The Perversions of Nature & Roommate for Sale
an excerpt

Roommate for Sale

Chapter 1

When I first moved in with him, my roommate seemed nice. True, he seemed a little strange, but not too strange, which I considered to be a good thing because I wasn’t too fond of strange people at the time. I didn’t have an excuse for being as close minded as I was; I simply didn’t care for people that were slightly different. I didn’t feel comfortable around them, you see. So you might understand that I had my fingers crossed as I was on my way to meet my new roommate for the first time.

As he opened the door, my nervousness almost fully disappeared. At least he looked normal (which shouldn’t be too much to ask for, but you never know with all those freaks walking around these days), and friendly at that. He offered his hand and I shook it, slightly surprised at an eighteen year old being so polite to another eighteen year old. But at least it was something; I seemed to have gone through at least a thousand advertisements before I had finally found someone my age. “I’m Casey,” he introduced himself, and looked at me expectantly. Then it dawned on me that I should tell him my name as well.

“Oh, I’m Blake,” I said. “Nice to meet you. Please don’t mind my manners.”

Casey laughed. “That’s okay. Come in, I’ll give you a tour. It shouldn’t take long though. Would you like something to drink?”

I politely declined that offer, and he began showing me around in the tiny apartment starting at the living room, which was of average size but barely had any furniture in it. There was an old looking sofa, an old but comfortable looking chair, a small TV, a table and some stuff piled up against the wall. There was an open kitchen in the back of the room. “I’m sorry about the mess,” he apologized. “I even cleaned up this time. It’s usually worse.”

I smiled, appreciating his honesty. We made our way to the next room, which turned out to be the toilet. When I looked better though, I noticed a shower as well. “This is supposed to be the bathroom,” Casey said. “It’s so small that you can barely move in there, but at least there is running water.”

“Hey, you should stop being so negative about this place! Point out the good stuff. Anyone would have left by now. It’s a good thing I’m desperate.”

Casey shrugged and smiled. “Too bad there isn’t much good stuff to point out. Anyway, let’s move on to the bedrooms.” I followed him, and within three steps we had arrived at another door. “This is my bedroom,” Casey told me. “You can take a look inside, but there isn’t much to see.” When he opened the door, I saw perhaps the biggest mess I had ever seen in my entire life, and I couldn’t help but chuckle. “See?” He said, and closed the door.

We moved on to a room directly next to Casey’s bedroom, and since it was the last room left I figured that this would be my room, if I decided to move into this place. I turned out to be right. “Well, just take a look, and tell me what you think,” Casey said. “There isn’t much furniture in it, so…” He opened the door for me. ‘Not much furniture’ turned out to be an understatement, since there was no furniture in it at all. But it was a nice room, at least, seen how cheap it was. It wasn’t too tiny, not too cold, and there was a small window with a nice view.

I looked around for about five seconds. “Okay,” I simply said.

“What, okay?”

“I’ll be glad to be your roommate. If it’s okay with you, that is.”

He looked slightly flabbergasted at me having made up my mind so quickly. “That’s…Sure, that’s fine with me. Don’t you suppose we should talk things over first, though?”

A couple of minutes later I found myself sitting on the sofa with a glass of water that had practically been forced on me by Casey. To be honest, I didn’t quite understand what there was to talk over, but I couldn’t blame him. There weren’t many people who acted on impulses as much as I did. “So,” I said, trying to start a conversation as it seemed that Casey was just going to sit there in silence. “How did you end up here anyway?”

Thankfully, Casey was willing to open his mouth now, even though it turned out to be a quite personal subject. “My parents and I never really got along, and it only got worse as I got older. So as soon as I was old enough, they let me live here, and paid my rent. They’re not poor anyway and they were glad to get rid of me. These apartments are usually only for college students, but since I was eighteen and no one wanted to live here anyway they made an exception for me. But then a while ago, my parents suddenly stopped paying my rent. I wouldn’t know why, I hadn’t spoken to them for months. I have a job, but I can’t pay for the rent on my own. So I had to find a roommate.”

“Why did they…What did you do that they wanted to get rid of you so bad?”

Casey’s face saddened for a moment, but he quickly recovered himself and smiled. “That’s a bit personal, if you don’t mind. Why don’t you want to live with your parents anymore?” He asked me, quickly focusing the attention on me.

“My parents…They are slightly retarded,” I said, and Casey snickered. “No, seriously. They are in the middle of a divorce right now, which they should have done about ten years ago, but anyway…I think they are still sleeping with each other, which is rather disgusting to me. I mean, the idea of parents having sex in general is…” I shivered. “I couldn’t wait to turn eighteen, so that I would be able to live on my own. I never really planned anything though, and it all turned out to be a little more expensive and a little more complicated than I had expected.”

“So now you found the crappiest and cheapest apartment in town. And you are stuck with a roommate.”

“That’s one way to put it. But that’s okay. You’re still in high school, aren’t you?” I asked him, because I thought I had seen him walk around in my high school before.

He nodded. “Yes, I’m in my senior year right now. You are too, right?” When I nodded, he said: “Alright. Well, you know the rent from the ad, right? That’s half of what I’m paying now. You think you can come up with that? Do you have a job?”

“Yeah, I have a weekend job. And my parents will pay some too, they said.”

“Okay, so then we’ll split it equally.”

We spend some time getting to know each other after that, because after all, we were going to live in the same house. I hoped we would keep getting along as good as we did that day, since I supposed we weren’t going to have a lot of privacy in the tiny apartment, sharing a bathroom and everything. Casey was terribly nice, I had a lot of fun talking to him but still my mind kept drifting off to the question of what had made his parents dislike him so much. Parents usually love their children no matter what, so he must have done something awful, I figured. Then again, he didn’t seem like the type to do something awful. If you asked me, he came across rather innocent.

Soon I found myself looking at him talking, but not actually hearing what he was saying, wondering to myself if he really was such a goody two shoes. “You ever had a girlfriend?” I asked. He blinked, so I figured I had probably blurted that out in the middle of one of his sentences. Luckily, I didn’t get embarrassed easily so I repeated my question as he didn’t answer.

“No, I haven’t. I don’t see how that is relevant,” he said, his voice turning colder.

“Hey, relax. I wasn’t trying to upset you, I was just wondering.” I briefly wondered how it was possible that an eighteen year old guy had never had a girlfriend. Perhaps he was…gay? Nah, I threw that thought out immediately. He didn’t seem gay, and if you met a gay person you could tell they were gay right away, because they were feminine, right? And they spoke with high pitched voices, and…yuck. There you go. This kid wasn’t like that at all.

But then why had he never had a girlfriend? He wasn’t ugly, as far as another guy like me could judge. He had a nice smile, I supposed, and he had dark hair and light, bright eyes, just like me (though his were blue while mine were green). Most of my former girlfriends had adored that combination. I asked him, and he raised his eyebrows at my big mouth. “Has it ever occurred to you that the whole world isn’t about physical appearance? Maybe I just don’t want a girlfriend.”

In fact, that had never occurred to me. And neither had the possibility of not wanting a girlfriend. Well, that wasn’t exactly true. I knew guys who didn’t want a girlfriend because they didn’t want to have to be faithful to one girl, wanted them all, and that was something I could understand. But somehow I doubted that Casey’s mind worked that way. I decided to change the subject, and we talked about school for a while. Turned out we indeed went to the same high school.

“But, where do you sit then, during lunch breaks and everything?” I asked him, slightly confused. Our school was very group orientated you see, and by asking someone where they sat during lunch breaks you were usually able to figure out what group they belonged to. I had seen Casey walk around in school a couple of times, but I had no idea who he hung out with. “Who are you friends with?”

He shrugged. “If you’re asking me what group I belong to, then the answer is none. I usually sit upstairs, alone or with some friends.”

I nodded, though I thought it was a very vague answer. “So, when do you want me to move in?”

“Well, I’m paying my rent this week since the new month starts after that, so if you could move in about next week that would be awesome. What are you going to do about your room though, if you don’t mind me asking? It’s pretty…empty.”

“I suppose I’ll pick some stuff up from home. And I might go to some second hand store, just for the hell of it,” I chuckled. This could even be fun! Before, even the thought of even having to sleep in a second hand bed would have turned me off enough to crawl back to mommy and daddy, but I was determined to not let that happen. Then I got an idea. “Care to come with me?” I had never been to a second hand store, but I imagined it could be lots of fun, and we should spend some time together before we became roommates, I thought.

“Sure!” He said, sounding way more enthusiastic than I had expected him to be about the idea. I had been under the impression that he hadn’t liked me that much since I had asked him about the girlfriend thing, but apparently I had been wrong. “How about next Saturday at eleven? We can use my car. If it doesn’t fall apart before then, that is.”

I smiled and told him that was fine. We said goodbye, agreeing that we would make any further deals that Saturday. As I left, I chuckled, now understanding what he had meant with the car comment. Outside of the apartment complex stood a tiny, grey car, that seemed to be falling apart in every possible way. I couldn’t tell what brand it was, as there was no logo on it anymore (I suspected it had fallen off), but I could tell it hadn’t been very expensive, unless he was the one who was responsible for its current state.

I took my bike (yes, to my embarrassment I was unable to afford a car, especially now that I was going to have to pay my own rent) and left. As I was making my way home, I suddenly heard someone calling my name and I as looked in the direction the sound seemed to be coming from, I saw my friend Laurie waving at me. Smiling at that pleasant surprise, I stopped and parked my bike on the sidewalk. “Hey Blake,” she greeted me, and gave me a tight hug.

Laurie was the only female friend I had that was just a friend and nothing more. Unfortunately, we had started out as boyfriend and girlfriend, which just didn’t work as we had started to become friends more than lovers to each other. And I had cheated on her, too. But that was beside the point. She was a very pretty blonde, and each time I looked at her I remembered why I had fallen for her in the first place. I liked pretty blondes. “Hey Laur, where are you up to?” I asked her.

“I was just on my way to Rob’s,” she told me. Rob was her boyfriend, who looked like some sort of body builder. When she had started to date him, I had realized that if he was her type it wasn’t too strange that she had seen me as a friend more than anything; True, I was into sports, but I liked swimming and soccer and some basketball. Rob was the kind of guy that spent hours in the gym every single day just to gain more muscles and strength. “It’s his birthday next week, by the way. I’m going to get a present on Saturday, but I have no clue whatsoever about what I should get him. Would you come with me?”

“I would, but remember I told you ‘bout that apartment? I just met my roommate and we are going furniture shopping on Saturday.”

Laurie’s eyes widened with interest and a smile appeared on her face. It gave me the creeps. “Oh really?” She asked. “And you’re already calling him your roommate, eh? So does that mean that you’re definitely going to live there?”

I nodded. “I don’t really have much of a choice, do I? The place is cheap as hell, and to be honest with you I could tell why the minute I walked through the door, but that doesn’t matter. It’s small, but as long as it’s not falling apart…And that guy is okay too.” I said, not sure if I liked the evil smile that played around Laurie’s lips.

“What’s his name? Do we know him? What does he look like?”

I raised my eyebrows. “Stop bombing me with questions already! Why are you so interested in him anyway?”

“Just curious who little Blakie’s going to live with. So answer me.”

“Because you asked so nicely,” I said sarcastically. “His name is Casey, I don’t think you know him. And what does he look like, damn, why do you even care? I thought you had a boyfriend of your own.” Laurie looked at me warningly. “Alright, alright. I don’t know, he’s kind of skinny, dark hair, blue eyes.”

“So you did pay attention to him!”

“Laurie,” I sighed. “Of course I paid attention to him, the living room there is so small that I was practically sitting on his lap.”

Laurie giggled. “So he’s a nice guy?”

“Yes!” I yelled in desperation. “He is. Now get your ass to your boyfriend’s place.” To let her know that there were no hard feelings, I hugged her before we parted ways. As I left and looked at Laurie over my shoulder, she had that look on her face again. I rolled my eyes. She always acted like she knew something about me I didn’t. Silly girl.