Friends Don't Let Friends Play in the Dryer

The six roommates had made a list of things to do before the semester ended and they all went their separate ways. They had managed to cross off a majority of the items on their list and had even endured the stresses of finals week. The only thing that remained between them and summer vacation was the dreaded white glove, the thorough cleaning of their apartment that had to be done before they moved out. Laurie hadn’t even bothered to change out of the basketball shorts and t shirt she had slept in to start her cleaning. She sat on the floor of their tiny kitchen with her head inside the oven, scrubbing away. After several hours of cleaning, Laurie reappeared, thinking if she ever saw the inside of an oven again it would be too soon.

“Do you know what I’ve always wanted to do that we didn’t put on our list?” she asked, metal scrubber in hand. “I’ve always wanted to get in the dryer.”

This may sound strange at first, but it was not too unusual of a feat for those living in the apartment complex of Greenbrier. Each apartment was equipped with a washer and dryer. The dryer, stacked on top of the washer, was huge and many people had crawled inside before. One girls’ apartment had pulled a prank on several guys in the complex using the dryer as the key element. They would call up an unsuspecting victim, claiming something was wrong with their dryer and asking him to please come take a look. When he would come over and open the dryer, out would pop one of the girls while the poor guy was caught on camera. One guy was so scared he shut the dryer and almost turned it on.

“Kids die in dryers, you know.” Jess said in response to Laurie’s idea. The other girls looked at her in bewilderment.

“What?!” They all asked in unison.

“Yeah, my mom said every year three kids die in dryer related incidents.” She calmly told her roommates, to which they all burst into laughter.

“Jess, I think your mom made that up so that you wouldn’t play in the dryer.” Amy told her when she could finally speak again.

Jessica continued to protest that kids really did die in dryers and her roommates continued to laugh and tease her. They joked for several minutes, coming up with several funny sayings, including “Friends don’t let friends play in the dryer.”

Despite the claims of Jessica and her mother, Laurie still wanted to get in the dryer. She pulled a stool over so that she would be high enough to climb in, then pulled the lint trap out to make getting in a little easier. She then climbed on the stool and stood there, unsure of how to approach the task.

The girls discussed several ways to get in. Laurie tried feet first, then head first, then several other ways. Try as she might, she just couldn’t get into the dryer. It was time to call in the reinforcements.

Michelle knew their friend Jordan had gotten in the dryer before to scare his roommates, so she called him up to see if he could help out. He came over right away and was in the dryer in less than thirty seconds.

“You have to go in butt first. No other way will work. Then you pull your head in, then last comes the legs.” He explained. He then climbed out of the dryer to let the other girls have a try.

Laurie was first. She wasn’t able to get in quite as fast as Jordan, but she did get in, laughing during most of the process. After Laurie climbed out, everyone turned to Jess—she was the only other roommate that was small enough to fit in the dryer. Despite her years of believing that she would die if she climbed in the dryer, her roommates somehow managed to convince her to climb in. She nearly panicked when she was completely inside, but she stayed in just long enough for her roommates to snap a picture, then she was out. And now, after climbing into the dryer, the girls could say their semester was complete.