text: Levi had a horrible habit. Whenever he realized he was standing in a hole, instead of trying to climb out, he’d start digging twice as fast, figuring “I’m already in the hole, might as well see how deep it goes.” He was leaning into that habit this morning in Stella’s apartment. It hadn’t been preceded by a particularly good night. He had the most important midterm of the semester in the morning and had gone to her place so she could help him study. But, somehow or another, they’d ended up having sex. She was quizzing him on his anatomy notes and before she knew it he was using her body as a live study guide. Maybe it was because one of her fairy lights strung up on the wall was flickering and it had been bothering him since he’d arrived. Maybe it was because her neighbors played emo-punk until 4:00 in the morning, making it impossible to stay asleep. Maybe it was because she wouldn’t shut up about how attractive Ryan Gosling is and he looked nothing like Ryan Gosling. But whatever it was, he hadn’t even waited for either of them to get up and put clothes on before starting a fight. “Who asked you?” Stella griped, turning away from him and continuing to play Candy Crush on her phone. “You did. Last night.” “No I didn’t.” “Yes, you did. You said, ‘I don’t get how I’m taking such easy courses but I never have any free time.’ And I’m telling you, it’s because you spend an inordinate amount of time on productivity-sucking apps like Candy Crush.” Levi said, sounding a little too superior even for his own liking. “That wasn’t a question it...” Stella was stuck. “It was a statement.” She concluded. “Then this wasn’t an answer. It was a relevant observation.” Levi shot back, arching his shoulders the way he would when he felt confronted. Stella usually loved his quick wit, but only when it was directed at other people. What bothered Stella most wasn’t even the holier than thou way he said it, but that he was right. “I didn’t ask you to observe. I was venting. Not everything is a problem that needs to be solved, sometimes you should just smile and nod.” “If I do that, you’ll say I’m not really listening.” Levi replied. “Ok. Let me give you the benefit of the doubt and pretend you were actually trying to be helpful. You weren’t, but, setting that aside for a moment. Was ‘if you didn’t throw away so much of the day watching swirling colors like a retarded preschooler, maybe you’d be closer to attaining your goals’ the way to convey said observation?” That was the moment Levi saw a hole beginning to form around him. There was a little voice hovering around his conscience screaming “Apologize! This isn’t worth taking where it’s going! Who cares if she plays Candy Crush? Are you really going to fight her on Candy Crush?” But there was a louder, deeper, voice drowning it out. One that had been programmed into him from his biological father and his high school friends and now received regular maintenance visits from his insecurities. It said “She doesn’t respect you as a man. She doesn’t care about your opinions. She’s really trying to say something about you, not herself.” Listening to that voice, Levi swung the proverbial shovel back and heaved it into the ground by remarking “Yah I do. Because that was my nice way of saying maybe if you had to work for the things in your life, you wouldn’t *want* to spend three hours a day staring idly at your phone.” His conscience stamped it’s feet and shrieked “Are you insane? Would she ever exploit your vulnerabilities just to get the upper hand in an argument? Why even open that door? You could’ve probably gotten a blow job before she left, but nooo. You opened your mouth and closed hers. Happy?” The darker voice prevailed with one demonic mantra, “She has an iPhone X. Her phone is nicer than your mother’s. Who is she to have anything your mother doesn’t have?” Stella and Levi didn’t fight often, because Stella was a talker. She didn’t like to leave situations angry, she didn’t usually let her emotions override her actions, and she was pretty good at seeing triggering comments for what they were. She could tell the difference between tactless and malicious. But Levi almost never took things that she told him in confidence were surefire ways to upset her and intentionally invoked them. Even still, her blood boiling at his boundary crossing, she gave him one last chance. “Did you just insinuate I didn’t have to work for any of the good things in my life, or have I misinterpreted something?” She asked, biting down on the inner flesh of her cheek so hard that she drew blood. Levi took the shovel and used it to bury himself alive. “*Do* you have to work for any of the good things in your life, or did I miss something?” Stella heard her statements for the first time as they were coming out of her mouth, she didn’t stop to think of them, let alone about them. “Ok straight American male. Tell me more about how easy my life is and how you got everything you’ve ever had from prodigious resiliency and backbreaking hard work by yourself. I’m sure it had nothing to do with your stepfather passing up a life-changing promotion so you wouldn’t have to switch to a school without a gifted program. Or your mother working two full-time jobs so you could focus on your education full time. Oh yah, and your 12 year old brother walks house to house collecting cans because any extra money your family has goes to paying down your student debt. But I’m sure that’s unrelated to your success. I mean, come on Levi, to so much as halfway suggest you just did all this on your own is so oblivious and downright offensive, I only wish your mom were around to have heard you say it.” Levi was wobbled, but not down. “You know what Stella, the thing about me is--” She cut him off. “Oh, wait. I know where this is going, this is a well-worn path for you. Please, tell me how the solution to all my problems is to be more like you. Because whatever you were preparing to say, that I’m too rich or in the wrong major, was some version of that, right? That my problem is I’m not like you. But you’re one of the most self-loathing people I’ve ever encountered so, and this one is a question, why would you think anyone is better off being more like you?” She didn’t hear the demons cheering her on, or her conscious pleading with her to stop, Stella heard static and saw red. There was supposed to be an unspoken understanding that certain things were off limits, even if they were arguing. Chief among those things were ones they’d disclosed as their prime insecurities. But Stella knew she’d been no better. What she’d said compared to what he had was like he slapped her and she retaliated by running him over in a car. His expression remained blank as she’d ejected her venom, but she could see the hurt register on his face as the words sank in. He stood up to get dressed and, inadvertently, wracked his brain for a devastating comment he could leave on. As he turned to go, he sniped, “Maybe if you spent less time lying around playing Candy Crush, you’d be thinner.” And slammed the door. He wanted to open it again as soon as it shut behind him. Now that he was alone, his conscience broke through the echo of his demons. “There’s nothing she could say or do that would justify what just happened.” It berated him, stuttering with rage. “You, you, you, antagonized a girl with a clinically diagnosed eating disorder about, about, about, her weight. Aren’t you such the manly man getting the last word in. How, how, how, courageous of you.” It was 15 minutes until the midterm that would either guarantee he passed or solidify a failure in his highest-level course of the semester. As he stormed down the hall and towards his test, the conflict boiled up inside of him. The things she’d said had pierced the tallest and thickest walls he’d built up around his vulnerabilities. He couldn’t decide who he hated more right then, her, or himself. One minute he’d be thinking about Stella using his parents sacrifices against him without even hesitating to consider the impact it would have. The next he’d be back with her in his bedroom the first time she visited him at home in Montana over sophomore summer. It was the middle of the night and they’d had to speak so softly because everyone was asleep. They were sitting on the floor by his Spider Man lamp, one of the only things 7 year old him had taken when they’d moved there. “I tried to kill myself once.” She’d said, fidgeting with the spider web lamp chain. Even as he crossed the linoleum tiles into class, he felt his stomach drop the same way it had when he’d first heard her say it. “Why?” He’d asked, wondering how he seemed more upset about it than she did. “My body didn’t fit in this world. It was like living in a cage all the time, everywhere. And the only way to open it was...” Levi had stopped her before she could finish. He didn’t want her to say something he couldn’t unhear. No one had ever disclosed anything of that magnitude to him before. His feelings were bigger than any words. He crawled over and wrapped his arms around her as tightly as he’d ever held onto anything and whispered, “We fit together.” He was so scared that night. Before, he’d worried about a lot of things, but her death wasn’t high on the list. When he found out he’d once been so close to the end of her, he vowed to do everything in his power to never let it get so close again. “When did I lose sight of that between then and now?” He wondered, as he went through the motions of finding his seat. Despite it all, he was so angry at her. Bitterly angry. Seething. He couldn’t believe the things she’d said, and he did want to hurt her as badly as she’d hurt him. But only because she mattered so damn much. He couldn’t remember the last time he was this confused. But he’d have to sort it out later, because the professor had just flicked the lights off and on, which meant there were only five minutes before the exam would begin. All around him, people began to get their desks ready. Whether he’d gotten there on his own, with a lot of help, or through a mixture of the two, he was in a competitive college vying to graduate with honors now. So, he commanded the ability to compartmentalize he’d honed over years of being in school with problems at home. He began to unload his backpack. The professor stood at the front of the room, reading the boiler plate exam instructions about time limits and acceptable pencils. But the final sentence caught Levi’s ear. “Phones must be silenced and stowed at this time as we are now beginning the dissemination of testing instructions. As you were all informed, this is an open-note exam. You are allowed one notebook on your desk and no more than one. It must be a notebook not a textbook. Digital notes are not eligible for use unless you have registered a medical accommodation with the office of...” Levi stopped listening. His heart pounded. He ripped open his backpack and flipped through the contents. His notebook, with six weeks worth of carefully organized, color coded notes he prepped for this exam, was not there. He tried to remain calm and retrace his steps. Could it have fallen out of his backpack? No. He looked around. Was it underneath the desk? Did it get knocked on the floor? Did he drop it coming in? Did another student steal it or confuse it for theirs? He tried to remember the last place he’d seen it. Then he realized. It was sitting open in Stella’s apartment. He’d rushed out in such a state that he’d forgotten to clear off the table. He’d been writing in it when they got sidetracked with their “hands on” anatomy review and they’d fallen asleep in the bed immediately afterwards. Every ounce of pride and injury Levi was grappling with drained out of him in an instant. Without that notebook, there was no chance he would pass this midterm, or therefore, the class. This was a prerequisite for another credit he needed to graduate, so if he had to retake it, he’d have to delay his graduation and find the money for another semester. That was money that wasn’t being spent on his four brothers’ health care, Christmas presents, or own college educations. This was bad. The professor was still giving his speech, he had time. Not much time, but some was more than none. He waited until it looked like no one was watching him and began frantically composing a text message underneath his desk. “911 STELLA STELLA STELLA URGENT 911 SOS!! My notebook for the exam is on your table it’s a red 70 page college ruled it’s covered in sticky notes can you get it here before 9am otherwise I will have to repeat a semester. It’s next to or underneath a book titled Unlocking Anatomy Volume 6: Splanchic--” “Levi!” A teaching assistant patrolling the aisles hissed. Levi was so startled, he dropped the phone before he could hit send. The TA bent down to pick it up. “You can get this from the professor at the end of the exam.” He said, powering down the phone and continuing up the aisle. “But--” Levi protested. “But nothing. Are you crazy? You had a smartphone in your hands. I could’ve had you removed. If it were anyone else I would have, and if anything else happens, I will.” Levi attempted to switch gears. He could feel the tips of his ears heating up and his mouth going dry as he watched a calamity unfold in front of him. “It is officially 9:00AM and I am now locking the door. TA’s, please distribute the exams.” The professor announced from his podium. Levi tried to assess the likelihood of getting through the exam from memory as a copy landed on his desk. He gave himself a realistic overview of the odds and decided his best shot at passing this thing was to make himself throw up. He’d be excused, and hopefully granted a re-test. But as he prepared to stick a pencil down his throat, he realized he’d either be condemning the people sitting around him to taking the exam next to a puddle of vomit or delaying the exam everyone was ready for except him. He couldn’t do that. “Maybe if I cry I can get some sort of mental health exemption for a retest?” He considered. “I guess I’ll find out.” He thought, as he felt the lump in his throat rising from thinking about telling his parents he needed an extra $30,000 tuition money, a year’s salary for either of them, because he forgot a book. Just as tears began to sting the corners of his eyes, there was a ferocious banging on the classroom door. “This, class, is why you plan ahead and make punctuality a priority.” The professor said, motioning to the jiggling and popping door. “Let this student be a cautionary tale for all of us. Now as I was saying. The exams are double sided, you’ll begin on side sfjrkjng...” He was inaudible over the increasingly aggressive hammering against the entrance. The professor paused. “They get points for tenacity, but not for the midterm, I’m afraid.” He went to the door and opened it partway. “I’m sorry, but--” In mismatched pajamas, one sockless sneaker, and a flip flop, stood Stella. Just as Levi was realizing his notebook wasn’t in the bag, Stella was realizing it too. She’d grabbed the first shirt and pants she could lay her hands on, the first left and right shoe her feet could find, and without even stopping to consider their fight or even shut her apartment door behind her, bolted across campus to his exam. She listened when he talked, and she’d been hearing all night before how important this class, and this test in particular, were. As she stood there with her hair as tangled as a bird’s nest, breathless in baggy pajamas, trying to shove past his 6’4 professor, she’d never been more beautiful to him. “The exam has already officially begun, no one may enter the classroom.” The professor said, blocking her way without expending much energy. “I’m not taking the exam. I’m just giving this to someone.” She explained, all the while trying to maneuver past him. “I can’t let anyone in or out once the exam has begun, it’s a security measure.” “I’ll give him this and go--security measure? What? Do I look threatening to you?” “A little.” The professor quipped. “Ugggghhhhh” she groaned. Stella turned as though she was leaving. Once the professor’s guard was down she spun back around, launched into the air, and threw the notebook as far as she could into the room. It landed about two rows ahead of Levi, but considering he was nowhere near the door, he was just impressed she managed to not hit the professor in the head with it. Thankfully one of his lacrosse buddies was in the row and sent it his way. By the time he looked up again, Stella was gone. The professor bent over. Oh God, did she hit him after all? No, he was picking something up. A piece of paper had fallen out of the notebook when she’d thrown it and the professor had it now. In a disapproving tone, with fury lighting his path, he made his way over to take Levi’s exam back. “Levi, considering you are holding the projectile notebook, I assume you were at the very least, an accomplice to this disruption and I--” He read the note, flipped it over, read it again, chuckled, and softened his gaze. “I think she’s a keeper.” The professor concluded. He placed the note on Levi’s desk and returned to the front without revoking the exam. “Now, unless anyone else has scheduled any deliveries, let’s take out our number two pencils.” Levi clutched his sides in relief as he held the notebook in his hands. He tried to clear his head and focus, but just could not begin to recall any scientific information without reading Stella’s note. As he unfolded it, he reconsidered his decision to look at it before taking this test. In large, bold, quadruple underlined print, she’d scrawled “I’M STILL MAD AT YOU.” But there was a little arrow indicating to the other side of the page. He turned it over. In smaller, softer print it said, “But don’t think about that right now, just focus on the test. Good luck, not that you need it. Love, Stella.” However, she finished the message with, “(but now read the other side again.