I need a beta! So if anyone is willing, please tell me!

The moment she leaves her bag by the door and takes off her shoes has some of the tension leaving her body. She's had a shit day. She didn't have a day as productive as she would have liked it to be, not for lack of trying, either. Which makes it even more surprising.

Sometimes it feels like not only is she surrounded by idiots, but they have been strategically placed to show up at the least convenient places. "Fuck it," she murmurs to herself. She needs to unwind; she'll sacrifice some sleep-time if that's what it takes. She'll survive tomorrow on a healthy dose of caffeine. Netflix awaits.

First things first, she turns on the computer and lets Spotify fill her apartment with music. Mood set. There's a brief moment of indecision when she doesn't know whether to go to the kitchen or the bedroom first. But she feels like having some fresh sweet bread so the choice is made. She gets the dough she left unbaked out of the fridge and into the oven.

Maybe she should allow the dough to gain some warmth but she's not feeling it so whatever. With that done, she moves to the bedroom while putting her hair up in a bun. She loves her hair, really, but by the end of the day, it's such a relief to pull it up. Rummaging through her drawer she picks an old ex's shirt as a pyjama and some wool socks. What? It's comfortable.

Clothes in hand, she goes to the bathroom. Well, her makeup survived this hell of a day; some part of her registers that she's distantly pleased about that. The rest of her is concentrated in taking it off so she can have her well-deserved shower. The commute back home was long and uncomfortable. Too many people in the bus meant that she spent the whole travel squished between strangers, being sweated on and generally manhandled every time someone decided to move.

Taking her constricting clothes off feels wonderful. Someone should get to bottling that feeling, they'd make a fortune. By the time she's done washing her face, there's still some foundation on her skin and she looks like a racoon. Oh, the wonders of waterproof makeup.

She gets into the shower anyway. She stands under the spray of water, letting it pound into her too tight muscles. She can feel the remaining tension in her body going away. It's not supposed to be hair day but she forgot to put the cap on so now it is. She takes advantage of it by giving herself a little scalp massage as she shampoos her hair, a little pampering is called for.

She sighs in contentment. Now, this is a good way to end a terrible day. This is better, she'll let the worries and stress for tomorrow, when she'll actually be able to do something about it. Live in the moment and all that. By the time she steps out of the shower, her mood has lifted. The bathroom feels like a sauna with all the steam. She dries her hair vigorously and puts on her pyjamas.

As she looks at herself in the mirror, she realizes there's still some mascara on her face. Of course, there is some left. She hates this mascara; it looks awful and is impossible to get rid of. But she's too cheap to get rid of it before it's finished so she suffers through it. She won't buy it again, though. She fights with it via a makeup wipe but concedes after a while. It's not all the way done; she figures it's the best it's going to get, though. She throws the wipe to the trash and leaves the bathroom.

The cold air feels amazing against her heated skin. She gets back to her room and stops to stare at the mess. It's been a busy week, she has been too tired to do much but crash in bed and it shows. There are socks, pants, shoes and some jackets all over the floor. The succulents are doing fine, thank the powers that be for those plants. They don't need much care. Whatever. She might as well.

It takes her about 5 minutes to take care of it; admittedly, she didn't even try to get some semblance of order on her desk or nightstands. That can stay as is; she'll worry about it at the weekend. It still takes long enough that her hair is only slightly wet, so she goes back to the bathroom to blow dry it.

By the time she's done, the oven beeps to tell her the time is up, so she goes back to the kitchen to take the bread out of the oven. It looks beautiful; she had had no idea how hungry she was until she could feel her mouth water simply by the scent of it. While the bread cools down, she starts to boil some water for the tea. She is feeling like lavender and chamomile today so she goes for it. Lavender is just so soothing.

She leaves the tea blend container on the kitchen counter and fishes around her fridge. She wants some finger food but there's not been enough time for cooking lately, she's been surviving on a daily basis of caffeine and instant ramen. She does find some strawberries and blueberries, though. So all is well.

She promises herself that she'll cook something healthy and delicious on the weekend. Ramen is great and all but she's tired of it after so long. She has plans on Sunday but Saturday is her let's relax and unwind day. She'll cook then, maybe clean up a bit and spend the rest of the day either curled up with a book or marathoning something or the other.

She goes to the living room with her bowl of berries to turn the TV on and find something to watch on Netflix while she waits for the water to boil. The control is not where it should be and she flounders for a bit because: what? It's not like she has a defined place for it but she tends to put it on the side table and it's not there. She swears she left it there the last weekend. Whatever, she lets it go. She leaves her bowl on the living room table and gets back to the kitchen.

She goes ahead and looks for her phone before preparing her tea. And then is back to the living room with the phone in one hand and the tea on the other. The tea goes on the side table before she picks her berries up and lets herself sink into the couch with a sigh.

"Come on, Alex. Get it together," she tells herself while trying to find something appropriately light to watch to match the mood she is trying to set. Thank Silicon Valley for Apps. Can't find your control? Who cares, there's an App for that.

She ends up falling asleep like that. Waking up is pleasant. She stretches lazily on her couch, the blanket she always has on it clinging stubbornly to her legs. Whatever. Alex reaches for her phone to check the time. It's simple luck that she wakes up with enough time to get to her morning routine without fear of ending up late. She sits up, dragging a hand through her hair. It doesn't seem to be all that tangled.

Maybe she didn't move much during the night. It doesn't really matter. She'll worry about it later; if it turns out she actually has to brush it or something. She puts on a 10-minute timer. That's how long she'll give herself to laze around before getting a move on. Alex reaches for the control and catches a glimpse of her chipped polish. Maybe she should get rid of it? Hmm… Something to think about later.

She doesn't feel like beginning an episode she's not going to be able to finish, so she switches to YouTube. CrashCourse has uploaded a new video and she clicks on it, allowing the sound to wash over her while her mind disperses the last of the sleepy fog. She stretches once more, hiding a yawn against her hand. The host rattles on about engineering. She'll watch again later when she's awake enough to understand what's going on.

The timer goes off.

A little regretful, she stands up and leaves her blanket behind. The next video plays on. In her room she picks one of her warmest hoodies, it's a pink monstrosity, so old it rightfully belongs in the trash but so warm she cannot bring herself to get rid of it. She puts it on while she walks on to the bathroom to pick up the pitcher from the cabinet under the sink. She fills it with water and puts on another 10-minute timer. She'll water all the plants she can on that period of time.

She shivers as she steps outside; the small balcony on her apartment is full of different plants in their pots. She goes to the basil first. The poor thing is looking all shrivelled up, she waters it generously. The tomatoes go next so that they won't get rid of their flowers due to lack of water. She's mostly done with the balcony by the time the beep of the timer tells her the time is up.

She rubs her hands together in an effort to warm them up even as she goes back to her room to get ready for her fitness routine. She's not supposed to jog all that much, what with the fast metabolism and all but the stress of the last week or so means she desperately needs the good feeling it gives her in comparison to, let's say, squats.

She picks her phone on her way out, headphones already on her neck and just waiting to be plugged on if she feels like it. She doesn't. It's early enough that the streets are mostly deserted and the birds make for wonderful background noise. She can feel her mind getting clearer and sharper as she runs. She's always found it easier to think while either walking or jogging.

She takes more time running than what she was expecting. It means breakfast is in danger now. Depressingly enough, it is not an uncommon state of affairs. Which is why she's prepared for it. She takes one of the Ziploc bags with the ingredients for her breakfast smoothies and leaves it to unfreeze somewhat on the sink, on the meantime she'll get ready.

Quick shower, some dry shampoo, clothes and makeup and she is done. She takes a look at herself on the mirror and snorts. The black of her hair gets a bit lost on the very similar black of her shirt, the jeans are on the torn side but she's past giving a fuck now. Which is obvious by the drama of her wing eyeliner.

She hasn't noted that correlation until a friend told her about it. Unless she's partying, the rule states that the more dramatic her wing, the least fucks she gives that day. Who cares? The shine of her highlight is satisfying in all its shimmery glory, she hopes the sun catches on it and it blinds someone. She's in a combative mood and she knows it.

She gets the blender going and runs to fix the living room up just a bit, before going back into the kitchen, turning the blender off and changing the cap with the one that makes it so it's a bottle. That way she gets to drink her breakfast smoothie through a straw on the bus with minimal risk of spilling. She loves the hell out of this thing. It's a good time to be alive. Alex picks up her bag, double checks that she has everything she needs and runs out the door.

Her day went better this time. College keeps overwhelming her with work but on the bright side, she's not as behind on the reading as she thought she was and a good reading schedule should take care of it easily enough. Work was a bit more complicated but still good. She had a very productive day.

Of course, it barely makes up for the bad rest of the week in terms of productivity but it still does and that's all that matters. Positive attitude. She buys herself a pack of chocolates on her way home, she deserves it.

Alex cannot help but feel relief as she unlocks the door to her apartment. She's happy and pleased but still exhausted. Maybe she should move. This whole need of a two-hour drive on the bus just to get back home is way too time-consuming and is taking a lot out of her.

She'll look into it as soon as her brain is back in working order. She leaves the bag and the shoes by the door, the keys in the little bowl. As she's pulling her hair up, she decides to go for the bedroom first this time. Some sweatpants and a loose shirt sound great right about now.

Getting back home and putting on some comfortable clothes is one of those little pleasures she looks forward to, and it's Friday as well which makes it doubly great. She takes the makeup off with a wipe and a bit of oil, as always the mascara refuses to budge. Whatever.

This time she remembers to put the cap on before the shower but she is too hungry to take her time under the water. She dresses quickly and fixes her usual bun that was coming undone. She picks up her laptop on the way to the kitchen but leaves it on the side table in the living room.

The take-out she bought is still warm so she doesn't bother heating it up, she simply plates it and moves on to the living room. Netflix on her mind and this time she's actually going to stay awake for the episode. Maybe she'll finally get to watch Daredevil, she doesn't care about the spoilers but she loves watching Marvel and all the analysis on YouTube after watching something and it isn't as fun if she hasn't seen the show or movie and has no idea if what the youtuber is saying is true.

She leaves the food on the table and as she moves to turn the TV on she catches something from the corner of her eye. Turning fully her couch to see whatever it is better causes her mind to short-circuit because: what? There's some dude passed out on her couch. She's sure she left the door locked so… How?

She turns on the light so she can actually start to try and make sense of the situation she's on. As she turns back around to look at the guy, she realizes he's shivering under her blanket which is both rude and sad. One part of her wants to bury him in blankets and the other part of her wants to rant at him about respecting other people's places. She decides on neither. Her phone is still on her hand and she unlocks it, just in case.

"Uhm… Hey, dude! Are you ok?"

He doesn't wake up.

She's at a loss. She gets closer to him, slowly. "Would you please wake up? I think you should go home."

Still, he won't react. She huffs under her breath. Fine, if the dude won't wake up, she can host him for the evening. He looks miserable and he probably will suffer a terrible hangover tomorrow. A big part of her brain is telling her this is a terrible idea but she doesn't listen to it, she's curious and he looks like he needs a break. She won't be sharing her food, though.

She looks at him and sighs. Dude needs some blankets, urgently. He's making her cold only by watching him shiver. She returns to her room and picks the thickest blanket out of her closet. It's large and knitted with thick light-grey wool and her favourite for cold nights in. After a moment of deliberation, she picks a smaller, thinner one for herself and puts on the pink hoodie. Back on the living room, the stranger is still shivering away on her couch.

With a sigh, she drops her blanket on the floor between the couch and the table before throwing the thicker blanket on top of him. With a roll of her brown eyes, she sits cross-legged on the floor and drapes her own blanket around her shoulders.

Daredevil is out of the question, then. She's not going to be watching it at a low volume to avoid waking her unwanted guest. Fine then. She'll marathon it as a reward for finishing homework tomorrow. It's cool, if slightly frustrating. She ends up putting some random series on and ignoring it in favour of her phone. Instagram and Pinterest consume her time for about an hour before she admits defeat.

Her eyes close without permission and she forces herself to stay awake and stretch. Right. Off to bed then. After another stretch and a big yawn, she stands up and turns the TV off in one fluid movement. She turns to look at the stranger and is surprised to find he has moved without her noticing.

He doesn't look like he was drunk and passed out as she had assumed, he looks sick. It makes her feel a bit guilty for some reason. The blanket she covered him with lays on his hips and is now covering only his legs, her couch blanket has been pushed between him and the back of the couch. She hums quietly, now worried.

There's some sweat making the smaller hairs of his crazy spiky hair-do stick to his forehead and his mouth is open and panting underneath his mask. That little detail has her confused for a second before she decides to ignore it. There's also a metal plate sown into blue cloth covering his left eye and he's wearing this militaristic green vest covered with pockets. That can't be comfortable. She debates for a second before letting it go. None of her business.

The good thing is that he seems to be getting better. She'll get him some medicine in the morning. Alex pulls the edge of the blanket up to his chin and makes sure he's well tucked in before going to the kitchen and filling a bottle with water. Back in the living room, she puzzles about how to put it at arms reach for him for a bit and ends up moving the side-table to accommodate.

With one last look at him, she goes straight to bed. She's too exhausted to bother. She does lock her door, just in case. She knows that the ship for good, rational safety choices has long sailed but still… it doesn't hurt anything.

She wakes up well rested and the weird achy feeling on her back lets her know she slept on top of her braid again. Alex turns a little in her bed, making herself more comfortable. The clock tells her it's 9 a.m. and she has every intention of lazing around in bed an hour more when her foggy brain reminds her that there's a sick stranger on her couch who might need medication.

A sigh and a couple minutes of denial later and she's out of bed and putting her hoodie on. Her braid is a mess but that's fine, she re-does it quickly so that her hair won't get in her way and fills her pitcher with water so she can start her morning routine.

On the way back inside, she decides to forego working out today. She hasn't skipped a day the entire week and Mr Stranger might feel better if he doesn't have to wait for medicine an extra hour. Speaking of Mr Stranger…

She rubs at her eyes with one hand, trying to wake herself up and out of zombie mode, while walking towards her couch to check on her uninvited guest. She ends up starting at his eye for a full minute before her brain finally understands that the guy is awake. Huh. Awkward.

She hums a bit under her breath and reaches for him, he snaps a hand out of the blanket to grab her wrist. She stares at it uncomprehending for a little while before frowning and trying to pull her hand back but his grip on her wrist doesn't loosen. Rude. Alex puts her pitcher on top of the side-table and frowns at him before flicking his hand with her now freed fingers.

"Behave," she tells him. "I'm trying to check your fever."

His expression is a mixture of scandalized and incredulous but she ignores him as she reaches for him again. He doesn't let go of her wrist but neither does he stop her for moving it anymore which results in his own hand going along with her movements.

She moves the metal plate out of the way and leaves it on the side table. His hand has yet to release her wrist. His fever is better but still, there, she decides, humming. She'll still get the medicine, just in case. His forehead is sweaty. She thinks that that can't be comfortable. This time when she steps back, he lets her go. She returns with a damp towel and ignores his eye on her as she wipes the visible part of his face.

She wonders if she should take off his vest but that feels dangerously like undressing a stranger without consent so she lets it go. She leaves the damp towel on the side-table and drags her hands over her face. "Fuck it," she murmurs to herself. She needs to pick up some groceries if she plans on having breakfast, anyway. She'll buy him something for the fever and maybe something for the pain, too. He's likely to have a headache.

She doesn't feel like a human being so she puts on some sweatpants, a shirt and a light-grey hoodie to hide the fact that she hadn't bothered with a bra. She's too lazy for it right now. She checks that her wallet has everything she needs and nods to herself.

"Right. Shopping list." Alex is trying valiantly to wrestle her thoughts into some kind of order.

She grabs her little agenda and a pen from the desk and marches herself to the fridge to figure out what she needs to buy for the week. Which turns out to be pretty much everything, she realizes. What a mess. She feels like having some ceviche, what with the nice sunny weather and all. Mr Stranger, however, is sick and she doesn't think that ceviche is a good idea in that context and she's not about to cook two dishes. Chicken soup it is, then. Ceviche can wait another week.

As soon as she's done with her shopping list, she stands up with every intention of leaving but her gaze catches Mr Stranger looking at her over the back of the couch. Right. He probably has been sweating on her favourite blanket all night, she thinks with a grimace. She should change it. With a resigned sigh, she stands up.

"Why do I do this to myself?" She questions out loud without really expecting an answer.

Not that she gets one, anyway.

She picks up the blanket she had used yesterday from the floor beside the couch where she left it and leaves it on the arm of the couch. As she takes the knitted blanket away, he makes a slight protesting sound that she answers with a quiet shushing sound she's been using on her younger cousins for years now. She lets that blanket fall to the floor for the moment before she busies herself with tucking him in with the new blanket.

Which is, of course, when she notices that he has his shoes on. How rude. She makes an annoyed sound on the back of her throat that has him taking his gaze away from her hands to her face. She sighs and takes his shoes off, leaving them beside the blanket, and finishes tucking him in. She makes sure he's comfortable and warm before checking his fever again with the back of her hand. Still there.

Fine, the medicine is a go, then. She picks the old blanket up and goes to leave it on the laundry basket, it's laundry day so she'll take care of it later. A round around the apartment later and she's sure everything is closed and as orderly as it's going to get in such a short amount of time.

Alex goes back to him before leaving, still functioning on autopilot. "I'll be back with some medicine and food, ok? Rest now." She informs him as she hands him the TV control and pets his hair a bit.

He's still looking at her like he's not sure what is going on. Which: fair.

She's not sure either but she's never been able to turn away people who need help and look pathetically terrible. Terrible decision or not. So she rolls her brown eyes at him and tugs slightly one of his strands to get his eyes on her again instead of on her hands. Once she's got his eye on her face, she smiles at him before finally making her way out to brave the market.