“I'm sorry,” he gasped in his sleep, the words a fractured plea that died in the quiet of the room. His breath was ragged, his chest heaving as if he were still running from the ghosts in his skull, and his entire body was flushing with sweat, leaving the silk sheets plastered to his skin like a second, suffocating layer.
Giovanni forced his eyes open, the transition from the nightmare to reality offering no real relief. He sighed heavily, a sound laced with bone-deep exhaustion, as he sat up on the bed. He glanced at the glowing alarm clock where the time read 12:50am. He had slept for barely forty minutes.
As usual, the sleeping meds didn't work. He wondered why he still went through the futile motion of using them. They never worked; his demons were bigger than any med could handle.
