Edited by: Stuti Sharma
Snippets from a journal titled “It’s Time We Close This Chapter”. Found in an old dorm room at Ashoka University. Unknown author.
Chapter 1: The Nothing Alley
Listen.
Do you hear that?
The sky is choking on thunderclouds.
It doesn’t rain. Not yet.
—
There’s a little alley between AC-03 and the basement ramp in front of RH-4.
In daylight, it’s nothing special. Hard, rough, sun-drenched, maroon with an indelible layer of dust. The alley is part of a banal routine. Back and forth, library to dorms, and repeat.
A few hours after midnight, it’s a space dimmer than any other. There’s no sound of people. The bricks are quiet under your footsteps. You begin to feel limbless if you don’t move.
Sometimes, out of the corner of your eye, you catch a shadowy silhouette on the reflective glass.
You look at your socked toes.
The silhouette looks at you.
When you meet its eyes, it looks like him. The ghost of a friendship that started in burning classrooms.
Funny, isn’t it?
He used to fit in your poems. Now you only think of him in places where you feel nothing.
Horrible, empty nothing.
Chapter 1: Dissociated
Chapter 1? Why am I still at Chapter 1?
—
The lock screen reads 3:23 am. Great. That’s seven more minutes.
You can read two more chapters. Then go to sleep.
You scroll down the list of your alarms. Turning them off, one by one, starting with the earliest that rings at 7:00 am. It hasn’t rung once this semester.
It’s fine. Your first class is at 10:10 am. You can wake up at 9:30 am.
There’s an infinitesimally small interval at night, when sleep takes her leave, placing two kisses on your lashes. When your gut feels empty and you crave scrambled eggs. When you’re positive you’ll discern decimal dimensions if you’re awake any longer.
Are you?
Where are you?
Schrodinger says there’s a chance some of your electrons are on the moon. Or, you know, scattered in some asteroid field, galaxies away.
Your eyes are drawn to the fan overhead. It spins languidly. Blades rhythmically catch the line of light beneath the door. Flapping, lashing, crescent ribbons.
The ribbons stir a mote of dust that swirls around and around. It settles nowhere, floating from one draft of air to the other. Your eyes stay stretched open. There’s no burn. It would be nice, you think, to float.
Chapter 1: The Cracking
Have I been here all this time? Did we never have a next chapter?
—
It’s been three days since you last texted him.
A week since he last reconnected with you after asking for indefinite space and returning a month later.
It’s strange.
You don’t miss him anymore.
The space he asked from you has made him return a new man—no, a new shell. A detoxed and de-carbs-ed shell. It’s the same old him. Except for that infuriating cheeriness on his spiteful tongue. You wish to sew his lip shut and cut the corners of his mouth in the shape of a smile.
Isn’t that the smile you smile at him every time?
But you don’t mean that, do you? He’s been your best friend since eighth grade. You grew up together.
You’re not obliged to care for a friendship at the cost of yourself.
You hate the person he’s becoming. You hate the person he brings out of you.
Is it really that surprising you’re falling apart?
Your mind becomes a tinderbox. He exhales sparks.
Chapter 1: Epilogue
It’s time we close this chapter, don’t you think?
—
The weekend leading into the reading week is a bizarre time.
In the end, it makes a pretty collage in your head. Your roommate and the perfectly sketched Anya Forger on her whiteboard, gossiping at midnight over chili oil Maggie, the traumatizing stench of rum, ‘good morning’ voice notes, pinned-up poems on your softboard, Monday night writer’s rooms, video calls to Dublin with brimming tea cups, jamming sessions in locked rooms during fumigation and so many more unforgettable pieces. Like confetti sprinkled all around.
It’s close to midnight. The mess lawns are quiet, save for the swooshing sounds of the wind.
Two girls lie on the grass beds, their words distorted into whispers. One of them throws her head back in laughter. It’s a pretty sound. Like wind chimes.
You stand alone at the front of the atrium. The peripheries of campus seem sharper—old silhouettes no longer haunt you. It’s a night without shadows.
It’s okay, you can rest now. You don’t have to chase people anymore.
It’s okay, you can let go. You have friends who make you want to be a better person.
It’s okay, you can start over. You know your priorities.
It’s okay, you’re on your own. Isn’t that exciting?
It’s okay. You’re happy.
—
You smell the storm before you hear it.
The skies are letting go.
Your lips twitch upwards when you feel the first drops of rain on your eyelids.
Chapter 2: Clean
Note: The journal ends with a new chapter title. Despite numerous extensive searches, no drafts of “Chapter 2: Clean” have been recovered. It is speculated to be unwritten.