11.4b

[Really, it's not the content that's killing me. I could probably go on forever like this. As a matter of fact, I know I could. I could just write and write and write and never finish. It's the PACE that's killing me. I just don't feel like I'll ever really quite catch up. So I'm writing another thousand something right now, just to put myself within striking distance of being caught up. I NEED 8,000 WORDS! I have 5.5! CRAPPPP]



I still didn't know what Enrique meant to Rosalyn, and it had been two weeks, three games, and a single lunchtime date since he ambushed me in the hallway and she said he was cute. It was going to drive me batty. I predicted my entire mental collapse occurring within  the month if something definitive didn't happen one way or the other.
Self?
Still here.
Be careful what you wish for.
Thanks, me. Good advice for life.

After game three, Rosalyn and Enrique walked out together, with me in tow. I figured if they weren't going to talk to me, I could take my sweet time getting back to the room. So I did. I lost them somewhere crossing the quad, and I sat down on a bench and listened to the sound of trees dying. It's a sound somewhere between sorrow and hope, like the rasping of a car as it struggles to make up its mind whether I'm walking today or not. Somewhere in the background, a single cello practiced a mournful droning line, just to add to the melancholy. I could have stayed on that bench on the quad for hours, if it wasn't for the growing chill and my pressing need to pee.
I picked up camp and got the heck out of dodge.
When I got back to the room, I had to fumble around in my coat pocket for the key. The door was shuddering with the sound of the bass from down the hall. I could see Daniel, our hall monitor, trying desperately to unlock a door for an attractive girl who was layered in a look of impatience and hate. I sighed in relief that I wasn't Daniel. Her glare was withering. I got my door unlocked before Daniel got hers unlocked and rushed inside to avoid having to watch her dissolve him with her passionate hate.
Self?
Yes, me.
I hate being me.
I know I do.
Enrique was there.
That's definitive.
I stopped breathing for a bit and slowly shuffled my way into the bathroom. Exhale. Good. Check vital signs. Alive. Pinch. Not dreaming. Mind? Still thinking. Stop that. Sponge? Don't mind if I do.
I picked up the sponge from the corner and started scrubbing down the communal sink. I had to move the twelve liters of beauty supplies that our suite mates seemed to deem necessary, so I shuffled them around as I scrubbed the sink a sparkly clean. Good. Ok. Got to get the grime out of the grout. There's a little ring of putty around the faucet and drain, too. Scrub those. Excellent. Shiny. Smelly, like old old shoes that have been left in a plastic bag. Turn on vent? Much better. Less smell, more sound. A trade I gladly made. Clean? Ah, mirror. Toothpaste flecks from last week. Toilet paper only makes the flecks into smears. Hm. Solution: clean washcloth and water. Weird streakyclean. Mmm. More water does not help. Dry it off. Streakyclean. Under sink: windex. Stupid. Windex and water. Streakyclean. Different washcloth. Clean clean. Dry it off. Excellent. I saw me clearly, then, in the mirror, a girl of indefinite sanity trying to determine whether or not Enrique was, in fact, definitive, or if he was, in fact, somebody or not nobody, when a knock came at the door. It was on our side. Good, or bad? Time to face the music.

I opened the door. Ros was there, sheepish.
"I should have texted."
She says it, but it stands for both of us.
I fell to my knees, exhausted. "Are you . . ." I let it hang like a wet cardigan.
"What? Am I what?"
"Are you in love? Are you single? Are you at least happy?"
"No, Cath. Too soon for love. Single? Probably. Happy? Magnificently. You?"
"Was he at least a good kisser?"
"Terrible."
We both laughed, then, and it felt like a brick building being pulled down in my mind. I made a mental note to thank Rosalyn later. She deserved it.