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Polar Mates

Chapter 1: Your new roommate

Sam was tired. Tired from all of the stuff that happened in the office that he worked in the entirety of the last week. It was the busiest week that he ever had whilst working in the company. And it was all due to his desk partner quitting the job and every single one of his responsibilities were transferred to him, which he felt as quite unfair, however when his boss dangled an extra incentive before him, he had no choice but to bite on that bone since his student loans were piling up and he had no choice but to pay them off.

Life was difficult for Sam. Jumping over to America for college after spending the lion share of his life in India was a big decision in itself, but the thing that screwed him up was the fact that his family was dirt poor when he made that decision. He knew that it wasn't the best decision deep in his mind, however the internet gave him the false imagery that America was the land of opportunity and that student loans for international students were easy to apply, which obviously wasn't the case. Coupling this with the fact that the loans had high interest and the living expenses were no joke when compared to the money he spent in India, he knew that he was doomed from the beginning.

And yet, he didn't feel like going back to India after he completed his course, since that would be the single most stupid thing that he would've done. After all, at least now, the conversion rate would allow him to act as if he is a big deal if he ever went back to his home country even though he has this big debt, but if he were to leave the job here, he wouldn't even have the luxury to do that shit.

Although everything seemed like it was going progressively shitty for him, his persevering attitude which his colleagues termed could be self destructive always found the silver lining. At the present moment, it was the place he was living in. The apartment; his place of solitude. The place where no one else came in and messed up with his work. A place so neat and tidy that even M*nica would be amazed by it. A place that was exclusively his and his alone. Or so it was, until that fateful day.

"Who is that even?" Sam looked really annoyed when he heard his doorbell ring for the fifth time.

Sam doesn't usually make people ring his doorbell for the fifth time or anything. In fact it is quite the opposite. Since he is awkward with normal human interactions, he doesn't have many friends. So, the only people that swing by are his landlord, Mr Ken and a select few friends.

Even if that was the case, they don't usually swing by his apartment on a Sunday, because they knew that it was the day that Sam spends on relaxing. And his way of relaxation was cleaning the entire room. And that was the reason why he couldn't open the door, since he was busy moving the stuff around.

Sam was quite confused as he stopped doing his work and walked towards the door. This event was quite the pattern breaker for his monotonous life. And for that precise reason, he was hesitant about opening the door; because he was worried. He was worried that the person on the opposite side of the door could be someone who would disturb his monotony. It wasn't as if he enjoyed his life being so monotonous, but at this point, he couldn't afford his life to be anything but monotonous.

After reassuring himself that it was one of his friends on the other side and that nothing was gonna screw his mojo up, he opened the door.

"Hi."

"Fuck. I should've listened to my instinct." He mumbled as he stared at the person before him.

The person before him was, well, someone he had no idea about. The only thing he could say about the person was that she could be a woman and she kinda looked attractive, but that was basically it. He knew nothing about her and didn't get why she was ringing his doorbell.

"What did you just say?" The woman asked, when she saw Sam mumbling to himself.

"Oh, it's nothing." Sam replied.

"Is that so?" The woman looked deep into Sam's eyes for a few seconds before slightly nudging him aside and walking inside.

"Hey, what are you doing?" Sam asked, looking extremely concerned as a seemingly random woman barged inside his room without any prior signal.

And it seemed as if the woman realized her mistake as well. "Oh, I'm sorry. I shouldn't have barged in like that. I just did it out of instinct since this is basically the kinda thing that I usually do in my other house as well, you know?" She shrugged as she said that.

"Other house?" Sam was quite baffled about the way she termed it.

"Oh, yea. My mom obviously didn't like the way I did things. She was always scolding me about how I shouldn't just barge in just like that and stuff, but I wasn't someone who listened to something like that. I was somewhat of a rebel, you know? Ah, good old times." The woman smiled as she looked as if she was reminiscing about the old times.

"Ah, I see. But what do you mean by other house? Like, this isn't your home!" Sam was in the state of a mini panic attack as he said that. He just had his fingers crossed hoping what he was thinking wouldn't end up as the truth.

"Oh, it seems like you didn't get the memo. Damn, I did ask Mr Ken to fill in before I got here. It would've got rid of this awkward atmosphere that we're having right now. Anyhow, I'll just introduce myself for now. Hi, I'm Jane. And I'm your new roommate." She gave out a warm smile as she introduced herself.