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My Life: Chapter 4 - The Roommate from Hell

by Fitz

College started with a bang. That bang was the sound of my school books crashing off my desk, hitting my chair, and taking said chair with them on their path to the floor. The first morning, and my roommate already hated me.

It really was not my fault. In a way, it was, I guess. Still, I never knew how to curb nightmares, and a person could not be faulted for what he did when he was still mostly asleep. So when my hand hit those books, the blow jarred me out of my dreams, and I woke in time to be doubly startled by the noise those books and my chair made upon hitting the floor. That sound was closely followed by expressive cursing above me.

“Fuckin’ A! What the fuck was that?!”

He liked to use the F-word a lot. If he ever went three sentences without saying it, I was not there to hear it.

“S-sorry,” I stammered, trying to control my breathing. I did not have nightmares often, but when I did, they were bad. Stress usually brought them on, and heaven knew I had been under a bit of pressure that week.

“What the fuck’s the time?” my roommate groaned.

My roommate’s name was Jonas. He swore up and down that he was one hundred percent Russian and ‘fucking’ proud of it. Not a day passed that I did not hear him rave about ‘Mother Russia’ and how the country would rise again. It was the point when he spoke of Russia’s great leaders of the twentieth century that I came to understand something a bit... unexpected.

“Like Stalin?” I had asked before I had the chance to really think about what a stupid thing that was to say to the fanatic.

“Whatever,” he had shrugged, no recognition at all in his face. “You know. The great fucking czars.”

“Oh, like the Romanoff family?” I offered, grateful to recover from that last comment.

“What the fuck are you talking about, Himura?” That was another thing. He always called me by my surname, as if there was another Kenshin walking around and that was the only way he could tell us apart.

I had just stared, incredulous. There he sat, all high and mighty, placing this country on a great pedestal, and he did not know jack shit about it.

“Never mind, Jonas,” I had waved him off, poking my nose back into my book before he could go off on me again. He thought I was the roommate from hell. He needed to take a look in the mirror once in awhile.

Back to that first day, though. The two of us just stepped off on the wrong foot. That was putting it mildly. In actuality, we stepped all over each others’ feet.

“It’s only five-fifty,” I replied to his question after glancing at my alarm clock. “Go back to sleep.”

“The fuck! I have to get up in ten minutes anyway!” Jonas snarled. He was not a morning person. How could he be when he stayed up until two o’clock every night? “What the fuck’s your problem?”

“Nothing,” I grumbled, already out of bed and picking up my chair, gently pushing it under the desk. “Sorry.”

“If you’re gonna yell like that every night, I swear to fuckin’ God, I’ll throttle you,” he announced gruffly. He climbed down from his bunk, shoving against my shoulder as he walked past. I grabbed my chair, nearly knocking it over again in my efforts to remain on my feet. Needless to say, I was not pleased with the way Jonas was treating me.

“There’s no need to push me,” I said, somewhat irate by this point. “I can move on my own.”

“Don’t patronize me, wuss.”

I bit back several heated responses, most of them insulting his intelligence. My ego was bruised, but I did not want to get into a fight so early in the morning. After all, if I did not take some crap from people, I would never survive college life.

Throwing on a pair of sweatpants over my boxers and grabbing my ID and keys, I followed Jonas out of the room. He went to the shower, and I went the opposite direction, down the hall to the elevator. With his attitude so far, I had the feeling he would take plenty of time in the shower, so I planned to take that time to eat some breakfast.

^_^

My place on seventh floor was not all bad. I soon discovered that Sano lived on the same floor. He was in a different wing, but it was a pleasant surprise to see a familiar face at the floor meeting. Even more nice was when he waved at me from across the room when I rushed in late to the meeting after my last class of the day. I took the invitation and sat on the floor next to his chair.

“Fancy meeting you here,” Sano said grandly. “Where’s your room?”

“The north wing,” I gestured toward the correct hallway absently, eyes drifting toward the man sitting in the lounge chair next to Sano. He had blue-green eyes and hair that was almost as startlingly long as mine. His hair fell to just below his shoulders, and he held it back with a bluish bandanna--similar to the way Sano did. Sano must have noticed my distraction because he calmly spoke up again.

“Kenshin, this is Katsu,” he introduced. “Katsu, this is the kid I met at orientation.”

“You never told me he was pretty.”

I had to blush at that comment, and I scowled.

“He’s straight, Katsu.”

My scowl turned into a wide-eyed blink of surprise. Katsu smirked.

“Pity.” Yes, I blushed again.

“Katsu’s an aspiring painter,” Sano explained. He offered that wily smirk with which I was beginning to grow familiar. “You know... the artsy type.”

“Ah...” I chuckled uneasily. Trying to shake off my discomfort over the way his intense gaze settled on me, I smiled. “Are you two roommates?”

“Me and Katsu?” Sano sounded surprised. He laughed. “Nah! He’d go nuts with someone like me in his room.”

“Sano is a slob,” Katsu murmured. “The last time he came over, he put his foot through a painting I had spent three months on.”

“I said I was sorry!” Sano groaned. “Come on! That was two Christmases ago!” He rolled his eyes and leaned down slightly as if to speak in tones Katsu could not hear. Sano spoke plenty loud. “He hasn’t let me step foot in his house since. Can we say paranoid?”

I chuckled, and Katsu huffed indignantly. Our conversation ended there because the CA* started the floor meeting.

^_^

*CA, aka, California, aka Community Advisor. Figure it out from the context. ^_~ Anyway, this is different from the usual RA/Residence Advisor. The college chose to change this for some reason. Perhaps to make it politically correct. Whatever. Now you all know what a CA is if I mention it again.

^_^

The first semester of college went smoothly for the most part. Classes were fine. I was not pleased with my Biology teacher. He gave me a zero on a test that I would have scored an A on, had I remembered to put my name on it. Call me an idiot, but my mind was elsewhere at the time. Like on what the difference between capillaries and arteries was. My saving grace was that he threw out your lowest test score, but I had kind of hoped to throw that sixty percent I had gotten on the single-celled organisms exam.

The situation with Jonas only got worse. He finally gave up on the whole Russia fanaticism thing, replacing it with cocaine and heroin. Considering my own background with such chemicals, I was extremely uncomfortable with their presence. Sometimes he had the drugs in the room, and sometimes he was just high when he stumbled in at night. Either way, I did not like it. After all, the mere fact that I knew the drugs were there was enough to get me kicked out along with Jonas should anyone discover what he was doing.

I confronted him one night, when he was a little more down-to-earth than usual.

Jonas was on my bed, flipping through some teen magazine. I had been out in the TV lounge, doing my Pre-Calculus, and I set my math book down on my desk when I saw him.

“Jonas, I want to talk to you,” I started, knowing from the tension around his eyes that he was well aware of his surroundings.

“Well good for you,” he snapped immediately. “What the fuck do you have to say to me?”

“I know about the drugs,” I said quietly. The door was closed, but I wanted to be careful.

“So?” he challenged. “What do you care?”

“I don’t like it!” I frowned at him, a bit frustrated at his lack of response. “If you’re going to shoot up, fine. But don’t do it in here.”

“I’ll do whatever the fuck I feel like doing!” he stood up then, towering over me. He was about six-foot-five, which placed him well over a foot taller than myself. It made things awkward. I stepped back, but I still had to crane my neck to meet his angry glare.

“You could get caught,” I warned.

“The only way anyone would find out was if someone else told them,” Jonas hissed.

“Keep pushing it, Jonas,” I replied, more frustrated than angry. “I don’t want that stuff around me.”

He was furious by that point, the violence in his face alarming. Then, he was looming toward me, using his greater size to force me back. I stumbled a few steps before my back hit the wall, and there was nowhere else to go. To my left was another wall, and to my right-- Jonas’s hand slammed into the wall, palm slapping flat against the surface when he saw me look that direction.

“I don’t care what you want!” he snarled, nose inches from mine. I stared back at him, my frustration mounting, anger building at this treatment. “This is my room, I paid for it, so I can do whatever the fuck I want in it!”

My conclusion: Jonas was a screwed up bastard who had terrible breath. I glared up at him, mad that he thought he could intimidate me with his size and even more irritated because he had not actually touched me yet. If he did not hit me, then I could not hit him back. I’d be damned if I threw the first punch.

“Yes, but it’s my room as well,” I replied coldly. “So I have a say in everything that happens in it. And I don’t want your shit in here. So get out of my face, Jonas.”

He shoved forward with a growl, and I tensed for the blow that never came. Jonas just pushed his entire body forward, nearly against mine but not quite, his face next to mine, breath hot on my neck. I turned my face from him, looking at him out of the corner of my eye. I refused to cringe away. He would not defeat me with intimidation and words.

“I don’t know what you’re planning, fag, but you turn me in, and I’ll have your hide,” he breathed into my ear.

“Back off, Jonas,” I whispered. The name-calling stung, but I had a feeling it would hurt a lot more if I was not careful. It was better not to acknowledge it than to make a big issue of it and let him know how much it upset me.

There was a knock at the door, and I jumped at the sound. Jonas smirked, and I hated him for it. That slight flinch had told him he had succeeded in his attempts to scare me. It was not true, of course. I had been so tense from the confrontation that the outside noise startled me. It had nothing to do with Jonas. But that was not what he thought.

“That’s right, bitch,” he murmured, then pulled away quickly, walking to the door.

My skin crawled from the encounter, and I shivered convulsively.

Son of a bitch! I thought angrily. I did hate him. Some deep, distant part of me, at that moment, would not have been sorry to see him shoot up a dose that would take him to the grave.

“Oh. Hi, Jonas. Is Kenshin here?” Sano’s familiar voice broke through my rage, and I pushed away from the wall. I passed the door and managed a curt wave toward my friend. While I went to my bed, he pushed past Jonas and entered the room. “Kenshin! You’ll never guess! I met this girl today. I mean, she was gorgeous--Kenshin?”

I glanced at him briefly, then returned to picking up the magazine Jonas had left on my bed--YM magazine. Very nice. I flipped it to the top bunk. My hands were shaking, and I would have given my left arm for a smoke.

“She’s a pre-med student,” Sano continued cautiously. “I met her on the bus...”

“That’s nice,” I mumbled noncommittally, barely hearing his words. He continued, and I straightened my comforter, contemplating washing my sheets after Jonas had lounged on them. At the very least, my pillowcase needed changing. I nodded absently at what Sano was saying, oblivious to the meaning behind the words coming from his mouth. Then, something he said clicked, and I snapped to attention.

“We did not!” I growled with indignant fury.

“Just making sure you were paying attention.” The words were light, but his expression was dark. My mind was still balking at the comment he made involving me and Jonas alone in this room. I was just glad Jonas had left the room, or we would have had some serious cussing on our hands.

“So... Kenshin,” Sano stood back as I went to my closet, retrieving a clean pillowcase. “Party in my room tonight.”

“I think I’ll pass,” I smirked over my shoulder at him. After all, I knew what kind of parties he liked. If the CA knew about them, he would throw a fit.

“It won’t be the same without you,” Sano protested.

“Why not?” I chuckled. “What kind of party is it that my presence would be so vital?”

“A party that consists of me, you, and an old classic,” he declared.

“If you pull out one of those nasty films--” I groaned.

“Lethal Weapon,” he held up his hands in a conciliatory manner. “The first one. Nothing bad, I promise.”

I had to laugh. Trust Sano to come up with something when I was down. He knew Jonas and I had argued, but, as usual, he opted not to comment.

“Grab your pillow and PJ’s, Kenshin,” Sano called as he walked out of the room.

That meant I was spending the night in his room. That was fine by me. I never would have been able to fall asleep with Jonas in the same room as I was that night anyway.

Half an hour later, I was settled on the floor in Sano’s room. Less than an hour into the movie, I lost track of the plot and closed my eyes. I stretched out on my stomach, buried my face in my pillow, and fell asleep.

^_^

I liked to go running in the afternoons. If it was too cold or rainy, I would go to the track. Nice days, I ran over the Washington Avenue bridge and around the east bank. It was nice to jog through the park and across the mall and interesting to stop to inspect the construction that was going on all over campus.

One afternoon, I jogged past the man on his soapbox and around the crowds surrounding him. He shouted about our savior Jesus Christ and the evils of the world. I’d like to introduce him to my roommate. But he was soon behind me, and I made my way around the Physics building and headed toward the Armory.

It was at about that time when Sano saw me.

“Kenshin!”

Stopping abruptly, I turned to see where Sano was. The brown-haired man waved at me from the bicycle racks, and I jogged over to him. That made me curious, actually. Sano did not ride bikes. As far as I knew, he never learned how to ride bicycle. He liked to walk or take the bus.

“Sorry to interrupt your jog,” Sano smirked.

“What’s up, Sano?” I waved off the apology carelessly. “Waiting for someone?”

“Actually, I am,” he said proudly, then sagged a bit. “She should have been here forty minutes ago.”

Blinking in alarm, I managed a weak smile.

“I’d say you’ve been stood up.”

“Tch,” Sano snorted. “You had lunch yet?”

“It’s almost four-thirty, Sano,” I smiled.

“So?” he stretched his hands over his head, then swung his arm down, hooking it around my neck. “That means it’s almost time for the cafeteria to open.”

“I want to finish my run,” I protested as he pulled me along down the sidewalk.

“There’s a Burger King not too far away from here,” Sano said suggestively. “You could run there.”

“I hate Burger King!” I reminded him. Sano already knew that. He did not know why I hated Burger King, but he knew I never ate there. “And you just want me to pay for your food.”

“I suggested the cafeteria first,” he pointed out.

“For god’s sake!” I continued to complain, but I was laughing by that point. I never could resist Sano when he was like this. No one could. Sano got more free meals out of Katsu than he ate at the cafeteria--where he had a meal plan.

Twenty minutes later, we reached the cafeteria. It would have taken me less than half the time to get there, but Sano did not want to run. Lazy, lazy, lazy. Well, at least he did not insist upon riding the bus.

Sano went straight for the grease. It was cheeseburgers and French fries that day. I took one look at the so-called sirloin steak and decided I would make a sandwich. Peanut butter was always safer anyway.

Dinner was uneventful. Our conversations ranged from dull and ordinary to strange and humorous in a very juvenile way. If nothing else could be said, Sano was always good for a laugh.

We were still laughing and talking about nothing when we walked through the lobby to the elevators. Twelve floors, about seven hundred occupants, and there were only two elevators. What’s that? 350 to an elevator? I wanted to throttle every person who got onto that elevator with the destination of second floor. Second floor! If a person could not handle one flight of stairs, then he had better be in a wheelchair or carrying something unwieldy.

I was following Sano into the elevator when a woman called out.

“Hold the elevator!”

Of course, I paused, blocking the elevator door to keep it from closing while the woman hurried across the lobby. I did not recognize her. She was pretty, I had to give her that. Her dark hair was long, not a strand out of place, her features fine, and her make-up applied to perfection. But as the old saying goes: Beauty is only skin deep. This woman was scary!

“Hey, rooster-boy!” she snapped as soon as the elevator door closed.

Sano knew the lady, apparently.

“M-Megumi?!” he stared at her in shock. “How’d you--”

“You idiot!” she glared at him. Goodness, but she was into the name-calling. “I told you five o’clock!”

“Five?” Sano blinked dumbly. That, in itself, was not uncommon. He was always easy to befuddle. I did that to him frequently when he wandered into subjects I did not care to discuss. “You said four!”

I got the picture. This was the girl Sano was talking about earlier. What was her name again?

“Never mind,” the woman waved off the misunderstanding although it was clear she was still somewhat irked. “Is this kid your friend?”

Kid? I frowned. People always did that to me. If they did not mistake me for a girl, then they thought I was years younger than I was. On the flip side, I got into the State Fair at the children’s rate.

“That’s Kenshin,” Sano introduced me then. “Kenshin, this is Megumi. The one I told you about.”

“The pre-med student you met on the bus,” I recalled, trying not to cringe as I stuck out my hand and smiled. “It’s nice to meet you.”

“Likewise,” Megumi took my hand and smiled slyly at me. “I never thought it possible.”

“Thought what possible?” Sano asked. It was a bait, and apparently the fish were biting. Megumi never broke eye contact with me--although it was making me squirm--as she answered.

“You have friends who are both attractive and gentlemanly,” she declared.

I wanted my hand back. Sano was glaring daggers at Megumi and me over that one. My face felt warm, and I silently cursed my easy blush.

“Uh... Thank you, Megumi,” I said as politely as I could manage.

The elevator slowed and stopped, the doors sliding open with a soft ding. I retreated into the hallway, babbling something to the effect that I had to go to my room. I promised to meet the pair in the lounge for a homework session. From Sano’s ramblings the day before, I already knew Megumi was in her first year of college. Coincidentally, we were in the same math level. We had different class times, but it was with the same professor. After fall semester, Sano was officially a sophomore, but when it came to math, he could not tell a proof from a derivative. He had to take extra math to get to college level calculus.

It was with relief that I left the two. They immediately started bickering--something about Sano’s hair. Strange how Sano spoke of this woman like the sun shined out of her ass when it was just him and me, but the instant she appeared, he was callous and slower than usual. Then again, from what I saw, she had quite the sharp wit. I was certainly no match for her tongue, and I made a mental note to avoid getting into a word war with her.

I was in high spirits that afternoon as I walked back to my room. Although he had harassed me less than a day earlier, I had not thought of Jonas since running into Sano. In fact, my mind jumped right past the math homework I swore I’d finish before the weekend to the next day. Sano had cleared his schedule and informed me that we were going to the Uptown theatre for whatever movie was playing. What it was, I had not clue, but it promised to be fun. Of course, Megumi was invited to go, so I would have to be careful there, but that was fine with me.

Jonas was sitting on my bed when I walked into the room, his nose in a Martha Stewart article. By the glaze of his eyes, it was obvious he was not entirely there. I doubted he knew the subject of that article he was supposedly reading. I would have to be careful.

“Hello, Jonas,” I greeted mildly, going straight to my desk to pick up my math book. It was not there. I stared at the desktop, wondering just what had happened to the book. I knew I had put it right there on the desk. “Jonas?”

“What do you want, fuck’n priss,” he replied flatly. I tried not to wince, dreading any conversation with him as he was.

“Have you seen my math book?” My eyes drifted around the room as I asked. “It was on my...” I stared at his desk, directly across the room from mine. There it was. It looked strange. “My desk.”

“‘s only good for fuck’n scrap,” Jonas had the strangest little smile on his face. I snatched up the book from his desk. I could tell what was wrong the instant it was in my hands. It was far too light. Heart pounding, I flipped the book open and stared at the ruined pages of the text. More than half of them were missing. The remaining pages were shredded to uselessness.

Obnoxious bastard! I clutched the book so tightly that my fingers went momentarily numb. I dropped the book, whirling to glare at Jonas.

“You son of a bitch,” I growled, so mad I could barely form a coherent thought. “Do you think this is funny?”

Jonas was on his feet a few seconds later, glaring down at me coldly.

“You think it’s funny to rat me out?” he replied finally.

“I didn’t tell anyone anything, you pompous shithead,” I shot back, beyond furious. “If someone knows, then it’s because you’re too stupid to hide it!”

He hissed as if I had said something that actually surprised him. His blue eyes widened, his dilated pupils giving him a wild, frightening visage. I suddenly had a very bad feeling. Unfortunately, he did not give me time to adjust to that feeling.

I choked and automatically grabbed for the hands around my throat. Trying in vain to take a breath, I grappled with his fingers, attempting to gain hold of any of them. He merely tightened his hold, and my vision went black with alarming speed.

At that time, I discovered exactly how strong the survival instinct is. Although I did not know it at that exact moment, Jonas’s grip had cut off the blood supply to my brain almost completely, and I was rapidly losing my grip on reality. I acted in a panic, and in hindsight, I guess I’m grateful I could even reach. He was a lot taller than me, after all.

My knee slammed into his groin, though not with the force I would have preferred. It was enough to get him to drop me, however, and I hit his desk, then the floor before my vision started slowly filtering back. Amazing how it could disappear so quickly, then take so long to return.

I could hear Jonas swearing up a storm in the background. I coughed, feeling fire in my throat as I attempted to breathe. Blinking rapidly and holding a hand to my neck, I finally started to understand the world again, just in time to feel a hand in my hair. I sucked in a painful gasp and scrambled to my feet to avoid the pain I knew would come with being dragged off the floor by my hair alone. It still hurt like hell.

“Fucking faggot!” Jonas hissed into my ear. I snapped my elbow back into his stomach. He grunted and doubled over, incidentally dragging me with him as his hand was still tangled in my ponytail. My yelp came out an ugly squawk, hoarse and muted. Holding my ground, I shoved him away. I must have lost a handful of hair in that move, not to mention my hair band, but he stumbled away, hitting the bed and flopping onto my sheets. I was definitely going to have to wash those now.

It occurred to me that this fight was not going to look good for either Jonas or me. Without a witness, it was his word against mine. He may have been the junkie, but I did not have the best of records myself. So it was with this in mind that I decided a little humiliation was better than getting kicked out of the dorm, if not the University.

Jonas was still trying to figure out the difference between up and down when I reached the door. Somehow, I managed to open that door and move into the hallway without stumbling or reeling like a drunk. Behind me, Jonas was not so successful. Leaning against the wall opposite the door, I tried to catch my breath. It hurt to breathe, and my throat made these awful rasping noises, but it was better than the complete lack of oxygen I had suffered a couple minutes ago.

Glancing around, I saw the hall was empty. It figured that the time I needed help, no one would be there. But if I wanted privacy? Hah! So I had to go out into the lounge area.

Jonas stumbled into the hallway just as I ducked away. He hit the wall, glared at it for a few seconds as if it had committed some crime against him. I knew he had seen me, so I did not worry that he would look down a stairwell and kill himself with a careless step. Trying to still the shaking of my hands, I pulled open the door out of the wing and quickly stepped into the open area of the social lounge.

To my left was a large, open and mostly empty room. To my right was the TV lounge, a much smaller room tucked into the side with a glass partition blocking it off from the rest of the area. At the moment, it was filled with people--maybe ten of them--watching Just Shoot Me and talking over books. A couple of them glanced at me, then turned back to their activities.

At about that time, Jonas reached me. I didn’t know what to expect when I got into the lounge, but I thought I would get a bit more than that initial, nonexistent reaction from the students. Well, if they did not react before, everyone was looking when Jonas’s hands hit my back, sending me stumbling forward several steps.

“Where d’you think you’re going, freak?” he demanded.

He must have been soaring to be this bold. Only a complete idiot would start a fight like this out in the lounge. I had gone out there hoping he would give up and go back to the room. Jonas was so far gone he did not realize exactly what he was getting himself into. No matter what he said about people knowing about his dealings, they must not have known that much because if they did, he would have been gone by that point. If it was just suspicions, then this was going to ruin him.

“Back off, Jonas,” I snapped, wincing slightly when I spoke. My voice was rough, proving some damage had been done when he attempted to throttle me. I glared at him, daring him to come any closer.

The idiot took up the challenge. He came at me again, his hands clumsy as he made as if to grab my shirt. That son of a bitch still had some of my hair tangled in his fingers! Out in the open, I had more room to maneuver, and I’d be damned if I let him touch me again.

“Jonas, don’t be stupid,” I cautioned, easily backing out of his reach. I wondered if he could even understand me. To my ears, my words were so papery and muddled that I doubted anyone would have an easy time listening to them.

“You always think you’re so much fuckin’ better’n me, you girly wuss,” he glared at me.

If he hated me, then I hated him ten times more. I never let anyone get away with calling me names and pushing me around. The last person who had tried had ended up in the hospital for two days. But that got me into a lot of trouble, and I did not need that at this point in my life.

Oh, but how I wanted to send him flying into a wall. Unexpectedly, a hand fell onto my shoulder, restraining me.

“But you’re just a fucking--”

“Just a fucking what, Jonas?”

I glanced up in surprise. Sano stood next to me, his posture tense with anger. His eyes glinted with fury. Jonas may have had six inches on Sano, but my doped up roommate knew better than to try to fight with him. Sano was a brown belt in karate and a boxer, and he looked it. It made a person wish he had the build to prove he knew how to fight. No one ever looked twice at me.

Jonas sputtered, and I felt something brush my neck. I jerked away from the feeling automatically, nearly bumping into Sano and turning to stare at Megumi in surprise. Her eyes were dark with disapproval.

“Kenshin, your neck,” she murmured.

“If anyone’s fucked up here, it’s you, Jonas,” Sano growled. “Did you do that to him?”

It was enough to make a person feel all warm and fuzzy inside when someone defended me like that. Not many people bothered. Granted, it was embarrassing.

“Ow!” I flinched away when Megumi poked at my neck. “That hurts!”

“Someone call security up here,” Sano suggested quietly. Jonas had nowhere to go. The students in the TV lounge had all come into the main room and had blocked my roommate in. He cursed at them and sat on the floor after a few seconds. I was willing to bet his balance was not all that great.

“Hey, Kenshin,” Sano looked down at me then. “You okay?”

“Fine,” I grumbled, letting Megumi coax me into a chair.

“Looks like that bastard tried to strangle you,” Sano observed, crouching next to me and making me tilt my head so he could see the bruises on my neck. He smiled faintly, attempting a joke. “What, were you combing your hair when he decided to go all homicidal on you?”

I smirked at his pathetic efforts and shook my head. It still hurt to talk, and I would have to do a lot of talking later, so I kept my mouth shut for the time.

Security arrived about then, and everything was really crazy for awhile. They found the drugs in Jonas’s stuff, and I had to go for some blood testing. Uncle Hiko came and yelled at the police for awhile, then came to yell at me a little longer before finally leaving.

In the end, it turned out okay. The school arranged for Jonas’s belongings to be removed, and I was to have a new roommate when the next semester began. If everyone on the floor had not already thought me to be some long-haired, wimpy freak, they certainly did after that.

Well, at least Jonas was gone. I heard he hung himself in jail, but I later found that to be an unsubstantiated rumor. Completely untrue. Good thing, too, because I felt terribly guilty when I found I did not feel a thing when Sano told me Jonas was dead. Even knowing that bastard was still very much alive and well, I did not like that apathetic attitude. Old habits die hard, though. It would take quite some time before I could figure out how to care about what happened to others.

^_^