Bad Vibes

Alone

I'm always alone.

It doesn't really matter if I'm surrounded by people. My family doesn't really love me. My friends aren't really my friends. They never want to see me. Nobody ever wants to see me.

These are my perpetual thoughts. Maybe if they flowed through my head a little less often, I'd occasionally find joy in being alive. That's not where I currently stand, though. I hate being alive. These thoughts run through my mind and cause a pain in my chest, and my stomach starts to burn. Even when the thoughts retreat to the background of my mind, drowned out by music or a TV show turned on too loud, it still aches. This perpetual dull ache in my chest reminds me even in my happiest moments that I'd still be better off dead.

But I had a good night at work.

It was busy. Stressful. I felt overwhelmed most of the night and apologized to customers for long waits more times than I can count. But for once in my life, I felt like I was enough. The customers weren't mad at me. They tipped me well. I drove home feeling so great that for once, I had forgotten about the ache in my chest.

I had moved back to campus for Fall semester three weeks before. I got stuck with a roommate, but up to that point, we'd gotten along really well. I wasn't so mad about having a roommate anymore, because at least I felt less alone.

But she was moody. I like people people to be straightforward with me, and she was anything but.

She didn't talk to me when I got back to our dorm. She snuck out of the room while I was in the bathroom, and after ten minutes she still hadn't come back. I retreated to my bed deciding we would talk in the morning, if she felt like it.

As I started to nod off, I was scared awake by the door opening and closing. And then again. And then again. The lights came on, and then off. I stayed rolled over toward the wall, not wanting her to realize I was awake. I grew more irritated by the second. I didn't want to be awake anymore. My desire to talk to her had passed. Finally the door closed for the last time and I was in silence. I rolled over and saw that she had left the bathroom door open and the light on over the sink. I slipped out of bed quickly and closed the door, then flipped the light off. I hopped back in bed and sighed.

I was alone again.

Just as I began to doze for the second time, the noise began again. This time, I rolled over slightly, irritation plain on my face. She stood right beside my bed smiling.

"Are you mad at me?" she asked, not sounding worried either way.

I didn't answer her. I just kept glaring. She lifted her phone and glanced down at it.

"Sorry, the acrobatics and tumbling team got really drunk and their friend needs a place to sleep. But it's a guy," she said.

"What the fuck?" I snapped, making sure she understood fully that I did not intend to allow this to happen. My glare held firm.

She backtracked. "I told him that you were asleep and I didn't think you would be comfortable with it, so he can't sleep here."

I turned my glare to the ceiling. Fine. No guy. But I still wasn't happy about being awake.

She disappeared out of the room again, turning off the light and slamming the door once more. I rolled back over with a heavy sigh.

I hated snapping at her. I hated snapping at anyone. I didn't have enough people in my life to potentially lose one. It made me ache again, knowing that I always walked on such thin ice with everyone I met.

Is it so much to ask to be able to be upset without worrying I'll lose someone?

The door opened for what I hoped was the last time. I rolled a little to glanced behind me and saw her coming back in.

With a guy.

They both got into her bed and I silently fumed in the dark for a few minutes before I couldn't take it anymore. I got up from my bed, gathered my laptop and a few notebooks, and went down the hall to the dorm's computer lab.

There was a couch and a TV in there with the computers, so that's where I chose to settle in. If I needed to take a nap there, so be it. It was a college after all. I wouldn't be the first one to fall asleep in the computer lab.

I wasn't in there long before I started to doze off with my head leaned on the back of the couch. Sleeping like that would have hurt my neck, so I was almost thankful when my roommate walked in and sat down on the couch beside me.

"I'm sorry. Can you please come back? He's kind of making me uncomfortable," she said.

"Then you probably shouldn't have let him sleep in your bed," I answered, pretending to be doing something on my laptop.

"I just didn't know what else to do. He needed a place to sleep."

"That sounds like his problem. I don't want him in my room."

"Just please come back."

"No."

We sat there in silence. I didn't look at her or make any effort to move. I just kept tapping away at my keyboard.

She finally got up and left after a few minutes. I kept tapping away. I kind of expected her to come back after a few minutes and tell me he was gone so I could go back to bed.

She didn't.

I woke up alone, on the couch in the computer lab with a raging headache and sore back. And that's where I still am, clicking away on my laptop so that if anyone walks by or comes in to do their own studying I won't look like I just spent the whole night here after an argument with my roommate.

I should really try getting used to this. I'm always going to be alone.