[Right now, Alex Reagan is practically overloaded with multiple and contradicting emotions that rush through her. But the first and the biggest is that he was hugging her back and holding her and that's something that hadn't happened before. Honestly Alex had half-expected him to just shove her back, and she isn't sure if this a sign that she's losing it here, how shaken he is here, or after what had happened the night after Coralee had left. But either way, it's nice and it ends far too quickly for Alex's liking.

The second emotion isn't as generous or charitable, and so obviously Alex is just going to try and refute it:]

What? A hoax? Richard, you can't be serious.

[Calling him Richard was generally a new phenomenon, that had mostly come from the things that they'd talked about that very long night, even if she'd slipped up and had done it before when she should have drawn more professional boundaries around their relationship. Alex was fairly well versed at ignoring all personal boundaries, even her own.]

An infection? It looks like someone has gone all Circe with this.

[Circe and her island of pigs who had once been Odysseus' sailors on their doomed voyage of course, after so long Alex knew her mythology.]