I sat next to you and got absorbed in my book, deep into the night. You typed and typed and typed. The Second Sex became impossible to read at around six in the morning, so I wandered off into the stacks and looked for something else. I returned with Bibliography of Ancient Sumerian Religion and spent an hour or so letting the titles of conference papers and dissertations slip past my eyes. At some point, you finished typing, slammed your laptop closed, and grinned at me.

On the way back, we talked about everything we still had to do, and you told me that you were also staying for winter break. Back at the co-op, we sat together as my housemates came in and out, you poking at your phone and drinking black coffee out of a Moscow mule mug, me just sort of staring off into space. We blended back into the morning scene, when we had been outside of time for a little while. People said hi to you, and you talked and talked and talked.

January 10

We were friends after that. One day over winter break, I came back from a long, aimless walk and found you and a group of guys I knew in the living room with a drum set and some amplifiers. When I walked in, everyone started laughing.

“Um, hi,” you said. “We’re rehearsing.”

“Something like that,” the drummer said.

You started up again, once I was in my room. Covers of the Cranberries and Fiona Apple and some stuff I didn’t recognize. Afterward, you knocked on my door.

“Hey, sorry if that was too loud. Can I hang in here for a sec?”

“Sure.”

“I’m overstimulated. This is, like, the chill out room.”

I had painted the walls a deep russet red and strung up a bunch of Christmas lights. You plopped yourself into my chair.

This became a regular thing once classes started. Most evenings we would read in the same room or do homework. Other times you’d pick out tunes on your guitar. We spent a lot of time like that, sometimes not talking, sometimes talking a lot.

One of the things that fascinated me about you was your air of preoccupation when you were thinking. If there was some idea that wouldn’t come, you’d sit there and stare just past your laptop screen until you thought of it. When you were playing guitar, you’d play the same phrases over and over, changing one or two notes, until you liked it enough to continue. Everything was getting worked out thoroughly in your head.

Once, late at night, while I was catching up on something, you were laying in my bed. Without saying anything, you handed me your phone.

“What do you think of this guy?”