Mirrored Cuts

Chapter 14

I soon discovered that all college students believed sleep was for the weak. It was again, the middle of the night and I had been asleep when Akul and Carl burst through the door laughing with Ruby and her friend, Lily, on their backs. They fell into a pile on the floor. I shot up in bed, afraid, for a moment, that we were having an earthquake. I couldn't take more topography shifting events.

Ruby realized I was sleeping. I had no idea what she thought I would have been doing because she had done this before. But she had never done it with EMS people. How had they been invited to hang out with EMS people and I hadn't? Had I not seemed fun enough? I peered over at them from my lofted bed and they looked up. Akul's eyes were hypnotizing, the blue and green flecks shining like hidden gems. I wanted to brush the hair out of his face, keep his eyes focused on the world.

"Ruby, you didn't tell us Andi was your roommate!" Akul said.

"Oh, sorry. Andi is my roommate," Ruby said. Everyone laughed.

I smiled, hoping that it crept up into my eyes. Ruby performed so effortlessly.

"Come on down, Andi," Carl said. "We're going exploring. Want a piggy back ride?"

And just like that, I was in again. We ran out of my room holding our arms out, children pretending to be airplanes, pretending to be anywhere but here. We flew over the dreary carpets of puke colored greens and past the whiteboards of work-work-work. We jetted across streets, speeding up when the cars we were dodging started beeping. We bumped into each other and our giggles bubbled up like champagne. We were lights, planes that could pass for stars, and in the darkness, we were radiant.

We landed in a dorm's common room. Smaller-than-normal couches littered the floor and we took full advantage, flopping on them like dreary fish. Ruby and Akul pulled two couches together and made themselves a fort. Carl must have thought himself lucky to have two girls by his side and put his arms around each of us. I tensed my muscles, ready to flee and hoped that Akul or Ruby would look out at us and end the situation.

"Are you tired?" Carl said to Lily and me.

I nodded, using the small movement to try and put some space between myself and Carl.

"Maybe we should go to sleep?" I said, squirming even farther to the left.

"Maybe," Carl said, realizing my direction and taking his arm off of my shoulder. He focused his attention on Lily who stared at his face in adoration.

I launched myself onto another couch and curled up in a ball. Carl leaned back and Lily rested her head on his chest. They looked like babies, falling asleep with their mouths open, occasionally twitching to ward off an unwanted dream.

I hugged a pillow to my chest, regretting my decision to run away. Everyone else had made a friend, and I was on a cold couch, cuddling a scratchy pillow.

We started hanging out as a group, two boys, two girls and me. We would run around campus being silly and listening to their stories until it got too late and then we would sleep somewhere random and possibly against the rules, wake up with sore necks when the light called to us and go back to our dorms to shower, dress and pretend that we were getting 8 hours.

Being in EMS was more fun when you knew people. Flint kept asking me to do our chocolate chip cookie ritual or listen to music and I had to turn him down. I was always trying to catch up on sleep, homework or taking care of myself. I didn't have time for more. Especially with the shifts I was taking. I had started sniping shifts with Ruby and Lily. Everyone would get very quiet around 5:55 pm and everyone would start fidgeting with their phones. We would all try to be discreet so as not to alert the others of what we were doing, but we all knew. I had the delay in Internet connection down to a science. I knew at what second I needed to press submit for the Internet to transmit my message at 6:00 pm on the dot.