Chapter 2 #3
“How far was your job from here?” Tristan looks annoyed.
“Half an hour on the subway, but I don’t work there anymore.”
“But you did, for three months. Where’s the closest subway station?” Tristan’s nostrils flare.
“A couple of blocks. It’s a seven-minute walk.”
Tristan’s jaw tics. “And you walked there by yourself?”
“I have pepper spray, and I’ve taken self-defense classes. Besides, after today, I won’t be living here, so it doesn’t really matter, does it?” I don’t get why he’s suddenly so concerned. He was biting my ear and crushing me twenty minutes ago.
“Let’s pick a better neighborhood for your new apartment,” Flip says.
“As long as it fits into my budget, sure.” Toronto is an expensive place to live.
Flip falls into step beside me, and Tristan follows with his phone in his hand. He’s probably sexting tonight’s victim.
My nerves kick into high gear as we pile into the tiny elevator with the little old lady who smells like tuna and mothballs.
She makes small talk about how nice the weather finally is and how hard Canadian winters are on her old bones.
It’s a standard conversation. Canadians like to bitch about the six months of snow and subzero temperatures.
We also like to moan when it gets too hot. There’s really no pleasing us.
The little old lady gets off on the twelfth floor, and we continue to the twenty-third.
The elevator clunks and groans, but the doors open, which is awesome.
I got stuck in here once when it stopped between floors.
I was trapped with a pizza delivery guy.
He’d been worried about the forty-five-minutes-or-free situation.
I was worried I’d pee my pants. Ten interminable minutes later, they pried the doors open.
I’d used the stairs for two weeks after that.
Flip and Tristan follow me out of the elevator and down the hall to my soon-to-be former apartment. I stupidly dropped my fob back into my purse, so they stand there awkwardly while I rummage around searching for it.
“What’s all that crinkling?” Tristan asks.
“Mini bags of goldfish crackers and a few fortune cookies,” I mutter. I always carry snacks in my purse. I finally find my key fob and swipe it over the censor. I didn’t warn my roommates I was coming. I figured the element of surprise would benefit me.
But as I examine the scene before me, I reconsider that strategy.
On the upside, Eugenia isn’t tied to the pillar in the middle of the living room.
On the downside, her boyfriend, Claude, my other former roommate, is doing the helicopter, and every rotation of his wiener slaps Eugenia’s cheek.
She’s dressed in another impressively designed period piece, her boobs hanging out.
I’d like to say this is a first, but that would be a lie.
“What the fuck?” Tristan mutters.
“Is he slapping her in the face with his flaccid dick?” Flip asks.
“Yeah,” I confirm.
Eugenia is the first to notice me. My brother and Tristan are still in the hall.
For now. She scrambles to her feet. “What are you doing here?” Her eyes flare as two shadows appear on either side of me.
“Oh! You brought friends! Is this your way of apologizing for calling me a psycho bitch last night? I have dibs on the yummy one behind you. Claude, you can have the other one.” Eugenia squeezes Claude’s arm, her voice trembling with excitement.
I hold up a hand. “I’m not apologizing. I’m here to get my stuff. Then I’ll try to erase this nightmarish little blip in my life, probably with copious quantities of booze.” Cheap wine, most likely.
“You still need to pay next month’s rent. It’s on the lease that you have to give thirty days’ notice, and you gave us no notice,” Claude says. He’s tucked his penis back into his pants, thank God.
“These two asked you to take part in a threesome, yeah?” Flip confirms.
“Yeah.”
“And you said no, yeah?”
“That’s correct. I said no.”
“And they still tried to get you involved again?” Tristan asks.
“Uh, yeah.”
“So they asked twice?” he presses. “And both times you said no?” For a second, I expect him to tack something shitty on the end, but after a few seconds of silence, I realize Tristan’s on my team.
“They asked more than twice, and I always said no.” I’m embarrassed that it’s gone on as long as it has, but with the hours I’d been pulling at work, I didn’t have time to look for another place. Nor the ability to comfortably afford something on my own.
“So they kept pressuring you, even though you’d made it clear you weren’t interested in participating?” Tristan’s nostrils flare, and I try not to notice how hot he is when he’s defending me.
“I’m pretty sure that’s sexual harassment.” Flip looks like he wants to punch Claude.
“If someone says they’re not interested, but the other person keeps pushing them, and then gets naked in the living room when their roommate could come home any minute, knowing full well it makes them uncomfortable…
” Tristan and Flip exchange a look, and I’m not sure if I’m imagining it, but there seems to be a weird tension between them.
“It does sound a lot like sexual harassment.” Tristan turns to me. “Would you agree, Bea?”
“Um… Yes.” This is the Tristan I had a crush on. The one who did nice things unexpectedly, like bring me my favorite chocolate bar for real and not throw a toad in my face.
“I could post about it on my social media, see what other people say. You know, in case we’re off base,” Flip says.
“How many followers do you have again, Flip? Two million, or is it three?” Tristan pulls his phone out of his pocket and starts scrolling through social media apps.
“You’re lying.” Eugenia crosses her arms, which thankfully cover her nipples.
“Am I?” Flip pulls up one of his social media accounts, where he has over three million followers, and shows it to Eugenia.
“Flip Madden?” Her eyes bounce from the small screen to my brother’s face and then to me. “He’s your brother? And he plays professional hockey?” she asks.
“Yeah.” I often keep my brother’s status to myself, in part because people can get weird about it. I turn to Flip. “I’m gonna get my things so we can get out of here.”
“I can help,” Flip says.
“It’s fine. It won’t take long. It’s just clothes and books and stuff.”
Tristan says nothing, but carries the empty plastic bins into my bedroom, then stands outside the door with his arms crossed.
I frantically toss stuff in the bins, glancing over my shoulder to make sure Tristan isn’t paying attention as I empty my top drawer.
It contains all my most important items—bras, panties, and self-gratification toys.
It takes less than twenty minutes to pack my belongings, and they fit into three bins. One for each of us.
Eugenia and Claude are sitting on the living room couch, looking terrified and slightly awestruck.
Flip is standing in the doorway of their roleplay room, rubbing his bottom lip.
Tristan is being his annoyingly attractive self, hair flopping over one eye as he leans against the wall outside my bedroom, wearing a pensive expression.
“All set,” I squeak. I want to GTFO and forget this ever happened.
Flip turns as I set the heaviest of the bins on the floor. He makes a circle motion with his finger. “Anything out here that belongs to you?”
With my brother and Tristan standing sentinel, I scan the room for any of my personal effects. The role-playing living-room sex-capades had escalated in frequency recently, so I’d been disappearing into my bedroom most nights.
I cross over to the fridge and tuck my bottle of orange juice into my purse, as well as the half-block of sharp cheddar and two apples.
My condiments will take up too much room and are mostly empty.
But the freezer contains a box of ice cream sandwiches.
The good ones. They were my grocery splurge this week.
I check for those. It was unopened yesterday, and now there are only three left. Jerks.
I hold up the box. “Either of you interested in an ice cream sandwich?”
“Sure. Let’s take them to go. Ready to roll out?” Flip grabs one of the heavy bins and heads for the door.
I set the apartment key on the counter.
Tristan picks up the lighter bin, then he sets it down and takes the one full of books. His biceps pop under the strain. He waits at the door, keeping it propped open with his foot as I pass through with my bin.
“Thanks,” I mumble.
He grunts and turns his attention to Eugenia and Claude. “You two are fucking assholes. If you cause Bea any more drama, Flip and I will make your lives a living hell.” He lets the door fall shut, his expression unreadable. “Let’s get the fuck out of here.”
I follow Flip down the hall to the elevators.
It isn’t until we’re inside and on our way back to the lobby that anyone says anything. “How long has that shit been going on?” Tristan’s right eye tics.
“It only escalated into super-weird territory over the past few weeks.”
“What about your financial situation? Is it bad? Is that why you were living there?” Flip asks.
“Rent was cheap. I know why now. It meant I could save twenty-five percent of every paycheck instead of ten. I’d only planned to stay for a year, and then I’d have a cushion and could afford a nice studio or something.”
I want to have at least five thousand in savings.
That’s enough of a buffer to cover first and last at a new place and incidentals for a couple of months.
Our parents never had savings. It didn’t matter that they both had full-time jobs and my dad even had a side hustle painting houses on the weekend.
Every time they tried to sock away money, something would happen, and they’d need it to cover an emergency.
And Flip’s hockey was expensive. I don’t ever want to be in the same position.
“I would’ve helped you out, Rix. You know that.” Flip’s forehead is furrowed.