FOR THE NIGHTS WE WONT FORGET

FOR THE NIGHTS

WE WON’T

REMEMBER

The air was crisp and promising on that Friday night. Like clockwork, as soon as an inkling of the sun vanished the two-hour routine just to end up wearing the same wornout black crop top and ripped jeans commenced. With Megan Th ee Stallion blasting in the background, drugstore makeup scattered across the dorm-room fl oor, and the sting of Pink Whitney hitting her throat- the night had offi cially begun. As a freshman in college, Friday nights are integral to building her new and fabulous college experience. Th e insanities that freshmen engage in at the club must be the stories that maids of honor tell at their best friends’ weddings, right? Nights where you end up completely obliterated to the point where you can’t even remember how you got home have got to be how you fi nd lifelong friends, right? If she was being completely honest with herself, staying home and rewatching reruns of One Tree Hill aft er an exhausting fi rst week of being lost on a brand new campus sounded like a much more attractive way to spend the night. But alas, the promise of the night- who you’ll meet, where you’ll end up, the illusive yet exciting mystery of it all overpowered her exhaustion and she found sitting on the bathroom counter applying not just a second, but a third coat of blue mascara. A few shots of vodka later, before she knows it, her dorm room is suddenly packed with people she doesn’t know. Although she can barely move from the lack of space, she never felt more alone. Her head spinning, she asks the one girl she knew from Intro to Psychology, “I thought you were just bringing a couple of girls from your class for the pregame?” “Girl, they brought their friends too, just vibe before the Uber gets here”, she replied. She scarfs down some more Pink Whitney and before she knows it, the herd of unknown freshmen run fl ush out of the dorm and run downstairs to catch their Ubers, in hopes of embarking on a night they will never forget. Th e following morning, she awakes in her dorm wearing the same worn-out black crop top and ripped jeans as the night before. With an intense trembling in her stomach, she jolts out of her extra-long twin bed and sprints toward the bathroom. Th e reminiscent taste of Pink Whitney rolls off her tongue as she expels the endeavors of the night into the porcelain bowl. While staring at the white rim of the toilet seat and with a persistent pounding in her head, she tries to piece together the blurred events of the night before. Having no recollection of how the night went or how she was able to get back to her dorm, a bitter sense of dread creeps over her. Looking around, she scrambles to fi nd her phone. She fi nally locates it, and a fl ood of notifi cations bombards her screen. Multiple Snapchats, texts, and missed calls stare back at her. Before she can read or even respond to any of the messages, her phone dies. Th e black screen and dead battery icon taunt her as she plugs her phone into the charger. Dragging herself to the sink, she stares at the smudged blue mascara around her sunken eyes. She splashes her face with cold water as a sense of anxiety fl oods through her body. Her thoughts continue to race but she keeps asking herself the same questions — What happened last night? How did I get home? Why did I drink so much

Writers: Emily Valmana, Kyrsten Schneider / Editors: Jayna O, Racquel Gluckstern, & Lexi Fernandez