I walked back into the living room with the notebook in my hand and blazing thoughts going through my head. Twyla and jay were sitting on the couch with Louise on the floor in front of it. Winter was pacing back and forth, her arms crossed. She was just as angry as I was, but everyone else seemed confused.
"So what's this fight about?" Jay asked me.
"Winter seems to believe that although she pays no bills and has been sleeping on our couch for the past months that she has any right to say whether or not my boyfriend can sleep in my room and possibly move in eventually. I disagree and I would like your opinions." I spoke casually, choosing my words carefully.
"You know that you have to talk to the rest of the house before he moves in, right?" Twyla asks calmly.
"Yes I know. The topic was being discussed between James and I before he actually moves in. He's not sure if he wants to live here or at his place. I was voting for here." I respond.
"I thought Winter paid bills like the rest of us," said Louise. "I just didn't know which ones she pays." Jay and Twyla agreed.
"As I can show you with this notebook, I have no record of Winter paying bills." I said, holding out the notebook to the group. Twyla took it from me and opened it to the pages from this month. "So unless winter has been paying bills that I don't know about, she's been paying no bills."
"Fuck it. I give up." Winter growled suddenly. "I got fired, alright? I didn't want to tell you guys and I was hoping that you wouldn't notice that no money was coming from me."
"Jesus Christ Winter. You need to start telling us shit. Do you like having fights every other week because you didn't tell us something? Have you at least been looking for a new job because I haven't seen you leave this house for over two weeks."
"Of course I have, you prick. I haven't gotten any interviews. I had a little problem with some of my references."
"For the record, if you had told me that you lost your job, I would have worked around that and we wouldn't be having this conversation right now. But I guess now that I have everyone here, I might as well ask. Would you guys have a problem if James moved in here?"
"How long have you been dating?" Louise questioned, looking at her phone.
"Uh, about two months, I think."
"I thought it's only been like a month." Twyla interjected. "I thought you guys officially started dating on the 8th."
"I don't know, we decided not to celebrate an anniversary until six months."
"I know where this is going if you've only dated for a month." Said Louise, giving me a knowing look.
"No, I'm not gonna break up with him. Not this time. I actually really like him. And he likes me. It's going well. I promise." I looked at the floor. Of course.
"Give it another two months and then we'll see how it goes. Maybe we'll let him move in. Your track record doesn't look good though. Can we go now?" Louise was standing up.
"Yeah, anything anyone else wants to add?" Twyla asked, also standing up.
A chorus of 'no' echoed around the group and Twyla, Louise, and Jay left the room and went their ways, leaving Winter and me in the living room.
"Winter? Can we just...talk?"
"Sure, I guess. Do you wanna talk here or somewhere else?"
"Let's go get coffee or something, I need to get out of here. And I need a nice warm drink." I said, grabbing my jacket, purse, and keys from next to the door.
