Shades of Limelight

5: Imbalance

Reasons why I am likely to lose my mind sometime in the near future (abridged):

1. I left a career-building unpaid internship for something meaningless that at least paid me, and it certainly seemed like no one understood that besides my mother.

2. My now ex-boyfriend turned a moment of victory for the school into a horrible front-page story that made us both look bad.

3. A very nice sorority girl who told me I was pretty could have died at a party I was attending.

I looked up from my notebook for a moment. Even though it was just a shortened version of why I wasn't in the best place emotionally, it didn't seem like a lot now that it was written out in front of me.

Courtney, the girl who ended up unconscious at the party, definitely had it much worse than I did.

Her pale, unresponsive face came right back into my mind, and it was such a weird change from how full of life she was just a few minutes before. It was like I didn't even have the chance to realize how scary it was, even while Ryan and I were making sure nothing got worse as we waited for the paramedics to arrive. In that moment, all I could do was keep an eye on her breathing and make sure she had space. How did it all seem so unreal up until just now?

But before I could go back to looking busy by writing more reasons and making my list look a little less pathetic, Ryan came into the room.

"You hear anything about how she's doing?" Ryan asked me.

"Who? Courtney from the party?" I shook my head. "You don't think she got roofied, do you?"

Ryan sat down next to me and shrugged. "I don't know, but that's what I was thinking myself. I've never seen anything like that happen ever."

I hadn't seen anyone so young get so sick so fast either, but he also had a lot more time to go to parties than I did, so it wasn't like my ignorance meant much in the moment.

"It's just really upsetting. I hate seeing anyone in pain or in trouble, and there really wasn't anything we could do to help her besides calling EMS," Ryan continued.

I wasn't really in the mood to relive the experience, so I nodded. "We did what we could for her. You never think something like that could actually happen so close to you."

"You know, that's exactly what's bothering me the most about this. You think we would have heard by now if she was dead, though, right?"

I let out a breath. "I don't know."

"I mean, shit, Layla. It's so easy to forget how precious life is, and I take it for granted so much. Not anymore, though. From now on, I'm—"

I cut him off. "You should probably quiet down. Isabel's probably busy and doesn't need to be distracted with this conversation," I said and nodded my head toward the door with Isabel's name on it.

"Oh, you're probably right. Sorry."

I knew that he wouldn't be able to keep quiet for long, so I flipped the page in my notebook before he had the chance to ask me what I was working on. It didn't matter and made me look really self-centered. Besides, I had enough material to start on a new article about the possibility of Wisconsin being in the National Championship Game. It was always Corey's dream to be able to play in such a big game, and now that opportunity was right in front of him.

I wasn't sure why that thought crossed my mind. It didn't matter to me anymore.

"So how are you holding up?" Ryan asked.

The quiet was nice while it lasted.

"I'm fine. It's been a long week," I said.

He nodded. "It has, but that's not exactly what I was asking."