Recently, I’ve noticed an uptick in Pissing Contest entries relating to roommates—living together can strain relationships of any kind, so it’s totally understandable that some Jezebel readers are using our weekly themes to go in on that college flatmate who ruined everyone’s fun. As good, ethical Samaritans continue to remain in place to slow the spread of covid-19, I can’t stop thinking about the home, both as a place of shelter and contentment. If you have roommates, it’s likely that they have annoyed you at some point recently. But what’s the absolute worst thing they’ve done? Or better yet, tell us about your most nightmarish roommate in general. What did they do, and how did you survive?
But you know what? Let’s take a look at last week’s winners first: these are your most memorable friend breakups.
TonySK, this is inspired:
I moved into an apartment with a friend I’d known online and met irl for a few different weekends back when I used to play yugioh. He’d masturbate on the couch in broad daylight, even if I was in the apartment but not in the living room, never shared in the cleaning of the apartment, and expected me to cook for him if I was cooking because he didn’t want to learn how. Outside of his self help on the couch most of these were annoyances I could look past because I was enjoying life and spent most of my time out or at work with people I didn’t hate.
The tipping point came when he damaged the brakes on my car while driving it and refused to tell me what happened, accept any sort of blame, or even share in the repair costs. Luckily I was able to get it taken care of because I had a credit card for emergencies, but it was a $300 repair job in total that I wasn’t expecting.
After ensuring that the last month of the lease and the electric bill were paid in advance I made my getaway. I packed up and left in the afternoon while he was at work. He returned in the evening to a dark and mostly empty apartment. On the table was a letter explaining why I did what I did, letting him know who he could contact if he needed financial assistance to get home after the lease was up, and ending with what so far has been a true statement: You can hate me all you want, but you will never find me and we will never see each other ever again.
Because I’m extra I did place a yugioh card, one of the only things we wound up enjoying together, in the envelope behind the letter. It’s name: Vain Betrayer.
Senchal Sosa, if you ever find out what happened, you must tell us. I’m invested in this mystery:
My former best friend and I met when we were 11. We were best friends for many years. I was the maid of honor at her first wedding and she was my maid of honor. She was in the room when my Daughter was born. I helped her move out in haste when she came out to her family, and they didn’t take it well. We were roommates when we first moved out as young adults. We supported each other through multiple break ups. I got her jobs at the places I worked multiple times. We were each other’s ride or die.
We had had some ups and downs throughout but I thought I could always depend on our friendship. Then one night we went to dinner at one of our mutual friends home and something felt off. I could tell her energy toward me had changed. A few days after the dinner I asked her what was wrong. I was told everything is fine. We were “good” and that I was worrying for no reason. Fast forward…I haven’t spoken to her in 5 years, but get this she works at the same company as me because I got her a job there. I do see her around every so often but we never speak. I did try when I felt our relationship changing to call her and find out what was wrong. What did I do? What did I say? I reached out while we were at work to try to have a conversation and I have not gotten a straight answer to this day. I was just ghosted.
The Incinerator’s Lost Key, this is absolutely insane and also fuck your former friends:
When I was 12, I started a new school and immediately became besties with a pair of fraternal twins. The girl was the most gorgeous girl in school and already had a huge set of tits. (That is important as a tween.) The boy was handsome, artistic, and very introverted. They had a built in clique of all the punkass kids in school, I was now a bad chick and loving this new badass life.
Fast forward a few years, we’re in our late teens. The girl got knocked up at fifteen, but due to her looks she had three different guys wrapped around her finger at all times. At 18, she married what she swears is the father of her child, but that child looks exactly like her favorite side piece and not her husband. The cheating never stopped. She found another married teen mom to bond with and go run around on their husbands while their moms watched the babies… I just stopped answering her calls at one point. We were still in the same punkass clique, saw each other every weekend, but we were just bland acquaintances.
As we grew older and I was growing farther and farther apart from the girl, I actually became closer with the brother. We were extremely close and a day didn’t go by that we didn’t talk or hang out. There was no secrets between us, and there were many times when we just blew off whoever we were dating to jump in the car and drive around talking all night.
The problem began when their older brother very suddenly went on a racist crusade and was recruiting all our punkass friends into all of it. I’m not talking about casual racism either. They actually joined the KKK and neo-Nazis. The older brother would got a kick out of debating race and feminism with me, and would insist that I be at every party for us to verbally spar.
It was only a matter of time before the racism spread to my best friend. For several years, I kept telling myself he’s just following his brother’s lead and he’ll wake up and be his own person. That time never came. In our early 20s, he met a girl that instantly despised me and got pregnant as soon as she could to drag him to the altar. I was informed that he was breaking our pact of being the best man / woman at each other’s weddings because his girlfriend wouldn’t allow it. Then I was informed I could not be in attendance as the wedding was for Aryans only.
We never spoke again.
Drop those horror stories in the comments below.
Join the discussion...