Paper Boy

PROLOGUE

Riiing.... Riiinggg... Riiinnggg...  

The loud ringing slowly settled like a nagging that kept going forever. Despite the noise, I don't want to wake up. Instantly, my hand crept on in its own to the side of the bed and pulled the pillow I hugged between my legs and buried myself in it. Riiing.... Riiinggg... Riiinnggg...  

"Ughh..." I groaned. My hand reached up to the alarm and slammed it with full force. Another morning in this big empty glass house. I stretched my feet as far as I could as I stared at the white ceiling of my bedroom. Sunlight passed through the walls as the windows greeted me with the view of the blue sky. The thick dark blue curtains were tied from side to side. For a typical morning, it was oddly a bit too cold than the usual. 

Like a bewitching spell, my four-poster bed seemed to hypnotize me with its warm and comfy covers. I don't know if it was me or the pillows just seemed softer than before. I snuggled around the corner and rolled around the bed. With a few twists and pulls, I turned the covers until it started to choke me.  

Behind the back of my head, a small pestering voice crept slowly behind me. Dead...line ...Deadline...  

It was then that I realized... my deadline.  

"Shoot! I almost forgot!" I muttered, aloud. Slowly, I reached for my glasses near the oak night stand. With heavy footsteps, I dragged myself towards the bathroom, my pink pajamas flailing behind me. I gritted my teeth in annoyance at myself as the gears in my brain started to function.  

There was an interjecting loud cough. "Miss Cohen." said a soothing deep voice. 

My grey eyes darted at the old bald man sitting in front me. He wore a small comfortable smile in his almost-blank face as he looked from his small notebook, to me, and back again. There was an easy and calm feeling that radiated from him. Maybe it was the familiar wrinkles he had in his eyes despite the cold tacky business-like suit he wore or maybe...it was just that he oddly reminded me of my father. 

Instantly, I sat up from the old brown leathery sofa I was lying on.  

"Miss Halley Cohen..." he said again.  

"Call me, Halley." I said, automatically. 

"How does this make you feel?" 

"Is that a natural routine question?" 

"Why?" he replied as he looked at me, keenly. Curious but not overwhelming. The pencil in his hand tapped lightly, waiting for action. "Does that bother you?" 

"I'm a writer. If I'm writing about this very situation, you're line is so cliché." 

"Touché." he agreed, betraying his own poker-face with a wide smile as his round belly shook in light laughter. 

"Look, Dr....?" I said, struggling to remember his name. 

"Evans." 

"Dr. Evans." I said innocently, slyly concealing my own mistake because of very short-term memory. "I'm not insane." 

"Of course, you're not. Who said you ever were?" 

"Riiiiggghhhtt." My voice tainted with irony. 

"This is just a conversation with an old friend...." He smiled warmly as he nudged on his own chair. 

"-Whose a therapist." 

He sighed. His eyebrows formed a concerned little frown over his head. The wrinkles in his forehead formed waves of concentration and a little bit of apprehension. "You seemed to be... upset. Does the whole place bother you?" he asked as he gestured his hands around the office. Almost all of the furniture was made of hard wood or oak except for the leathery chairs he placed in the center. It looked like a wooden cozy living room rather than an office. His office desk near the end of the room was the only thing to remind me of where I actually am and... why I was here.