Back when I was a sophomore in college, I had this one really bad couple of months. It wasn't the worst period in my life, but it sucked in a whole new set of ways than what I was used to. I had lost my job at the cryogenics lab that summer, which I guess was just as well because the commute was killing me - if I missed the last bus, I'd be stranded in the middle of an industrial park all night. But I was devastated. I'd never lost a job before, even in my hometown where just being a DeCastle was solid grounds for getting fired. I got a work-study job in the chem lab that was pretty good, but the damage had been done.

And my social life was nonexistent. That was a huge disappointment for me. People had kept telling me that things were different in college, that I'd leave all the stigmas behind and start making friends. When I hadn't made even one after over a year, it really took its toll on me. There was one girl who showed some interest in me, but, well, that whole thing was really stupid. Stupid on my part, and maybe on hers too. I think it was just a spectacular display of miscommunication. After that I stopped trying entirely, which didn't help my prospects.

What else? Oh yeah, that kid Mike. Mike was a reasonably popular kid in the same dorm as me, and we never really paid each other too much attention. But one day I'd made myself some steak and eggs for lunch - have I told this story before? - and he showed up and asked me for some. I didn't want to share my food because I expected him to take it and leave, but i didn't know how to say no. So I gave him half, and he sat down and we had this great conversation. I was thrilled. I mean, even if Mike and I never hung out again, at least I knew I could hold a friendly conversation, and maybe I'd have other opportunities.

A week or two later I learned that Mike had been hit by a truck and was dead. Or was it a month? It all happened so fast. The funeral was in the next town, but I didn't go out of respect for his family and friends. They didn't want some strange, dirty untouchable marring a perfectly good funeral. You learn these things being an untouchable, when to stay out of sight. Actually I didn't go because I was afraid, and besides, we weren't even friends. We'd just shared lunch the day before. But for some reason I couldn't shake my grief. He was the first person I knew who had died, even though i didn't really know him. Nobody had ever taught me to grieve. So I just sort of piled it on top of all the other crap I didn't know how to get rid of.

At that point my grades were starting to suffer. I was putting more energy into avoiding crowds and staying out of sight than I was into my schoolwork. The worst was English Lit. I always hated that class, and any literature class, because the answers weren't definite enough for me. I was a very right/wrong thinker. But on top of that, the professor was a real dick. He was this super-liberal ex-hippie, kind of like my mother but without the substance abuse issues (or maybe he did, I don't know), and he seemed to think that all college students were just like him. I was failing his class. So one day I stayed after class to try to ask him for some guidance, and he humiliated me. He pretty much said that if I couldn't do things his way, I wasn't worth much as a person. I've heard that sort of crap all my life, but at the time I was hanging on a tiny thread of hope, and that incident broke it.

I think I also had a rather disturbing encounter with the girl I'd mentioned before, too. Can't remember the details. My health was suffering, too. I tried to will myself to death, but all I managed to do was will myself sick.

One evening in the chem lab, cleaning up other people's messes, I chose that moment to end it all. I never thought of asking for help or confiding in anyone. I thought the whole point of suicide was to do it in secret so nobody else has to get involved. I found a bottle of something cyanide in the cabinet and I was going to drink it. But my hands were shaking so badly that I couldn't get the bottle open. So I tried throwing it against the wall to break it, but it rolled under something and I lost it. I figure if I'd really, really wanted to succeed, I'd have kept trying, but instead I just finished up and sulked back to my dorm room and berated myself for being such a miserable failure at everything I touched.

The next day it finally occurred to me to ask for help. Or the day after or something. I didn't know how to go about it, but sometime around then I saw a flyer for peer counseling. So I signed up. I wasn't going to go, but I seem to have this horribly pervading sense of duty, and I couldn't get myself to stand the person up. So I went.

It turned out to be a girl I sort of knew. Well, we'd been in some classes together and saw each other around sometimes. She was one of that group that used to whisper about me behind my back. Weird, ugly, shy people apparently spark the ol' imagination, I guess. But then she gave me this whole spiel about confidentiality and how if I needed to talk, I should just talk.

I don't remember what I said. It wasn't all that much, or all that coherent. I told her about the whole deal with Mike, and at some point I started bawling my eyes out. That was shocking; I can suffer a lot of shoit without feeling the need to cry. At the end she said some kind words and told me to make another appointment and that was it. I spent that entire night obsessing over whether she'd ever talk to me again (she didn't) and whether I really should go back for another session (I didn't).

Sometime around then, I decided I hated girls. Guys were a whole different set of problems - I had no clue how to do the drinking-buddy thing and it hadn't occurred to me that there might be other options. I wasn't the kind of person guys talked to, anyway. But girls... man. Girls had all sorts of expectations I didn't understand. Even the ones who seemed like nice people. They gave me this sort of catch-22 - if I was cold to them, they didn't like me because I was unpleasant. But if I tried being friendly, they were scared off. I think because they were afraid I was horny. I was, but I was so desperate for human contact that I would have gone along with any limitations I had imposed upon me. I also understood that untouchables are not allowed to have libidos. So I kept mine under control... or at least, I would have if I'd been given the opportunity to have a platonic friendship with someone. I knew I had a long, long way to go before I was ready to be somebody's boyfriend, and I was willing to work up to it. But they were all way ahead of me. Nobody knew where I was coming from. You can't explain that sort of thing to someone who's not in it.

So back to the story. I lost my desire to die, and I went into this state where I was running on pure fury. I had run completely out of hope, self-confidence, and anything else worthwhile, and so I tapped into my anger to keep me motivated to go through the motions of everyday life. I think it showed in my schoolwork, especially my Lit essays, which were usually violent, heartless assessments of the nastiest topics I could choose. I also fantasized about the people around me dying in creatively gory, agonizing ways. Yeah, I was a messed-up kid. The Lit professor was my favorite victim.

Speaking of which, he had this horrible habit of changing the classroom at the last minute. I think it was his way of satisfying his wanderlust, but it annoyed the hell out of me. I had to listen carefully at the end of class in case I had to jot down some room number for the next meeting. That same week that I tried to kill myself, he did it again, but that time I forgot. So I went to the usual classroom. And that's how I met Reg.

He was in the same class, and we had one other one together. I'd never really done much more than take casual note of him. He was obviously an untouchable like me - nobody pays attention to anyone who's as much of a mess as he used to be - but beyond that, I really didn't know what to do about it. But that day I found him outside the door, confused because it was locked and it wasn't supposed to be locked.

So we stated talking (if you could call it that... I prefer to) and then I remembered that I had the new room number written down, so we went to the room together. When we walked in, the class was just about halfway over, and the prof gave me this baleful glare and recited some demeaning quote from whatever Shakespeare play we were on at the time, that was obviously pointed at us. So I shot back with something insulting I'd read the night before, that just happened to pop into my head. Then he quoted another one... we really had something going there. Now, this whole time Reg and I had been picking our way through the classroom because we had to go pretty far in before we reached two seats next to each other. I tried to think of another retort, but i was having trouble. But when we sat down, Reg pulled out his copy of something or other and turned to a page and pointed to an absolutely brilliant passage. I read it, and the prof thought up another quote to respond with, and then Reg looked me up another one.

I guess at that point, the professor was either stumped or feeling like he was losing his control over the class, so he went back to the lesson. But man, I was flying high by then. There was nothing he could say to hurt me after that, because I knew I was his equal when I played the odds right (and when I had Reg at my side). And in addition to that, I discovered I was in love... although I didn't quite understand what I was in love with at the time.

I wish i could recall the exact passages we'd quoted at each other. It was one of those spectacular moments when everything just fits together, and then when it's over, it never comes back.

I guess it's pretty clear after all why I've been thinking of it. It's easy enough to say, "Don't kill yourself, because when I tried it, I met my life partner a week later, and something good might be coming your way too." But it was much, much more than that. Or maybe it wasn't.