The other guy is even taller than that, maybe 6’6”, and he’s not got the Thor-like build of the blonde guy, but his biceps are huge, practically bursting out of his navy polo shirt. He’s scowling down at me, his dark hair falling in strands across his eyes.
“Watch where you’re going,” Tallest Guy says, face screwed up in disdain, before walking fully around me and my suitcase. I splutter in infuriation- you should be looking where you’re going, your friend knocked me over with his dumb paddle!- and turn where I’m sprawled on the ground to yell after him, but a large, strong hand yanks me up by my arm. I turn, now unceremoniously standing, back to Broad Shoulder Guy.
“Keep a look out, yeah?” he says, before hefting the shoulder pads a little higher under his arm, picking up his kayak paddle where he’d put it on the ground, and walking past me as well. I’m so shocked I don’t even yell after him. He picked me up like I weighed nothing.
When I pick up my suitcase from the ground, the hard plastic is scuffed all over. I grimace.
What a welcome to Aurora.
The students thin out the further I get from campus, wandering the wide sidewalks with my phone open in my hand. I’m getting close. This had been the only affordable place I had found in Aurora, and I’m kind of surprised it was so cheap to rent. Sure, I’m getting one room of four, and I’ll apparently have to live with three guys, but even then. I’ve seen the pictures on the website; it’s a really nice apartment, big windows and modern furnishings, and it’s barely a fifteen minute walk from the campus.
Or, it should be. The phone dings to tell me I’ve arrived, but the block I’m stopped by is one building with no doors. I circle the block, and the only places with doors are businesses, not apartments. I grimace down at my phone, and zoom out to check the map properly. I really am at the right place, as far as I can tell, but how do I get in? I circle the block twice more before admitting defeat and opening up the email chain with the guy who had advertised the room on the student bulletin board.
From: [email protected]
Subject: Room for Rent
Cool! Looking forward to meeting you tomorrow. Give me a call if anything goes wrong.
303-555-0195
I dial the number. It rings for a really long time, so long I almost consider hanging up, before clicking through.
“Yeah?” A voice says. He sounds like he just woke up.
“Hi, Seth?”
“Yeah?”
“It’s, uh, Rachel. Rachel Miller.”
“Who?”
I blink.
“Rachel Miller, I’m moving in today.”
“Oh, shit. That’s today?”
“…Yeah, uh, I’m outside, but I can’t find the entrance. Could you help me—”
“Ug-g-g-h. I knew this would happen. Fuckin’….hang on.”
The line goes silent. I check to make sure he hasn’t hung up. He hasn’t, but I can’t hear anything at all.
“Hello?”
No answer. I’m about to hang up myself and ask random strangers for help when I hear a voice yell from overhead.
“RACHEL!”
I jolt and look up. Three floors above me, a guy with scrubbed-up hair like he’s only just got out of bed is leaning out from his balcony yelling down at me. He’s wearing a varsity jacket, boxers, and beneath the jacket, nothing else. He’s slim, he’s not some giant football player or something, but his muscles look like I photoshopped them on.
Wait, did he sleep in his varsity jacket?
Seth points directly underneath the balcony he’s standing on.
“It’s through there, dipshit!”
A few passers-by look over. My head fizzles for a moment with shock and rage. I stare at him, shirtless but for his varsity jacket, barefoot, his muscular legs dusted with thick, dark hair, his expression of impatient distaste. He had been so polite over email.
I look where he’s pointing; there’s a concealed entryway at the side entrance of the optician’s office. I don’t look at or thank Seth; I walk for the doorway. Head still buzzing with anger, I locate the right button on the list of apartments and press it for one long, angry tone until the door clicks open. There are three long, narrow sets of stairs that I heft my suitcase up. The door is open wide, but Seth’s not exactly there to welcome me. Not that he hasn’t given me one hell of a welcome already, along with the rest of Aurora’s asshole student populace. I roll the suitcase along the entryway. A long, wide and airy corridor, with two rooms on the side, leading down to the kitchen. A staircase between the two rooms, presumably leading to the next two. The walls are clean and freshly painted in a neat grey, but the floor is disgusting; you would think a dozen people lived here rather than three. Shoes of all kinds litter the hallway, mixed with random trash and unopened letters. One or two pairs of shoes are neat and paired, tucked into the corner next to the door, but most of them represent enough of a trip hazard that I have to lift my suitcase again and pick through them.
The first bedroom door I pass opens. It’s Seth again, this time with his hair slightly less sticky-up, and with jeans and a shirt on. I find myself missing the view. If he’s going to be an unmitigated asshole to live with, he could at least walk around with the washboard abs on show.
“That one,” he says, pointing to the next bedroom door along, and then slams his door in my face. I blink. Even the abs might not be enough. How long did I sign this lease for?
I trip along the shoe-filled corridor and push open my bedroom door, my new apartment keys jingling in
