on every single one of her channels simply nerve racking. Shaking her head, she went to where her dog lay, fast asleep. Kneeling down soundlessly next to Sian, she reached out to softly stroke a hand over her fur, rousing her dog from the deep slumber she had been in.
“Hi there. Do you want to stay here, or listen to me snoring half the night again?”
Sian only yawned and turned to her other side, baring her belly to Stella’s caressing hand, sighing deeply and pinching her eyes closed.
“Okay, stay here. You’ll be quite comfortable on your carpet, anyway. Just having a shower and I’ll be off, too. Till tomorrow, then.” After one last, affectionate pat on Sian’s head, Stella went into her bathroom. Enjoying a long, hot shower, she almost couldn’t bring herself to turn off the water and dry off. Oddly enough, this just made her more tired than she had been before. While pulling her favorite sleep shirt over her head, she walked into the darkness of her sleeping room, on the way to her bed stretching and doing a good imitation of Sian’s yawn. She fell asleep so fast she barely had time to pull her blanket up to her chin, the way she used to every night.