And I don’t like being the only one without knowing the joke.
I light a cigarette on the back porch, and open the case file in my head. My criminal law professor calls it prosecutorial thinking; my high school counselor called it a “persistent social deficit.”
Tomato, tomato.
Exhibit A: Grant Holloway (22, Construction Management)
He runs the house. Everyone naturally defers to him, and he’s self-aware enough not to abuse the leverage. He cooks on Sundays, which I did not expect, and the food is actually edible. He’s got the protective streak of an older brother, extending it to everyone whether they asked for it or not. I don’t love it, but I don’t exactly hate it either.
Note of Interest: I caught him alone on the couch at 11 PM, two days after I moved in. Laughing. No, more like chuckling—actuallygiggling, which on a guy Grant’s size is a very unexpected sound.
I figured sports highlights or some viral idiocy.
It was a book app.
I stood there for probably thirty seconds watching Grant Holloway, football scholarship, highlighting dirty talk in what appeared to be a porny romance novel with considerable focus.
My read on him shifted two degrees that night. It was my first time seeing someone study dirty talk.
Exhibit B: Miles Thorne-Leung (22, Computer Science/Cybersecurity)
He didn’t like me from the first second we met. I could tell because Miles is the kind of person who doesn’t bother simulating social niceties. He’s not rude; he just doesn’t perform warmth he doesn’t feel. I find it significantly more comfortable than small talk.
I don’t like him either, so we’re even. His code is great, though. I respect the work even if I don’t respect the man.
Field Note: Found him passed out on the hallway floor three nights ago. I checked for a pulse, then I liberated a joint from hishoodie pocket because it was visibly sticking out, and I wasn’t going to leave that on the floor.
It was, for the record, decent weed.
Exhibit C: Finn Gallagher (21, Digital Media)
Finn produces content for a degree, but he’s funny enough that I don’t hold it against him. Actually, Finn is low-maintenance. He is the exact type of guy I had three of in high school—the ones who talk constantly, don’t care if I’m paying attention, and manage to make an entire conversation about a TV show I’ve never seen actually tolerable.
He’s the reason I’ve watched two episodes of four different anime series since moving in. He doesn’t register my silences as unfriendliness. I appreciate it more than I’ve articulated out loud.
The Pattern: I caught him jerking it to porn twice, and anime once. Not my business, but noted.
Exhibit D: Walker Brooks (21, Kinesiology/Sports Med)
This one hurts.
It’s painful to say this because Walker is loud, and a jock, and leaves pizza boxes literally everywhere, and once woke the whole house up at 4 AM because he was doing jumping jacks in the kitchen for some reason—but Walker is, against all odds, the most normal person in this house.
Yes, that’s a frustrating conclusion to reach, but I’ve sat with it for two weeks and it keeps coming back true.
He’s healthy, socially adjusted, and annoyingly nice. He works at the campus clinic, which I didn’t know about untilhe showed up in my doorway four days ago, looked at me massaging the side of my neck, and said “That’s your levator scapulae. You’re sleeping on your side with shit pillow support.”Then he handed me a tube of gel and left.
I used it. My neck feels better.
Kit Adler (22, Mechatronics Engineering)
My roommate.
Kit works on robotics. That’s something you’d never guess because he looks exactly likethoseguys in high school—you know the ones. Easy smile, comfortable in his body, popular in that effortless way, where they’re not trying to be liked, but everyone likes them anyway. Handsome as hell, too. I bet anything he was a prom king.
I was ready to hate him on principle, but the silence between us is actually comfortable. He’s quiet, organized, and actually really nice.
And he’s always covered in hickeys.
