BOOK 1: The Bad Boy's Roommate - EDITING

2. Negotiating with the Bad Boy

I spent the remainder of the evening unpacking my things into my bedroom, then re-packing them, and unpacking them again so that my room was exactly how I wanted it. I wanted it to be perfect, as after all, I wouldn't be spending much time out of this room, especially when Reagan was around. I wanted it to be the room that I never had at my parent's place. Even though I had loved my old room at my parents' house, I felt like I had outgrown it and really wanted to put the effort into making this room the best I could.

I stepped out from my room and shut the door, looking around to farmiliarise myself with my new surroundings, as last night was a total blur and I had no idea what I had let myself in for. I longed for someone to speak to other than Reagan. He wasn't exactly the best company, and the things that he had bothered to say to me so far were less than polite considering I was new.

I made my way into the main living area to find Reagan in exactly the same place as I'd left him approximately two hours ago when I had crept out to grab something to eat. Plopping myself down in the tattered arm chair next to the sofa he was sprawled out on, I smiled over at him. My hands began twisting around in my lap, something that I always did when I was nervous. Flattening my skirt against my legs and examining my ankle boots as if they were the most exciting things on the planet, I waited for Reagan to say something.

But he didn't say anything. He just simply ignored me, never moving his eyes away from the TV screen in which was showing some kind of action film. Considering he was glued to it, it didn't look all that exciting to me. But then again, I suppose it wouldn't.

"Hi, I just wanted to introduce myself properly. I'm Eloise, you're Reagan right?" I rushed out so that he had no time to fire an insult at me mid-sentence.

Reagan didn't look too impressed when he turned his neck to look at me. He couldn't have been any more obvious in checking out my legs. His eyes slowly trailed from my face to my boobs, to my legs, and then back up again.

When he realised that I wasn't really that much of a catch, he turned away and grabbed the remote, turning up the volume. 

I coughed loudly after a few seconds to attract his attention again, which worked well considering the TV's volume was now so loud I was sure everyone across campus would be able to hear the crashes and explosions coming from it.

After a while he muted the TV, a look of annoyance on his face. His eyebrows were furrowed and his bright blue eyes were currently sending me daggers. His skin, pale and almost translucent as the sun shone in through the crack in the curtains. Why he insisted on having them shut in the middle of the afternoon, I just don't know.

"Yeah, I'm Reagan. What of it?" he spat. One of his eyebrows was now raised. I was a little shocked at the fact that he'd even bothered to answer me, and so hadn't thought of anything to say next. He actually looked like he was prepared to listen now, as he sat up straight and turned off the TV, turning to me on the sofa.

"Oh, well, erm. I just wanted to say hi, that's all. We didn't exactly hit it off when I first arrived."

Reagan chuckled, flashing his pearly white teeth. I wondered if they were natural, or whether he'd had them bleached or something. Must've cost a fortune. I bet his parents paid--

Reagan snapped his fingers right in front of my face, causing me to become cross eyed and disorientated when my eyes travelled down my nose to meet his hand.

"Now who's not listening?"

It was my turn to raise my eyebrow. 

"As I was saying, before you went off on a little daydream." he added. "No, I suppose we didn't."

Huh. That sentence didn't actually contain an insult. Maybe he'd cracked, surely he couldn't stay annoyed at me for long.

"So, what are you studying?"

"If you must know, I'm in my second year of Economics." I was a little shocked to say the least, but I tried to act interested, as I had no idea what it was or what job you could do with that degree.


"Oh, that's cool. I'm doing English Literature with Creative Writing." I contributed. I wanted to keep the conversation going for as long as possible before I mentioned living arrangements to him.

"Sounds boring." he put bluntly. I couldn't help but chuckle a little bit. That's what most people said to me when I told them what I was going to be studying.

Reagan clearly had a very short attention span, as after insulting my choice of subjects, he stood up from the sofa and wandered over to the kitchen area. Flinging open the fridge and bending down to see what was inside, I couldn't help but take the oppotunity to check him out a little, as I hadn't really looked at him properly yet. His brown hair was messy from lying on the sofa most of the day, and as I mentioned earlier, he was tall. Like, really tall. He had the typical boy student look, wearing dark blue jeans and a dirty pair of navy blue Vans. His t-shirt had something offensive on the front of it, and was black.

I was startled when he turned around and threw a can of 7-up in my direction, but I still managed to catch it.

"Good catch, you should've done PE instead of all that Literature crap." he snickered. I creased up my nose at him when he turned his back again and I placed the can on the glass coffee table that was placed in front of me on a furry brown rug.

Reagan finally selected a drink and a snack and headed back over to the sofa, throwing himself onto it clumsily as far away from me as he could get.

"So I thought we could maybe talk about living arrangements? I didn't just come out here to be insulted about my choice of subjects." I laughed. I was desperately trying to keep my cool, even though I'd killed him in my mind at least 3 times already. I'd only been living here for about 5 hours and he was already driving me insane. The thought of staying here all year with him was already beginning to take its toll on me.

"What about living arrangements?"  He looked across at me like I was mad for bringing the subject up and waited for me to say something.

"Well I thought that we could maybe share chores and stuff? Like cleaning--"

"Chores?"

"Err, yeah..."

"Do I look like the kind of guy that does chores, sweetheart?"

Sweetheart? Oh that's it, he was in for it now. I felt my fists clench and I turned away from him and looked down at the floor.

"Well no, but--"

"But what? You thought we'd take turns in mopping the floor and washing each other's laundry? Please. I've lived on my own in this apartment for a year, and I intend to keep things the same as they always were. You live here, you clean up your mess and I clean up mine. Understand?"

I crossed my arms and found myself sitting right on the edge of the sofa, now very much pissed off.

"And you think that because I'm the girl, I should have to do everything?" I clarified, just about ready to punch this arsehole.

"Ding, ding! Somebody's finally got it!" he shouted, his words dripping with hate and sarcasm, which caused me to jump. I couldn't understand if he was just doing this to enteratain himself, or if he really was a sexist pig. He threw himself off the sofa and began bounding around in front of the coffee table, throwing his arms into the air and clapping. "Congratulations, princess!"

Once he'd finished, he sat himself back on the sofa and grinned, flashing his pearly whites at me once again as he threw his crisps onto the floor one by one. He even went to the lengths of crushing them into the carpet with his foot. "And while you're at it, you can pick those up as well. Just because you're the new girl, doesn't mean you have the right to order me around. Now get cleaning, and don't expect me to help 'cause I'm not."

That appeared to be the end of our conversation, because after that, he'd turned back to the TV and resumed watching his film from where he had left off, pretending like nothing had happened. I couldn't believe what had just happened. Of course there was no way I was ever going to clean up the mess he had made on the carpet, but I couldn't understand what I had done to deserve this sort of treatment from him. 

I had to tear myself away from the sofa before I physically knocked him out. I was so angry that I had started to shake and I even felt like I was going to cry. But there was no way I would ever catch myself crying in front of him, so I made my way across the room and thundered into my bedroom before slamming the door behind me and locking it. Even though I knew hitting  him wouldn't solve anything, it would make me feel so much better.

I stood in front of my bedroom door and walked across the room. Making my way over to the bed, I threw my duvet and pillows onto the floor and ripped the sheet off my bed. I started re-making my bed a few seconds later, as I desperately needed something to do with my hands before I used them to smack Reagan in the face. 

I jumped when I heard someone knocking on the door. It wouldn't be for me, as no one knew me yet, so I left it. 

"Are you gonna get that?" I shouted. My friendly girl routine was beginning to slip, and my tone was getting louder by the minute.

"Nah, think I'll just leave it. Unless you wanna get it for me." He called back.

"You're useless, you know that?" He said after a little while. "COME IN!" he bellowed to whoever was stood on the other side of the front door.