Silent Scream

Monday night, 10:00 pm, Towers Dining Hall.
I'm in line for food. I couldn't really eat dinner a couple hours before, I was too jacked up on caffeine and had too much anxiety churning in my stomach to really eat anything. A bite of salad here, a piece of carrot there, maybe a chunk of steak, I couldn't take anymore than that. I had to send my plate off into the kitchen almost completely untouched. I felt a little guilty for wasting the food.
And so I went off to work, and after my shift I was fucking ravenous. And so here I am, in line for Late Night, some of the most awful food on campus. I'll put up with it, I just need something to put in my stomach.

And then she cut in line. Right. Fucking. In front of me.

She was short, dressed in a pink hoodie, with her sweat pants tucked into obscene, furry little boots.
Black hair, carelessly drawn back into a ratty, half-assed pony tail.
Purple glasses, behind which rested oblivious, glazed over cow eyes.
And the voice. Oh that voice. One could spend hours listening to that excruciating voice were one so masochistically inclined. Long Island sharpened her speech to an exquisitely painful edge. It sliced right through my armor with each syllable, I could almost hear my bleeding soul cry out for mercy. My god it was beautiful piece of work.

And the words that voice spoke:
"So anyway, all I had at dinner was, like, a little salad, some of those potatoes and a piece of cake, so I shouldn't be overdoing it with Late Night."
"So, um, do you, like, want to go to the gym later?"
"Oh my god! What is that you're wearing?"

She crossed in front of me, I think, to join her friends. Her pack of hyena friends. All of them were at least a head shorter than me. I, the giant amongst a group of childish, chatty little pygmies.
If we lived in a simple time, one without the trappings of modernity, perhaps a more sensible time, I think I'd be able to kill all of them for getting in the way of my food without a silly hint of remorse.
It's simple really; eat or die.
Hey, why not?
I look at the silverware rack, giving a tender, then savage glance at the butter knives. My cultural conditioning keeps me from satisfying my baser desires. I damn humanity as I take my hamburger. As I walk to my table I catch her glance, wishing and praying for the venom in my eyes to reach straight through her. I don't know if I succeeded, I don't suppose it really matters.

I had two tests in a row today, one interrupted by a fire alarm.
My prospective landlord told me that there is another group of three who are eyeing our apartment. He told me the first to sign the lease and give him the security deposit is going to get the place. He might as well have ripped my sanity right out of my head; my paranoia about losing the apartment has grown tremendously since we spoke this afternoon.
We have our first concert this Friday for VoiceStream, I'm working publicity Wednesday morning in Campus Center, and we have three hour rehearsals both Wednesday and Thursday night. On three songs out of our fourteen song set I have no idea what I'm doing. Over the weekend we leave to do a gig in Vermont.

It's been a long time since I've been completely frozen in fear. My room is a mess, my hands shake, I can't sleep.
And she has the audacity to cut me in line. Were I just a little weaker I think I would have thrown things against the wall and screamed.
I considered punching a wall earlier. I still have a bump on the knuckle of my right middle finger from the last time I punched a wall. It was last year, I was in the shower. I can't remember what it was I was frustrated about, but I threw my fist into the shower wall four or five times. I hadn't done it before, I was curious how it would make me feel. The rush was satisfying at the moment, but the pain killed the satisfaction after a while.
I made a loose fist, singled out a cinder block in the hallway at about chest height, and paused. The grief inspiring realization that doing this is just going to make my hand hurt and not solve any of my problems washed over me with crushing finality. I walked on defeated, sort of tapping the wall with my hand as I passed.
And so I sit here and type, buried alive.