The weirdest vector algebra class

I wake up to a sudden rustling. It doesn’t surprise me anymore; this has been happening for quite a while now. It’s my roommate, rummaging around his closet, trying to find his fishing rod. He goes out fishing every day, but he never returns with anything. It’s a mystery how he can afford the rent. I mean, the rent isn’t too high; we live in a pretty average house, and the location kind of hurts the rent. All of my work is on the computer, so I don’t really leave the house that often. He always brings in the groceries, and I cook. We’ve had this routine for as long as I can remember.

Truth be told, I can’t remember the last time I left the house. He’s the only “friend” I have after I moved here. But I don’t really miss going out all that much. I had my fair share of fun in my twenties, and now that I’m almost 33, I don’t think I can handle all the action kids these days have going on for themselves. Anyway, I got up from my desk, and just before he left the house, I called out to him. I don’t know what was different about today, but I couldn’t control myself. I had this itch for ages, and I had to know what he did every day he went out to fish and why he never caught anything. So I asked him, “Hey, uhh… do you mind if I tag along? Just today. You see, I’m kind of ahead of schedule and don’t really feel like working.” “Sure, man, whatever floats your boat,” he said. I don’t remember the last time he made a joke. It took me a while to understand it. Seeing the fishing rod in his hand is how I got it. I put on my overcoat and followed him out the door.

The sun felt too harsh on my face. I credited it to all this time I had spent indoors. But what I saw next was no product of my hibernation. A gust of wind carried with it sand, sand that rubbed against my face. It stung a bit, but I liked it. A quick look around and I see that our house is surrounded by sand. I don’t remember seeing this on the lease, I think to myself. Sand of this color, the last time I saw anything remotely close was when I was a kid. Driving amid the red rocks of the Mojave. All I could think of was that road trip. I never even gave a second thought to the fact that I had been living in the middle of a desert. Just then I see him waving his hand; he’s reached his car already. I quickly made my way to him; the sand made it difficult. I shouted “Shotgun” trying to reciprocate his humor, but it seemed he didn’t care much for it. I didn't mind; it was a crap joke anyway.

We sat in his car. The smell felt familiar; I had the same pine-flavored freshener in my old car. He started the car, and before I could even put my seatbelt on, he gunned it. My heart almost skipped a beat as he jumped over a sand dune. The ride was pretty boring; none of us had any reception, and he forgot his AUX cable back home. I’ve had quite a few boring rides in my life, but for the first time, I had a boring drive. There was no sense of direction, at least for me; he probably knew this place like the back of his palm. While I was lost in thought, I saw his hand drift across my face. He was pointing to a dune up ahead. It was the biggest that we had come across yet. “There, that’s where we’re stopping.” Stopping? I wondered why he wanted to stop in the middle of the desert; was there something on the other side? Soon we reached the top of the dune. He got out first and took out his fishing rod and his bait from the trunk. I was still making sense of all that had happened this morning. He made his way around the car and opened the passenger-side door. I took off my seatbelt and climbed out. The heat hit me like a truck, the air-conditioning almost made me forget we were driving through a desert. I took off my overcoat, put it on the seat, and closed the door. I followed him and heard the doors lock behind me. Soon, we stopped. He took out the bait, attached it to his rod, and got ready to cast the line. I turned my head in the direction he was aiming. A shimmer, a couple of hundred meters from where we were standing. A body of water, but it couldn’t be. No vegetation of any kind, flicking so damn much. It was a mirage, it had to be!

Whoosh. He cast the line, a perfect cast. The bob landed right in the water. I was at a lack of words… for a moment I was expecting a splashing sound to reach my ears. What was wrong with me? Was I falling victim to the same thing he had clearly fallen victim to? I turned my head to talk to him and saw his face. It was covered with a cloth. Maybe to protect him from the sand? I wasn’t really knowledgeable about the practices of desert-fishermen. Soon it hit my head, I couldn’t remember his face! I saw that man every day, as he came home, brought in the groceries, complained about his day, and asked what I was going to make. But for some reason, whenever I tried to remember any of those moments, the cloth seemed to be stuck to his face. Just then I saw his head turn towards me; I heard him say something, but the cloth muffled his voice. I told him to remove the cloth and speak, but he didn’t seem to listen.

With anger on my face and firmness in my hand, I bent over and grabbed the end of the cloth. It was poorly tied and came off quite easily. He turned his face down as if trying to hide it. I grabbed his chin and forced it up. Soon all the blood rushed from my legs. My knees turned weak, and I stumbled and fell on my back. The face I saw was one I knew too well; it was my own. As my lips struggled to form words, his eyes, my eyes, stared me down. I felt the chill down my spine turn into a shiver. I crawled back trying to escape him, but the sand beneath me slipped away. I felt myself roll over, speeding up as I made my way down the dune. For some reason, I held my breath as I saw the mirage on my way down as if preparing for a dip. Soon I reached the bottom and entered the water. I felt the heat of the desert dissolve away, a cool breeze touched my neck. I was still holding my breath. After all, I wouldn’t want to drown in the desert; that would be a terrible way to go. As the cold breeze hit my neck again, now from the other side, I let go of my breath and opened my eyes, which were sealed shut the moment I entered the water. I saw myself surrounded by classmates. I looked at the board, and it was vector algebra. Reading through all the equations almost made me doze off again. Just then, a thought filled my head. I reached into my pocket to get my phone. I felt my phone there and pulled it out, but with it spilled out a handful of sand. “Weird,” I thought to myself. I opened my phone and looked at the chat with my “mirage.” As I scrolled up, I realized these waters are much deeper than the ones I saw today. As I sat there wondering how many fishless days I had spent, I decided to toss away the rod and blocked Ms. Mirage.