Up at Night

You stare at the cards, willing them to play out right in your solitaire game. Actual solitaire, not on the computer. That's busy playing Sonny Rollins anyway.

Your roommate sits to your right, watching How I met Your Mother. He can't sleep either. He just broke up with his girlfriend. He acts OK but you can tell he's hurting.

You look back to your game. There's just not enough empty spaces for all four kings. Knowing you can only guess, you move the red king on the left to the empty spot. This results in a loss. As you check the other three to see what they had hiding underneath them, you realize that any other move would have resulted in a win. You sit and wonder for a moment how your luck is that bad.

You cough as you stack the cards back up, pretending that's not blood you taste in the back of your throat. You shuffle the deck and prepare for a new game. You notice how calming shuffling the cards is, then wonder why, because that is a weird thing to calm someone down. You make up and answer to give yourself- along the lines of its a soothing rhythm and it's repetitive- and prepare to deal out another game.

You start to wonder why you can't sleep, then you stop wondering, because you already know. But you also don't want to think about why you can't sleep, so you turn back to your game of solitaire, hoping this time you'll win.