Page 13 of Riesling with My Roommate

When I finally emerge, it’s night, and Sara’s nowhere to be seen, her laptop and accouterments folded up and tucked to the side next to one of my spiral notebooks. I think there were some dirty plates in here that I forgot about, but Sara must have cleaned them.

In fact, there are a lot of clean dishes in the drain, including pots, pans, knives, and some things I can’t even identify. When I open the fridge, there are more signs of Sara—it’s overflowing with food.

Anything that was in here previously is on the top shelf, which is a pathetic collection of stuff that I should probably throw away—a half-eaten snack bar I chucked in the fridge when I had an idea for a song title and some sauce containers from takeaway orders stretching back to when I first arrived.

The rest of the fridge is Marie Kondo’s wet dream. Sara stacked and labeled storage containers with things like ‘Mexican kale salad’ and ‘rye berry bowl.’

What the fuck are rye berries?

Then there are two shelves that are organized by color. Red raspberries, diced yellow melon, sliced orange mangoes, and all the other colors stare back at me, everything washed and ready to eat. The green section is the biggest, with multiple boxes of spinach and a drawer of kale that springs out when I open it like a jack-in-the-box of cruciferous vegetables.

“Jesus fucking Christ,” I say, slamming the fridge closed.

Paper flutters, and I see a note attached to the door via a magnet.

Help yourself to veggies :)

I pluck the magnet up and pull the paper away, flipping it over. There’s a pen by my notepad, so I grab it and hunch over the counter, sketching a variety of vegetables with stick arms and legs and open mouths with sharp pointy teeth.

The magnet clicks as I pin my drawing to the door. I open the freezer, which is mostly unchanged, and pull out a frozen pizza. Much tastier than that colorful crap.

The next day,Sara’s working in the kitchen when I come in for coffee and food. This time, she doesn’t join me out on the patio—probably avoiding my cigarette smoke—and I do the same thing as yesterday. I retreat to my studio.

Later, in the early evening, when I get too bored to work, I walk out into the main room. Sara’s practicing yoga out on the back deck, a camera filming her, facing away from the house.

I watch her for a few minutes. Soft music comes from her phone, and a sheen of sweat covers her bare skin. Instead of leggings and a tank top, she’s wearing shorts that barely cover the swell of her ass and a sports bra.

Her voice is low and calming, a stark contrast from the hoarse, grating vocals our band does. It’s a soothing balm instead of sandpaper. I creep closer, leaning against the window.

“Now press up into a plank and hold the pose here. Close your eyes and take a deep breath. We’re going to do a thirty-second body scan here, bringing mindfulness into our practice.”

Sara’s facing away from me, her strong arms holding her body off the hot pink mat. I listen as she walks her viewers through a breathing exercise, and as I lean against the door, I breathe with her.

Breathe into my toes and out of the top of my head. When that time is up, Sara continues through more movements and positions with crazy names—downward dog, tree pose, happy baby, the last of which makes me shift against the doorframe and ask my cock to relax.

Is this what having her as a roommate is going to be like? Seeing her half-naked and watching her body flex and move is like waving a juicy steak in front of a hungry dog.

Despite her health-nut lifestyle—or maybe because of it—Sara is fucking hot.

At night, when I emerge from another unproductive day for a hot meal, there’s another note from Sara on the fridge.

What are you, a carnivore?

I take the new sheet of paper down and draw two figures. The first is a wolf, which I label “me”. The second is a rabbit chewing on a carrot, which I label “you”.

For the entire week, these notes become the extent of our communication. She responds with:

Even wolves eat vegetables.

I reply with a drawing of a wolf sitting on its haunches, holding up its middle finger.

The next day, I bark a sharp laugh when I see that she added a cigarette to the wolf’s mouth.

Having a roommate is not exactly the change I expected. Sara and I operate on opposite schedules. When I wake up, she’s working on her laptop in the breakfast room. She gives me a little wave, her big headphones on, while I pass through the kitchen to make coffee and go out to the porch for a smoke.

She’s working hard at something, so I succumb to peer pressure and try to write in my studio. I’m also hiding—after watching Sara practice yoga a few days ago, I jerked off to memories of her flexing and stretching body and then got pissed at myself for lusting after her.

It’s best if I stay in my studio for the afternoon.

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