The other day I had print something, so obviously I went to the mortuary chapel to take care of that. I should probably explain that my college used to be a monastery, and apparently all the old monks used to go to one wing of the complex to die. Once dead they’d be carted down the hall to the mortuary chapel, which is now our computer room.
To be honest, I have to question how much of this is true. I know I heard the story from a priest, and when has a priest ever lied, but I can’t help feeling like the whole thing was made up for shock value. You know, the other colleges have stories like, “JRR Tolkien used to sit at this very chair!” or “And in this room, CS Lewis probably took a dump!” Tourists and students alike faint with excitement at the mere suggestion of historical connections, no matter how tenuous. And, as much as I like Fort Jesus, we just don’t have that kind of history. Because “people used to die in our college” is kind of the trump card of the desperate, the Helen Keller or Hitler card in “Apples to Apples” if you will.
Still, just in case, I insist on propping the door open when I’m in there alone at night. While not entirely sure if the suggestion of death has made me perceive an aura of death in that hallway or if there is a genuine aura of death there, I don’t like to take any chances. I figure if I prop the door open the chances of the ghost of some dead Anglican monk coming out of the walls and killing me for being Jewish are significantly lower than if I were to close the door.
So last night I was in this creepy chapel that smells of death (that is, if death smells of printer toner and faint body odor) when all of the sudden the door facing the open computer room door opened. Out from the darkened room stepped a girl, maybe about 8 or 9, who made intense eye contact with me. She gave me that look that you always get from your roommate’s friends. I’m not referring to any roommate in particular, I just mean that it’s a universal truth that if your roommate has friends over and you enter the room, all of the friends will turn to stare and give you a look that says, “Who the fuck are you and what the fuck are you doing here?” After they’ve met you their look drops the “Who are you” part, but they will always give you the “What the fuck are you doing here?” part. I’m genuinely fascinated by this look because I’m deeply curious to know what they could possibly think I was doing in my own apartment. I want to respond to their silent “What the fuck are you doing here” look with a casual shrug and an “Um, living.”
Anyway, this little girl gave me that look, probably minus the “fuck” because she isn’t even aware of that word yet, being 8 or 9. We had an intense minute or so of just staring at each other, a minute in which I had to fight the urge to shout a word, any random word, just because I felt so uncomfortable. Luckily before I could shout “CHESTNUTS!” the little girl peered round the corner of her door and started shouting at someone down the hall. I know it wasn’t in English, maybe it was French. Yeah, I know it’s terrifying that I did a bazillion years of French and the best description of this kid’s language that I can give you is, “Maybe it was French.” But get over it. Most of my brainpower at that moment was being devoted to planning escape routes for various horrific hypothetical scenarios involving the ghosts of dead Anglican monks.
So what’s your computer room like?
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