Once upon a time, I was the up-all-night, falling-through-the door-with-the-morning-sunshine, wild party-lover. On Friday nights, I’d be so excited about the debauchery that lay ahead that my bowels would actually loosen – the anticipation of hedonism acting as a laxative. Gross, but true.
I’ve been surrounded by mirrors and white powder, danced on rooftops with new friends I’ve picked up on drunken escapades and looked down and discovered bare (bleeding) skin and ladders, where there should be tights, after running through brambles to find a secret entrance into a squat rave.
So I get the draw. I understand the necessity of 5am expeditions to the convenience store for more vodka and fags. I’ve been that person stumbling along the road as the sun comes up, tripping over empty beer bottles, with red lipstick smudged across my face and black eyeliner dripping like gothic tears down my cheeks.
But that doesn’t mean that when I’d given up that lifestyle and you, my dear flatmate, were still at it, I was able to turn a blind eye. It doesn’t mean that I’d pull a pillow over my head to drown out the cackles and husky conversations, ever increasing in volume, coming from the room right below my bed.
This is how it would tend to unravel.
I'd hear your key in the door and hope for two creeping tiptoes. But instead, get ten pairs of dirty shoes slapping against the wooden floorboards, accompanied by loud laughter, the occasional 'shhhh' from you (followed by your stifled laughter) and the clink of glass bottles in blue plastic bags.
You all settle in around the kitchen table, turn on the laptop I’m now wishing I’d brought upstairs with me, and play music at a volume that seems acceptable. Only, your ears are still ringing from the basement club you’ve been in all night so you’re totally unable to gauge it.
They’ll want to go to bed soon, I'd think. Surely. But then I hear the clicking and scraping of cards, followed by a series of long sniffs. I realise that you definitely won’t be going to bed any time soon.
I let it go for an hour, lying wide-awake, staring up at the ceiling, thinking about the outing I’ve planned with my new boyfriend tomorrow. Of course, the only reason I’m no longer out on the razz is because I’m now attached. If I were still single I’d be plonked at that table, singing along to Beyoncé and downing vodka shots. But now I’ve matured. I spend my weekends hangover-free, visiting art galleries and generally being a more productive human being.
I tell myself I should be less smug and more tolerant. But I’m not. And you weren’t tolerant of me when it was you in a relationship and me doing all-nighters.
After more than a few occasions of this exact scenario, I knew I had to find a solution to this problem, because giving you the evils when you were on a raging comedown later in the day wouldn’t do anything for relations. You’d cry. I’d feel like a super-bitch.
So I worked out that if you find yourself in this situation, you have two options. If your new man really is your soulmate, you could move in with him. Beware: This will signal the end of the all-night-parties. Forever. The alternative is to move in with boring mature people. You could find a small group of classical music-loving teetotalers, who opt for evenings around the dining room table reciting poetry, while sipping on dandelion and burdock. People who prefer being up all day to all night.
But the dilemma with either of these options is that as soon as your new relationship goes down the pan, the person you’ll be desperate to be living with is the same flatmate who’s downstairs keeping the party alive while you lie bitter and twisted in bed, conjuring an escape plan. Because she might piss you off with her selfish party antics, but one thing’s for sure – she knows how to have a good time.
So, wild-child flatmate, I forgive you your sins. And I thank you for giving me the mental tools to block out sound, so that I can now ignore the booming Saturday night TV my other half insists on watching while I lie alone in bed, reminiscing about those carefree party years.
Follow Annie on Twitter @annieridout
Picture: Rory DCS
This article originally appeared on The Debrief.