Crying, sobbing, she screamed to no avail, no one could hear her, no one was there. Would anyone truly miss her, she wondered; no one ever really bothered to go out of their way to talk to her, to speak to her, to ask her how she was, to ask her what she was doing that evening, how life was going, what her hopes and dreams were, where she got those pants, who did her hair, nice shoes Jessica, see you in class maybe. Not a word. She engaged others first, hi, how are you today, did you get the assignment done; going to dinner, can I come with? No? Oh alright, next time maybe. She stared at the computer, at the blank MS word page, the white space and the blinking cursor taunting her with the twenty pages she needed to write for one of her classes – the first draft being due the next afternoon, she was pulling her hair out over it.

She’d not slept a total of five hours in the past week, she glared at the silent TV set with its flickering images, she kept it on mute so she could have some semblance of concentration yet kept it on for comfort so it was not so silent in the room, despite the music that continually blasted from her computer’s speakers. She sighed, tears still tracing down her cheeks, and closed the word processor. She was not going to get anywhere with the paper tonight, she could tell; despite the fact that half her grade depended on it, she just did not care.

Care about anything really, she glanced at the door, closed as usual, not that anyone knocked on it – she lived in an isolated part of the building, not that it kept them from not visiting her when she lived in a more accessible part of campus. She looked at the posters that hung haphazardly from the walls, their inability to stay where she put them a continual source of frustration – a shallow one, but a frustration nonetheless. Her eyes hit upon the shower bucket and more importantly the razor in it. But only for a moment, she knew she’d never go through with it. It wasn’t the act itself; it was the dislike of leaving a mess – never one to make a fuss. Smiling bitterly she wondered if anyone would even notice if she did, how long would she stay undiscovered up here?

Turning back to the monitor, her hand hit the cup next to the mouse, spilling the caffeinated contents all over the keyboard to her chagrin. Grabbing the paper towels she sopped up the mess, and nearly collapsed on sticky mess out of pure anger. She threw away the soaked paper and leaned back in her chair, just trying to keep from breaking something else, and found herself staring at the ceiling, at the blinking light of the smoke detector, becoming mesmerized by that.

She was three weeks from graduating, three weeks from leaving this hellhole behind, and here she sat, about to fail a class, not sleeping for three days straight, not knowing what to do, not having anyone to talk to about it, not having anyone who cared and yet she did. She opened MS Word again and the words spilled out like the soda had moments earlier. Pages flew into more pages, and she did not stop writing for eight straight hours, not bothering to edit, not bothering to proofread, not bothering to do a damn thing but cite and write, stopping only to save and print. Walking into class, she handed the thick stack to the professor and immediately turned and walked out, no, ran out, not listening to her classmates call after her, not hearing the teacher do the same, just ran out the door of the academic building and down the main drag til she had tired herself out. It’s all messed up but we’ll survive, it’s all messed up but we’re alright.