The Roommate From Hell

d with a simple rule f

fifty-fifty, Alex. It

ce that suddenly felt much smaller. I just nodded. It sounded reasonable. I' m not a

of "fair" was a twisted, one-way

put it in our shared mini-fridge. I came back from my afternoon class and f

to keep my tone light. "Loo

, man, it' s great. So, there are nine cans left. I figure w

g to process the logic. It felt l

hole pack, Mark. You

' re sharing the rest. We split the cost of

ence for a moment. He wanted me to pay for ha

sense. I bought them. You can have some, I d

replaced by a look of deep, personal injury,

u were a reasonable guy, Alex. I' m just trying to

but it was a declaration of

holding my laptop. It was a brand new MacBook my parents had bought me for gra

y laptop?" I asked, my voi

machine. Way better than my old one. Since we share a desk, and we both use the sp

ring. It was so ridiculous it fel

op. My parents bought it for me

property. We can AA it. You paid, what, two thousand for this? Just give me

erse. It was the term he used for splitting costs, a te

him. I' ve practiced taekwondo since I was a kid, not to fight, but for the

ouch my laptop again. You will not talk about splitting the

ng in my eyes that finally shut him up. For a moment, anywa

wn the hall, but I kept a small supply of better-quality toilet paper in our ro

roll last night. It' s good stuff. The roll cost

nerve was almost impressive. He wanted me to

as mapping out the insanity correctly. "I bought the roll.

. I used my portion. You still have your portion left. I

ayed thread. "That's not how any of this works. You don't get to use my things

ify his next attempt to leech off of me. Living with him wasn't just annoying, it was mentally exhausting. It was like being locked in a room with a broken c