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It was a weird switcharoo. I'd always had memories of Jor listening to me tell stories and yet here I was totally entrap with him. The man couldn't help but move his hands, letting emotions cascade over his face, as his voice took on a storyteller's cadance.

The first yawn snuck up on me, almost knocking me over. The coffees were gone, the shop was dead and I was relaxed back in my egg-chair, feet curled under me with my scarf marauding as a blanket. Jor was leaning forward, smiling and talking about something that my brain was too slow to track.

"You're just about to keel over, azizam," he said softly, reaching forward to rub my knee. "I should get you home."

"Sorry," I mumbled, not even trying to argue with him. "What time is it?"

"Quarter to three," he said, checking his phone's screen.

"Damn. We've been talking for almost six hours."
"And yet I still haven't caught you up on the twenty years you missed. And I'm pretty sure I still only know about your last few years."

I struggled to get up, stumbling as my legs made their numbness known. He was there in a second to catch me. "Careful there."

"Thanks," I mumbled, shaking my foot to get feeling back into it. Leaning on Jor, I tried to come up with a game plan of getting my exhausted butt back to my apartment.

The subway was closed, leaving me few options in one of the three cities ride shares or an overly expensive yellow cab. Walking was a no go in this weather or these heels. But the thought of getting into a cab as conked out as I was worried me; I'd read enough "handsy cabbie" stories to thoroughly sour me to the idea.

"I need to get another coffee," I mumbled bitterly, as I looked at the barista leaning against the counter, scrolling through his smartphone.

"Why?"

"No way I'll stay awake in the cab without one and I am not falling asleep there."

After a moment in which I experimented with putting weight on my numb leg and found it successful, Jor remained quiet. Another yawn hit me, and I bumped my knee into the rounded edge of our small coffee table. The pain jolted me enough to wince and reach for my leg, but not enough to stop the next, blinding yawn.

"Just stay at mine. You're in no shape to do anything but collapse."

It was a full minute later before I realized what he'd said. "What? No, no. I'm sure your roommates'll be mad at you enough without bringing home some random chick."

Jor frowned before lifting his hand to start ticking off his fingers. "One, you're not a random chick, Ayanna. Two, I don't have roommates. I live alone."

Alone in New York? It would be a miracle if he had more than a show box with a single bed and hot plate, especially with his salary as a waiter. It wasn't like my place was much better, but the below ground apartment was mostly mine with only a sharing of the kitchen, hallway, and front door.

But then I remembered my neighborhood. Seedy by day, it was just plain dangerous when the sun set. "Um..." I couldn't tell if this was a bad deal or not. My brain was working on a caffeine comedown, ten hours of sleep between the last two days, and Kind bars I pretended worked as actual meals. "Does the bedroom door lock?"

"It does," Jor said steadily without a hint of anger or snark.

I was too tired to think more about my decision as I nodded and Jor hustled me out of the coffee shop. The cold had intensified, but not even that was penetrating my fog as I leaned heavily on Jor and tried to put one foot in front of the other as he walked us to his place. It was another ten minutes before we stopped in front of a brownstone-turned-apartment building. The front door was stained glass with a panel of twelve intercoms beside it.

Slipping his keys out of his pocket, Jor juggled my half-dead ass and unlocked the door. We stumbled inside to the warm antechamber that housed a wall of silver-plated mailboxes. The chandelier was dimmed, creating a halo of light that extended only as far as the next door leading into the building. Another key. Another lock. Two floors up. And we reached his door: 3B.