Not remotely what my roommate and I look like

Bwog forced Friday Daily Editor Idris O’Neill to read 1,000 of those fake script memes during housing season. Here’s what happened.

INT. FERRIS BOOTH – MIDDAY

A crowded scene, loud rambling. ED SHEERAN’s “Photograph” is playing from downstairs, but just out of earshot. The COLUMBIA HEAVYWEIGHT CREW TEAM is taking up too many tables. Next to them sit TWO WOMEN, one clearly exasperated, the other slightly amused by them. Walking up the stairs, catching sight of these women laughing, is YOU.

You are a a first-year, an avid fan of romantic comedies and 90’s R&B and thus appropriately melodramatic, a real Barnard woman.

The exasperated woman is a stranger to you. The WOMAN across from her is your roommate – 18 or so, eyes bright and friendly, clearly angelic and too good to be eating here. You do not approach their table, but your roommate, momentarily distracted from the conversation, turns and catches your gaze. Still, you do not approach, but the ramblings come to a silence and Ed Sheeran’s “Photograph” grows louder. Slowly, the lighting dims, a limelight on your roommate. The dining hall setting dissolves into…

…your SULZBERGER DORM.

Within this flashback, you and your roommate sit on your respective beds, opposite each other. Though your beds are a mere five feet apart, the distance is exacerbated by the tension. Your roommate is backdropped by polaroids she has accumulated this school year. Ed Sheeran’s “Photograph” is still playing.

YOU

I just wasn’t sure if you wanted to.

ROOMMATE

I know, I know. I didn’t know if you wanted to either.

YOU

I wasn’t expecting this to happen, you know? I didn’t think, when I first saw you, that this would be it for me – that you would be it for me. I can’t imagine this with anyone else.

ED SHEERAN

You won’t ever be alone, wait for me to come home.

ROOMMATE

But we never really talked about us. I overheard you talking about it so I just assumed we’d be rooming with other people next year.

A beat. You consider this. You did, in fact, not-so-discreetly talk about your housing plans in front of her. You feel a pang of guilt. Of course even when you made plans without asking her to room with you again in the same room as her, she, being the angel she is, said said she “overheard.”

ED SHEERAN

I swear it will get easier, remember that with every piece of ya.

YOU

It’ll be fun though – rooming with your friends. Honestly, what an upgrade for you! You won’t have to deal with my alarm going off six times every morning. No accidentally leaving the heater on or window open. God and my friends? They won’t just burst into our room anymore. It’s fine! It’ll be so fun. Just not the same.

ROOMMATE

Yeah. Not the same.

FADE…

The scene returns to Ferris Booth. You and your roommate are still looking at each other. She gives a smile and you return it. You keep walking.

THE END

Photo via Wikimedia Commons