Room for Rent: Domination Included

I checked and double-checked the address: "625 Rainview Drive." It was an old house in the old part of town. Most of the surrounding houses were run down. Some were in "okay" condition, but nothing stood out as tip top. This house looked like it was in good shape for a Victorian despite the peeling paint on the siding.

It was late in the evening and a solitary glow came from a window on the second floor. I tried the doorbell but didn't hear a ring, so I knocked.

The pitter-patter of bare feet came down a wood stairway and stopped behind the front door. It seemed like forever until it finally creaked open, and I was confronted with the face of a very apprehensive young, dark-haired woman. She crinkled her brow at me.

"Oh, I must have the wrong address, sorry about that," I said even as I checked the numbers beside the door and found them the same as the ones written on the slip of paper I was holding.

As I turned to leave, she called, "Cary?"

Shocked, I turned back and asked, "Drew?"

She rolled her eyes at me. "Oh... Cary like Cary Elewes."

"And Drew, like Drew Barrymore," I sighed. "Well, then this is awkward."

"You mean to say, that whole time we were chatting online, the subject of our... boy girl-ness never came up?"

"I guess not", I answered sheepishly. "I mean we were mostly just playing games and you were playing as a guy."

"Yeah well, I don't like being harassed." She smirked. "And you were playing as a girl."

"Fair enough, I knew a private room at a reasonable price was too good to be true." Admitting my disappointment I added, "With a roommate I actually like."

She glanced away, and then back at me. "Yeah well, I had to promise Jesse we wouldn't go co-ed."

"I know, I know. You explained the whole situation. And Jesse... there's another ambiguous name."

She chuckled at that. "Well, I'd feel kinda wrong if our meeting ended like this. Want to come in for a drink?"

"Only if you're comfortable with that?"

She looked me up and down. "Oh no! I'm a defenseless girl, afraid of a big strong man!" she mocked me. "Besides I think I could take you." She was just a tad taller than me, and she wrapped her fingers around my bicep pointing out that I wasn't exactly built like a tank.

Though I really didn't need coaxing, she pulled me inside and poured me a glass of wine. While I was there, she showed me the room they had for rent, which turned out to be a set of basement rooms, a bedroom with an attached office nook.

"That would have been perfect."

"Yeah, I know. Look, Jesse had some guy living here before I moved in. Apparently he was a bit... abrasive, and he would cheap out on his rent, and then he started hitting on her. And they went through a whole big fight, before she called the cops on him and kicked him out. It was messy. And that's why she doesn't want to live with guys."

"Understandable."

"Actually, I'm meeting her for dinner. Why don't you come along?"

"I wouldn't want to intrude..."

"Well, if we can't be roommates, we might as well be friends."

When we met a tall blonde-haired woman for dinner, and Drew introduced me as "Cary", and all the blood ran out of her face, I knew I had just met Jesse.

"See, I guess we never talked about it, genders, online," Drew explained.

"I'm not going to force myself into the situation. I'm just here to say hi," I added.

Jesse relaxed a bit, and her face, once scrunched in apprehension, relaxed to disappointment. "And so the roommate hunt continues," she let out with a sigh.

After a long discussion on the relative virtues of "Buffy" versus "Veronica Mars," dinner ended, and we went our separate ways.

* * *

Over the weekend I looked at half a dozen other apartments and rooms. Some were too small, some were too expensive, and one smelled of fish.

Then on Sunday night I got a call from Jesse.

"Heya Cary," she said apologetically, "Have you found a place yet?"

"No, still looking. How about you, have you found a roommate?"

"That's kind of why I'm calling... If you're still interested, I might be willing to. No, that didn't come out right... I mean you are our favorite candidate."

"I didn't even know I was one."

"Well yeah."

"What changed your mind?"

"Turns out there are a lot of flakes out there. We've talked to a dozen girls and they are either too weird, or not weird enough, or not the right kind of weird. So I thought I might call you. Drew doesn't know I'm talking to you. I mean she's a definite vote for you..."

"And you're not..."

"Well, it depends I guess, mostly I just don't want a macho vibe, and you didn't seem all that macho to me..."

"Okay, I'll try to take that in a good way. Is there something you wanted to know?"

"I guess there are a few things. Like are you a big sports guy? do you do a lot of man things? You know like hang nudie pics all over the place, have lots of guys over for football, stuff like that."

"I don't really watch sports, I wouldn't hang nudie pics, and I almost never had any of the guys over at my last place."

"Not that you couldn't have friends over, just you know, I want my home to be my own space."

"I see what you're getting at, look I'm more of a geek. I do contract work from home, so I'd be around a lot during the day. Occasionally I'll have friends over for a movie, and I guess I do watch the super bowl, but that's about it. If you sort of zone out," I added sarcastically ,"you might not even notice I'm a guy."

"With a name like Cary right? Sounds good to me!" The genuine tone of her voice implied she'd missed my sarcasm. "Thanks for answering my questions."

"... so am I in then?"

"Well, don't make me regret this, but I don't see why not, welcome aboard!"

When I moved in the next weekend, Drew and Jesse even helped. Life with the girls was a lot of fun. Most of the time Drew was geeky enough that I sort of forgot she was a girl. I suppose her short hair made that easy. Occasionally, we would "notice" each other, and Drew would respond by going into Tomboy mode, punching me in the shoulder the way that guys do, and challenging me to a video game.

Jesse was very lady-like, but she could geek out, from time to time. She announced she was having a "girl's night in" to watch a Rom Com, and at first I thought she was asking me to give them space and stay in my room. But she collected me before starting the movie, and explained that I counted as a girl for girl's night in.

I found out a little more about them too. Jesse was a lawyer for a pharmaceutical company, and Drew was studying to be a nurse, although she still worked at a spa as a way of putting herself through school.