Now I stare at the words, but all I see is the subtext: am I just the sum of my traumas, the aggregate of all the secrets I’ve learnedto keep? Is my future anything more than a negative space left behind by his desire? I should care about the test tomorrow. I should care about my GPA, my future, my rent, my ability to stay on at Century. But all I can think is: What if I never get over Liam Thomas? What if this is all I’m ever going to be?
I let my head fall onto the desk. The paper is cool against my cheek. For a second, I think about falling asleep right here, letting my body shut down and reboot without my permission. Maybe when I wake up, the world will have rearranged itself and I’ll know what to do.
A text buzzes on my phone: one short vibration, then silence.
I don’t look. I won’t look.
I stare instead at the ceiling, at the pop-corned texture, at the way the lamp shadows creep up the walls like mold. I wonder what my life would be if I’d never met Liam Thomas. Would I be a better student? Would I be happier? Sadder? Would I still be convinced I was “broken,” or would I have found a way to want something that wasn’t just a reflection of what someone else wanted from me?
I wonder if I’ll ever learn how to stop.
The heat in the room is stifling. I kick off my slippers, pull my knees to my chest. The highlighter slips from my hand and rolls off the desk, vanishing into the fossil record of snacks and dust bunnies under the bed.
What I want: I want to pass all my classes. I want to be proud of finishing something. I want to not feel like a walking repository for other people’s needs. I want to stop looking at every man and wondering what they’ll take from me.
But if I’m honest—and that’s the assignment, isn’t it? To be honest, at least in your own mind?—I want him. Even after everything, even after the contract and the ugly truths and the sharp, bright humiliation of being a variable in his plan, I want him.
Maybe that’s why I can’t study.
Maybe that’s why I can’t sleep.
The highlighter clatters against the metal leg of the bed. I flinch, then laugh. I’m losing my mind.
In the window, the reflection is unkind: my hair in a tangled bun, dark circles under my eyes, lips bitten raw. I look older than my age, but also impossibly young. A girl who tried on adulthood and found it too big in the shoulders.
I push the lamp away, plunge the room into a gentler dusk. The computer’s screen saver is a carousel of old photos: me and Andie at the lake, me in a Halloween cat costume, me at my last birthday party, grinning like I’m still capable of joy. The Simone in those photos is an artifact, a record of a person who might still be in here, somewhere, if I can dig her out.
Another text. The screen lights the window with its false dawn. I close my eyes, try to remember the last time I truly wanted something. Not because of a man, not because of my transcript, not because I was afraid. Just because it was mine to want.
I can’t.
That’s the saddest part.
I lean back in my chair and let my eyes close, just for a minute.
Outside, a siren wails. Inside, the radiator ticks. The world goes on, indifferent.
I tell myself I’ll wake up in twenty minutes and get back to work.
But for now, I just want to feel nothing.
For now, nothing is enough.
The next dayis all static and migraine aura, the morning sun coming in harsh and low through the grime-streaked dorm window. At some point in the night, I must have migrated from the desk to my bed, because I wake to the feel of a heavy fleece blanket and the faint, percussive rattle of my phone alarm.
I sit up and blink at the room. There is no order. My notes have slithered off the desk and onto the floor, fanning out like a tide of yellow and pink. A box of granola bars has been cannibalized to a pile of wrappers, and my laptop is asleep with its lid half-closed, as if it, too, gave up on the night.
I’m staring at nothing when Andie bursts in, holding two coffees overhead like a conquering champion.
“Morning!” she stage-whispers, then, seeing my face, dials it down to a gentle: “Hey, sleepyhead.”
The girl is a sight. She’s wearing leggings printed with cartoon avocados and a hoodie from our campus mental health awareness week. Her hair is in a lopsided braid that would make Elsa weep. She looks, in a word, functional, which is the most anyone can hope for during finals.
I squint at the coffee. “Is that?—”
“Of course,” she says, setting one down on the edge of my bed. “Triple shot, oat milk, extra sugar, and a dash of whatever cinnamon dust they put on top.”
She flops onto the desk chair, sending a stack of old readings tumbling to the floor. “Jesus, Simone, you’ve built a fort in here.”
