Boyd was home. He lay in a great tangle of bedclothes, snoring hideously and making little motions with his hands and arms like a beached whale. Malone padded over to him and dug him fiercely in the ribs.
"Come on," he said. "Wake up, Tommy-boy."
Boyd's eyes did not open. In a voice as hollow as a zombie's, he said: "My head. Hurts."
"Can't feel any worse than mine," Malone said cheerily. This, he reflected, was not quite true. Considering everything it had been through recently, his head felt remarkably like its old, carefree self. "You'll feel better once you're awake."
"No, I won't," Boyd said simply. He jammed his head under a pillow and began to snore again. It was an awesome sound, like a man strangling to death in chicken-fat. Malone sighed and poked at random among the bedclothes.
Boyd swore distantly, and Malone poked him again.
"The sun is up," Malone said, "and all the little pedestrians are chirping. It is time to rise."
Boyd said: "Gah," and withdrew his head from the pillow. Gently, as if he were afraid he were going to fall apart, he rose to a sitting position. When he had arrived at it, he opened his eyes.
"Now," Malone said, "isn't that better?"