The One That Got Away

Ty was not lying. The room was a bit of a mess, boxes and clothes sitting haphazardly around on the floor, and there was a desk and a chair in the corner. A twin bed sat in the opposite corner of the room, stripped bare from its covers. There were two windows, both without curtains, and only a single light bulb in the ceiling, with no cover on it.

“Well, that won’t actually change,” Ty said with a sheepish grin, gesturing at the light bulb. “We haven’t really bothered getting a lamp cover for it.”

Turning around, Ty pushed open the door across the hallway to reveal a room with the ugliest fuchsia floral-patterned wallpaper Oliver’s seen in his life. “This is the upstairs bathroom,” he said. “I know it’s an eyesore, but we have a pretty decent sized hot water tank. The toilet could be kind of annoying sometimes so you gotta jiggle the handle a bit to make it flush, but all the utilities were included in the rent already. Our landlord’s a pretty cool dude.”

He headed back down the hallway and down the stairs again, briefly tapping the door closest to the stairs as he passed. “That’s Chris’s room, but he’s like, never here. He’s not a student, he had a band that played a lot of semi-local gigs, so he travels quite a bit, and when he’s in town he crashes with our friend Clarence a lot. I don’t care; they’re both nice guys and Chris pays his rent on time, so it’s all good with me.”

“I don’t go out much,” Oliver mumbled, sticking his hands in his pockets.

“Oh hey,” Ty said with a shrug and a grin, “Good for you.”

Coming from anyone else, it might had sounded snide, but Ty somehow made it sound like he was genuinely happy for Oliver.

“I don’t care, dude,” he continued. “I’m not your mother. As long as you pay your rent, I don’t care if you’re never here, or if you bring the whole damn football team in to party every weekend. I’m just easy like that.”

They made their way back downstairs again, and Ty gestured in the doorway to their left.

“This is the living room.”

Oliver looked at the worn couch which had a very soft looking fleece blanket tossed over it. In one corner of the room there was an oversized reclining chair, and on the wall facing the couch there was a small entertainment center with an incredibly tiny TV that looked like it might had been in its prime back in the 70s. A Play station 3 rested on one of the shelves, nestled between various DVD covers.

“We got your basic cable and internet; there’s an internet outlet up in every room as well, and we got more than enough bandwidth for your everyday use.”

Oliver thought briefly about his game, but pushed the thought to the back of his mind; it might not be an issue, and even if he had to cut back on his gaming, so be it. It wouldn’t kill him to find other hobbies.

“Kitchen,” Ty said, going across the hallway. “We take turns cleaning everything, but again–I’m not your mother. Do whatever you want in your own room, as long as it’s not a fire hazard or it would warrant a visit from the health department.”

They soon end up back by the front door again, Ty having talked for the most part, with Oliver only mumbling a response here and there.

“My own room was down there,” Ty said, pointing past the stairs to a door that looked like it might fall down any second. “I have my own little bathroom, which connects to my room, because I’m cool and special like that.”

Oliver couldn’t think of a witty response so he nodded dumbly.

“I know it doesn’t look like much,” Ty said with a lopsided grin and a shrug, “but it really isn’t a bad place, the rent’s good, our landlord kicks ass, and really–I’m an awesome roommate.”

He threw his hands out a bit for emphasis, and Oliver couldn’t help but laugh a little.

“Do you had any questions for me?” Ty asked.

“Um,” Oliver said. He probably should had some questions. To show that he was a serious person, capable of grown-up stuff like researching the place he’s thinking about renting, or something.

“Why’d your roommate decide to move out so early in the year?” he finally asked.

“I’m gay,” Ty said.

Oliver did a double take and couldn’t help the frown that appeared on his face. He opened and closed his mouth once, trying to come up with an appropriate response to this seemingly completely random bit of information, before he got it. Ty wasn’t being random, he was answering Oliver’s question.

“Oh,” was all Oliver could say to that, feeling bad for his mental VD joke earlier, and then immediately felt even worse for automatically linking the two together in his mind.

“Is that a problem?”

Something must have shown on Oliver’s face, because while Ty was still smiling, Oliver didn’t miss the slight challenging tone of his voice, the stiffening of his posture, the wariness that said Ty was ready for a fight, verbal or otherwise.

The idea that Ty thought Oliver might be some homophobe, maybe even get physically violent, simply because of Ty’s sexuality kind of baffled–and okay, insulted–Oliver a little.

“Of course not,” he said, and his outrage that there was even a possibility it might had been a problem must had been evident in his voice, because Ty visibly relaxed again.

“Good,” Ty said, one corner of his mouth tilting up a little further.

“I’m sorry,” Oliver blurted out, and Ty raised one eyebrow in something that might be a mix of confusion and amusement.

“Not that you’re gay,” Oliver mumbled again. “Sorry that your last roommate was a bigoted ass.”

He could felt his cheeks warm at his own words, but Ty just looked amused.

“Dude,” Ty said, “You don’t have to kiss ass. The room’s yours if you want it.”

Oliver couldn’t help a little smile. “Yeah?”

“Yeah.” Ty said, smiling back, bright and happy like he’d done for the whole time Oliver’d been there, like he didn’t have a care in the world and he genuinely thought Oliver was just a cool guy.

“Okay,” Oliver said, taking a deep breath and shaking Ty’s hand. “I’ll take it. Though for the record, I wasn’t trying to kiss ass.”

Ty just snorted out a laugh in response.