The Worst Roommates EVER
If there’s one person we want to always be getting along with, it’s the person we live with.
After all, spending the majority of our time with someone would be a far more pleasant experience if we didn’t find their presence to be a major unwanted nuisance. Unfortunately for some people out there, that was apparently too much to ask.
1. Be My Guest
My roommate keeps the place extremely messy and never helps with any of the household chores.
So, I pretended to be a hot girl on Tinder and matched with him, telling him I was coming over in the hopes that this would get him to clean up the apartment. My plan failed spectacularly. He did not clean up, and also sent me a picture of his junk that I didn’t need to see…
2. When The Cat’s Away, The Roommates Will Play
I've sat on this story for years, but I think it’s finally time to tell it. Just pure jerkery and the end of life-long friendship.
A good friend of mine, Jay, was moving to New York City with his girlfriend and another friend of theirs from college named Lisa. I had been in New York City for a few years already, in a lousy but manageable apartment.
I traveled a lot for work and I was fine with my situation. Once they realized the rent costs out here, Jay and his girlfriend started pushing me to join them in getting a nicer two-bedroom apartment, saying that we would split the costs three ways.
Since they arrived, Lisa pretty much disappeared, having her own friends, who she spent most of her time with.
She would occasionally stop by on the weekends and crash on the couch, but that was about it. Every bone in my body was saying that this was a bad idea, but I decided to give it a go. I lived to regret it BIG TIME.
Upon moving in, I really don't see them much. I'm on the road nearly every week for work, so we hardly interact.
I would basically get back home late every Friday night, do my expense reports for work, check in on the bills for the apartment, and then leave town again Sunday afternoon.
Jay asks that I let him know in advance any time there is a rare week when I'm not traveling, so he knows whether or not he and his girlfriend could be home alone.
I didn't think much of it and happily gave him a heads up when I knew I was going to be around. For the first few months, the bills were growing and I was paying a little more than I expected, but overall, things were fine.
Until one weekend, it all changed. The girlfriend gives me a note with my share of the bills. I can't believe my eyes.
I see a $500 phone and TV bill with my name on it. Note that my two roommates, who live there all the time and don’t travel, claimed only a combined $80 of the bill as their own responsibility.
The bill included a bunch of calls from the phone landline to California and a ton of On-Demand movie purchases. I knew I hadn’t been behind any of these purchases.
I confronted the others. Me: “These aren't my purchases, there is no way I'm paying for them”. The girlfriend: “This is simple math. They aren't mine, they aren't Jay’s, so they have to be yours”.
Me, brandishing a folder with all my travel receipts that I keep in a file until I get my reimbursement: “I was in Boston and Baltimore for the periods that all of these bills are for".
As in, there is literally no physical way I could have made those calls. Girlfriend: “I don't care what your papers say, it wasn't me and it wasn't Jay”.
This loop continues for about an hour or so, at which point I politely ask her to leave my room. Red in the face, she vows that I'm paying my share. Jay finally turns up late at night. All hope was crushed at that point.
Understandably, he takes his girlfriend’s side and is trying to appeal to me rationally to own up to my side of the deal.
I'm showing him dozens of receipts placing me hundreds of miles away and the loop starts all over again; that it wasn't Jay or the girlfriend, so it had to be me. I lock my door, leave, and meet up with my boss for dinner.
Again, as I travel so much, we try to catch up over dinner and a drink when I'm back in town. I explain the situation and he thinks something else must be going on. He asks if I'm on the lease. This is when I begin to get a genius idea.
I mention that I'm not, as it’s just Jay and the girlfriend who had signed their names to it.
He advises me to keep all my receipts showing where I was in case they try to go after me in small claims court. But also, as I'm not on the lease, he suggests that I should really consider moving out.
He's telling me the situation is only going to get worse from here. He tells me to take a few days this week and see what I can find, as normally I'd be on my way to Boston Sunday night.
He also tells me to change the lock on my room. That Sunday morning, I change my door handle from the generic indoor lock to a keyed lock.
The tensions in our apartment at this point are still thick between us, as the bill issue is still not resolved. I don't talk to Jay or the girlfriend for the rest of the day, as they are out and about.
Sunday night, I'm in my room, door locked in bed trying to figure out what the heck I'm going to do. Then the fun begins.
Please note this extremely important detail of the story: They don't know I'm still home, as I'd normally be on the train to Boston by 5:00 pm. 8:00 pm rolls by and I suddenly hear my doorknob jiggle.
I then hear the girlfriend say, "That little jerk changed the lock, YOU JERK!!! YOU HUGE JERK!!!" She starts screaming hysterically at the top of her lungs. I'm trying to figure out A) Why is she so angry?
, and B) Why is she trying to open my door in the first place? Now I hear Jay trying to open the door. The next words out of his mouth shocked me.
He calmly says to the girlfriend that they can just jimmy open the door with a butter knife. That is when I open the door and demand to know what the heck they are doing. Their faces both immediately go as pale as a ghost. I ask again, "
What the heck are you doing trying to open my locked door?" They reply asking why I changed the lock.
I reply, "It doesn't matter, I'm paying rent, it's my room". They start with the mind games again, saying: "That is really messed up that you would change the locks, don’t you trust us?"
They get really angry and are shouting all sorts of stuff at me for the next few minutes. The next moment changed everything. The lock to the main door of the apartment opens.
In walks their friend Lisa with a suitcase…and looking like she's also seen a ghost as soon as she spots me. It all comes together for me at that moment.
Lisa has obviously been staying in my room when I'm traveling, and all the mysterious bills they were asking me to pay were hers. I was absolutely livid. She had been staying in my room with all my belongings without my knowledge.
I felt betrayed. When I voiced these complaints, the girlfriend just shrugged and uttered something about me not using the room that much anyway. I didn't say another word.
I just locked the door, packed up my clothes and belongings, and walked out the door. I made a few calls and one of my cousins was more than accommodating until I was able to find a permanent new spot.
I left that night and never spoke to them again. Over the next week or so, Jay left a ton of voicemails for me, starting off with asking when I was coming back, then getting to when am I dropping off my share of the rent and bill payments.
I never responded to any of these messages. I did see them pop up on my Facebook recently as suggested friends.
Turns out they are married now and living in New England somewhere. Screw the both of them!
3. Not Seeing The Connection
After weeks of struggling to get the internet functioning in our apartment when I needed it for work, I woke up this morning to a bizarre sight.
It was a handwritten note from my roommate, who apparently isn’t aware that WiFi is just radio signals that are constantly around you in the air whether or not you turn your computer’s receiver on.
“Hey, I’ve been shutting off our WiFi because it turns out it’s really bad for your health! Sorry about the inconvenience. I was trying to only do it after you fell asleep.
There’s info on the web about how it can cause cancer, infertility, headaches, and disruption of your cell repair while you sleep. If you’re interested, you can look it up for more information”.
I can’t look it up for more information, because somebody cut off my internet connection!
4. This One Doesn’t Sound Too Good…
I’m of Mexican descent, and as such I enjoy listening to a lot of Spanish-language music around the house. The other day, completely out of nowhere, I received a text message from my new roommate. When I read it, my blood ran cold with fury. “
Hey dude, as your roommate, let me give you some advice: you should start listening to more English and American music if you want to fit in".
He then continued: "Leave your Mexican reggae garbage behind and embrace your new culture”. Aside from a number of other questions, I am baffled by what made him think this was an appropriate or good idea to send me…
