There is a specific kind of intimacy in sharing a bathroom, a forced vulnerability that I have never gotten used to. But there are boundaries. And then, there is the violation of my prescription pH-balancing wash. It kept disappearing. When I asked my roommates, they feigned ignorance. Becca and Chloe just shrugged, eyes glued to their phones. But Sienna? Sienna laughed. "Maybe you just use a lot of it," she sneered, applying a layer of gloss. "Or maybe you just have a lot of... problems down there that need fixing. You know, from being loose." She implied I was dirty. That I carried something contagious. I didn’t scream. I didn’t fight. I just felt a cold, hard knot tighten in my stomach. I took the bottle, emptied the expensive medicinal liquid down the sink, and filled it with industrial-strength adhesive. That night, the dormitory was awakened not by a nightmare, but by a scream so raw it sounded like fabric tearing. 1 Let me back up. My luck had been rotting for weeks. First, the infection. A persistent, burning itch that kept me awake until the sun bled through the blinds. The campus clinic doctor prescribed a specialized, expensive wash. "Use sparingly," she said. "This stuff isn't covered by basic insurance." I treated that bottle like liquid gold. But a month’s supply vanished in a week. At first, I thought I was crazy. I bought another one—seventy dollars I didn’t have—and marked the level with a Sharpie. Two days later, the line had dropped by three inches. Getting to the specialist required three bus transfers and a half-day missed of classes. The copay alone was half my grocery budget for the month. I felt every penny leaving my account like a physical blow. But it wasn't just the money. It was the thought of someone else’s hands—someone else’s body—touching the nozzle that touched me. It made my skin crawl. I confronted them again. "Not me," Becca said. "Gross, no," Chloe added. Sienna was at her vanity, perfecting her eyebrows. She saw the bottle in my hand, snatched it, and held it up like a trophy. "Oh, look. It’s the coochie medicine," she announced, her voice pitching up so the girls in the hallway could hear. "Maybe if someone wasn't sleeping around with randoms, she wouldn't need prescription-grade disinfectant. Careful, girls, don't breathe too deep. You might catch whatever she has." Becca and Chloe actually recoiled, pressing their backs against their bunks, looking at me like I was a biohazard. 02 "It's just a bacterial imbalance," I stammered, feeling the heat rise in my cheeks. "I have the lab results from the Medical Center. Look..." Sienna didn't look. She just crossed her arms and smirked. "Save the act. I saw you last Sunday," she said, her eyes narrowing. "Getting out of that black Mercedes G-Wagon. That guy was old enough to be your dad. Disgusting." "That is the father of the kid I tutor!" My voice cracked. "It was pouring rain. He offered me a ride back to the dorms—" "Bullshit." Sienna cut me off, her gaze dropping pointedly to my chest. "You smell like desperation. You’re hopping into old men’s cars and then coming back here acting like a saint?" I was shaking. Not from fear, but from a rage so pure it felt electric. Before I could speak, Sienna tossed the bottle. Clatter. It hit the trash can rim and fell in amongst the used makeup wipes. "Who knows what kind of diseases are on that plastic?" She grabbed a can of Lysol and began spraying the air around me aggressively. "So unlucky. I heard you can catch that stuff just from breathing the same air." The panic was contagious. "Sienna, spray my side too!" Becca squealed. "I think I touched her curtain earlier, oh my god," Chloe whined. "And she picked up my Uber Eats order today... I feel sick." Sienna smiled, a predatory baring of teeth, and linked arms with them. "Come on, babes. We’re going to Target. We need bleach. Tonight, we scrub this room. Anything she touched gets boiled or trashed." They left in a cloud of performative giggles. A second later, the door flew open. Sienna marched back in, aimed the Lysol directly at my face, and held the trigger. "The thing that needs sanitizing most is you," she hissed. "Do us a favor and drop out. Stop infecting our lives." I coughed, my eyes stinging from the chemical mist, tears streaming down my face. She slammed the door, leaving me in the silence. 03 I stood there, my chest heaving. Why? I was the one being stolen from. I was the victim. And now I was the pariah? My grandmother used to say, Swallow your anger and you’ll swallow poison. If I let this go, if I just bought a lockbox and hid my things, I would be admitting defeat. I would be accepting that I deserved this treatment. No. Fuck that. They didn't deserve my grace. I pulled out my phone and opened Amazon. Industrial strength cyanoacrylate adhesive. Add to cart. Miniature wireless nanny cam. Add to cart. Overnight shipping. Two days later, the package arrived. When the room was empty, I tucked the camera onto the top shelf of my bookcase, hidden between two textbooks. Then, I poured the remaining medicinal wash into a travel bottle for myself. I filled the original prescription bottle with the glue. It was clear, odorless, and had the viscosity of gel. It looked exactly like the soap. But the reviews said it could bond steel to concrete. Finally, I took a label maker and printed a single word in bold, red letters: GLUE. I stuck it clearly on the bottle. I placed it at the very back of my desk, behind my laptop and a stack of notebooks. Hidden. Private. 04 That night. The scream tore through the darkness like a physical weapon. I bolted upright, heart hammering. Becca and Chloe were sitting up, silhouettes of confusion in the dim streetlights filtering through the window. We looked at Sienna's bed. It was empty. My stomach dropped. No way. She didn't actually... I scrambled down the ladder. The bottle on my desk was gone. From the bathroom down the hall, the screaming shifted into a guttural, animalistic sobbing. "It’s Sienna!" Becca realized, sprinting into the hallway. I followed, barefoot on the cold tile. Becca pounded on the bathroom door. "Sienna! What’s wrong? Open the door!" The only answer was a shriek of pure agony and the sound of something heavy thumping against the stall wall. The handle jiggled, but the lock held. The commotion summoned the Resident Advisor, a tired senior named Jessica, followed by a growing crowd of students in pajamas holding up their phones. "Move! Everyone back!" Jessica yelled, key in hand. She shoved the door open. The collective gasp sucked the air out of the hallway.
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