OC note: Allen is code-switching to street Clovennian when he speaks in all-lower-case text
Normally, Allen would have been up before dawn, especially when he would have liked to be out early to beat the Aurellian heat. By now, he'd have bathed, shaved, begun to dress, and started the water to boil for coffee. But the drugs he'd been given for nighttimes after his surgery kept him sweating and tossing through eerie dreams all night, then groggy and slow in the morning -- just like his father. Henri's voice roused him from his fog.
Allen's bare legs were tangled in a single layer of damp sheets, and his hands felt heavy as he tried to shuck them away. When he'd rented the place, he hadn't thought about how the heat would rise and settle into his third-story walk-up in this country's miserable summer. He ought to drag his mattress down from the loft and sleep on the floor, but navigating the nearly vertical half-stairs was difficult with his knee being what it was. He simply hadn't had energy (or sense of balance) to try to fix the uncomfortable mess to something more tolerable yet.
Fuzzily, Gator dragged himself out of bed, pulled on a pair of boxer shorts from a drawer he'd left ajar when he'd last managed to try to put away his laundry, and took a seat at the top of the steps leading down from the loft where he had his bedroom, feet resting on the second step from the top. His color was like sallow milk, and the sheen of sweat, overgrown stubble, and undisguised bruising on his face from his cracked jaw didn't do him any favors. Still, looking down on his hung-over brother, the first thing he managed to get out was, "you look like you had a rough night."