We met through one of those Facebook groups that Freshmen typically join when they’re getting ready to go to college. You know, the ones that help people find friends and roommates. Girls gush over what kinds of bedding their dorm room should be outfitted with and guys… Well, who knows what they talk about anyway. Girls. Sports. Who has the dirtiest laundry… whatever it is boys talk about. In our group, we chatted about how excited we were to have our first night at school. For us to all meet up.
Mia and I decided that we wanted to live in the apartments that bordered main campus. We’d have all the dining halls close, our classes within minutes, and the fields where the football team practiced where within view of our kitchen. Talk about prime real estate. Mia loved the idea, so we signed our lease separately when we visited the school for orientation in different groups.
I mean, maybe I’m looking at the entire endeavor wrong. I guess for some people, having a person share your space would be exciting. You can color coordinate your bedspreads to look like a page in a PB Teen catalog. You could borrow each other’s clothes, go to parties together, and turn into the best of friends. The kind of friends you read those online lists about; you know, the ones where someone describes their relationship with their roommate and how close they are? They’re on the Odyssey Online, Buzzfeed… whatever sites you like to read, I can guarantee that roommate relationships are on there. 20 one-liners you and your roommate have exchanged. How your roommate is like your sister. A letter to my roommate.
Like I said, the first few days were rough. Mia’s voice ran through the apartment like a non-stop windchime. High pitched and skin curdling, she’d chirp about her day and the boys she met and whatever else she did with her time when she wasn’t at our apartment. I’d sit there with whatever I was doing, wondering why she kept talking. Did all roommates do this? Don’t get me wrong, I was really excited to meet her and become friends. It just… I don’t know. It just wasn’t everything I thought it would be.
Instead of hanging out with me, her new friends started to come over. They’d all squeal and chime like wind chimes about boys, failed tests, and the really cute dress they’d found for game day next Saturday. Maybe college wasn’t for me. At least, not like this. Not when Barbie lived across the hall from me. It’s tough, watching someone who was supposed to be your friend branch out and leave you behind like a cactus after a southwestern sand storm. Um, hello? I have feelings too!
That didn’t really matter. Mia stopped coming home most of the time on weekends. She and her friends would post lots of pictures on FaceBook and Instagram or whatever it is people are using these days. I don’t really care; why would I want to watch other people's’ lives anyway? At any rate, Mia stopped coming home but she’d leave notes on our fridge saying things like, “At the Zeta house. See you tomorrow!” Or something similar. Aren’t Zetas those ugly girls from The House Bunny?
People drop by occasionally, looking for Mia. I don’t know what to tell them, so I quit opening the door. Mia’s sister dropped by the other day, but I told her Mia was out and I didn’t know anything about where she’d gone, or who she was with. Her sister gave me a funny look when I said that, suspicious or something. What does she expect? My life isn’t about Mia!
Our freshman year was coming to a close, riddled with finals and teary eyed girls who worried about seeing their friends over the summer. Would that cute boy still work at the corner store at home? There were a lot of other complaints, so I’d head home to the apartment after my classes and study sessions to get away from the boring chit chat.
Recanting the last day of the semester is kind of tough. I don’t remember all of it, especially because the taser must have shocked my memories away or something. I don’t know how that works, but the police officer obviously did because the next thing I know, I was in a locked hospital room post-op.
The nurses wouldn’t really talk to me, and my parents stayed outside of the glass. The doctor came to check on my incision a few times, but he was pretty quiet too. I know, I know… they’re disgusted or worried I might crawl out of the bed Emily Rose style and bite off their fingers. They don’t understand, though. I don’t really know if anyone will.
After the hospital came “the facility”. I don’t get to have a roommate here, and I’m not allowed into group therapy yet. They gave me a laptop that had no internet connectivity (um, do they even have that in a psychiatric facility? Bet not….) and told me to write. So, instead of group therapy I get to sit here and write about my feelings and “think about what I’ve done” to try and make sense of it. Little does anyone understand, it makes complete sense to me.
I don’t have a drive to kill. I don’t even like the idea of mutilation. Saw I, II, and however many other movies are out there that glorify torture, yeah… no. I don’t like those movies. Doctors here are reaching for any conclusions: she has anti-social personality disorder, she was psychotic. But what if I wasn’t?
What if I just felt better wearing Mia’s skin?
