Unwell

After I left Mark’s room, I was determined not to be sad or weird or whatever. I wallowed for exactly 30 minutes. I allowed myself that. Then, I did what any grieving girl would do, I went to the library and studied and studied and studied. I left at 11pm, not having eaten dinner. I went back to my room, took a shower, and went to bed. The next morning, the library was closed when I woke up, so I went for a run. Ha! A run! I ran over 4 miles. Mind you I hadn’t run since I was in high school and they made you run in PE.

I showered and collected my school things and went back to the library. Around 1pm, I got a text from Yvonne.

I’ve been by your room a couple of times. Rich said Mark came over last night pretty upset. Wanna talk?

Nope. I’m good. Just studying. Thanks though!

If I let in the idea of wallowing or talking it out, it would certainly create a situation I didn’t want to be in. I would then have to look at what happened and dissect it. I didn’t want to do that. At all. I stayed in the library until it closed at 6. Mind you it was Saturday, so I was basically the only person in there.

When I got to my room, Yvonne was waiting outside the door. “How long have you been sitting here?” I asked with a lot of judgment.

“On and off all day.” She nonchalantly shrugged her shoulders.

I opened the door and let her in. “Something up?” I questioned, playing dumb.

“Oh no. Not really. Mark just called Rich saying he needed a guy’s night last night, and then Rich came in this morning saying you two broke up. So no, not anything...” She gave me a mean stank eye.

“Look,” I said matter-of-factly, “I am done. I don’t want to make a big deal of this. Do I love Mark? Of course. Is this going to work between us? Obviously not. So, it’s in my best interest to move on.”

“With Kenny?” Her eyes were curious.

When she said Kenny, it kind of broke my heart. I wasn’t really interested in Kenny a few weeks ago when he came around. I wasn’t. It was just convenient. But I can see how people think this is now about Kenny. Honestly, I don’t want him. He isn’t for me. He’s a fine guy, but he’s boring. I need someone else. “No. With myself.”

Yvonne looked at me weakly. “Why didn’t you tell any of us what was going on?”

“Because lately I’ve been such a mess. I was just sick of being the girl with constant boy drama. And I needed to get over this. By myself. For myself. With myself.”

“Mark told Rich he regrets what he said.” She went from being sad to hopeful.

“I wish you hadn’t said that. Because it still doesn’t change anything. And he hasn’t reached out to me. I’m going to move on. Next weekend is all the Halloween parties. I’ll go with Ree, and we can hang out with Chet and his friends. I’ll make it work.”

“Rich and I aren’t going to take sides. You can still hang out with us!”

“Where? At the Theta house? With Leslie, Mark, and Luke? Yeah, that’ll be lovely. I already told Leslie what happened. She didn’t even answer my text. I’m sure you guys will be fine without me.”

“Leslie’s in a weird spot. She loves you both. Be considerate.”

“Whatever. I’m not mad at her. Or Mark. I’m mad at myself. I created this. I need to fix it. I need to carryon. This is over. I’m devastated. But I can’t let myself be a mess. I’ve got to get up, move on, and be a big kid.”

Just then, Luke knocked on the not entirely closed door, opening it himself. Great. Just what I needed. I shot him a mean, yet equally exasperated look. “Can I help you?”

He shook his head. “I don’t know, Kathleen. I mean we’re all pretty upset at you. Dumping Mark, again!”

“Whoa! Whoa! Whoa! I did not! He did this. This is on him.”

Luke visibly balked. “Kathleen, he’s walking around. A mess. I’m sure he wouldn’t do this to himself.”

I was mad. “Oh, and you guys aren’t even the slightest bit to blame? You’re not initiating him with all his pledge brothers!”

“No one ever said he wasn’t getting initiated on time...” He thought seriously. “Oh shit! We were all mad at them at chapter, because they didn’t clean up the party room very well. I said something to the effect of ‘Who is in charge of this crap? He better watch it. He certainly isn’t getting initiated at this rate!’ Oh gosh! I can’t believe!”

Yvonne sat up. “I’m going to get Rich to get to the bottom of this. Something weird is going on. Like seriously.”

Luke walked me to Leslie’s room in the sorority house. “You two girls have a nice night to yourselves, okay? Rich is talking to Mark. We’ll figure out what’s wrong. He’s not himself.” And with that, he left Leslie and I in silence.

Leslie and I commiserated over wanting to know what was wrong with Mark. We put behind us the fact that she thought I had broken his heart. Again. She didn’t call me out for flaking. We just sat and talked through all the little things we noticed.

Rich called my phone around midnight. “Kathleen, I am not doctor, but he’s depressed. He flies off the handle, but he’s too exhausted to act out on it. I’m calling his parents.”

“No, let me and Leslie call them. We’ll be over there in a minute. Rich, I appreciate you doing this for me. I know I’m not your favorite person right now.”


We called his parents, they agreed he needed to see someone. He was seen by a psychologist the next morning, who suggested he go to a psychiatrist. The doctors told him at his first meeting to take a break from all the things that were adding undo stress to him. He went on medical leave from school, he suspended his pledgeship, and moved back home. He told Leslie to tell me that he needed this time to focus on himself, and he'd call me when and if he thought we could figure things out. And when he wasn't so disoriented.


It's been a week. I've never felt more confused and alone.