My Little Roommate

by The Equestrian Gentlecolt

Prologue (Dave's perspective)

I never really believed that stuff about “Apartment 13” being haunted. Sure, I’d heard the stories. Things happened there. Weird things. That was usually about as descriptive as they got, too. New guy moves in, everything’s normal for a few days, then one day he’s gone, and we find out he packed up and left like the devil himself was on his tail. They usually don’t even stop to ask for their deposit back.

Yeah, I never really believed there was anything weird about the place. Until I met my new roommate.

I guess introductions are in order, huh? My name’s Dave. David Clarkston for long, but I just go by Dave. I’m a college kid. Civil Engineering, on my way to a Structural Engineering degree. High hopes, low funds, and a student loan the size of Baghdad. You probably know someone just like me.

Apartment 13 probably deserves some introduction of its own. It’s part of Yellowwood Apartments, right by the college. Its real name is Apartment 213 (it’s on the second floor), but everyone just calls it “Apartment 13” or “The Haunted Apartment”. There’s no Apartment 113, if you’re wondering - nothing there but a janitor’s closet, but they skipped right over the number. Probably superstition. Anyway, the place is pretty close to the school like I said, so the rooms tend to get snapped right up. Except for 213, of course.

Well, this is my first year in college, so it was time for me to move out of my parents’ place. Even if I’d wanted to stay, it was a good forty-five minute drive from there to the college. I needed to find somewhere closer by. Somewhere cheap.

I was in luck. There was one apartment left. I’m sure you can guess which one.

I’m David Clarkston, officially the sole renter of Apartment 213. This is my life. Cue the theme song.

---

Livin’ it up in Apartment 13.
Got my own piece of the American Dream.
Just moved away from home, feelin’ so sad and lonely,
Until I met up with my little pony.
She’s not just your average college town girl,
But I wouldn’t give this filly up for the world.
She can’t go on beer runs and she can’t pay the rent,
But sometimes it’s true, all you need is a friend.

---

God, that was corny. It doesn’t really do the situation justice, either. Theme songs never do. Sometimes I swear, the people who compose them don’t even watch the show. Enough about that, though. I’m sure you’re curious how we met.

It was a sunny day. I knew it was a sunny day because the radio had just, in defiance of the view out my window, told me so. As far as my window was concerned, it was overcast. Then again, it was always overcast, if you looked out my window. I imagine it had something to do with the layer of grime that had built up on it. Layers, really. If you cut the grime away, you could probably count them and figure out how old the apartment was.

It had been a couple of days since I moved in, and I was in a bad mood. I’d had no luck finding a roommate, and I wasn’t looking forward to having to cover all the expenses myself. Like I said before, not exactly rolling in dough here. So you can imagine that I was hopefully optimistic when I heard a knock at the door.

“Hold on, I’ll be right there!” I got up from the worn remains of an antique armchair (don’t ask me, it came with the place), tossed aside my copy of Game Informer, and pulled open the door.

Turned out the radio was right. The first thing my potential new roommate got to see was a bed-headed college kid staggering back, shielding his face from the sudden onslaught of what must’ve been the brightest mid-morning sun I’d ever had the misfortune of being blinded by. So much for first impressions.

When my eyes finally adjusted to the light enough for me to squint out at my visitor, I thought maybe my ears had been playing tricks on me - there was no one there! My expression probably had time to shift about halfway from dazed to confused before I thought to look down. Then I decided that, no, it was apparently my eyes that were playing the tricks.

There in front of me, damndest thing, right? There in front of me was this little... horse thing. Looked like something out of a kid’s show. (I found out later that there actually is a kid’s show about them. Go figure.) It had crazy bright green fur, I’m talking neon lime green here, and its mane and tail... I’ve seen horses, okay? My folks took me to a horse ranch when I was little, I even got to ride on one. I’ll tell you, though, not one of them had blue hair. They didn’t have a horn, either, but I was more hung up on the blue hair at this point.

That’s not even the weirdest part, though. This horse thing, which I’m already pretty sure can’t possibly exist, is holding in its mouth one of the fliers I’d posted up looking for a roommate. I can’t help but feel, at this point, that something important has been missed.

“You’re a horse,” I informed the creature.

“You’re a monkey,” she replied around the flier. It was definitely a she, if the voice was anything to go by.

“Hold on, I’ll be right back.” I shut the door.

A lesser man might have screamed, or tried to run, or just fainted right on the spot. I like to think that I’m not a lesser man. I’m a natural overachiever. I tried to do all three. It came out as a muffled sort of yelp, an adrenaline rush, and a slight stumble away from the door before I came to my senses.

That obviously hadn’t just happened. I reopened the door, just to reassure myself.

“So, you still looking for a roommate?” the horse thing asked, sounding slightly impatient. It was still there. It was still talking. I looked over the edge of the little balcony in front of my apartment. People were out there walking, biking, or driving by, the same as always, completely oblivious to the fact that there was a talking horse on my doorstep.

Well, it couldn’t get any weirder from here. Might as well just roll with it, and hope nobody notices me out here talking to myself. “Uh... yeah. I take it you’re interested?”

She let the flier drop out of her mouth, perking up visibly. Literally, her ears lifted right up when her expression changed. “Sure am! I’ve got my share of the rent right here. I hope you don’t mind if I move in right away. It’s kinda a long story, but I need a place like today.” The top flap of a saddlebag on her side opened by itself, and a small brown pouch floated through the air toward me.

Okay, I was wrong. It could get weirder.

After what might have been thirty seconds of me staring blankly at the pouch, my new roommate obviously felt the need to prompt me to action. “Are... you going to take it, or what?” I took it. It was surprisingly heavy - I hoped for a moment that she wasn’t trying to pay in silver dollars or something. Turns out it was worse.

“Are these... gold coins?”

“They’re bits.” Was that a horse joke? “You’ve seriously never seen bits before?”

“Uh, no, look uh Miss...” I struggled to remember if she’d already told me her name.

“Key Lime.”

“Miss... Keylime. I don’t think this is going to work out. I’m not sure where you’re from, but I can’t pay the rent with bits. I’m pretty sure they only accept paper or plastic here.”

“Oh.” The little horse thing looked up at me with what was very obviously a disappointed expression. Even her ears were drooping, slowly lowering until they hung down beside her head. “I guess I’ll have to keep looking.”

“Yeah. I guess so.”

“This was the last place I had to try.”

“Sorry.”

“Well, bye then.”

“Bye.”

The little creature turned away, head lowered, and began to make her way carefully down the steps to the ground. I couldn’t help noticing an odd mark on her flank, a tattoo or something, of a musical note. I wasn’t really paying much attention to that, though. I was pretty sure I heard sniffling. I shut the door.

Good job, Dave, you just made a girl cry.

She had just been some crazy hallucination anyway, right? She wasn’t real. Even if she was real, it’s not like she was actually a girl. She was just some kind of talking horse thing. Some kind of talking... sentient... horse... girl.

Dammit.

“Wait!” I threw open the door and rushed out to the stairs. Key Lime looked back at me. I swear I saw tears in her eyes. A few of the people passing by gave me some odd looks, but I ignored them - I was already pretty well committed to being crazy now anyway. “You... forgot your bits.” I held out the bag, which I had forgotten myself until right then.

“Oh. Thanks.” Not even Eeyore could have sounded less enthusiastic right then.

“Look... you can stay. We’ll work something out, okay?”

She perked back up. I couldn’t help but smile.

“My name’s Dave, by the way. Come on, I’ll show you your new place. I’ll warn you, it’s not much to look at.”

She trotted back up the stairs, and past me. “That’s okay, neither are you.”

I’m David Clarkston, officially the sole renter of Apartment 213. I have a pony for a roommate. This is my life.

Comments

[Spike the Destroyer]

Wut. This promises to be hilarious, if you can do it right. Tracking.

[Vinyl-ScratchDJ17]

I love this so far but since it has 0 dislikes i can't help but tease sooo....*clicks thumbsdown*