the roommate → brad simpson | ✓

nineteen - "i wont have to kill you"

The door unlocks and I stir from my sleep, turning over and opening my eyes slowly to see Brad stumbling through the door. The room instantly stunk of weed and I scrunch up my nose.

He shuts it quietly and looks over at me. It was too dark to see that I was awake so he probably thought I was asleep. As he stumbles around in the dark, he finds the light-switch and puts it on, causing me to squint my eyes so I could readjust to the bright light.

I put my arm over my eyes, causing Brad to look over and realise I was awake, "shit, sorry."

"It's fine," I sigh and sit up. He had been out late every night for the past week since he opened up to me, and we'd barely spoken since. He usually came back high or drunk or both. "Are you alright?"

He doesn't reply as he shoves off his shoes and throws his jacket on the floor. He reaches into his trouser pocket and pulls out his phone, turning off the light and turning on his flashlight as he stumbles across the dorm floor until he reaches his bed.

"Brad?" I gain his attention as he turns his flashlight off and I reach over to turn on my lamp. "Brad, are you alright?"

He now lies on his bed, his hands on his face as he lets out a shaky sigh. I look over at the clock and it's almost midnight. It's the first time he's been back this early since he started going out every night.

"Brad, talk to me," I say, my voice quite as I sit up on my bed. Something was definitely up with him as he didn't look at me, and I hear a sniffle rise from where he is on the bed.

I instantly frown and throw my quilts off of my body, walking over to him and lying on his bedsheets next to him. He moves his hands and wipes his eyes to remove some tears that were there as he notices my close presence and I put my head on his shoulder and an arm over his torso, holding him close as my other arm is above his head, my hand playing with his curls.

"I'm sorry for waking you up," he apologises and I shift my head so that I was looking at him. "You can go back to sleep if you want."

"Not until you tell me what's wrong," I counter and he lets out another shaky breath. "Brad, you can talk to me. It's not like I've got any friends to tell."

"I'm high right now, Mango," he shakes his head. "I'll probably do or say something stupid and I don't want you to get sad again."

"Tell me what's wrong," I demand, persistent to know what's upset him. "I wanna help you."

"I get high and I get drunk because I'm lonely," he gives in too easily. "And in the moment I feel fucking amazing because I don't care about anything. But afterwards I get really bad anxiety and the drugs fuck with my head because I get paranoid about everything and then I overthink everything and that's when I feel so low. And because I feel low I want to get high again so I go out partying and it's just this vicious cycle that I can't get out of."

I stay silent, my lips pursed and my hands still playing with his hair. I didn't know what to say because I didn't want to say the wrong thing and upset him. He was already upset enough.

I finally find the courage to speak again, "I'm always here for you if you need to talk to someone. Please don't think the only thing you can resort to is drugs because it's making you feel like this, and no one wants that."

He doesn't reply and instead looks down at me with sad eyes. I move my hand from his chest up to his eyes and wipe away the few tears. Usually he's the one comforting me and I felt so useless when I was comforting him.

"Why don't you go to sleep and maybe you'll feel better in the morning?" I suggest and he nods stiffly. I smile at him and press a small kiss to his cheek before removing my hand off of his cheek and my other out of his hair but he only pulls my hand back to his hair. "What are you doing?"

"I like it when you play with my hair," he hums as he closes his eyes. I run my hands through it with a small smile. "I told you I'd do something stupid and I want you to stay here in my bed tonight."

I almost stop playing with his hair in surprise but I don't because he looks content. I rest my head back on his shoulder and I hear him let out a small sigh. I close my eyes and let my other hand rest on his chest once more.

♡

The next morning I find myself facing my bed, Brad's arms holding me close to his chest as his head rests in my shoulder. I remove my arm from under his pillow and rub my eyes, trying to wake myself up properly.

I remove his arm from around me and climb off of his bed and into my own. He was probably going to forget everything from last night and he might end up killing me if I was sleeping in his bed with him.

I grab my phone off of charge and end up scrolling through social media and playing on games for an hour until Brad stirs awake. He turns over from facing the wall and frowns as he feels the space next to him.

I turn to look at him and shoot him a sarcastic smile, "good morning sleeping beauty."

"What time is it?" He mumbles, his voice hoarse from only just waking up. I show him the time on my phone and he sighs, resting his head back on his pillow. His curls were a mess from where my hand had been last night and they covered his forehead completely.

"I'm gonna get a shower," I announce as I plug my phone back on charge. He grunts in response and I walk into the bathroom. The bathroom lock wasn't going to get fixed until next week when Brad and I both leave the dorm for Halloween.

I spend fifteen minutes in the shower and when I'm done I walk back into the room as Brad texts on his phone.

"My friends are gonna be here in a couple minutes so hurry up and get dressed," Brad announces and I look at him in surprise. "What?"

"Nothing, just—"

I was interrupted by a knock on the door and I look at him in alarm. He smirks at me as I wrap the towel tighter around my body and he stands up, starting to walk to the door.

"You're not seriously going to let them in while I'm wearing a towel are you?" I whisper over to him harshly as his hand hovers above the handle.

"Yeah, why wouldn't I?"

"Can you not wait five minutes for me to get all my stuff and go to the bathroom?" I suggest and he looks challengingly over at me.

"What would I get from that?"

"Well I won't have to kill you, for starters," I say as though it's obvious. "I don't want boys to be looking at while I'm pretty much naked."

"Nothing I haven't seen before," he smirks and I groan at him. He turns to face the door and shouts through to his friends. "One second guys, my roommate is naked and she wants me to wait before you guys can come in."

"Why can't we join the party?" One of his friends chuckle through the door and Brad's jaw sets hard as he turns to me.

"Get your stuff, now," he orders and I nod, grabbing my underwear and some jeans and a shirt to wear quickly before disappearing into the bathroom to change. I hear the door opening and some cheers fill the dormitory as I pull on my trousers. I pull on my yellow, orange and white striped button up and put it on, smiling at myself contently as I leave.

A wolf whistle erupts from his friends and a blonde one smirks over at me, "damn, Brad, I didn't know your roommate was this hot."

"Yeah," Brad rolls his eyes.

"I'm going to class," I inform Brad, ignoring his friends who were eyeing me down as I grab my bag from the floor. I felt so uncomfortable under their gaze.

As I walk down the stairs to my classroom, I receive a text and my phone buzzes. I quickly get my phone out of my pocket and read over the text. It's from Tristan.

Party at my place on Friday night. Come hang with us.

unedited.