The alarm had long gone silent.
The apartment was too still—that deceptive, cozy kind of quiet that only existed when people should've already been up.
Noel's eyes blinked open to sunlight spilling bold across the sheets.
He squinted, groaned, and then saw the time glowing on the clock.
8:43.
For a moment, his brain stalled. Then—
"Shit."
He threw off the blanket, the cold air biting instantly.
Beside him, Luca barely stirred, mumbling something that sounded suspiciously like five more minutes.
"No, five more minutes and we're both unemployed," Noel said, grabbing the nearest pillow and smacking him once—not hard, just enough to wake the dead.
Luca flinched, half sitting up, hair sticking out in five directions. "What—what happened?"
"We overslept," Noel snapped, already halfway into his shirt. "It's almost nine."
That did it.
Luca bolted upright. "What?! Why didn't the alarm—"
"It did. You turned it off."
