Alice Samson sat by the window, staring blankly down at the city street. With a glass of brandy beside her, she watched, her cigarette smoke coiling around her and fogging up the glass. Tiny people scurried along the pathways strewn with scraps of rubbish and peered in at the shop windows curiously as they passed. Cars, buses and bright yellow taxis thronged the roads. Lights separated the impenetrable darkness.
Nobody could know what Alice Samson was thinking at that moment. Her expression unfathomable she continued to gaze at the street.

Alice woke next morning slouched in the chair. Rubbing her strained neck, she glanced at her watch and rose slowly to get ready for work.
When Alice Samson left her house, she didn’t look as though she had been up ‘till 3’oclock in the morning. But then again, she stayed up ‘til 3’oclock in the morning most nights. Alice clutched her coffee and walked briskly down four flights of narrow wooden stairs to be greeted with the crisp morning air like a slap on the face.

Alice Samson endured a dull day at the office, as she usually did. She caught the bus and arrived home at exactly 6:15, as she usually did. She stayed up ‘till 3 in the morning, with a glass of brandy beside her, cigarette smoke fogging up the glass and staring blankly down at the city street, as she usually did.

But the next morning wasn’t usual. Alice Samson never woke up.