shit like that just doesn’t happen in real life.

If you heard the doorbell ring at a quarter past midnight, and everyone in your house was sleeping, would you answer it?

She had been packing a few last minute things, since she’d be leaving for school the next morning. She had even turned off her laptop and put it away. It was then that she realized: she needed her ethernet cord, or else she’d not be able to have the internet when she arrived on campus. She padded down the stairs in naught but a t-shirt and shorts. A quick glance towards the computer center revealed that the box that had contained the cord had been moved.

She rummaged around the dining room for a bit before finally assuming that her mother had moved the box outside to the utility shed. She slipped on a pair of sneakers, and wrapped her mother’s coat around her, and went outside to the shed. Shivering slightly, she snapped the shed light on and glanced around the floor. A few boxes, but not the box she wanted. Looking up, she saw it atop the refridgerator. She brought it down, and detangled her cord from the other cord in the box. Returning the box to its spot, with a smile on her face, she snapped the light back off, closed the door, and headed back to the house.

Upon reaching the back door, she realized a horrible thing. The back door, which she thought she’d left open, had closed, and the door was locked. “Oh shit,” she thought to herself. She then remembered that she and her sisters usually made a practice of keeping the rarely used side-door unlocked, in case of forgetting their housekeys while at school. She tried the door, but it too was locked. She rapped on the back door a couple times with her knuckles, but she knew nobody’d be able to hear. After all, they were all in bed, supposedly sleeping.

She jogged around to the front door, where at least there was a doorbell. She opened the storm door, and once again rapped on the front door a few times. This at least started the dogs barking, which she hoped would wake someone up a bit. She then pressed the doorbell, and waited a minute or two for someone to come down.

But no one came. She pressed the doorbell again, and waited again, and still nothing. She rapped on the door again, harder, pressing the doorbell repeatedly. By this time, the dogs had recognized her, and had stopped barking. She tried yelling to them through the door, “Go get mommy! Go get daddy!” but they just looked at her. She pounded on the front door. She leaned on the doorbell. And still, no one came.

Reality set in. If no one woke up, and answered the door, she’d spend her last night at home outside in the cold. Unable to even get into a car without keys. Unable to call anybody without a phone. She broke down then. She began crying almost hysterically. She continued, desperately, knocking and ringing the bell. Her knuckles were sore, her legs were cold, and her head began to hurt from the crying, but she couldn’t stop any of it. She thought to herself, “This feels like something out of a movie. Shit like this just doesn’t happen in real life.”

But it does. It did. The she, is me, and this just happened about a half an hour ago. It couldn’t have been more than 15 minutes, but it felt like an eternity. It was almost like my greatest fear realized.

I’ve mentioned numerous times throughout this diary that my greatest fear–my only fear is being alone. Alone, with no one to turn to, no one who cares about me. I’ve been locked out of my house, my car before. But those times, I had the security of knowing that I had someone who could bail me out quickly, at least within a few hours. Being locked out of your house, when you KNOW that there are people inside, ignoring your only means of communicating with them–the doorbell… That is the epitome of isolation. That is what it feels like to be alone.

Finally my sister came down to let me in, and I, still in tears, practically screamed at her, “What the fuck took you so long??” Her inadequate (in my opinion) response? “I didn’t know what was going on.”

If your doorbell rang in the middle of the night, and you “didn’t know what was going on,” wouldn’t you check to see what was going on?? ESPECIALLY when the doorbell was rung repeatedly in rapid succession, and was accompanied by dogs barking?

I continued to sob for another ten minutes or so after making it back safely to my own room. Then I turned on my laptop immediately to come write about it. Now I’ve a headache and my eyes are itchy.

Happy last night home to me.

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