Joohyun stared at her computer screen, her brows knitted in frustration and the round frames of her glasses scooted down on the bridge of her nose. She nervously tapped the pad of each finger to her thumb in rapid succession as she read the ad in front of her.

Looking For a New Roommate~

Hi,

My old roommate moved out, as she wanted to pursue her Masters at a different college… I’ll be continuing my studies at [X] University, so I was hoping my prospective roomie would also be a fellow grad student! :D

You’d have a private room, and some communal living spaces as well. I’m rather tidy and quiet, and I’m not really too picky when it comes to roommates.

I’m more than willing to bake some housewarming cookies if you’re interested, so give me a call and maybe we can iron out the details!

XX XXXX XXXX :)

Irene stopped playing with her fingers, and instead massaged them on her left temple. Her other hand was busy rapping a pen on the table. She had been staring at this ad for far too long, dissecting it even. It was obviously written by a woman, and a rather considerate one at that. It seemed like she was deceptively aware of what she was searching for in a roommate, though. Joohyun saw right through the diction of the ad, and she liked it.

So she sat, for hours, in the school’s library, drumming up the courage to either call the woman or reply to the ad on the website. She had watched the guys at the table next to her start and finish a small report before she had even made an attempt.

Irene was no outsider to the library, in most cases she spent most of her days in the back corner, her laptop plugged into the outlet in the wall, and a large coffee placed on the corner of her desk. She often brought an extra coffee for the rather ancient and brooding librarian. Irene wasn’t sure why, but the woman would shoo away other students, letting Irene work in peace. Joohyun, always polite, would shoot her a relieved and thankful smile, to which the woman always responded with a curt nod.

Being a double major wasn’t easy, and Irene was more than grateful for the old librarian that seemingly had an eye out for her. It was comforting, especially because Irene practically lived at the library at this point. She only went to her dorm for the necessities, opting to avoid her rather obnoxious roommate. It wasn’t that Joohyun was intolerant of others being loud (she was), she just preferred quiet, non-confrontational surroundings.

So here she was, looking at the same ad she had been looking at for the past 48 hours, which seemed to be mocking her at this point. She really needed to find an apartment soon. The end of the semester was rearing its ugly head, and Irene followed suit with her obscene lack of uptake in physical appearance. Exams were grating on her, and so was the unnecessary stress of finding new living arrangements. More often than not, she trudged out of her dorm with messy hair in a bun, and smudged eyeliner staining her face like a charcoal sketch. The only thing she really cared about at this point was finding a new place to live before she was forced to camp in the back of the library for the remainder of her university life.

She sighed, squeezing the pen in her hand before putting it down, and packing up her belongings. It was rather late at night, but she figured she should sleep sometime after all. She checked the time on her watch, 11:34. She exhaled loudly as she hastily shoved her laptop and notebooks into her backpack. She waved a goodbye to the librarian, shouldering her rather heavy belongings as she walked out of the warmth of the library.

She pulled out her phone (the ad plastered on that screen, too) and stared at the number. She hastily typed it in with trembling fingers. It wasn’t cold, really, but Joohyun got nervous walking alone at night, and she had forgotten her cardigan in the library. Another excuse to go back there tomorrow, anyway.

She lifted the phone to her ear, waiting for a woman to pick up the phone. Unsurprisingly, the call went to voicemail, and a rather cheery voice blared from the phone. Irene jumped and ed the phone from her ear, shocked by the sudden outburst.

“Hi! You’ve reached- Well I guess you haven’t reached me right?” an awkward laugh interrupts the woman’s honey-sweet voice. “Anyways, this is Seungwan, leave a message and I’ll get back to you as soon as I can!”

Irene furrows her brows in befuddled amusement. What an odd woman. She couldn’t help but think the voice sounded familiar, unsettlingly so.

The beep of the voicemail alerts Irene to begin talking, but the chatters of her teeth and the sheer nerve of finally calling the woman had gotten the better of her usually nonchalant tone.

“U-Uh hi this is uh..” she paused. “ sorry, uh.” She hung up the phone and groaned in frustration.

God, you’re such a ing dolt. She thought to herself, redialing the number and steeling herself to leave an actual response this time.

The same message played, and Irene couldn’t help but feel detached upon hearing it. The woman’s voice was calming, but in a way that irked her. No one was that kind. Not to her, anyway. There was a reason she ignored her roommates, actively avoided conversation with strangers, and turned down the lines upon lines of male suitors that never seemed to get the hint. The woman’s saccharine voice filled her with an equal concoction of bitterness and envy, curious as to how she seemed so bubbly and sure of herself from a 5 second voicemail snippet. Irene was definitely interested in the apartment.

“Hi.. Sorry for the last voicemail, I’m walking outside and it’s kinda cold. Anyway, I was interested in the roommate vacancy. This is Joohyun. Call me back, or text me, at your soonest convenience, thanks. YY YYYY YYYY.”

She hung up the phone for a final time. She stared at the numbers that seemed to burst from the small screen and taunt her. Why was she so drawn to this unknown woman that made her so unreasonably exasperated, and a tad bit uneasy?

She had made it home safely, grumbling when she passed the coat rack and remembered her accidentally discarded cardigan. She rolled into bed, not even bothering to change her clothes, before she fell asleep.

…

Irene awoke in a cold sweat. Uneasy, and tired, she found that her roommate was out for the day. It was later than Irene usually got up, 10:30. She sighed, rubbing her eyes.

The woman’s voice would not leave her head. The sickly sweet laugh ghosting her ears. There was something eerily recognizable about the woman— Seungwan’s— voice. Irene dragged her feet to the bathroom, and stared at the witch-like woman looking back at her.

The black bags under her eyes were almost as heavy as her shoulders, sagging with the weight of finals week.

Maybe I could use some home-baked cookies.. she muses, wiping away the tarnished makeup from the day before off of her face.

She started the shower, warm steam coating her face. While she waited for the water to heat to her liking, she went to retrieve her phone from the other room. She picked it up, not expecting anything (as usual), but her notifications were flooded with messages from an unsaved number.

The same number she had feebly dialed last night.

XX XXXX XXXX

Hi! This is Seungwan

XX XXXX XXXX

But you knew that..

XX XXXX XXXX

I, Uh I hope it’s okay with you but I’d like to meet

But first some basic conditions of course…

XX XXXX XXXX

I tend to have people over a bit, if that’s okay

(It wasn’t.)

XX XXXX XXXX

I also like to play guitar and sing, I’m a music major!

(How unfortunate.)

(She had saved the woman’s number as “Apartment Woman; Seungwan”)

Apartment Woman; Seungwan

Ah anyways! Sorry for blowing up your phone… meet at mine at 6 tonight?

(Whatever.)

Irene couldn’t exactly place what was so annoying about the woman, her positivity to a fault, or the fact that she still seemed familiar. Irene didn’t let herself think about it too much.

Me

Okay.

Irene placed her phone back on the counter, the steamy tendrils of warmth from her shower beckoning her in like a siren. She inhaled, and felt the thick air fill her lungs. It was a nice feeling. She was walking towards the room when her phone buzzed, and she stopped in her tracks. She sighed and picked up her phone.

Apartment Woman; Seungwan

Awesome! I’ll have cookies waiting for you then. :)

Irene smirked. She thought of warm cookies as she entered the humidity of her bathroom, the tepid steam hugging her now body like an old friend. Maybe things were looking up.

...

Irene held the overly heavy literature book to her chest as she walked to the library. It was nice out today, a light spring breeze in the air, and small traces of flowers aching to flourish. Irene loved spring. Maybe she was biased, being born in March, but there was something about new beginnings and the scent of mowed grass and the emergent blooms of flowers that made her heart swell.

And even better, the library was quiet too. Irene smiled inwardly as she placed her book and backpack on her signature corner table, settling in for the remainder of the day. Her cardigan, thankfully, was untouched from the night before, hung on the back of the chair. She was planning to work on her lit write-up, and maybe do some light research on the area around the apartment. It couldn’t do any harm.

She was surprisingly energetic today, perhaps spurred on by the very peculiar woman that had reminded her of home in a weird way. Perhaps she was grasping for straws, but Joohyun had took an instant shining to the woman with seemingly annoying tendencies. She tried not to think about that.

Ever since Irene had gotten to college, she had been on self-inflicted thin ice. She tried not to think about her little sister at home.

(That was the kind of thinking that hurt.)

Irene preferred to drown her slip ups in more school work, hence the double major. She liked literature, found solace in it. She envied the author’s way of weaving tales together, painting an elaborate schema of mental images and raw emotion that was unmatched by any pitiful thing she had seen in real life. Her second major was in accounting, less of a passion, more of a creature comfort. She liked the constancy of numbers. Nothing could go wrong, nothing was open to interpretation. Nothing to think about, just simple calculations.

Joohyun flipped open to the tabbed page in her literature book, squinting at the small words on the page. The task at hand was to analyze a short poem. Irene opened her new highlighters (she purchases new stationery sometimes to motivate her to be more productive) and starts reading through the poem.

It’s short, and not particularly interesting to Irene.

I met a traveller from an antique land,

Who said—“Two vast and trunkless legs of stone

Stand in the desert. . . . Near them, on the sand,

Half sunk a shattered visage lies, whose frown,

And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,

Tell that its sculptor well those passions read

Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,

The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed;

And on the pedestal, these words appear:

My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;

Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!

Nothing beside remains. Round the decay

Of that colossal Wreck, boundless and bare

The lone and level sands stretch far away.”

Irene frowns at the concise nature of the poem. She prefers literature with deep symbolism, extended metaphors. Not whatever this was.

She highlighted the words half sunk a shattered visage lies . She thought the lack of intense diction was interesting, like it highlighted how unimportant the statue was. Forgotten and alone, broken and buried. She highlighted more lines in the poem.

“Boundless and bare”

“The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed.”

She reached for her iced coffee, eyes not leaving the book. A shaky hand attempted to bring the straw to , a furrowed brow giving away the intense focus inscribed on her face. Her hand trembled just a bit more because of the frigidity of the ice, and condensation droplets fell onto the words that Irene was so futilely trying to analyze.

“Oh goddamnit..” she trailed off, blowing short breaths on the page in a weak attempt to dry her mess. She sighed loudly, and shut the book in frustration. She booted up her laptop, and pulled out her phone to double check the address.

She unlocked her phone, and frowned at the unexpected message.

Apartment Woman; Seungwan

Hi again! Are you allergic to anything?

Apartment Woman; Seungwan

Because I’m making cookies..

Apartment Woman; Seungwan 
Oh my god that sounds so creepy I’m sorry, but yeah anyway, are you allergic to anything

How did this woman manage to be so annoying, but also so caring? Irene squinted to read the messages, and saw the three dots in the corner of her screen disappear once she had opened the chat. Irene chuckled at the nervousness of the woman, and couldn’t help but feel a little bad for her.

Me

No..

Me

They better be good

Irene figured the least she could do was tease the clearly anxious woman, and hoped her messages didn’t come off as blunt as they seemed.

The three dots immediately reappeared.

Apartment Woman; Seungwan

They will be! I promise

Apartment Woman; Seungwan

I mean no one’s actually complained about them before...

The three dots remained at the bottom of the screen as Irene opened the chat to respond.

Me

Don’t stress it Pillsbury dough girl, I’m sure they’ll be fine

Irene snorted at her own comment, and also at the way the three dots miraculously disappeared once she had sent her message. Seungwan was a lot more fun to tease than Seulgi, that’s for sure. She looked at the address in their earlier messages, and typed it in carefully to the open search engine on her laptop.

The neighborhood was close to the school. Convenient. The apartment complex was also gated, a nice surprise for the price that Seungwan had posted. Irene hummed in approval, clicking through the supplied pictures from the home association. She’s still not sure how she got so lucky with this all, an uneasy pit settled in her stomach at the thought.

Irene finished scrolling through all the pictures, and reluctantly returned to analyzing her poem. She got deep into her work, almost finishing the supplemental essay, before realizing how much time had passed. She cleaned up all of her belongings, and walked out of the library to gussy up for her “roommate appointment.”

…

Irene had put her black locks in a high ponytail, and worn comfortable clothes that screamed “I’m homey, and personable, but also nonchalant about my looks and ‘I’m a chill person- I promise.’” She had spent a while getting ready, needless to say.

She punched in the code to the gates of her (hopefully) future home, and watched anxiously as the gates swung open painfully slowly.

Jesus, can’t these things open any faster? She thinks, tapping her steering wheel restlessly. It would help if her radio was working, so she could listen to some music to soothe her nerves, but along with most of the amenities in her clanky old car, lovingly named Lou, the radio was broken beyond repair.

Irene hummed to distract herself, pressing the gas pedal tentatively as she took her first glances around the community. It was pristine, an odd beacon of warmth in the otherwise dingy suburbs surrounding it. Lakes in the middle of the community sparkled their welcome, and Irene smiled, spotting the porches attached to most of the apartments.

She could already picture herself sitting on the porch, watching the seasons change. What a delight.

A blaring car horn shook Irene out of her domestic stupor. Apparently, she had stopped in the middle of the road to gawk at the buildings. She scowled and threw a quick middle finger to her rearview mirror, and drove to the back of the community, where Seungwan had indicated her address was.

Irene pulled into the marked “guest” spot carefully, and turned off her car. A few pathetic coughs of exhaust indicated the car had shut off, the loud wheezes harmonizing with the incessant clicking of the engine. After finding an apartment, the next thing Irene needs to find is a reliable mechanic.

She pulled down the sun visor, and adjusted some loose strands of hair before putting it back up, and getting out of her car. She walked silently up to the second floor apartment, the only noises heard being the clanking of her heels on linoleum.

She approached unit 210, and knocked three times. She looked at the rainbow flag on the door curiously, this woman was brave to be displaying her pride so blatantly.

Get out of here, you ing dyke! You aren’t welcome here anymore. Don’t bother contacting us EVER again. The voice echoed in her head as she stared at the flag. She felt sick. She tried her best to repress those memories, but the most obscure things would trigger her remembrance. She was shaken out of her stupor by the creak of the opening door.

This had to be a joke. Irene’s fists balled at her sides, and her eyes seemed to bulge out of her head. Anger and disgust churned in her stomach, and her brows furrowed at the sight in front of her. She stood, planted to the ground in disbelief, as her eyes sized up the rather short and admittedly beautiful woman in front of her. Irene felt a bubble of panic and rage bubble up in . No wonder Seungwan had seemed so familiar.

“Irene?” The woman said, clearly just as incensed as Joohyun felt.

“Wendy??” she mimicked, the name searing off the end of her tongue with a growl.

The two women stood and glared at each other, neither one daring to say a word.

Of course it would be Irene’s luck that her high school crush, the one that outed her and got her kicked out of her home, would be the same one offering a deal she couldn’t resist.