I sat in the passenger seat, watching buildings go by as the car sped down the road. It wasn't long before I could no longer recognize the scenery outside.
As we neared the end of the trip, my mother broke the silence. "Get. Out."
Without glancing back, I opened the door, and started off towards the giant sprawling black-and-grey mansion in front of me. I carried a purple backpack on my back, and heard the sound of screeching tires as I headed towards the place where I would be trapped for the next six years.
The light grey pavement of the sidewalk, and the old bricks of the building were a dramatic contrast to the red and orange trees surrounding it. As I walked up to the simple double doors that marked the entrance, I could hear the crunching of something walking through the leaves next to me. I looked over to see a fat black-and-orange cat stalking something.
As I stared at it, the world in front of me shifted. I could still see the cat, but it was in a different time. The cat looked older. The space shifted again, and the cat was in snow. This happened once more with the cat soaking wet. Then I could hear a loud "meow" and the cat was there again at the right time, and it stared up at me before running off into the distance, in a flurry of colorful dead leaves.
I turned back to the building, took a deep breath, and pushed open the doors. I pulled out a slip of paper from my back pocket. I was told that I was assigned a roommate by the name of Kaitlen. She was going to show me around. I knew nothing about her, except that she didn't have a roommate and that the whole thing was done last minute. That had nothing to do with her really, but I didn't think that she'd be too excited about having to look after some 12-year-old kid that she'd never met.
I paid little attention to the small lobby area I had entered, and instead focused on finding the correct room number. After passing through a series of hallways full of doors, I eventually stopped in front of a shiny black one covered in various emoji stickers. Centered on the door, just above my head was a set of metal numbers which matched the for that I'd written down on the paper.
"Are you just gonna stand there, or are you gonna walk in?" I jumped at the loud voice, startled and surprised. Before I could respond, the door in front of me swung open. It clipped my shoulder causing me to jump again. I was staring at the door that seemed to have moved on its own, when the voice came again, "I'm going to assume that you're Alyssa?"
"Yeah." I confirmed, my voice soft. My gaze was drawn to the floor where who I expected to be Kaitlen was laying on her back. The problem was that she didn't look much like a girl. "Are you Kaitlen?"
"No. I'm Jay. You're here because Kaitlen made some threats to Butters and I don't want to chance her following through with it." Jay was wearing a green beanie, a grey tank-top, no shoes, and red skinny jeans. He held up his hand - which was holding a phone - and gestured over to the right side of the room. It was mostly empty save for a bed and a small table. "You can stay over there. I don't care what you do. Just don't touch any of my shit. Alright?"
I walked over to the bed, tossed my bag onto it, and sat down. "Who's Butters?"
"Cat." A few seconds after the flat statement, I could hear loud, fast-paced music which I assumed came from some speaker.
Taking this as a cue that the conversation was over, I looked around at his side of the room. The bed was larger than the one I sat on, and it was covered with a wide array of plush throws and body pillows mixed with synthetic blankets. It looked like a cozy plush rainbow, and I was mildly jealous over the setup.
The floor was lined with mismatched carpeting, which in turn was covered in a scattering of miscellaneous items - pencils, empty soda cans, books, wrappers, old phone chargers, a rubix cube- I think I even saw a fidget spinner. In the corner, there was a 5-foot-tall plush giraffe. Save for the bed, there wasn't much in the way of furniture. There was a beanbag chair, a basket chair, and a desk hidden under stacks of what looked like blank loose leaf paper.
"Can you turn down the music?" I asked, quickly finding the high-pitched singing annoying.
"I can." Jay answered.
I watched him for a moment, waiting for him to pick up the phone, and turn it back down.
"...but I won't." Jay continued as if realizing that I'd been waiting.
I nodded, not wanting to get into an argument. A few songs later, I pulled my phone from out of my back pocket, then asked, "What's the WiFi?"
"DeathToTheDouches." Jay stated helpfully.
"Thanks." I scrolled down, and quickly found it. The connection was password protected, so I asked, "what's the password?"
"Capital 'T' then lowercase 'r-a-p-p-e-d-i-n-a' then capital 'P' a zero capital 'R-N' and another zero." Jay answered.
"Lovely," was all I could say as I logged onto the wifi. I checked my messages. There was nothing from my mom, but I was expecting that. I didn't have anything from anyone else, so instead I simply scrolled aimlessly through Instagram.