Sundown in Boy-Town

"I can't sleep. I can't sleep. I can't sleep. I can't-" before Sarah could complete her final redundancy, she gave herself a forceful slap across the face. A mirror wasn't needed, the heartbeat in her cheek was evidence it had already begun to swell.

"I can't sleep. I can't sleep. I can't-" SLAP! "Come on!" She leaned her head back and downed the rest of her cola, now it'd been empty before she placed the light aluminum on the table. Just then..CRACK! Another can opened and she picked up right where she left off.

The moon was high in the starless sky and while everyone else in her apartment had been most likely fast asleep on this Thursday night ready to get up early for work or school or what else, Sarah had been hyper fixated on her laptop, some random Death Metal music she found on Spotify playing in the background and text on screen which read

ARE YOU A "BOY-TOWN" EXPERT? ANSWER THESE TEN QUESTIONS ONLY A TRUE FAN WOULD KNOW. THE FIRST TEN PEOPLE TO ANSWER ALL CORRECTLY WILL WIN EXCLUSIVE TICKETS TO THEIR UPCOMING TOUR. QUIZ LINK TO BE DROPPED AT A RANDOM TIME IN THE NEXT WEEK SO DON'T LEAVE YOUR COMPUTER! AND REMEMBER "AT MIDNIGHT, I ONLY DREAM OF YOU"

Midnight had passed in California and it'd now been 2:58 but on the East Coast, it'd only been 11:58. Sarah's heartbeat increased as every minute went by. She couldn't miss seeing her favorite 90s teenage-hunk now middle-aged men boy band for their reunion tour and she knew she couldn't afford the tickets as they were, it was out of the question.

2:59 AM

The seconds were counting down but they felt as slow as molasses. Her mouse cursor was over the "refresh" button and her index finger quivered over the laptop's touch tablet. The caffeine had made her shake like a junkie without their fix, the bags under her eyes from lack of sleep all day had felt like they'd filled with sand the way they sagged, one blink of her eyelids and they may not open. This was the moment of truth.

The clock struck 3 AM, midnight on the east coast. Her finger was faster than her brain and just like a gunman in the Wild West, she was quick on the trigger. She had no doubt she'd get all the questions correct, it was just a matter of being one of the ten to get in on time. The page went White, the time was now. "Girl, I only dream of you. You are my number one, you know it's true" played in her head to a poppy melody. The page refreshed and...nothing. The same text as before. Something was wrong. She refreshed the page again, same message. The quiz wasn't here. It had to be up now, Sarah knew the lyrics "at midnight, I only dream of you" was from their song, "Thursday".

She was anxious, frustrated, somber but more than anything else perplexed. Her and Alana were the biggest fans of "Boy-Town" they knew. She could at least confide in her with her confusion. With her heartbeat still rapid and her hand still shivering from the caffeine, she opened her phone and pressed the touch screen to call Alana. The phone rang..and rang..and rang. "Wouldn't she be right by her phone?" Sarah thought to herself. After an eternity (actually just about ten seconds), Alana answered in a daze. Her tone of voice like she'd been drinking or..asleep.

"H-hello?" Alana asked.

"A-are you sleeping?"

"Huh? It's 3 in the morning."

"I know it's 3 in the morning! It's Thursday and the Boy-Town quiz isn't online! Why are you sleeping?"

"Th-the quiz is gonna be up Thursday. Why are you up now?" she replied even hazier then before.

"I just said! Because its..." just as Sarah went to finish her sentence, she paused and looked at the bottom right hand corner of her screen to reveal it was in fact not Thursday but Wednesday.

"..Sarah?" asked Alana. A moment of silence filled the telephone signal.

"I'll talk to you later" she said and hung up the phone.

In her state of anticipation, she felt so foolish to not see the date right under the clock on her computer screen. She'd waited up all for nothing but her body and her mind were running at different speeds. After she unplugged her laptop, shut the light off and laid down in the dark, the exhilaration showed no signs of slowing through her. The caffeine, the music, the possibility she could be seeing her favorite boy band live. It was all too much to drift into an easy sleep. A half hour passed, then an hour, then another hour. The sunlight had begun to creep over the horizon as she closed her eyes and finally able to surrender to the slumber when like the snap of a finger...EEEH EEEH EEEH! The alarm on her phone ignited and it was time to get up for work. She opened her hazy eyes to see that through all her excitement she only had a mere two hours of sleep. Sarah wanted to just stay in bed and sleep all day, forget her responsibilities but she knew two things. One, she had to go to work, her report was due and two, it was less than twenty four hours before the opportunity arose again for her to win the tickets. Just. One. More. Day.

"Wake up on the wrong side of the bed this morning?" asked Lisa, peeking her head over the cubicle wall like the nosy pain she was.

"Wha-what?" Sarah replied in a half daze, her hair a complete mess, makeup smeared, drool rolling down her cheek.

"You look like you've been up for days!"

"Yeah..yeah, I can't sleep."

"Well, my husband now takes ten milligrams of melatonin and he told me..." The words kept flowing from Lisa but Sarah was far too exhausted to be able to listen. She nodded her head at her every word, regardless of what she was even saying. Sarah's mind was on two things, getting home, getting to bed and getting those tickets. She was so tired she hadn't realized those were in fact three things.

That night was Sarah's chance, it was the right time at the right date. She'd been back in the same spot she'd been twenty four hours earlier. She couldn't remember if she was on her fourth or fifth cup of black coffee for that evening but she knew she was losing the battle. It was almost 3 AM, Midnight on the east coast. It was evident that if she laid back on the bed, the instant her head touched those pillows it was game over for her. Her phone rang, it was Alana.

"Hell..ooo?" asked Sarah sounding like Alana had the previous night.

"Hey, Sarah! Are you in front of your computer! You gotta get ready!"

"Yeah..I'm...here." She couldn't hide it, her words were noticeably dragging. The lack of sleep had truly caught up to her and it now became a battle between the awake and the asleep. She had been so tired that things were looking dim, darker in the room, her computer screen sucking the brightness away.

"Come on girl, don't nod off yet! You're right there! You've got a minute!"

"Alright, alright, I can do it" she said with an assured confidence. She had come too far to nod off now. Withstanding the heat, Sarah piped down a giant gulp of the black coffee. Let her insides ache in the morning, at least she'd be able to wake up knowing she got those tickets.

Thirty seconds.

The elation had been the caffeinated cure she needed the whole time. Her eyes widened, her senses regaining their full strength, she was the fastest hand in the West and she would get those tickets. "Girl, I only dream of you." No matter what she had felt the past day it would all be made up for when those boys (now grown men) come out of stage, the sound of millions of screaming girls at the top of their lungs ready to sing and chant out every lyric to every song and be amongst the fans who waited to see them and-BING! The computer shut off.

Her heart sunk into her stomach. She rapidly pressed on the keys on her computer but nothing. A thousand questions ran through her head, the electricity radiating throughout her body. Everything on the laptop seemed to be in good working order, nothing out of the ordinary. She couldn't sit, she had to get up but when she stretched her legs to stand, the issue showed itself. The laptop cable had fallen out. Sarah realized she must've not plugged it all the way back in from the previous night. Her hand targeted the cable and shoved it back into the port, her finger now rapidly tapping the power button while the screen had yet to power back on.

"This isn't happening...this isn't happening..."

Suddenly, the black screen brightened, the computer logo popped up, it was booting, she still had a chance. Sarah was helpless to the speed of her computer.

"Come on! Come on! Come on!"

Her browser opened, her fingers flying faster than her brain, it'd only been two minutes, she still had a chance. The keys to the equation of the website ripped its way into the search bar, the page was white, it loaded and...

THE CONTEST IS NOW OVER! THANK YOU FOR PLAYING AND REMEMBER "I ONLY DREAM OF YOU!"

She stared at the computer in disbelief, her eye twitching out of sheer disbelief. Just then, her phone notified her with a text message. It was from Alana. "i got 1!!! so excted!! wht bout u?" Sarah sat upright, her heart still racing. The phone dropped from her hand. She casually closed her laptop as if nothing had happened, shut off the light next to her bed and laid her head down on the pillow ready to surrender to the night. Her heart couldn't stop racing, the caffeine was rushing through her system, the excitement of a previous opportunity now shot hadn't left. There was a party happening right inside her and as much as she wanted to close her eyes and drift off, all she thought was

"I can't sleep."