The Annoying Sleepwalker novel · Chapter 1 of 24
Chapter 1: 3:12 A.M.
Her roommate smashes her laptop in front of the whole floor, everyone tells her to let it go, and this time she says yes and plans to put their priciest things on her desk.
At 3:12 in the morning, my roommate Kelsey got out of bed with her eyes open and walked straight to my desk.
She picked up my desk lamp and brought it down on my laptop.
The screen split in half with a crack that carried down the whole hall.
Kelsey set the lamp back where it had been, turned around, and walked to her bed.
She lay down and pulled the blanket up to her chin.
I stood there in my sleep shirt with my hand over my mouth.
I wasn't shocked, because I had stood in this exact spot before.
Four weeks from now she would destroy my internship portfolio.
I would miss my final-round interview at Larkfield Design, and she would post on the campus forum that I was a bully.
I had lived all of it once.
Then I had opened my eyes, and it was the first night again.
Half the third floor was crowding our doorway in pajamas, holding up phones.
Our RA pushed through in her bathrobe and looked at the lamp.
"Jessa, she's asleep," she said. "She doesn't know what she's doing."
The first time, I had yelled that Kelsey never went anywhere but my desk.
Colson McKim leaned on the doorframe in basketball shorts.
He was Kelsey's boyfriend, and he wore his steel watch with the green face to bed, because he liked to remind people it cost $9,800.
"Relax," he said. "It's a laptop. You can always buy a new one."
A girl from 3C shook her head at me.
"Don't push her," she said. "She's in a bad place already."
Saskia shoved through them and wrapped both arms around me.
Saskia had been my best friend since freshman orientation, and she smelled like the vending machine tea she'd brought down with her.
"Breathe, Jess," she said into my hair. "She's sick, you know that. Let it go. Please. For me."
I felt her pat my back twice.
"Did you back up your portfolio?" she asked. "The final round's in four weeks, right?"
"Cloud and my external drive," I said. "The drive's in my desk drawer."
"Good," Saskia said. "Keep both. I'll get you some tea."
She let me go and looked at me with wet eyes.
The first time, I had argued for twenty minutes.
I lost the argument, and four weeks, and the job.
So this time I stopped arguing.
"You're right," I said. "She didn't do it on purpose."
Nobody in the doorway moved.
"I'm sorry I made a scene," I said.
The RA nodded. "Thank you. That's very mature."
Colson grinned. "That's the spirit."
"It's just a laptop," I said. "Things can always be replaced."
"Exactly," Colson said. "Honestly, if my girlfriend broke my watch, I'd just buy another."
"Would you?" I asked.
"Sure. I'd buy two."
The RA laughed, and so did the girl from 3C.
"I really believe that now," I said.
I memorized every face that laughed.
The girl from 3C smiled at me for the first time all night.
They all went back to their rooms, and the hall went quiet.
Saskia squeezed my hand once more at the door and left.
Kelsey lay in her bed with her blanket still tucked at her chin.
Her breathing was slow and perfect.
I picked up the broken laptop and held it in my hands.
The keys were scattered across my desk, and one had rolled under her bed.
I took a photo of every angle with my phone.
Then my phone buzzed in my hand.
It was a message from Casper in 3B, the quiet film major who had stood at the back of the crowd and said nothing.
He was the only one who hadn't told me to let it go.
*I filmed the whole thing. Sorry, I know you didn't ask. Before she picked up the lamp, she turned her head and looked straight at my phone.*
I read it three times.
Then I looked at Kelsey's calm face in the dark.
I had already let it go once, in my first life, and it had cost me everything.
This time I wasn't going to fight her.
I was going to put the most expensive thing owned by every person who told me to let it go right on my desk.
I opened the floor group chat and typed with steady thumbs.
*My capstone is a product photo series called "Worth It." I need the priciest thing you each own, for one weekend, on my desk. Since things can always be replaced, right?*
Colson answered in under a minute.
*Lol sure. My watch is $9,800. Try not to drool.*
Four more people liked his message.
I turned my phone face down on the desk, exactly where Kelsey would walk.
Want to keep talking to characters like these? Chat with AI romance characters: AI Boyfriend · AI Girlfriend · Dark Romance · Fantasy Romance · BL (Boys’ Love) · Billionaire Boyfriend · Mafia Boyfriend · Possessive Boyfriend · Hockey Boyfriend · Older Boyfriend · K-Drama Boyfriend · Anime Boyfriend · Vampire Boyfriend · Werewolf Boyfriend · Demon Boyfriend · Fae Romance · GL (Girls’ Love) · Anime Girlfriend · Goth & Alt Girlfriend · Gamer Girlfriend · Tsundere Girlfriend · Fantasy Girlfriend