Theories of Insanity

30 | Alliances

30 | Alliances

Sunday, February 11, 2018

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Insanity:

Having a sleepover an hour away from 10 PM on Thursday to 7 AM on Friday.

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            Yara left earlier that week, and I was sad to see her go. She had brought an innocent light to the apartment—free of the drama and issues that wracked us for most of the time.

            Speaking of which.

            Since the beginning of the semester, Paige and Madison had started to become remarkably close. It was a strange thing for the rest of us to witness, seeing as Paige had strongly disliked Madison for the majority of our Fall semester. It was also strange because, well...Madison made it strange. (1)

            There had been a few times in the past week alone where I would be sitting on the couch in the living room with Ashley and Madison—not speaking to Madison, naturally, after everything that had happened on the previous Sunday. The front door would open, and Madison's head would whip around to see who was walking in the apartment. On the off chance that the person walking in was Paige, Madison would jump up off of the couch, shout "Paige!" at the top of her lungs, and spring to bury the other girl in the biggest hug that her bony frame could muster.

            Ashley and I had considered doing the same thing when one of us got home to mock the two, but we couldn't force ourselves to do it. The act itself was just so strange and remarkably embarrassing, and we couldn't do it even for the sake of mockery. (2)

            On Monday night, Paige had called a meeting with the entire apartment to establish a 'ten o'clock quiet rule' for the apartment. Evidently, Ashley and I were far too loud late at night and were keeping Paige from being able to sleep when we played music out loud past 10:00. We agreed, seeing as the apartment should have been a comfortable and safe place for everyone, (3) even if 10:00 was an absurdly early time to demand absolute silence in a college dorm.

            Ironically, the Wednesday after this rule was established, I was taking full advantage of it by going to bed early so I could wake up early the next morning to take an exam. It was close to 10:45 and I was just beginning to fall asleep when the front door to the apartment opened and closed loudly, accompanied by two voices screaming at the top of their lungs.

            I had rolled out of bed after about five minutes of trying to fall asleep through the noise and walked into the hallway to see Paige and Madison standing directly outside of my bedroom door, exchanging loud stories about their evenings.

            I wasn't going to be that roommate who got angry over people talking before 11:00 PM. But as I walked back to my bed and climbed in, wrapping the pillow around my head, I couldn't help but note the irony.

            Thursday night brought about another strange occurrence: one o'clock in the morning arrived without Madison coming home, and I walked into Ashley's room in confusion—the girl was usually home before midnight, since she was such a stickler for the curfew imposed by Legered University's on-campus housing.

            "Hey Ash, any idea where Madison is? If she was kidnapped, I'm torn between being worried and grateful." (4)

            Ashley laughed, looking up from the book she was reading.