A thousand moments become one night. It’s one of those times when you can’t sleep, when memories flood in and each breath is a lungful of regret. I type this on Craigslist, 4chan, Reddit, because as a college kid during the golden age of Craigslist personals, I am familiar with posting desire. The responses might not have been what I needed, but always what I wanted: attention. The same had been for 4chan and Reddit. Either site held a flavor. 4chan promised a quick tryst and a kiss with violence. Reddit offered some rhetoric or advice. On Craigslist, I just wanted something real. I asked for movie buddies, hiking mates, a hook up, or free shit. In short, I wanted to feel like I existed. But my moments of connection always fell shallow. People I met in real life seemed to fade in passing. I can no longer remember most of their faces or names, but occasionally I close my eyes and turn the wheel back in my mind to remember the seat in the autumn sunlight while waiting for college classes to start. I feel like I can see it still, though the spot has been renovated into an office building a few years back. I still remember your face though.
Now it’s nearing 3 AM and it hurts to breathe. Life has changed completely from that sandbox that was college. Quietness has always granted me some invisibility and I had taken that as a shield from the dramatics of the world. Now I’m falling apart in slow motion. The seams of me pulling loose now that I am of so little substance. It feels like a late night drunken existential crisis, but I’m not drunk, yet I’m unashamedly spamming messages out into the world.
I don’t know why I’m trying to talk to you. It’s been 10 years since we last lived together in college. Plus, we hated each other. You did, didn’t you? I was too introverted for your late night pub crawls; you too much of a tool. Yet, I thought we had a balance going (you even found one of my Craigslist ads and responded), but then you asked to change roommates.
It never did happen, but each day passed in silent resentment. You would say something snide like, “Are you not leaving the room today?” And of course, I had to act normal and pretend to live a life. A Craigslist post later and I had someone to watch a movie with. It seemed everything I did was a response to you. You found a boyfriend, and I made a Craigslist hook up. You chatted on the phone with family, I posted memes on 4chan. That time you responded to my ad, you wrote simply: “Please don’t.”
The scariest moment was when I woke up and your bed was still empty. Our room was so small, we practically stared at each other when we slept. Both our beds were raised and we both set up our desks below the beds. It was around 1 AM with rain pounding at the window that I stepped outside. I made laps around the dorm. Not sure what I was looking for. At 3 AM when I thought the rain would never stop and would drown the streets, I saw you walking down the street. You didn’t have shoes on, you wore a white medical bracelet on your wrist, and you had on a ill-fitting jacket. I ran back to the room and threw the blankets over me. When you came in, I kept my eyes closed, feigning sleep. You stepped towards me. I felt your breath on the blanket. The stench of alcohol. It felt like minutes with you waiting… for what? Did you suspect I was awake? You always tested me before going to sleep. Saying my name, waving in the dark from your bed. I always tried to block out the sounds, but maybe I didn’t try hard enough. You’d stop if I answered back.
Right?
You finally climbed into bed and after a moment, I heard you snoring. The day passed with you passed out. After we stopped being roommates, I thought change would come. It didn’t, each year that passed seemed to be a shadow of you. I still responded to the memory of you. I tried to be like you. I did pub crawls. I tried dating. I tried being the person you’d come home to.
Maybe you left too much of you with me. I could hardly imagine how. You told me so little about yourself. But you responded well when I told you I was autistic. You already know about it. Your brother was autistic, and you often spoke about the bullying, the self-harm. I think that was what caused me to look you up a few years ago. To see how you were doing.
You seemed well enough. Your sense of fashion grew wilder. Your friends more chaotic. I think you even started drugs. You hadn’t post anything in a year when I heard about your passing. Your brother posted something using your account, saying that it’s been a few months and your family finally decided to take down your social media.
I had finally thought that a door had closed. That I was now alone. I remember posting a Craigslist message on Missed Connections saying goodbye. It was trite, I know, but it was a way I communicate (often to myself). Then I dreamt of you.
We were sitting in my living room, in my current apartment. You had your hands folded. I was nervous. We were having the talk. “Look,” you said. You looked at me, trying to hold my gaze. “I think we need a new living arrangement. I talked to the RA already. We’re just too different and I don’t want to bother you.” I was about to nod along when there was a knock.
And I woke up to the knocking. I stared at the ceiling. The room was dark and the streetlamp outside casted bars of light against the wall. But as I moved, I heard something shift beside me. A breath grazed my cheek and tinkled my neck.
I froze. Seconds stretched as my heart pounded in my ears. Another breath. Strands of hair fell across my face. I didn’t dare to breathe. Someone was in my room inches from my face. With each breath that blew against me, my lungs strained. Just when I feared I would give away that I was awake, I heard the knocking again. And the breathing stopped.
I flicked on the light and when I saw that no one was in the room, I cried.
That was the first. Things seemed to progress normally. I didn’t tell anyone. It could’ve been a hallucination. It was honestly weirder to explain that I cyberstalked you for years then dreamt about you. But I wanted someone to weigh in, so I made a 4chan post. Maybe it was the nostalgia in me, but I need a slap of reality by someone calling me an idiot and a creep. Instead I got a response, “Please don’t.”
I didn’t check the responses after that. And the following nights, there was always a knock that woke me around 3 AM. Sometimes, upon waking, I felt the tickles of breath. The breaths faded when something interrupted the quiet. A passing car, a dog barking, or the knocking. I’m fairly sure the knocking isn’t from the front door nor is it from the window (thank God). But it’s somewhere in my room. I’ve started waking just before 3 AM to prepare for the knock, but that seems to make it worse, because I see someone across the room. I’m sure it’s you, but why you’d wave, I don’t know.
I don’t respond, in fact, I learned to keep my eyes closed.
Tonight it’s different, because I can’t go to sleep anymore. The last few times I dreamt I was walking down the street and I see you. It looks like you’re waving, then knock. Now I’m hearing my name when I wake up. So I won’t sleep.
I’m spamming messages. I feel like I need to be heard, especially now that it’s almost time for the knock. I resolved to finally end my silence. I always found retreat in invisibility, but now I think I’ll be there for you when you come. If you’re reading this, I posted this after 3 AM.
-–
Hey it feels weird being back at the computer, I thoguht it would be different somehow. After hearing knock in my room i turned and as usual, lik a dream, there was someone acroos the room. They waved and I know I heard my name. I tried to answer back and it was difficul t. but i did say hey. I swear he smiled and he didn’t sotp but another knock an d he stoped and the kcok was from the closet my closet. knok kncok knock. the lights were off but i walked my way there. I felt him breathing and following me his face by my face a shadow with me
konck knock
when i opened the closet i swear he was waving at me but why wave with his hole body i don’t no. his feet knock knocking agsint the door and wall hes shaking and licking the air
he called me again and i called to him and i fell in the closet where i felt i was breathing the same breath as him. It seems I just missed him