A portrait of trudging back to your second floor Dascomb room at four in the morning

by Violeta Gonzalez, Contributor

1. You should not have done this. Your body is beginning to fail you. There’s a weird exhausted ache in your chest. Your eyes feel like they’re about to bulge out of your skull and roll away. But it’s okay, because you were working in the lounge, so one measly flight of stairs and two sets of doors is all that separates you from your lovely, incredible, amazing, soft, cozy, warm bed. 

2. You ascend the stairs with your body slanted at what feels like a 45-degree angle because you’re all but collapsing from fatigue. But it’s okay. You have to be up at 7:30 tomorrow, but it’s okay. In the eternal words of George Harrison, all things must pass. Bed soon. Bed. Bed. Soon bed. Bed. Bed. Bed. Please god walk faster to my bed.

3. You swipe your phone on the little scanner thingy. You like this scanner thingy more than all the others because it does the scanning faster and makes a very pleasant sound when it unlocks the mechanism.

4. You open the door. 

5. And you literally cannot see anything. 

6. It is so dark. It is almost comically dark except for the very end of the hallway, where the exit sign glows red in an apocalyptic sort of way. Even the bathroom door is closed, in what you assume is for the first time in all of Oberlin College history. 

7. What is this? Why is this happening? You also came back at this time, like, two days ago, and the lights were on then. So this is obviously Not Normal. The door just closed behind you. You probably should not have let that happen. You wish you had left your headphones—which had been playing “Summertime” by The Sundays on loop for the last two hours in what you would describe as “a desperate attempt to feel something”—on over your ears when you walked up. For comfort.

8. You take a step forward. Then another. You start thinking about how this is how people get abducted in horror movies. Some crazy dude makes all the lights turn off right when you come up here and hides behind the closed bathroom door (Eureka! That’s why!) so when you walk by he can swing it open and pull a burlap sack over your head and take you away and put you up for ransom. Who would ever do this, one may ask. And to that you say, well, everybody is obsessed with me of course, so statistically one of them must be a crazy dude.

9. Alternative explanations:

10. The Upside Down is real and this is it. You really hate that you thought of this but tragically there is a very small part of you very deep down that still kind of likes Stranger Things.

11. All of your ex-best friends are playing an elaborate prank on you even though they are all still on the West coast. This is, of course, far more bone-chilling than any monster the universe could throw at you right now. 

12. Cult ritual? Dracula? Legion of bats? Surprise party? The introductory two minutes of some 2043 teenagers’ shitty true crime documentary? Hazing ritual even though everybody here is a first-year?

13. Oh god you’re going to die here. Oh god oh no you should have called your mom today instead of being like I’m sorry I have a lot of work can I call you tomorrow instead. Oh no. You haven’t even had a crazy ex yet. Or won an Oscar. Is it really possible to have lived until you’ve had a crazy ex or won an Oscar? You had so much potential. But when you finally turn up ten years from now, all that people will say when they see your body is—

14. Oh you’re inside your room and you didn’t even notice. You’ve been hovering by the door for like half a minute. And oh my god your bed is right there. Ohhhhh yeah baby. You love your bed. Your life has become better since getting the chance to sleep in this surprisingly comfortable college dorm bed. Wait why were the lights off? Who cares. Your bed is the best, and monsters are not real and there are no crazy murderers here, and your ex-best friends are all miserable because they miss you so much and you are doing great because you don’t miss them at all. And now you get to sleep.