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skeletalroses · 3 years

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I was going to submit this anonymously to one of the bigger aspec blogs but it got so long that I’d feel like a pain in the ass. I’m posting this because I’ve recently landed in a bit of a difficult situation in the vein of Just Aroace Things, and I’m not sure what to do or even how to feel. I’m hoping to get some advice from the community re: a topic that comes up from time to time---navigating roommate/housing situations as an aroace, particularly when your potential roommate’s romance fucks you over.

I met my best friend, A, our sophomore year of college when we got paired up via roommate lottery. We clicked right away and had a blast living together. Unfortunately it only lasted a year, since the best option for my major was to transfer to another campus while for her it was best to stay put. We’ve known each other for nine years now and live in different states, but we visit regularly and had always talked about living together again once we both moved away from our parents.

I’m aroace, sex- and romance-repulsed. A is super considerate and supportive of this. She even discovered recently that she’s demisexual (which she learned about while researching the symbolism of the asexual flag! On her own, completely unprompted! Because she thought it would help her understand me more! See? Super supportive!). She is, however, very, very alloromantic. Up until now this has just been one more facet of our overall odd-couple dynamic (I’m an Addams and she’s a Disney fairy), which has always been something we’ve laughed at and reveled in.

A couple months ago, however, A moved out of her parents’ place and in with her boyfriend of a few years. I’m still with my parents, which suits me fine for the time being, but I eventually want to move out. Like I said, A and I have long talked about living together. We never made any specific plans, but I’ve asked her before to verify that yes, this is a thing we’re both Actually down to do when the time’s right. But that was a good while ago, before she moved in with Boyfriend. We visited last weekend and I brought up the subject again, because I’ve been unsure about it since that whole development.

“Feel free to say no; I won’t be offended; I just want to know how my options stand at this point. We’ve talked in the past about rooming together again. With Boyfriend in the picture now, is that still on the table?”

A’s answer: “Boyfriend has a lot of anxiety, so probably not. Sorry. He doesn’t even like having his family stay over. You’re welcome to stay a few days but not for like weeks on end.”

This was a calm conversation had over cocktails in the mall. She asked to make sure my parents weren’t threatening to kick me out or anything; I assured her that they weren’t, and I wasn’t moving anytime soon, and it’s okay that my rooming with her is out.

Only I’m not that okay with it. I wasn’t confident she’d say yes, but I did kind of think it was likely, and moreover I’m realizing how much I was unconsciously banking on that plan. I’ve been sans income during the pandemic, and I have a fuckton of economic anxiety to begin with. A’s a STEM major in a big city who easily found a solidly-paying job right out of college. She gets promotions and raises and shit. I’m a humanities major in the middle of Bumfuck, Nowhere where all my impressive qualifications (which I do have) can’t get me anything with a living wage below management level, let alone something in my field. And I’m never going to have that built-in cohabitant in the form of a romantic or sexual partner that allos like A can take for granted. A was the person I could split costs with so as to maybe live semi-decently with someone compatible. Without her, my chances of having that have plummeted.

And it’s all because she got a romosexual partner. This guy who’s known her half as long as I have; who never worked her through the trials and eventual breakup of her previous long-term, engaged-to-be-engaged relationship; who has himself caused her massive amounts of grief, suffering, and sometimes outright danger through his inability to competently handle the drama in his personal life that should never have touched her, all while her mother would write letters to me asking me to come visit because, actual quote, A only smiles when I’m around. He was the reason she would be too depressed to function, and I had to long-distance therapize her through it even though she refused to take the basic step of leaving this grown-ass man at least until he got his shit together, because “he needs me.”

It’s like this dude calls the shots in A’s and my relationship now. I hadn’t seen her in seven months because every time we planned a weekend to hang out, it’d get canceled because Boyfriend wanted to go see his family or something (and he can’t do that without her, I fucking guess). Even this last visit got cut down to overnight when it was supposed to be the long weekend, because Boyfriend wanted to make other plans. And now my best option for future living arrangements is apparently down the shitter because of him. It’d have been one thing if A doesn’t want to live with me anymore because she and he need their allo space or whatever the fuck couples do (still amatonormative and lousy for me). But as far as I understand, it’s not even that. It’s not her. It’s Boyfriend. A and I can be planning something for the two of us for weeks, for months, for years, then it all goes away in a minute because ehh, it kinda cramps Boyfriend’s style. I’m, as A called me, her “best friend soulmate.” I Was Here First. I never fucking made her cry. But I can’t kiss her or fuck her, so I automatically take a backseat to the one who can. I don’t need to be her Number One, but I don’t appreciate being pushed aside at Boyfriend’s every whim.

A, I’m sure, doesn’t realize how it looks from my angle. I know she cares about me and doesn’t want me to feel devalued. She’s just an oblivious alloro. I’m not even sure Boyfriend’s intentionally hogging her. (To be clear, I don’t think he’s a bad person; I’ve only met him a handful of times but I reliably clock my friends’ truly shitty partners on less. I haven’t heard about any crises in the past year or so, so I guess he’s finally managing his baggage well enough that A’s life can go smoothly and not suck.) I’m not unsympathetic to anxiety either; I’m chronically mentally ill and I’ve had my share. And I get we’re little more than strangers at this point. But I hate that he can just singlehandedly veto me and A rooming together ever. It’s much more of a blow to my likely quality of life than he or A---or tbh even I did, before this point---realize.

I hate feeling like I’m being jealous and needy. Maybe A just genuinely likes him better and it’s not only an amatonormative thing. I know I’m not entitled to live with her; it’s not like we promised or anything. But the option getting shut down really made me realize how much I resent not having it, and how much I kind of resent Boyfriend in general.

Which brings me to the asking-for-advice part, to the maybe two people who’ve read this far. Aspecs on here have talked about how amatonormativity fucks over single people and especially aros in terms of housing and life in general. Has anyone dealt with a situation like mine? How do you manage the amatonormative behavior of people in your life snatching your prospects out from under you, or feeling like it has? Is my reaction even reasonable? If so, how should I bring it up to A? This would be the closest thing we’ve ever had to a conflict, and also I’m...not great at being vulnerable. I can’t even vagueblog about these topics because my social media presence is limited to Tumblr and hers to Facebook. Hell, maybe I should just forget it for now, since I’m not changing housing anytime soon anyway, and cross that bridge when I get to it. I wouldn’t ask her to leave him, since their relationship seems to be going a lot smoother than it had been. But goddamn, am I filled with aroace salt about this.

#aromantic #amatonormativity #arophobia #asexual #aroace #might delete this later #sorry about the rant #why this is hell nor am I out of it

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j-writes-and-suffers · 6 years

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NaNoWriMo Day Five

To his relief, Philip was feeling much better when he woke up on Wednesday morning. The tickle in the back of his throat had faded, and he could actually breathe through his nose again. He managed to be dressed, gather his things and show up on campus a whopping ten minutes before the booths were supposed to open. As an actual prepared and functional adult, Lucien already had everything set up, and was sitting patiently at the booth when the younger man arrived.

“Hey! Sorry I’m so late, I’m… really bad at mornings.” Philip hurried over to sit next to Lucien, looking around the booth. On the table before them, the cards were sitting in a little ‘take one’ tray, with a stack of free bookmarks next to them. Nearby was a clipboard with a sign-up sheet, and the whiteboard already read, ‘What is your favorite book?’ The peppy blond was clearly impressed. “Damn, you’ve got this shit down… why am I even here?”

“To socialize, because I’m awkward and out of touch.”

“Right! I can do that.” Philip nodded, bouncing on the edge of his chair. “Kids will be out and about soon, right?”

“Any minute now.” Lucien was testing the handful of pens he’d brought, making sure they all actually worked.

The day went by quite smoothly, with Philip’s energy and loud mouth attracting curious kids throughout the morning and well into the afternoon. They got plenty of votes on their whiteboard, and Lucien had nearly filled the sign-up sheet. There was only one hiccup; near six p.m., when the duo were almost ready to pack up, one more curious student wandered by. She was a bigger girl, with incredibly thick winged eyeliner and clearly home-dyed pink bangs. Slung over her shoulder was a battered messenger bag with the Tardis on it, and buttons running down the length of the strap. As soon as she came trotting into view, Lucien retracted from the table, sinking down in his seat and trying to disappear.

Philip leaned in, whispering, “What’s wrong, man, allergic to bad dye jobs?”

Before Lucien could reply, the girl was right in front of them, grinning broadly. “Hi!”

“Uh, hi…” Philip found himself pulling back; despite the table between them, his personal space still felt violated. “How are you?”

“I’m good! Do you guys discuss a lot of cryptozoology in book club? What about supernatural occurrences? Magic?” Her too-tight Hot Topic t-shirt was screaming at the seams, struggling to stay in one piece as she bounced around in excitement.

“I mean… I suppose they would if they were reading a book about that stuff. I’m not really the expert on that.” Philip turned to ask Lucien for details, but the older man had disappeared from his seat.

“They should!” She nodded firmly, pulling a battered spiral notebook from her bag. “Magic is real, and it’s very important to study! I have all sorts of notes about potential cryptid sightings in the area, and I’ve been compiling a list of spells to summon them. Do you want to see?”

Philip bit back a ‘hell no,’ instead forcing an awkward smile and mumbling, “Suuuure. Why not?”

That was a mistake. The girl proceeded to spend the next twenty minutes talking his ear off about her studies of Wicca and how she was absolutely positive she wasn’t the only magic user on campus. She begged him to study with her, help her learn more about the supernatural energies in the area and figure out who it was. The only thing that saved Philip was his phone going off. It was actually just a telemarketer, but he pretended to be having a serious conversation with his mother, going on about the well-being of a fictional great aunt and cousins until the overbearing girl got bored and shuffled off. Not thirty seconds after she was out of sight, Lucien reappeared at the table, settling back in his chair like he’d been there all along.

“You fucking traitor!” Philip turned to glare at him. “How could you leave me alone with that?”

“I’ve sat through her shpiel before, and doing it again might have killed me.” Lucien remarked. “I was intending to warn you about her, but I’d gotten optimistic and assumed she wasn’t coming.”

“Well who the hell is she? And what’s her problem?” Though normally very chatty and friendly, Philip’s patience had been worn right to the bone, and he was now in a pretty bitter mood.

Lucien sighed, running a hand through his hair. “That’s Shelby Mitchell. She’s a delusional junior who’s been the bane of my existence for the last two years. I don’t know what drugs her mother was on while pregnant with her, but the girl is an absolute lunatic. Dead set on hunting down and cataloging all the ‘mythical creatures’ that live in town. In reality, she’s probably the weirdest thing on campus, save for maybe Professor Noctus…”

Philip scrunched his nose in distaste. “Sounds like a grade-A pain in the ass.”

“She definitely is, and she’s been haunting the book club ever since she enrolled here.” Lucien grumbled, scowling in the direction Shelby had walked off.

Philip was honestly a little surprised; he’d never seen Lucien genuinely upset about anything before. Sure, there was his feigned offense during their banter last night, but he’d clearly been joking. It was strange to see those usually lively green eyes shadow over in distaste. “Can’t you like… kick her out?”

“No, she hasn’t broken any school or club rules. Sadly, it doesn’t violate policy to be incredibly annoying.”

“Well, we’re supposed to be done by now, anyway. Let’s just pack up and get the hell out of here. You don’t have to deal with her just yet.” Philip was doing his best to lighten the mood, gathering up the leftover bookmarks and cards as he spoke. He jotted down the final tally of votes for ‘favorite book’ before wiping the whiteboard clean. “Do you wanna carry the supplies or drag the board?”

Lucien shrugged, “Whichever is easier for you. I brought them both out myself.”

Philip’s cheeks flushed pink; he felt a little guilty for being too late to help with setup. “I’ll take the board.” he offered, knowing the boxes weren’t full enough to be heavy.”

The older man nodded, climbing to his feet and stacking the boxes in his arms. “Come on, this is the fastest way back to the library.” He lead Philip past the academic building, weaving a barely-worn path through the trees on the edge of campus.

“Ooh spooky,” Philip joked, waggling his eyebrows as they trudged through the shadowy forest.

Lucien scoffed, rolling his eyes. “If it scares you now, you’d best be gone before sundown. I once saw a whole owl. Truly horrifying.”

“I was joking, smart-ass.”

“I don’t know, you look pretty scared to me.” Lucien teased.

“I am not!”

“You’re awfully defensive, too. It’s okay, I won’t judge you for being a pansy.”

Philip huffed, “I am not assho - oh fuck!” His protest was cut off as he tripped over a tree root, bringing both him and the whiteboard crashing down in a pile of crunchy leaves.

Biting back a laugh, Lucien set down his boxes, kneeling down to help the younger man up. “Are you alright? That was quite a fall… You didn’t turn your ankle or anything, did you?”

Philip gave both legs an experimental jiggle before shaking his head. “Nope, the only thing hurt is my dignity.”

“Good. Then pick up the whiteboard and keep walking. I’d like to get back to the library this year.”

“It’s not my fault you have longer legs than me!”

“What was that? I can’t hear you from all the way up here.”

“You’re not even that tall, asshole!”

“Yeah, but you are that short.” Lucien grinned mischievously, now walking backwards through the trees. He had switched direction partly to better keep up the conversation, and party to give Philip a chance to catch up. “So, I suppose you’ll be playing in the dodgeball game Friday?”

Philip immediately perked up, his defiance fading. “Yeah! You should come watch!” He was eager to show off; despite his size and general clumsiness, he was actually not a terrible athlete. Dodgeball had always been his favourite game in high school - he was notorious for catching anything that flew in his direction, and fights had broken out before over whose team he would be on.

“I might.” Lucien shrugged, “Depends on the weather, and how much I have to get done for Saturday.”

“Oh! Do you have a float in the parade?”

Lucien shook his head, shifting his boxes to one arm to adjust his glasses. “No, I’m helping make the food for the picnic. Despite being a chronic bachelor, I’m actually a decent cook. I just don’t usually have anyone to cook for.”

“You should make me dinner sometime.” Philip blurted out, not really thinking as he spoke. He stopped dead in his tracks, turning bright red. “I-I mean. If you want to. Platonically. If you want it to be platonic. Honestly you could give me a can of cat food and I’d be okay with it. I just wanna go to to dinner with you. If you wanna go to dinner with me. If you don’t I’ll put this whiteboard up and you never have to see me again. You - you don’t have to answer now. I didn’t mean to put you on the spot like that. Oh my god why am I still talking I can’t shut up when I’m nervous.”

Lucien chuckled, raising an eyebrow. “You done?”

Philip nodded sheepishly, staring down at his shoes.

“Good. Then I’d love to make you dinner sometime. Maybe next weekend? This week is awfully busy.”

The younger man looked up, an incredulous smile spreading across his face. “Are… are you serious?”

“Of course. I wouldn’t lead you on like that. I’m not that much of an asshole.” Lucien smiled back. “Come on, let’s get out of the scary woods. We can talk more inside.”

“I told you, I’m not scared…” Though his tone was indignant, Philip couldn’t keep the smile off his face as he continued walking.

“Riiiight.” Lucien laughed, turning around forwards as they exited the woods, heading up the steps of the library. He held the door open for Philip as usual, following the younger man inside and setting his boxes on the circulation desk. “You can leave the whiteboard down here for now. It’s not worth the trouble of moving it upstairs. I’ll make the student workers do it next week.”

Philip laughed, “Is that all you use them for, manual labor?”

“No, they also make sure the computers don’t blow up.”

“Right, I forgot. It’s good to know I’m smarter than you at something.” Philip smirked.

Lucien raised an eyebrow. “What makes you think I’m smarter than you at all?”

“Well, you’re like… you read lots of books, and you have to be really smart to know all that Dewey Decimal shit, and I’m… kinda dumb.”

“I don’t know,” Lucien mused. “I think you’re a lot smarter than you think.”

Philip’s face lit up, and he leaned in a little. “You do?”

The older man nodded. “I do. You’re pretty charming, in your quirky little way, you’re technologically savvy, and you don’t come across nearly as dumb as you make yourself out to be. But I do think you need to work on being a morning person. If you’re late to every obligation that starts before noon, you’ll find yourself on the receiving end of more pink slips than a Valentine’s Day lingerie model.”

“Yeah, I… I know. I’m really trying.” Philip squirmed, not having expected to be criticized. “I just… I have so much trouble dragging myself out of bed in the morning.”

“Have you tried cocaine?”

Philip’s discomfort faded again as he laughed, “Dude, I don’t have the money for cocaine.”

“Ah, true. I hadn’t factored in budget. I guess you’ll have to go the boring route then, cold showers and coffee.” Lucien smiled. “Or, here’s an even better idea: go to bed at a reasonable hour.”

“Are you sure there’s not somewhere I can find cheap coke?” Philip pleaded.

Lucien couldn’t help but laugh. “Just go to bed, dumbass!”

“But I like staying up late!” The feisty blond whined.

“Well, I’m guessing you also like having a job, don’t you?”

Philip sighed dramatically. “Yeaaaah.”

“Then get out of here, and go to bed!” Lucien gently nudged the shorter man towards the door. “Go on, shoo!”

“Wait! I almost forgot!”

“What?” Lucien raised an eyebrow.

“Will you come to the poetry slam tomorrow? I… I’m gonna be reading a few of my own works. I’d really like to have somebody I know in the crowd.” Philip begged, surprisingly sincere in his desperation.

“Of course I will. But if you’re late, I’ll boo you off the stage myself.”

“Okay! Thank you!” Philip spun around, giving Lucien a quick hug before ducking out the door and heading for home.

#i finished this like three hours ago and forgot to post #i'm an idiot #send help #nanowrimo #nanowrimo 2017 #fantasy #modern fantasy #comedy #school #my writing

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