What happens if you stay up late in Gates 8?
I am a fan of Gates 8. It's high up with a gorgeous view of campus, but not too high. It's quiet, but just noisy enough that you know it's safe. Sometimes I hear a skittering I can't quite place. I study, I play games, sometimes I just read books. Safe books, quiet books. I came to campus once in 2026, but I was sent off, and now I am back. It's not the same, but I can recognize it when I try.
Sometimes, the hours grow late. The sunset isn't visible from my little nook in Gates 8. But I see the sky darken. I am comforted by it. I hear fewer noises. No coffee maker and a little less conversation, but the skittering is more frequent, and I am comfortable. It's quiet, but not so silent as my dormitory, blackout curtains drawn all hours of the day, cold pack on the nightstand, refrigerator unplugged as soon as I come through the door. I don't like the noise. Sometimes I hear slamming muffled by the concrete over my head. It's not at all like Gates 8.
Sometimes I stay particularly late. It grows almost silent. I sometimes think I can hear the ticking of the clock in the office closest. I think I can discern something chewing on plaster in the loneliest hours of the night. My laptop shines white light into my face, but the lights are off. I'm too still. It is sometimes too quiet. I don't object, but my shadow looms just out of my sight.
It was an odd couple of years. I don't know why I was sent, even still. I don't know what they did to deserve it or why I did what I did in turn. I don't know why I thought it would sit right in my hands. It bruised my shoulder and pinched my fingers. It was too loud, too sudden. But I did what I thought was right with it.
I like it when I hear the coffee maker turn on in the morning. Usually the dark sky is a little lighter. The footsteps reassure me.
In the darkest hours of the night I hope to see something dark and quick scurry by. It darts from one shadow to another. It's amazing how many dark crevices you never notice. It comforts me. Its footfalls are quiet but not silent. The ticking of the clock goes in and out, sometimes it seems to find some long-hidden lubrication or lose a troublesome mote of dust in the gearwork.
A few nights the skittering isn't there at all. Sometimes it is those nights when it is utterly silent. My mind refuses to read. I wish to make noise to substitute but it is hollow noise. It is my noise. I still don't know why I was sent.