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little-goose · 7 years ago

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Okay, so I’ve put it off for a long time, because I just needed to wait or not think about it or what have you, but I am going to briefly chronicle my 2016 as the personal hell year for roommates. Just so I have it down somewhere.

So let’s start at the tail end of 2015. I was a few months into my college program with Disney, settling in and making plans for staying on once the internship was done, when the news that my current roommate was planning to move home to finish school. So around late November/early December i was very much like a passenger on a sinking ship, scrambling for a lifeboat. It didn’t matter if it was the nicest, or had the best people, it could’ve had a hole from which we had to keep bailing out water, but it would’ve been something.

A girl who worked in the same restaurant as me knew my situation but continuously never offered me a spot, instead telling me how she’d been apartment hunting with a few other girls and hoped I’d find something.

For now, let’s call her Vacation Bible School (henceforth; VBS) because that was very much her. She didn’t know I was bisexual and within 10 minutes of meeting her I knew I couldn’t tell her that, which was fine, I’m very used to that now. However, she was very critical of the fact that I, as a 24 year old, drank socially. She would occasionally make comments like, “well if anyone here has done drugs, it might’ve been you.” In the way of someone who is trying to make a joke of it, but is 100% judging you for that. She also asked, first if I was Christian and when I said that I was agnostic, immediately asked if I went to church. Gonna let you think about answer number one for a minute, VBS. She also saw me bring some alcohol into the house and because it was more than one bottle of wine, told our roommates that she was worried that I was an alcoholic.

Anyways, we were friendly enough and I asked if she wouldn’t mind throwing my name out to any of the CPs also staying on after our internship ended on the 2nd of January. She said she would.

Who I found was a girl I did not know well, and didn’t particularly care for, because my first conversation with her included the classic, “Well, with d*sney, assume a guy is gay until proven straight.” But again, I was on a sinking ship, and I figured I could just live amicably enough and not talk about anything except the weather and Harry Potter. Let’s just call her M.

Problem is, in Southern California, you can’t afford to have less than 2 or 3 roommates in a 2 bedroom apartment, working for somewhere like Disney. So I still needed something else.

In comes VBS, halfway through December saying two girls dropped out of her living plans (why didn’t you notice, past Julia?) at the same time and she wanted me to fill those spots.

Long story short, I ended up in an apartment with VBS, M, and another girl from my restaurant I didn’t know, who was Batshit™ Crazy (BS). Due to an error on VBS’ part, because she INSISTED on being the primary name on the lease, we lost our 2 bedroom for the first month, and we were four people in a one bedroom. For one month, until another 2 bed was available.

We move in and oh boy wasn’t that fun. Because I was the only one who had furniture from living more or less on my own in Washington, I had a small uhaul brought down. Which is fair, since most of the furniture was stuff that we needed and did not have to buy.

Right off the bat, VBS was telling other people “can you believe she brought a uhaul for all her stuff? all our furniture is either her or BS’ I feel like I can’t use it.” As a side note, I was determined to make that situation as easy as possible, and enthusiastically (stupidly) said I was happy to share pretty much all my stuff with them. In retaliation, VBS personally allotted us spaces in all the closets and cupboards we had, when we weren’t home one day.

Our first month is nearing its end and me and BS have been getting along better once we find some similar interest and briefly talk about changing our rooming situation when we move, since we get along a little better. Plus, she had a loft bed and I had a queen, so practicality dictated this made the most sense.

And surprise, it did because 2 bedroom apartments in SoCal are TINY. So BS and I agree to speak to our respective planned roommates (VBS-BS, Me-M) about this. I send M a text briefly explaining the space situation and I would like to find time to talk in person, before we move to hash it out.

She chooses not to reply. And to also not speak to me for the next 3 days. We sat in a room with all four of us, and I was just not there to her. I thought it was weird but didn’t press it then.

Cut to the day before move-in. We get the go ahead to move in a day early because of my renter’s insurance (I was the only one with it, since it was only necessary for one, and I already had a plan that I could easily change). At which point, M and VBS finally deign to talk to me about the situation. They wait for BS to take a load of stuff across the complex before approaching me to say that they think it was a, “shitty, passive-agressive thing to do,” and I had a chickenshit way of approaching my problems and that wasn’t a conversation to have over text (I didn’t, of course). And apparently, BS is in no way to blame or involved in this, she just keeps saying she wants to move in. Doesn’t support me, or deny me but still moves both of our things into the same room. We stop for maybe an hour and a half to have this conversation between me, M, and VBS in which I am tired from moving, I want to just have a room in which my bed isn’t pressed against my roommate’s and a person I can stand talking to.

M finally lets it go, but only after she claims the “master” bedroom for herself and VBS, and grudgingly lets go of extra storage space for herself as compensation.

The next move in day, M decides that the day we’ve all set aside to finish moving is the day she needs to go on a tinder date, and leaves around noon, expecting us to move her things into her apartment for her. We all leave it there, with her new keys and go to a movie. Come home that night to a facebook post about fake people and real friends. Because you know, we didn’t move her shit while she went on a date.

From February to maybe June, the most she and I interact is when she gives me her share of bills which I pay (consistently a few days late).

The trouble there, stems from BS and VBS. I was comfortably going along assuming how great it was that I made a friend like BS, who I knew well and could share things with. (Turns out she consistently posted about me on twitter for pretty much the whole year). The worst was probably in late april, when I think I subconsciously realized how much stress my living situation was beginning to cause me but couldn’t put a voice to, because I had a full breakdown on my floor and she came in to “help me out” and I ended up opening up to her, stupidly assuming I could trust this girl.

And why shouldn’t I? While we were still on speaking terms (circa march 2016) she was telling me how awful VBS really was. How she’d lied to BS that M and I were such great friends and wanted to live with them. How I was some alcoholic party kid who was so sarcastic and rude. I mean, she was so wrong, I was a good friend. And my traumatized ass, who can count all my healthy relationships on one hand, was weak to someone going “I love this girl” when I said something funny. Who laughed at my jokes and brought me starbucks at work. I genuinely wanted to believe that this girl and I could be friends for a long time.

But around late April, early May, I suddenly was not on speaking terms with any of my roommates. No warning, one morning BS and VBS were gone, and BS had blocked me on all forms of social media. It was only once I’d logged out of twitter and wandered to her account that I’d seen all the things she’d been saying.

This continues through summer, while at the same time drama was starting at work (that’s a whole different can of worms tbh but what a story that is too). When I realized that my roommate situation wasn’t great, a group of kids (R2P2) kind of welcomed me into our group, where they didn’t welcome VBS. And again I felt so relieved that I was making friends. And in reality, they are all a lot younger (19-20) than me and I can’t fault them for how things went. But they came over one night when I was seriously frightened by a text BS sent me about “want to tell me about how all of our restaurant thinks we’re the worst roommates ever when i get home?” And they took me out when she came home and stayed over night in our living room. Politely and quietly. We left before anyone was up, and halfway through breakfast with them, I get a text saying that I wasn’t allowed guests unless my roommates were told beforehand and approved of them coming. Not entirely unreasonable, until you consider that it’s not the courteous heads-up she wanted, but the ability to flat out say “no you can’t.”

I spent a week sleeping on my friends couches because the stress of being at home when people slammed doors to let you know they were there, moving your shit, waking you up when they decided you’d had enough sleep (even though you work til 3 am some nights), and never knowing when they’ll break their vow of silence to tell you what shit you were doing wrong, was too much.

Then they stopped paying me their shares of bills in July. Until the remote for my television in the living room disappeared for a day and a half. Not misplaced. Gone.

It was brought back when I told them the internet password. They still hadn’t paid me.

But not to worry, almost every day I woke up to notes on the fridge or notes that would fall out of cupboards when opened, letting us all know about who shouldn’t touch what and how much everyone should clean. Because, of course, M wouldn’t want us to be passive-agressive about things.

It took a group text to get them to do so. And my telling them that I can remove privileges to my possessions when necessary. Even so, I began to notice things of mine were getting misplaced and when I’d ask BS, assuming she didn’t flat out ignore me, she didn’t know. Of course she didn’t. Til I found some of my stuff in her drawers. I didn’t ask.

On the morning of my birthday, I wake up next to a card from BS, which took a whole page to say she didn’t know why we grew apart, but she thought it might have been a little bit her fault and she wanted to make amends. And clearly she did a great job. Her bandaid birthday present to me was a sheet of cat stickers.

And somehow we returned to a tentative talking situation and I clung to it because it was better than finally admitting that I had signed a 13 month lease with the Bitches of East End, and I was only halfway through. She didn’t unblock me–where else would she complain about me—but she definitely talked to me to complain about our roommates. Apparently she could only stay friends with VBS for 3½ months. She was a big fan of throwing the first stone, then letting other people take over so she could seem like the nice, reasonable one. Idiot Julia didn’t catch on quick.

But I did finally realize that I needed to get out. I started looking for new apartments, but I couldn’t post anything on a roommate facebook page where VBS and M were members, because I didn’t want to say anything about leaving until I knew I had a safety net. It was a lot of hunching over apartments.com listings like they were porn, from september to december.

All while peppered with continuous notes from M and BS, though the latter, she promised, was not directed at me. By november at least BS and VBS started paying me for bills again, though never paid me back the months they just elected to ignore my presence. M, however, wrote me a letter in which she detailed why she did not have to pay me for either renters insurance or back months of internet. She even did the (incorrect) math, to show me how much I should be charging her, not that she ever paid me more than a third of it. When I agreed to let her out of paying for the last few months, in which I never gave her the password again, VBS insisted I still charge her, because it was unreasonable to split a payment between three of us. So she tried to get out of paying again. In the end, internet won out for her.

Turns out though, in January, no one felt the need to communicate their living plans, so M tried to keep our current apartment without telling us, which she couldn’t without our approval, VBS was going to leave early to move home, and BS wanted to keep our apartment too. Nothing like having your landlords comment on the drama in your apartment every time you try to pick your mail up. I also don’t recommend hearing about your roommate’s moving plans from your landlord first.

The good news is I did find a place to live, and a friend of mine was ready and willing to move down two states to live with me, the only tricky bit was moving out.

Mostly because VBS moved out a week early, and opted to not do any cleaning or repairs before she left. She also left with one of our keys, and expected us to help her pay the fine. Cute.

In the end, I was the last one to officially leave, because I had to move essentially all my stuff out and into a uhaul by myself, after a friend left after an hour of help. And then move it to storage for a week. But because of this, they left me with a kitchen and living room full of odds and ends garbage to throw out and clean. Despite the fact that they still had a day to come back and finalize it all.

And while there were plenty of awful conversations, texts, and notes in between this, I made it out, with most of my stuff. They did damage some things, including a mug I’d had for years and a tablecloth I’d inherited from my Oma, and I still find small things missing now and then. But I made it out. And I live with an amazing friend.

The downside is, of course, after having been in survival mode for essentially 14 months, and finally being in a safe place, the depressive episode hit hard and fast. And even that I wanted to deny, because it didn’t feel fair that I finally had a good thing going and now my depression was back. But it was, and still is, and I’m finally working on that. The good news is unlike last time, it didn’t take a year and a half for me to recognize it for what it was and try and get help again.

So, if you read all that, I hope it clears up some of my vague posts from the last year, some of my absences or weird tags. I feel bad that I did have friends reach out and offer support, but I just couldn’t say it at the time. And I want to blanket thank you all those people, several of which are on here, who tried to support me as best I could, even when I downplayed how I was feeling. It’s been months and it’s only now that I wanted to face it in its entirety and realize I wasn’t overreacting, and I wasn’t always in the wrong.

Sometimes, it really isn’t you, it’s them.

#personal things #sooooooo there's that

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