I was 21 years old and a junior in college. I had been living with The Girls, Liz and Diedre, who were awesome, but timing and circumstance meant I would have to move out at the end of the summer. They had two more roommates moving in, something arranged before I’d even started living with them. I hadn’t really even started looking for a place when out of the blue, a friend of mine, Tessah, contacted me. She was looking for a roommate and was just calling around to see if anyone else was looking. Tessah already had a place lined up — a condo that belonged to a woman her mother worked for as an accountant.
The arrangement seemed great. I would be living with a friend instead of a stranger. The price was right. It was conveniently located on a bus line to school in a great neighborhood. I could bring my cat. The condo had hardwood floors, a dishwasher and an enclosed courtyard. But as I hung up the phone after agreeing to move in with Tessah, I had a very bad feeling about it. I immediately ignored that feeling and started packing my stuff. I moved in a week after the fall semester started, the first week of September. Tessah had signed and magneted the lease on the refrigerator.
I asked Tessah if she wanted me to sign too. She said no. She claimed I didn’t need to sign the lease because we were renting from someone she knew. At some point, the lease disappeared from the fridge without my signature. Tessah was…spiritual? Alternative? Esoteric? I’m not sure what words describe her, but she was into things that were different. Energies, astrologies, auras, past lives. Having been raised by hippies who believed in this sort of thing, I was fluent in the lingo, so it wasn’t weird to me that she claimed she could see energy.
I came home one evening and Tessah told me she’d been communicating with my cat, Sheba. The cat, Tessah informed me, had been a warrior named Ichobar in a past life and from that point forward, Tessah would be referring to Sheba as Ichobar. I shrugged noncommittally, but suggested the cat still preferred to be called Sheba.
Another night, my boyfriend, David, was over and while Tessah cut vegetables in the kitchen, the three of us talked. Tessah authoritatively informed David that his aura was yellow-greenish, and very strong. She then asked his astrological sign. According to Tessah, as a Carpricorn, David was incompatible with her sign, a Leo (I think). David rejected the legitimacy of astrology, and the conversation took a confrontational turn.
As I tried to think of a way to change the subject, the two of them traded barbs that got more and more personal. The argument ended when Tessah slammed the knife down into the cutting board, made a comment to David about ending his life and then laughed.
Before she strolled off to bed, she assured us she was just kidding about all of it.As uncomfortable as it was, I decided to give her the benefit of the doubt that she really was just kidding, and the knife slamming was her bizarre way of ending an awkward, confrontational conversation. In the meantime, we clashed over typical roommate things. She had a bird that she let fly around the bathroom — I didn’t like the shit everywhere and asked her continually to clean up after the bird. She usually didn’t.
She also left her uncleaned juicer out during the day which attracted tiny flies. I asked her to clean this, too. She wouldn’t. One night, she told me she’d overheard David and I having sex. Embarrassed, I apologized and promised to be quieter. She assured me it didn’t bother her, but I was quiet from then on. About four weeks after I had moved in, David was over, spending the night. He’d fallen asleep while we’d been watching T.V. in my room, and I was close to being asleep when I heard a knock at my door.
It was Tessah, hysterically crying in our hallway. “What’s wrong?!” I asked, thinking something had happened to a family member. Through her sobs, she choked out: “He…has…to…go…” *sob* “What? Who?” “Him,” she choked out, pointing into my room. “David? Why?” “I just…I can’t….*sob* It’s his… *sob*…energy.
I just can’t have him here…*sob* with his energy *sob*.” With that, she ran down the hall-way into the bathroom and vomited into the toilet. When she emerged, she told me should couldn’t deal with David’s energy anymore and he had to leave. Then she started sobbing again, ran into her room, and slammed the door.
Not really knowing what to do, I woke David up and explained what was going on. I asked if he could go home so I could talk to Tessah about what was going on with her. Sleepy and more than a little annoyed with me, David agreed to leave. As soon as he did, Tessah came out of her room, puffy, red, and tear-stained, but obviously in a much better mood. We sat in the living room as she explained that she’d been sensing his energy and it had become overwhelming for her. She didn’t know what to do, so he had to leave.
My years of hippie parenting guided my advice to her, which was to learn to block out energy from others. There would always be energies — good, bad, intense and otherwise — and she needed to learn to block them out so she didn’t become overwhelmed. She agreed — she did need to learn that. I went to David’s house that night to try and assuage the situation on his end. I was only marginally successful. Maybe a week or less later, Tessah emailed me to tell me she was moving out and I would need to find another place to live. Caught off guard and confused, I called her and asked why she was moving.
She had a litany of reasons (finances, nearness to campus, space). Not wanting to move again after a month, I suggested that instead of both of us moving, I would stay and get another roommate. She said she’d have to ask the landlord who was in Australia. Maybe the owner’s son could make that decision, Tessah suggested helpfully. She would call the son and ask him, she told me.
In the meantime, October rent was due. Because Tessah’s mother was the condo owner’s accountant, our checks went to her. Before I left for campus the morning of the last day of the month, I gave Tessah the rent check, a day that also happened to be a Friday. My parents were helping me out and would both deposit some money in my account by the end of the day. By 10 a.m., I had a voicemail from her mother informing me the account didn’t have sufficient funds for the rent.
She really needed me to call her back and let her know how I was going to pay it. I called her back, explained my parents would deposit money that afternoon and by the time the check hit my account on Monday, it would clear. All seemed fine, and my parents put money into my account that afternoon as promised.
A few days later I received another email from Tessah. She wanted to know when I’d be moving out so she could tell her next roommate when they could move in. Feeling like a crazy person, I called her and asked what was up. “I thought I was going to stay and find a roommate, and you were the one moving out,” I reminded her. “Why am I moving out if you are just going to find another roommate to live with again?” I asked.
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