Page 36 of My Roommate from Hell
“Oh, really?” he says. “I’m so sorry.”
We survey the damage. Bell’s burned a huge black patch into the carpet.
“Can you fix it?” I ask.
“I think so. It might be too damaged, though. Don’t be mad. She can’t help it.”
I set my teeth on edge. I don’t want to be told I can’t be upset that his forbidden cat’s lava vomit burned a huge mark into the carpet. One that, if I am hearing him correctly, he may have no means or intentions to fix.
“Is something wrong?” asks Zarmenus. “I got you a coffee. And something called a cronut.”
As nice as both sound, I’m far from hungry. He woke me up again last night. When I did get some sleep, I had nightmares about the ghoul in the mirror. And now this.
Remember the internship. Remember the internship.
“Talk to me,” he says. “Tell me what’s wrong.”
I nearly put on a fake face and smile and tell him that everything is okay. It’s what I would’ve done in the past, and all my instincts are telling me to do that to him now.
For the most part, I think people who keep the peace are given a bad rep. People say they aren’t being genuine, but I think there’s more to it than that. It’s a choice, because I can tell what will happen if I open my mouth and tell Zarmenus how I feel about how he’s been acting. It will create tension. We will probably fight.
I don’t want that. What I want is for him to be more considerate, and to take better care of this room we’re sharing. It would probably also be good if he could deal with the ghoul, but I’ll settle for the first two. I have to decide if fighting for it is worth getting that, when I could just as easily swallow these emotions.
But his cat nearly burned down our room. Turns out even I have a line.
“We should talk,” I say.
“About what?”
Where to start?
“About you coming home late at night,” I say. “When you’re hooking up.”
“Dude, I’m so sorry I woke you.”
“It wasn’t just last night. You woke me up the night before as well.”
His eyes widen. “I did?”
“Yeah.”
“Why didn’t you say anything?”
“I didn’t think it was going to happen again.”
He shoves his hands into his pockets. It seems this is sinkingin, and I feel a little bad. I know it’s justified, but he looks like a scolded puppy. I was expecting him to act annoyed, or to dismiss me completely.
“I’m so sorry,” he says. “I truly thought you were asleep.”
“It’s on me, too. You’re right, I could’ve told you. And I don’t want to stop you from having a good time. I just, you know.”
“Like sleep?” he interrupts with a grin.
“Yeah. But how about this. If you ever need the room for yourself to, you know, hook up or whatever, why don’t you let me know? I can go to the library or something.”
“You’d do that?”
“Of course. I don’t want to be some, like, party ruiner. It’s just hard for me when you wake me up because it feels like you don’t respect my space.”
