SHARED HOUSING, SHARED HEADACHE

RIVER

"How did this happen?" she asked me, taking the agreement from my hand as she began to tap on the keyboard. I calmly explain the situation to her, and she looks up at me after staring at her screen for a while. She looks at me as if I am being ridiculous or maybe joking with her; when she sees I am waiting to hear from her, she drops the papers on the table.

"You had me worried for a second," she says as if she had solved everything, but in reality, she had done nothing.

"Well, shouldn't you be? I am supposed to have a girl roommate, but..."

"You have a boy," she nods, and I tilt my head, trying to understand what she meant.

"And you don't think that's an issue?"

"Of course not, how can it be? The house you chose is a shared house, meaning that both genders can cohabitate there," she explained, and even though that should be enough to clear the air, my mind still can't understand what she meant. "You did not specify in the agreement that you wanted a girl, so we went with the next person on the list, and it happened to be..." She looked down at the papers in front of her before adding. "Taylor Deluca"

"I thought Taylor was a girl," I cry out in frustration.

"You've said so, but as we've established, Taylor is a boy, and going back and forth isn't helping us both." I stare at her because I don't believe her one bit.

"Can I at least swap rooms and have a girl roommate?" I ask, and she shakes her head as if she is about to deliver great news.

"I am sorry I cannot do that; if you find someone who wants to swap, then I would happily help you, but without their consent, I can't change their room." I eyed her and couldn't believe how unhelpful she was being. Do I begin to knock on people's doors asking them if they want to swap rooms with me?

If anyone asked me that, I would think they had gone mad and slam the door in their face. I groan, and she smiles. "It's not such a bad thing," she adds with a smile. "One of the best relationships I had on campus was with a boy I shared a bed with." I was almost certain that the situation was different, but I was not in the mood to talk about what her life was like.

"Is it possible I can change housing?" My mind was spinning, trying to find a place to live. I could not think of living with Taylor for the rest of the session; it could not work. What was I to tell my father when he called?

"Well, you can try, but I am sure that all housing around campus and on campus is full." For some reason, she seems to be enjoying this more than she should. "Just take the house and don't make a big deal out of it." She is ready to dismiss me, and I can see it. I sigh and take the agreement form from her desk and step out, feeling my life slip from my hands.

This was not how the start of my morning was supposed to go. I was supposed to come in here, have the issue resolved, and then go to my department to get my class schedule, but now I wonder if the day was cursed already from the start. I stay rooted in place for a few more seconds before I turn and begin to walk back to the apartment. I should be going to school, but my day was ruined. Why ruin it further? By the time I had walked forty minutes and was at the top of the hill, I was panting and huffing so much that I did not know how much longer it would take me to catch my breath. I see a motorcycle parked in front of the house. I wonder how I had not noticed it this morning when I left.

I open the door, and I see Taylor standing in the kitchenette, shirtless, pouring water into his mouth. I stand and take a deep breath, trying to focus my eyes on anything but his toned abs and slightly more visible tattoos on his side. If only that lady at the housing agency had seen this, she would not have said it was not a big deal and would have tried her best to help me out. How was I to deal with this?

"You are an early worm," he says, closing the bottle and dropping it to the counter before wiping off the remains of water on the corner of his mouth.

"And you sleep in," I return. I don't know why I said that when I was supposed to be talking about our situation.

"So you are getting back from the housing agency, I guess." He ignores my remark and walks out of the kitchenette towards me. I take a step back, not because my brain tells me it's the right thing to do. "What did they say?" a teasing smirk on his face.

"You already knew what they would say, didn't you?" I asked, shocked he had allowed me to waste my entire morning walking back and forth, only to get disappointed.

"It's already too late to try and switch houses," he says, almost repeating what the woman had said.

"And you could not have told me this yesterday?" I ask, feeling my blood boil. He felt like a prankster in that moment, and I hated it. "You made me ruin my entire day just to get that news at the housing agency?" My voice rose a bit, but as soon as I realised the change, I stopped talking and threw a glare at him.

"With how uptight you seem, would you have listened to me?" His question strikes a chord in my entire being. He is right; there was nothing he would have said that would have made me relent. I would have still gone back and forth without thinking about it. "See," he adds with a head tilt and then the smirk over his face.

"I guess you are my roommate," he exclaims, not smiling, still smirking at me.

I take a deep breath and nod. "I guess I am," I mouth to him, and he claps his hand. Was I really doing this? Living with a shirtless boy who made water look scandalous? Maybe the woman at housing was right. Maybe I was cursed.

"You strike me as a girl who would like to make rules that must be followed. I will listen to you," he says as if he were giving them an opportunity. I frown and sit on the couch for the first time, feeling how soft it is. Maybe this place can't be that bad; it would be a year, and I would make sure to change my housing and double-check it all so this does not happen again. How bad can a year be?

"Are you giving the rules or not?"

"I want to write them out."

AUTHOR’S NOTE

She walked up that hill thinking she’d win.

And what did she find waiting for her? A tattooed, abs-having smirk demon.

Be honest, would YOU have stayed in that house?

Or would you have marched back down and slept in the lecture hall?

COMMENT. Say something. Scream with me. Tell River what rules she should write before it’s too late.

Love,

Your emotionally unhinged, but “shared housing” defending author,

Zera