I wrote this in the time span of a few hours one night. It's been in my drafts for a while now. Nothing special about it, but I just didn't know where I wanted to take it after the final bit. I've been trying to dive into moderately normal stories but that hasn't been working out too well. If anyone knows how to write normal concepts please share your secrets. Anyways, with the virus going around, stay indoors and stay safe. Appreciate the time you get to spend in isolation but make sure to socialize and avoid the spiral of depression that I have been sucked into. Thank u for reading and I hope you enjoy.

Part one

I went to college to get a degree. At least, that's what I told my parents. I was accepted to some fancy state school because I am somewhat of a hyperthymesiac, and all I would do was read the textbooks for twenty minutes to achieve the highest score. Not only was I considered a legend, but I could run like hell if someone passed me a baton. I was a shoe-in for college, a solid candidate for scholarships, and an automatic acceptance for just about anywhere I wanted to go. Harvard, Yale, and Princeton all denied me and I had to act like it was a tragedy, but I was not in the mood to cough up tens of thousands of dollars per year on some buildings made of bricks and white dudes who believed monocles were still socially acceptable. I could not have given less of a shit.

I didn't want to go to college. That was my parents dream. Everything I did in high school was to complete their biggest fantasies, not mine. I don't even know what I want to do, but it's not related to spending another handful of years hitting the books, no matter how stellar my memory is. I did not want it on my agenda and I never planned on adding it.

But I went to college. For a whole year, I memorized every bit of information that came my way. All of the courses about criminal justice, every class about race and inequalities, and each formula from algebra was permanently engrained into the folds of my cerebral cortex. I was the definition of successful and dedicated. I never failed a test, never missed the homework, never fucked up.

However, I did want to blow my brains out. I understand that education is the heart and soul of some people, and I respect that. You go to college if that defines you because pursuing a higher education is fucking difficult and it's certainly not for everyone. But if it's not something you plan on doing forever, then you lose interest and tumble into a never ending spiral of depression. Not only did I sit in bed and wallow in an infinite silence, but I wanted to climb to the top of the chemistry building and see what would happen if I took a few steps off the edge. I wanted to try it but I never did for fear of the campus security snitching on me to my mom. I would've offed myself a while ago if I didn't have to keep my scholarships, and I definitely would've flunked out during my first semester if I didn't have hyperthymesia and a constant influx of fast food and tea from the union.

Over the summer, things started to lean further into the negative direction. My roommate, Jake, said he could get me a fake ID card. I didn't need one and I didn't plan on getting one, but I wasn't about to turn down the opportunity. If it was passable, I could get some drinks and sell them off at a slightly inflated price to churn some profit. Worst comes to worst, the ID doesn't work and I call up my older friends.

The ID did work. Jake kicked down the door two days before classes began, set down his belongings under his bunk bed, and shoved a fake drivers license in my face. It was almost identical to the real deal. It was extremely impressive.

At first, it was just a way for me to purchase a few drinks for Jake to take to some girls. His classes were scheduled in the afternoon and mine were during the morning, so we'd meet at our dorm in the evening, exchange cash and goods, and then we'd be on our separate ways.

Jake has been my best friend since sophomore year of high school. He has straight A's and dozens girls gawking all over him every second of every day. He uses the same pomade in his dark hair and wears the same cologne. He's a creature of habit and a ruthless romantic. I would be too if my parents were divorced and tried to kill each other on three separate occasions. He's been dragged to court by his parents so many times, he could become a lawyer by default. As a result, he has severe issues with forming meaningful connections and finds great difficulty in trusting people unless they offer benefits right off the bat. There are just some things you can't let go of.

At first, it was just me going out to buy whatever Jake wanted when he was too swamped to get it himself. Whatever bottles the store on the corner had behind the counter, I would get it. I didn't care for alcohol, but I never left my room and figured it was a decent way to get out of my dorm for more than twice a day. Whatever. It didn't matter and it wasn't a problem. If he got caught, I had nothing to do with it. I kept everything in thick reusable bags so it's not like anyone could see what I had anyways.

The issue came about when the second semester of my first year hit.

I have a chart pasted to the back of my desk that identifies all the types of negative thinking. It's helpful to decipher what is wrong with me at that exact moment in time, but it offers little to no solutions on combatting the negative thinking, thus rendering it close to useless. However, the chart does not outline the characteristics of the one type of negative thinking that affects me the most. There is no name for it. It's just the overwhelming crushing sensation that everything sucks, everything is insignificant, don't talk to me, don't touch me, don't look in my direction, I want to be alone and wallow in my sadness because every outside factor in my life awakens a deep anger that I forgot existed. I also call it "TOCS", which stands for "the overwhelming crushing sensation". Nobody else knows what this is so it's pointless to turn it into an acronym but I did it anyways.

The issue spawned from the deep depths of depression. Maybe I bought some for myself. Maybe I did. But I did down a whole bottle of some transparent-coconut-flavored-gasoline on a Tuesday night. And I didn't like how it tasted at the time but I liked the feeling I got after I did it. Nothing mattered and honestly, I couldn't have given a shit about anything. College? Nah. Disappointing everybody? Nah. The overwhelming urge to drop out and fly to Australia? Nah. I did sleep very well, and that outweighed the nasty headache the morning after I did it.

So the next night, I went out and got myself some more. I was ridiculously glad I kept a job throughout high school and saved up a fair amount of money. I sure as hell wasn't spending it on any recreational activities with friends, which was what I told my parents. It was just me, hanging out in my dorm room and figuring out if the coconut gasoline tasted better with lemonade or cranberry juice. After a month or so, I decided on orange juice.

It turned from an every now and then drink, to a nightly drink, to a constant flow of whatever I could get my hands on. The worst part was going home for thanksgiving break because only the devil humans could merely guess what my parents would do to me if they found out about my nightly habits. I was not going to break their hearts after they bought me a train ticket to come home. Who even takes a train anymore? Me, apparently.

Jake stayed behind during the week break, and he's not the only one hanging out in our room when I get back on a sunny Sunday evening.

"Hey, Dallon," he waves and cigarette ash goes flying all over his bedspread, "this is my friend, Pete. We met at a party, like, two days ago."

Pete looks like he's shaking hands with death. Clearly, he doesn't have anything in his system, but he either needs to sleep or invest in some brightening face masks. I don't have adequate experience in either of my suggestions.

I drop my duffel bag and nod in his direction. He's spinning slowly in Jake's desk chair, watching me like I'm about to pull a knife on him. I turn to my roommate and point to the cigarette between his fingers, then up to the smoke detector bolted to the wall above our beds. "You trying to get us busted or what?"

Jake points to the windows across the room. The blinds flap in the breeze that flows through the room. "Hey now, I know what I'm doing. Can't even say hello to our new friend?"

I turn to Pete. "Hi, Pete. I'm Dallon. It's very nice to meet you."

"I heard you have a fake ID." He says. He crosses his arms and refuses to break eye contact. I don't think he's sleepy, just mean.

"Yeah," I stuff my hands in my pockets, "what's it to you?"

"Just need a few favors now and then. You know how strict the RA's are." He raises his eyebrows like I don't know what he's talking about. I do. I know exactly what he's talking about.

I glance over at Jake and the smirk plastered across his face. I turn my attention to Pete and lean back against my bed. "What're you looking for?"

He shrugs. "Depends on the day. What do you have?"

I have to lift the curtain of sheets out of the way to lean underneath my bed. I pull out the main mini fridge, and drag out another fairly large mini fridge. Pete's eyes widen significantly. If you don't know what you're looking for, you wouldn't have any clue it's there. I'm far from stupid.

I nudge the door open with the toe of my sneakers and in all it's glory sits bottle after bottle of whatever alcohol Pete could dream of, and those are just the refrigerated ones. The hidden space behind my dresser is loaded with even more, along with a small variety of drugs. I'm not a fan of drugs, but I know they're in demand. I don't have a job and I have to keep an influx of cash somehow. I can't have student loans forever.

"You want it, I got it." I say and shut the door. Pete sits in a state of shock for a second until he asks the second most common question.

"How much do you charge?"

It's my turn to shrug. "Negotiable. I tend to charge just a bit above the shelf price, but really not too much extra. I wouldn't do that t'you."

He does a few calculations in his head. His eye twitches when he does it. "I'll probably be swinging by this Friday," he says, "surprise me. I'll bring fifty bucks."

Jake grins as I pull my sheets back down over my refrigerators. He likes to see that money he spent being put to good use.

"Pleasure doing business with you."

Part two

I'm sitting on the floor on my phone with a drink in my hand when Jake bursts through the door to our room at six o'clock on a Thursday. It's cloudy and the threat of rain looms in the forecast but fails to predict anything with accuracy. He smells like the exhaust pipe of an eighteen-wheeler and slightly expired strawberries. I'm right in the middle of my fifth mixed drink of the day. I didn't go to my single class scheduled at eleven in the morning.

"Wanna go to a party with me tonight?" He asks and slams the door shut behind him.

"No. Don't be ridiculous. Only chicks with tube tops get into parties." I roll my eyes at him. No boys allowed.

He stands in the doorway with his deflated black backpack. He took my fur-lined jean jacket to his three classes for the day, layering it over a white shirt and black jeans. We both desperately need to do laundry, but the washing machines are down in the basement and that is too far away.

"I know a guy that will get us in," he says, "I told him we'd bring a bottle."

"Shit ain't free, Jake. That would be a loss in profit." I rub my fingers together as if I'm holding a dollar bill.

"I'll pay for it. Whatever you want to cough up, I'll Venmo you."

"Thirty bucks for a two liter bottle of your least favorite."

He glares at me. I don't look away from my Snapchat home screen, but I can feel the imaginary daggers. "Fine. I'll send it later. I guess that means you're coming with me?"

"I didn't say that."

He tosses his backpack onto his bed like it's full of rocks and sinks down to the floor beside me. "You going through it?"

I set my drink down on the hardwood tile before I can crush the plastic cup into shards to threaten him with. "Shut the fuck up."

He does not. "Did you go to group today?"

No. "Yes."

"What did you talk about?" He pushes.

"Maintaining a daily routine." I mutter. "They said we should try to spend more time outside and enjoy the sun."

Jake frowns. "That's dumb. What does sunlight have to do with anything? If anything, looking at the sun hurts my eyes and reminds me that life is insignificant in relation to the rest of the universe."

"Lack of sunlight has been lined to decreased serotonin levels. Serotonin release can be triggered by natural light entering the retina. When the days are shorter, seasonal depression tends to kick in due to the brief periods of sun. A common solution and treatment to seasonal depression or just straight up depression is phototherapy, more commonly known as lightbox therapy. You place a strong light in a box so that it mimics natural light, and expose yourself to it for about ten minutes per day to achieve desirable results, but—"

"Thank you for the lecture, encyclopedia." He grabs the side of my face and stares into my pupils. "I feel like I'm looking into a pair of black holes."

"That's scientifically impossible. Black holes absorb light, particles, and electromagnetic radiation and are therefore invisible to the naked eye."

Jake clenches his jaw and lets go of my face. "Your presence is both a blessing and a curse. Mainly a curse. I don't hang out with you to learn shit."

"You asked." I say.

"Whatever. I know you didn't go to group today, and I also know you have an appointment tomorrow night. Five o'clock at the West Lake dorm's satellite location."

I wish he'd stop snooping through my scheduling book. What an invasion of privacy. "And what're you gonna do about it?"

Jake unlocks his phone and scrolls through his daily calendar. I watch over his shoulder as he checks the time slot for four and five o'clock tomorrow. They're both blank. "We're going to go together. I'll wait in the lobby for you."

"Ha ha," I mutter, "hilarious. You can't force me to do anything. I'll beat you up if I have to. You know I'll do it."

He gestures over his shoulder to my stash. "And you know I'll call the RA and casually mention the plethora of illegal items you have underneath your bed."

"I'll throw you under the bus with me. I won't go down that easily." Actually, anything could take me down. If a feather were to land on my shoulder, I would come crashing down like a crappy set of Jenga. All it would take is for someone to look me dead in the eyes and seriously ask if I'm okay.

We sit together in silence. I let him take a few sips of the concoction in my cup. He almost pukes, but muscles through the taste for the highly sought after buzz. It's six o'clock on a Thursday night.

"We leave at ten." Jake stands and hops into bed. "Wake me up at nine. Have to get ready."

Part three

It's very rare nowadays that I wake up with a raging headache. Usually, I just roll out of bed in a pair of sweatpants and an old shirt and I head to whatever class I have scheduled with little to no problems. Hangovers don't exist in my world.

Except for today. I can barely think straight, let alone try to recall who the fuck is sleeping in my bed, on my chest, wearing my fur-lined jean jacket. It sure as hell isn't Jake or some chick in a tube top. He doesn't look like Pete, and I don't remember the people that I sell to well enough to recall their hair color and style. 

Slowly, I detach my arm from around his shoulders and knit my fingers together at the nape of my neck. I glance over to Jake's empty bed out of the corner of my eye. I check to see if his bathrobe is still there, and it is. He's not taking a shower, it's too early for him to get food, so it's a safe bet he hooked up with someone a couple hours ago and decided to stay wherever he was. I'll have to check on his location when I get this guy off me, maybe I'll try to call him. Whatever. He's a big boy, he can make it home himself.

"D'you have class?" The guy on my chest groans. He props himself up on his elbow and rubs his eye with the palm of his hand. I don't know what I did last night, but I certainly came home with a winner.

I shake my head. "Who are you?"

"Brendon. Do you have class?" His voice is low and rough.

"No. You want to leave? I have a car. I'll drop you off wherever you need to go."

Brendon checks a silver watch strapped around his wrist. A large white scratch scars the face of it. "Don't think I'll go. Friday discussion classes suck."

"For sure." I mutter. "This is my room so you can head out whenever. I don't care."

My head is pounding and killing to break out of my skull. I could puke right now if I didn't have an ounce of self control. I would like nothing more than to chug a Red Bull and sit in one of the communal showers for an hour.

"You got any more shit to drink?" Brendon mutters.

"You name it, I've got it."

He sits up completely. In the limited light pouring through the blinds, it's safe to say I brought back a winner. Go, me.

"The hell does that mean?" He asks with a dopey smile. "You're twenty one?"

His grin is infectious. "Nah, I have a fake ID.
Are you twenty one?"

"If I could legally get alcohol on my own I wouldn't be sneaking in to parties."

Brendon lets go when I roll out of bed and almost collapse on the floor. He leans in his elbow and rests his cheek on his fist. "Pick your poison." I say.

"Surprise me. I don't take mixers." He winks.

We don't even talk, we just drink from the first bottle I grab until the blissful buzz hits again and our vision gets blurry. I don't even know who thus guy is, but he's here and he sure can hold his alcohol. There comes a point where I don't even look at which of my bottles I grab, I just pour cup after cup and chug like it isn't a Friday morning.

What catches me off guard the most is that Brendon keeps up. Again, I brought home a winner. I'm also surprised at how ready he is to get absolutely wasted with me. I guess we clicked when we met up last night and I just don't remember.

After the equivalent to shot number five, he does stop and hold my shoulder in a death grip. "Okay, if we're gonna have more, we have to start talking so I can focus on something other than the urge to barf up my intestinal tract."

I feel like my head is a whirlpool and whatever he just said is a little insignificant fish to all the force spinning my brain around. "Whatever. I don't even know who you are. Tell me your entire life story and I won't remember."

"Ah," he takes a long sip, "nobody wants to hear that shit."

"I can guarantee that it doesn't matter to me." I stare at the gasoline in my cup. It's potent and tastes awful. I take another gulp. "Try me. I've heard plenty."

"Don't think you could keep up." He shrugs.

"Try me."

"I won't. Tell me about you first."

"Woah, okay, now nobody really wants to hear that shit." I stare at the floor but I still see Brendon grin. "I could cite everything everyone has ever said to me and I can guarantee you would hate that."

He raises his eyebrows. "Oh, really? What was the first thing I said to you last night?"

I don't even remember leaving my room last night. The pregame was intense enough, let alone whatever I did while I was out and about. "Can I be honest? I don't remember anything. I was totally gone when I met you." I feel bad for saying the truth, but I also can't help but snicker when I confess.

I expect him to frown and throw his drink in my face, but he laughs and takes another sip. "I guess I have to fill you in."

"...Please tell me we didn't fuck."

"Nah, but you did tell me you wanted to marry me while we were walking over here."

Yeah, I don't remember that. I don't think I'll remember any of this either, but I hope I can recall at least some of this when he's gone. "Shit, you're telling me I have to go splurge on a ring now? I'm not sure I can afford one right now."

He shakes his head, still grinning and slowly swaying back and forth. "If you're trying to lock me down, good luck. Not even marriage can convince me."

My head hurts but in a different way. I don't know how to explain it. It's just different and it doesn't feel like someone's drilling into my brain with a jackhammer. "That... that sounds like a challenge rooted within years of emotional damage."

"Cheers to that." Brendon nods and holds out his cup. We gently nudge our drinks together and take a long gulp.

Then we sit in silence for another thirty minutes. We don't even speak when we go for two rounds of refills and start to pass out on the shaggy rug between us. The sun rises to the middle of the sky and casts moving shadows onto the tile. The hum of the air conditioner overwhelms every word that dares to float into my subconscious. Past a certain point, I can't even taste the burning sensation, I just feel like static. Static yields no emotions. Static cancels out TOCS.

This is nice. I'm going to regret it later, but for the time being, it is very nice.

"I don't know if you're bored of me yet," I mutter, "but you can stay the night if you want. I have an unused toothbrush and an air mattress if you don't feel like sleeping on my bed with me."

He sets his plastic cup on the floor and slides it against the wall with his foot. "Whatever. I don't even know how to blow up an air mattress."

"Neither do I."

"I'll just sleep with you. In a non-sexual way. Platonic sleep."

"I have no complaints."

"Are you tired?"

I sit up and stare at him through the swimming pools clouding my vision. "I don't know. Are you?"

Brendon shrugs the best he can in his position. "I don't think so. Is your roommate coming back any time soon? I don't want to disturb anyone."

"Pft," I roll my eyes and lay back down beside him, "whatever. Doesn't matter if he's uncomfortable. We've been friends for ages."

"Wow. That's a long time."

"Such a long time. I feel like... I feel like I've known you for longer. Like, I barely know you but I feel like I could move into a cabin in the middle of the woods with you and be completely fine with it. Is that weird?"

"No," he whispers, "not at all. That's what I was thinking when I saw you for the first time. I mean, I wasn't thinking about isolating ourselves in a cabin for the rest of our lives, but, like, similar concepts I guess. Is that weird?"

"No. That just means we're connected by fate. Do you believe in fate?"

He laughs quietly for about a minute straight before the giggles taper off and we tumble into comfortable silence again. "Not really. I believe in... I don't believe in anything anymore."

"Aw. That's sad. I'll believe in fate enough for the both of us."

"That sounds like a good plan."

Part four

When I wake up, I'm alone. The lights are off, I hear Jake snoring, and the sheets are tucked in neatly around me. I do peel a yellow sticky note from my forehead.

Thanks for having me. I got hungry and just decided to grab food and head home. My phone number is in your contacts and I think we added each other on Snapchat on Thursday night. Have a good Saturday. XO, B.U.

It takes me a few minutes to comprehend it and match the initials with the boy that spend the night twice. The recollection of the past forty eight hours is difficult, but it's something I don't mind piecing together.