Page 7 of My Ex's Roommates
I was on a campus with forty thousand students and I had not a single friend. It was a harsh wake-up call that I’d been living a life that had never really accepted me. It didn’t matter how I’d acted or looked. I still never really made it as one of them. Jake’s harshly whispered comments from the two years we’d been together replayed in my head over and over again. My clothes weren’t right. My shoes were sad looking. My hair was too big or not big enough. He’d looked me over so closely every time we went out together because I needed little adjustments to look like I could ever belong in his world. He’d known I didn’t belong all along but it hadn’t stopped him from staying with me.
While I was thinking about the whys of our relationship, the same one kept coming up again and again. Why had I stayed with a guy who did those things to me? The possibility that I was so weak and desperate for a different life than the one my brothers and I had been raised in that I’d let Jake treat me like shit for two years made me so ashamed. It made me hate myself almost as much as I hated Jake.
There was also the way I couldn’t stop it that was making me insane. I still tried to look the part. I couldn’t help myself. The idea of going out and being seen in less than perfect condition made my stomach twist in knots. I’d committed to the Stepford girlfriend look so hard that I couldn’t find my way out of it.
I’d managed to avoid my roommates by staying out of the house as much as possible or staying in my room if I did have to be in the house. I didn’t eat in the house or do anything else that would’ve required me leaving the room for longer than a shower.
If I was honest, I was lost. Everything around me that I thought I knew as fact wasn’t real. I no longer had a place in my own life, it felt like. I was just…floating aimlessly.
Part of me almost wanted to find Silas and have him be mean to me again so I could at least get that anger back. It’d burned so much sweeter than the sadness. Maybe it was my hoping for that confrontation that brought it straight to me. Or maybe I was just bound to overhear my roommates talking shit about me at some point because I was sure they did it a lot.
I came in later than usual that Sunday night after closing the library and walking across campus to buy food from the only place that was still open. I crept it the same way I always did, not wanting to bother anyone enough to have them send me packing. I recognized the change in the house as soon as I was inside and closing the door. Normally the guys were in their rooms or out of the house but that night they were in the living room.
I was so focused on taking the first step of the stairs as silently as possible that I almost missed hearing them say my name. Almost. I should’ve just continued up the stairs but instead, I was drawn to their voices. Ineededto hear what they were saying about me.
“...just like Jake. Just like the other silver spoon kids at this fucking university who drive around in their hundred-thousand-dollar car expecting the world to move for them.” Silas grunted. “No offense, Carter.”
“Hey, I drive a Jeep.”
Dylan spoke up. “I was just saying that we have to give her time to get out. We don’t know for sure that she’s just loungingaround, betting on us picking up Jake’s slack. She can’t expect us to step in where daddy and Jake left off.”
“I’m telling you, she can. People like that, like her and Jake, they walk around with their noses in the air, waiting on people to do their bidding. I wouldn’t be surprised if she wasn’t even all that upset about Jake leaving and it was all about the easy gravy train ending. Now she’s going to have to go through the trouble of hooking another rich boyfriend.”
“Good luck to her on this campus. She’s not exactly anyone’s favorite person these days.” Carter shouted suddenly. “Who the fuck was he throwing the ball to?!”
Over the low hum of the TV playing a football game and the sound of the icemaker in the fridge kicking on, I heard my blood rushing through my veins, hot and furious. Listening to the three of them sum me up like they knew me was too much on top of everything else. That anger I’d wanted came rushing back with a vengeance, too hot to ignore.
I dropped my bag with athudand stormed into the living room, catching the three of them by surprise. I could tell by the looks on their faces that they hadn’t meant for me to overhear their little gossip session. I didn’t give them a chance to recover before I let them have it.
8.
***Harper***
“You three think you know me so well. You think you have me all figured out, don’t you? You saw me coming and going with Jake and decided exactly who I was, huh? You have no fucking idea who I am. You don’t know anything about me.” I was yelling but I couldn’t stop. “Do you want to know where mydaddyleft off? It sure as hell wasn’t at calling me princess and giving me a fancy car to drive.Daddyleft me on the side of the road when I was fifteen because I refused to go with his friend to score his next hit. My big brothers raised me from the time our mom ODed when I was still a kid. When they found out what my dad tried to do to me they nearly beat him to death and they’re in prison right now for it.
“I worked my ass off to get a scholarship to pay to be here. I have worked no less than thirty hours a week every week since I arrived on this campus, all while making sure my grades don’t dipat allbecause financial aid wouldloveto rip that scholarship away. As for your idea that Jake somehow spoiled me while I was with him? You’re wrong there, too. I was stupid enough to want to make sure he knew I wasn’t with him for his money so I never let him do anything for me expect cover the costs of whatever charity event he wanted to be seen at with his parents.”
They all stared back at me wide-eyed. Dylan tried to say something but I turned my ire on him.
“I’ve called over eighty people this week about potential housing leads. While working as much time as they’d allow me at the library. I have stayed out of your way as much as possible because I do not, in any way, expect anyone to pick up whatever slack you think Jake left behind. I don’t expect any of you to do a single thing for me other than take my money and let me sleep under your roof until I find somewhere to go. Believe me when I say, I’m not fucking dragging my feet in order to stay here with guys who think I’m a stuck-up bitch with a silver spoon in my mouth. I’d literally take anything I could afford to get away from this house and every asshole who’s ever stepped foot in it.
“I’m so goddamn sick of everyone judging me and hurling their bullshit at me.” I closed in on Silas. “And you can sit there and say whatever nasty, mean things you have to say about me but it’s starting to look a little obvious that you’re just a little bitter that no rich boyfriend came along for you.”
On the TV one of the teams scored a touchdown and the noise of the fans celebrating pierced the silence that fell on the room. My chest rose and fell fast, my breathing hard after hurling everything I had back at them. I still wasn’t finished, though. They seemed to know it, too, and they stayed frozen as they waited.
“I’ve been tiptoeing around here but it doesn’t matter if I do that or scream the place down. Your opinion of me won’t change. I’m done pretending I don’t exist for your comfort. Kick me out if you want. Until you do, though, I’m existing in this fucking house that I’m paying rent for.” I pulled the envelope of cash out of my purse and started counting out bills. “How much?”
None of them seemed willing to tell me. They didn’t budge.
“How much is the rent?!”
Dylan cleared his throat. “Look, Harper, I’m sor-”
“How. Much. Is. The. Fucking. Rent?”
“Jake paid nine hundred a month.”
I snorted, even as I silently panicked at how much money I was going to be left with. “You mean Jake’sdadpaid nine hundred a month.”
