The Melting Pot Complex

Chapter Eight ~ Roman

{Possible trigger warnings: omitting information?? idk-

If I miss something, I apologize and please let me know}

Logan took the copies of the lease from them once they'd all signed, grabbing a thin jacket as he headed for the door.

"Think I could come with?" Roman hopped up, eager to get away from the roommate glaring daggers at him across the island. He and Virgil had disagreed on several more points during their brainstorming session and clearly the other man was still annoyed.

Logan sighed and turned to look at him. "I suppose you may."

Roman grinned and grabbed a pair of his shoes from the little rubber strip Patton had brought to leave by the front door.

"What's our landlord like?" He asked as they stepped out into the hallway. Logan shifted his grip on the leases to pull the door closed behind him.

"He is... interesting. Though I do say that in the kindest possible way. Thomas is hard to explain."

"Hard to explain like eccentric?" Roman grinned. "I love people like that, they're always so unique and interesting."

"I wouldn't quite call him eccentric, he's still very tame as far as personalities go. I have known him for a very long time, and he's quite the character."

Roman shoved his hands in his pockets, sauntering along beside Logan. "The more I hear, the more I like."

Logan grunted and stopped in front of an apartment a few doors down from theirs. He raised one hand and tapped his knuckles sharply on the dark wood three times.

Roman heard footsteps heading in their direction and put on his most winning smile. First impressions were very important.

"Logan!" The man who opened the door was... quite frankly not what he was expecting. He knew their landlord was young, but this man seemed to be only a year or two older than he was. His hair was a soft purple, as if he'd dyed it and then let the color fade out without retouching it. He grinned at Logan and then saw Roman standing next to him.

"Oh, you must be one of the new roommates! Let me guess, you're..." he paused, narrowing his eyes at Roman. "Patton- no, you're Roman!"

Roman nodded, grinning. "Wonderful to meet you, Thomas."

"Want to come in, Lo? One of my friends dropped off some vegan doughnuts from the shop downtown and they're still warm."

Roman glanced at Logan, curious. Their roommate had so far presented himself as a reserved person who kept to himself a lot, who was this man that he had a nickname for Logan?

"I suppose. Although Patton will be sorely disappointed that he missed such a treat." Logan glanced back down the hallway towards their apartment.

Thomas waved him off with a smile. "You can always take him some. And the other one, Virgil right?"

Logan nodded and stepped into the apartment. Roman followed.

"How is it going so far?" Thomas asked as he led them through the cozy little apartment to his kitchen. Roman glanced at Logan, assuming this had been brought up before.

"We have encountered just about every one of the personality conflict I anticipated." Logan handed their landlord the leases he was holding. "I believe having these signed will help with that... I have also taken the liberty of making you a copy of our stipulations for you."

Roman glanced at the page as his roommate handed it over and raised his eyebrows. There was a point missing from it, but Thomas took the paper before he could figure out what it was.

Thomas pulled a white box off the top of the fridge and set it on the counter. Roman smiled as he recognized the smell of freshly baked pastries.

"How do you think everything's going, Roman?"

Logan made a sound in the back of his throat and Thomas waved him off. "You've been a pessimist since you first learned to talk, Lo, I'm used to you being grumpy about what's happening. I just wanna hear as many opinions as possible."

Roman chuckled and reached for a doughnut. "Well Logan isn't completely wrong... we've had some head-butting moments. But I think we'll get it together. Patton certainly thinks so."

"Patton is overwhelmingly optimistic in all situations." Logan pointed out.

"Nothin' wrong with that." Roman grinned and took a massive bite out of the doughnut. "Mmmmm."

"Good, aren't they?" Thomas laughed. "Terrence is a doughnut fanatic, and he's always trying new places."

"Logan, you have to try these, they're amazing-" Roman took another bite and closed his eyes blissfully.

Logan sighed and reached over to take one as well.

"One doughnut is not going to kill you, Lo," Thomas teased. "You gotta live a little sometime."

"Oh I like you." Roman laughed as Logan rolled his eyes.

His phone chimed and he checked it, then nodded to himself. "I have a meeting I need to attend in about fifteen minutes, I'll have to cut this visit short."

Thomas went over to the cabinet across the kitchen, getting out a small Tupperware container. "Here, we can put a couple in here for your roommates. And feel free to bring them down to meet me sometime."

"Yes, I will certainly put 'subjecting my roommates to the torture of my cousin' on my to-do list for the foreseeable future." Logan offered a surprisingly teasing tone as he smirked at the landlord. Roman raised his eyebrows as the comment clicked in his mind.

"Oh come on, I'm not that terrible." Thomas laughed. He put two doughnuts into the box in his hand and offered it to Logan. "Shoo, if you want to be gone that badly."

"I'm  sure we'll see each other again, Thomas." Roman smiled at him. The landlord nodded.

As they stepped out into the hallway, Roman turned to Logan. He waited until the door was closed before speaking in the lowest voice he could manage.

"What did you leave off of the stipulations page?"

Logan began to walk down the hallway as he answered. "Virgil's identity needing to be protected."

"Why?"

He looked at Roman, "Virgil wishes to be completely separated from his creator identity. If I had left that stipulation on the list, Thomas would want to know who his creator identity is, requiring that I break that line of the contract to explain."

{I'm sorry for the little moment of 'such and so character/person mentioned such and so food and now it's the only thing they eat in fics' but I thought Thomas buying Terrence the box of doughnuts after that last video they did before Terrence moved was so cute}