Sarah Mlynowski - Monkey Business

I can’t deal. I need to sleep. I turn off my reading light, toss the magazine onto the floor, climb back into bed and, crusty teeth and face be damned, I close my eyes. If I go to sleep, maybe I’ll feel better in the morning.

Did he buy new sheets? I bet he didn’t. Does she think of me naked when she washes those sheets?

I bet she comes every time. Shrieks and spasms and all. I bet she told him about how I faked it every time. Telling her that I thought I was frigid (after we’d polished off a pitcher of margaritas) was my second mistake. I told her about my little orgasm problem only because she’d confessed to being an occasional bulimic, but I realized right away that I’d been shortchanged. After all, she wasn’t telling me anything new. At least twice, I’d seen her puke after gorging herself on five slices of pizza.

I also told her how sweet Wayne was, which was my first mistake.

Never brag to another woman about your boyfriend, because she’ll want him for herself.

What else could I have blabbed? Thank God I didn’t tell her about getting pregnant.

Must sleep. Can’t.

I feel like the time I dropped acid in college, saw spiders on the walls, and thought that one of the girls was plotting to suffocate me. I saw everyone in freeze-frame, like a video in a broken VCR. I tried to sleep, but my brain wouldn’t turn off.

Like it won’t now. Maybe I’ll wash my face. There we go, that will give me something to do. It’s ten o’clock. I don’t even change into my I-look-sexy-even-though-I-happento-be-going-to-the-bathroom-in-the-middle-of-the-night outfit. What’s the point? No one cares. Russ isn’t interested. He has the lovely Sharon back home. Wayne doesn’t care. He’s living with Cheryl. And I’m a Stats failure.

My door creaks open. The hall is empty. Everyone is partying without me. No one is in the bathroom, either. Just me, alone. As usual.

As I lather the cleanser on my face, my eyes sting with tears. I hate when I cry. I’m not one of those sexy, demure criers. My eyes get red and blotchy and squinty, and when I breathe I sound like I have the hiccups. I rinse my face and sob at the same time, and accidentally swallow a mouthful of soapy water. Great. For the grand finale, the glorious conclusion to a truly spectacular day, I will now choke to death.

And that’s when the door to the bathroom opens and I am saved.

10:05 p.m.

“Are you okay?” I ask.

Kimmy is standing in front of the sink, bawling her eyes out and coughing. She nods and wipes her eyes. “I’m fine.”

I pat her on the shoulder. “You are not fine. Why don’t you come to my room and we’ll talk?”

Instead of looking at me, she looks at her reflection. “Talk about what?”

“About whatever is bothering you.”

She hesitates, then says, “Okay. Let me clean myself up first.”

“Good idea. And I’ll just be a sec.” I quickly pee, since that is the reason I came to the bathroom in the first place, and then find Kimmy waiting for me by the door. “I think you need a girls’ night.”

She opens her mouth to say something, changes her mind, then opens it again. “Where’s your room?” she asks as she follows me down the hallway.

“Make a right at the fork.”

We walk in silence. Maybe inviting Kimmy wasn’t a good idea. All I really know about her is that she was in diaper commercials. She seems so lonely. And she appears to be in need of a good girlfriend as much as I am. I snap on the light.

She scans my setup. “Wow. Did you get a decorator in here?”

“Not quite. But I appreciate the compliment. Why don’t you sit?” I gesture to the purple beanbag in the corner. “Just throw the newspapers on the floor.” I have a week of business sections that I’ve forgotten to recycle. “Do you want some tea?”

She sits. “Tea? No thanks.”

“Oh, Come on. I have herbal, and it’s good for you.”

She shrugs. “Okay.” This girl is at the bottom of her emotional barrel.

I plug in the kettle on my night table and then pass Kimmy a chenille blanket and a box of chocolate cookies. She shakes her head. “I’m more of a chips girl.”

“More for me, then,” I say, and sit cross-legged on the bed. I eat a lot of chocolate. Especially when I’m not having sex. I need to get my endorphin fix from something. “So tell me your life story. What’s wrong?”

She opens her mouth and starts to cry.

“Don’t cry, it can’t be that bad.” For the first time since I arrived at school, I feel at home. I miss my girlfriends. I miss my sister. I miss hanging out. I miss drinking tea, eating cookies and talking about everything and nothing.

“It’s that bad, believe me. I got a D in Accounting, another D in Economics and an F on the Stats assignment.”

I inwardly cringe. “Big deal. It’s just one assignment. Or three. And the Accounting assignment was only worth ten percent.” Probably not the time to mention my A’s or the Excellent job! comment I received or that Professor Gold gave me a smiley-face sticker.

“Trust me, Layla, I won’t do better on the next ones. I’ll probably fail out.”

“Fail out! What kind of talk is that? You won’t fail out. You just started. Maybe you’re not working hard enough.” The kettle hums, and I pour the boiling water into two cups stuffed with chamomile tea bags.

“You don’t understand. It doesn’t matter how hard I work, I don’t understand anything. I don’t get it. I’m a moron. I don’t belong here.”

I hand her a cup. I love these cups. They’re from the Calvin Klein mahogany fine-china collection. “You’re being ridiculous. Your group will help you.”

“No, they won’t. I can’t ask them. We’re having some, uh, issues. One of the guys has a crush on me, and I don’t want to encourage him.”

Gossip! I’ve missed gossip. “Yeah? Who?”

“Do you know Jamie Grossman?”

“Oh, yeah. He’s in your group? He’s hilarious. We met in the shower a few weeks ago.” She looks at me with disbelief, and I laugh. “Sounds more sordid than it was. I ran out of conditioner, so I asked the person next to me to lend me some.”

She nods. “So that’s what he was talking about today when he said he realized who was in the shower.”

“Ha! I’m surprised it took him so long. I recognized his voice from class immediately.”

“He doesn’t shut up in class.”

And the point is…? “That doesn’t bother me.”

“You never shut up, either.” She clamps her hand over her mouth. “I didn’t mean to say that out loud.”

I giggle. “You’re right. I like to talk in class. No reason not to get the participation marks.”

“I never talk in class.”

“You should.”

She shrugs. “I never have anything to say.”

“Neither do half the people in our Block,” I say. “And they still talk.”

She smiles. “I didn’t mean to insult you earlier. You make good points in class. I’m jealous.”

“And I’m jealous of the poetry you get in the bathroom,” I say.

“How embarrassing are those poems!” she shrieks, covering her face with the blanket.

They are a little embarrassing, but definitely sweet. “You could probably just wash them off the walls,” I suggest.

“I know,” Kimmy says, “but I kind of like them.” She laughs. “We got together in orientation.”

“Really? You and Casanova? No wonder he’s writing you poetry. So what happened? He wasn’t any good?” I ask, automatically leaning toward her.

She covers her face with the blanket again.

Girl talk! Girl talk! I need some girl talk. “Come on, tell me!”