floating in a tin can

Lee was still asleep when they got on the plane, and only began to stir when they stepped off. It's hot in New York in the summer, a close, thick heat that smells like cooking garbage. Los Angeles is hot too, but there's a breeze coming in from the ocean.

She's been sleepwalking the past couple of weeks, more zombie than human, but whatever quiet drama is going on in her head has been vastly overshadows by the riotous one going on at Sterling Cooper Draper Whatever it is now. Lee's not sure what's going on exactly, only that Michael didn't have a job for a week, and now he has a job waiting for him back in New York at some new firm, with some fancy title and no guarantee as to how long it will last. It could tank within a year. No one knows.

Given that, now is the only time they could have fucked off to California for two weeks.

Lee is happier out here, that much is obvious. She woke up, she's active and engaged. She spends a lot of time out by the beach, though after Michael turned an alarming shade of red she finally agreed to start doing other things, other indoor things, as well. When she's on her own she still spends most of her time outside, sunning herself like a lizard, until her skin has a lingering warmth to it like a baked stone. The sun baked her skin brown and bleached her hair white, and she always has the briney, salty smell of the sea clinging to her.

She still sleeps late, though, often not getting up until noon, like today. Michael's gone to walk off some of his continuous overabundant energy, but she stirs when the door opens again and even sits up, blinking blearily from a ragged curtain of her hair. “Michael,” she murmurs sleepily, reaching one hand for him and opening and closing her fingers. “Neshama, come here.”