Dreamer. [joshler]

ten. Roommates

I waited a while for Tyler to fall asleep, the icepack had melted. I slowly pulled it away, tapping on his hand to wake him up a little. He hummed in confusion.

"Hey, it's getting a little late. Do you want me to stay or go?"

"Mmm-stay." I quietly stood up.

"Well if you need anything I'll be just outside." He didn't respond so I assumed he had fell asleep again.

I quietly walked into his living room area and laid down on the couch.

-

I was awaken in the middle of the night by my phone, I picked it up to see who texted me. It was Tyler.

Tyler: I'm scared

That alerted me, I stood up and stretched. Carefully I opened Tyler's door and walked into his room, it was dark but lit by dim moonlight. Sure enough Tyler was awake, he sat up rubbing his eyes. When I stepped closer I noticed his face glistened with tears.

"What's wrong?" He kept crying and just smudging the tears all over his face like a three year old, I guess he was tired.

"Please hold me," he sniffled.

"Um, sure. Scoot over," I didn't want to make him any more upset.

He scooted over and I sat down next to him leaning against the wall. It startled me when he scrambled to get into my lap and laid his head against my chest. I wrapped my arms around him protectively, all I wanted was for him to feel safe. He began to sob lightly, I hushed him and ran my hand through his hair.

"Joshie?" Joshie, that's new.

"Yeah?"

"I don't think I love Ian anymore," he sniffled.

"It's ok, everyone goes through their first love." I cooed, rubbing his back lightly.

"What was your first love like?" He looked up at me through his lashes.

"Well, she was very pretty." I didn't want to think about her right now.

"She?" He made a confused face.

"Yeah, she was also smart. She had my heart since the first time I met her. We dated for a while, I loved her with all my heart. I thought she loved me too, but she didn't. She lead me on for the longest time, she used me. All she wanted was my money, she took every penny. I'd buy her everything, I wanted her to have everything in the world. She was my everything, my angel. And just like that she left, with all my money and my heart." I felt nimble fingers gently brush against my cheek, I hadn't even noticed the stray tear that left my eye.

"I've experimented since then, learned new things about myself. I learned that I'm over her." I smiled, but he didn't smile back.

"No you're not," his face contorted, I gave him a confused look.

"Your bills are a constant reminder of what she did, you can't seem to get away." He was right.

I simply looked ahead of me into the darkness, I really didn't want to think about it now.

"How much do you pay for rent?" What?

"Too much," I sighed.

"Well...if you were my roommate the most you'd have to pay is 500." Was he serious?