Mu

                You know how everyone knows someone who had the worst roommate of all time? Well I was that someone. I HAD THE WORST ROOMMATE OF ALL TIME. I went into my freshman year thinking that I was going to be best friends with my roommate and that we would watch movies and have sleepovers every night and plan each other’s weddings. This was not the case.

                Muhammad seemed fine when I met him. He was an engineering major, short, wore glasses and moved to America when he was thirteen. His English was almost perfect but he had a hard time with his adjectives. When something was bad he would say, “It is so shit, man. It is so shit.” He also loved Celine Dion. I would turn on “My Heart Will Go On” on my laptop and Muhammad would immediately stop whatever he was doing and start singing along very poorly. Little did he know that Rachael was on Skype and we were secretly laughing at him.

One time Muhammad accidently put metal in his microwave and pink and blue sparks went everywhere and I laughed and he got really mad at me.

                The worst thing about Muhammad was that he had three alarm clocks. He had one of the old fashioned ones that looked like this-

And then he had two cell phones for some reason. Oh, and he also hated it when the room was messy so I tried very hard to be a neat person which my friends would attest is not an easy task for me. I’m seriously a giant slob. One time I found a Dorito in my chest hair.

SO he would go out with his friends and drink and smoke hookah at their houses and then come back at three or four in the morning. Then, at seven his old fashioned alarm clock would go off and make the sound of a banshee. THEN every minute after that his cell phones would take turns alternating alarms which he would continuously hit the “snooze” button for about an hour until he woke up. I had several “roommate” talks which I said things like, “I feel” and “It makes me uncomfortable” and “Does everyone in the Middle East have three alarm clocks because I watched The Kite Runner and I didn’t see any of that going on.” He would wake up on time for three or four days and then he would relapse and start “snoozing” again.

Well one day I had enough! I said to myself, “I am a strong, independent, black woman inside of a white, gay man’s body and I don’t need any of this shit!” So I got up and threw my clothes all over the floor and started brushing my teeth and Mu realized that he was late for class yet again so he began scrambling to get dressed and he said, “Hey can you clean this stuff up?” And I said, “No! I don’t know how many times I have had to talk to you about your alarm clock but I’m seriously super sick of it!” My voice rose two entire octaves by the end of that sentence. He says “whatever” and runs out.

Later that day I’m reading a book in our dorm and he walks in and this is how the conversation goes-

Mu: Hey can I talk to you?

Me: (Thinking he’s going to apologize) Yeah what’s up?

Mu: First of all, don’t ever talk to me like that again. And second of all, I’m not going to change and there’s nothing you can do about it.

                And then he just walks out. At this point I am boiling with rage. I don’t think I have ever been that pissed since my speech teacher tricked me into thinking that Britney Spears died. So I went down to the front desk of my dorm and asked for the smallest screw driver possible. I brought it back upstairs, unscrewed the back of his alarm clock, pulled some wires, and put it right back where I found it. I’m such an evil genius.

                Around midnight, I go to bed but I can’t sleep because I’m like that little boy in the Disney World commercial-

                Mu comes home around two and he bounces around the room for a little bit and I hear him start to mess with his alarm clock. He tries to fix it for about five minutes before banging it on the counter (engineering major?) and finally turns on the music as loud as possible, turns on all the lights and starts screaming at me! Of course I’m awake this whole time but I squint and rub my eyes and I’m all, “mmmwhat? Mwhat’s going on?”

Mu: You broke my alarm clock!

Me: What are you talking about? (sleepily)

Mu: I know you broke it I know you did!!

Me: How would I ever do that Muhammed? It’s probably broken because you were banging it on your desk.

                At this point he is lunging at me with his hands in fists. I didn’t know he was going to be so upset! I mean it’s not like Celine Dion gave it to him! But I was pretty scared that I was going to get beat up so I called security and they said that they would be right over. Muhammed was hell bent on making sure that security knew that I broke his clock. We wait half an hour. I call them again and they said that they were coming. So by this point it’s like three in the morning and security never comes and Mu forgets that he’s angry and falls asleep. Well I’m scared that he’s going to kill me in my sleep so I stay up the rest of the night.

                And I am pissed. Right? So I stay at Justin’s for a few days and find a new dorm. But as I’m moving out I decide to look through all of Mu’s things one last time. And. I. Found. It. A backpack full of alcohol. So I grab the bag, bust Mu for underage consumption in the dorms, and move out :)

                Is there a lesson to be learned from this? Yes. Yes there is. I am such a slob that sometimes I spray Febreze on myself and call it “a shower.”