Apophenia

The "room of requirement," really just a spare room in our apartment where we keep a lot of inconvenient stuff that we don't really know what to do with, is not living up to its name today. We've torn it apart, and we still haven't found Katie's bike helmet. 

Irrationally, I decide that if she doesn't have a helmet, I won't wear one either (though looking back now I'm having a difficult time seeing how that would help either of us).

Still, it takes me miles before I'm hypnotized enough by the road to lose the creeping sense of dread that one or both of us is going to die today because we didn't recognize the universe hiding Katie's bike helmet as a sign that we shouldn't go out today.