it was one of those days where no act of personal hygiene could wash the shame off. she felt like maybe if she brushed her teeth one more time, the bad feelings would be spat out into the sink and travel pipeline routes far away. she had brushed her teeth three times today. she had also washed her face three times and she took a shower, but she was already physically clean—she just wanted to stand there and let the water submerge her, she was right underneath the shower head, the water sounded like thunder as it flooded her ears, she shut her eyes and put her hands on her shoulders, like she was hugging herself or laying in a coffin dracula-style. she felt like with enough determination she could drown in the shower, standing up like that. her damp hair clung to her skin. her eyes were welded shut by the water pouring down in droves. it was the first time she felt like she could breathe that day. she decided after ten minutes that this activity had run its course, and that she probably couldn’t drown like that, it was too passive. she turned the shower off and stepped out, dried herself off and wrapped her hair into a towel turban. she walked into her bedroom and put on jazz pianist bill evans’ album, blue in green. she had received a few texts from her friends, whom she had reached out to earlier even though she didn’t want to see or talk to anyone that day. she only contacted them because the thought of leaving loomed over her head, like some future guilt. she wanted to see everyone she loved all the time, even when she wanted to be alone, because there would be a lot of time for her to be alone the rest of her life. alone—did she understand what that meant? physically she was never alone, but there were times when she felt like she was, her thoughts on a distant planet, looking toward earth, detached. earlier that day she cried for the first time in months. it felt incomplete though, only lasting a few seconds, so she decided not to count it. she cried because her mother was talking about student loans. she cried because she was sleep deprived and anxious about the future. “you picked the wrong repayment plan,” her mother was saying. “we told you which plan to pick.” all she could say was “it’s my choice” over and over, like a mantra, slowly and carefully. “the plan you picked is a balloon, for your final payment you will have to pay thirty grand out of pocket. how are you going to save thirty grand?” her mother wouldn’t let up so she stopped walking for a second and scrunched her face up. it felt childish. her mother and father kept walking. they were going to take her grocery shopping but she was too upset now, she could not go in public. her mother took an envelope out of her purse and handed her some cash and they left. she sat by the window and thought about becoming an expatriate and moving to belgium or something. she thought about how she hadn’t cried or masturbated in months. was she just too disciplined now, or was she unfairly denying herself of her needs, or did she think she was too good to cry or masturbate all the sudden? a, b, c, or d, all of the above. she thought about how she got angry at her friend for not wanting to kiss her last night. she was exceedingly drunk. afterwards she said she was going to leave, so he said “alright” and locked the door. she knocked on the door and said she needed to find her lighter. he let her in. she couldn’t find her lighter but she stole one that was lying on the patio table and went through the house and out the front door again. she lit her last cigarette. her other friend came out and told her to come inside. “i’m going home,” she protested, holding her cigarette in the air. “come on, just come in and go to bed, will you.” her uber driver couldn’t find the house, probably because she put the wrong address in. she didn’t feel like resolving the situation so she resigned and
walked into the house, head down. she climbed into the first friend’s bed and slept there while the other two slept on the couches. she slept in the outfit she had gone out in and her purse and books were beside her on the bed. she did not dream. she woke up feeling excessively hung over and dissociative. her friend walked into his room to find his keys or something. “do you have ibuprofen,” she asked gently, and realized her voice was nearly gone. “yeah, i’ll get you one,” he said. he left the room and came back with a pill. “thank you,” she said. “and can you hand me that glass of water?” he misunderstood and thought she needed him to go get her a glass of water, so he did. he came back with it and she thanked him again. she asked if she should leave as he was leaving for work. “what,” he said. she repeated the question. “you can stay here and sleep if you want,” he said. she said “okay” and rolled over again. she thought about this scene as she sat by the window in her bedroom. she felt like she didn’t deserve such kindness after how she acted last night. she decided he was a saint and would never speak ill of him again. she wanted to text him and apologize for last night but she also hoped he would assume that she was too drunk to remember it happened. he was really drunk too, maybe he didn’t remember it happened. she apologized to him in her head and decided that was enough. after her friends left the house that morning, she could not go back to sleep. she realized nobody was home, not even the other roommates, and for the first time in weeks, she was physically alone. she began her hangover recovery process, used his toothbrush to brush her teeth, smoked marijuana, took a caffeine pill from the caffeine pill container on the table. she had never taken a caffeine pill before but something about it seemed wrong, like an unnecessary shortcut. there was no coffee in the house though, so she took it. an hour later she would tweet: “caffeine pills review: fucking weird, but effective”. being alone in someone else’s house was weird. as she walked in and out of rooms she had the vague sense that she was just a ghost haunting the place. it felt intrusive but also sort of okay. she spent an hour like that, waiting for the caffeine pill to kick in, considering the books on his shelves, looking for something to eat that hadn’t expired yet. all the food was fucking expired. who could live like this? she imagined that it was her house to haunt, like this was the fate she deserved or something. after mulling this over she decided it would be nice to walk to the coffee shop while she was in the neighborhood. she gathered her things and left, locking the door behind her. she put her headphones in and listened to the velvet underground. the coffee shop was further than she thought, but the weather was decent—generic, she thought—and the caffeine pill made her feel like she was just a floating head. she enjoyed walking through that part of town, past the charming brick homes, thinking about the lives of people in them, how many extramarital affairs were happening within a mile’s radius. as she approached the coffee shop she saw the back of someone’s head and recognized them. it was her friend zach. “zach,” she called as she crossed the street. he turned around. “hey,” she said, eyebrows knitted in surprise. she was never on this side of town and running into someone she knew only made this day feel more like a dream. zach was walking his dog. zach introduced her to his girlfriend. they said hey to each other. zach asked her if she was going to graduate soon and what her plans were after. she laughed without moving her face. they were both going to the coffee shop. zach
had to stay outside though, with the dog. she and zach’s girlfriend walked into the coffee shop, separate but together. zach’s girlfriend stood behind her in line. “that looks like a really interesting book,” zach’s girlfriend said. she was referring to shoplifting from american apparel by tao lin. they chatted about it for a bit. she looked around the coffee shop and noticed that everyone in there was white. “this place is like, filled with white people,” she said to zach’s girlfriend who was also white. “yeah,” zach’s girlfriend said. the line was taking forever. she looked at the backs of people’s heads and fell in love with them. she watched couples interact and wondered how they had met each other, what their days together were like, what they fought about. when she finally reached the front of the line she ordered an iced coffee with soy milk. the cashier praised her for spelling her name the right way. “my sister spells it the same way,” he explained. “yeah, they’re always doing weird shit to it at starbucks, adding two L’s or two S’s.,” she replied. he laughed politely. she tipped him and found a seat and began writing in her red moleskine. she wrote about how she fantasized about killing people who asked what she was doing after graduation. everyone seemed to have the acute awareness that she was graduating, even strangers, like the last four years were visible on her face. she finished her iced coffee and got tired of writing so she called an uber. her uber driver asked her if she was graduating and what she was going to do after.