Lia is having an allergy attack.
Funnily enough, it was because of a vacuum cleaner.
Yes, the epitome of life's mundane efforts. The sucking machine capable of erasing mistakes. The machine that should, theoretically, suck large amounts of glued-up macaroni off the carpet without breaking down.
Well, those just happened to be the failed debris of a school presentation she started for her class - which consists of a bunch of twelve to fourteen years old Math haters, by the way - before realizing that she had no business making Math fun for kids, and that glue macaroni were better left off for the so-called art teachers.
To erase the evidence of her embarrassing endeavor, she 'borrowed' Chase's vacuum cleaner and she may have broken it in the process.
Okay, she definitely broke it.
But she didn't have the heart to bring it up; she didn't want to tell her new roommate that she broke something of his, especially after turning his clothes into blue, not so long ago.
So she decided to just stop talking to the man altogether.
Did Lia mention that she doesn't like to admit fault, defeat, or regret? Yeah, she is a very well-adjusted adult. But it's not like she would never apologize for her mistakes, it's just that she would absolutely rather not.
So she avoided Chase for about a week. She imagine her avoidance has been very confusing for him, but tough luck. She could keep going on like this until the one year lease between them is up. Except, the man is acting weird too.
She is not sure what belonging of her he broke, but his behavior was too odd to be innocent.
But instead of avoiding her, the man has been coaxing her with food.
One night, he knocked on her door - instead of barging like he used to do. Lia honestly expected the worst when she heard the knock, she thought, it must be the police or something, but it was Chase and he offered her a takeaway dinner. For no reason other than to share it with her. His exact words were: "I brought some dinner on the way back from work. Would you like to have some with me?"
Who is this guy and where is her roommate?
Admittedly, she liked that he did those things - Lia is sane enough not to turn down a free dinner.
She only started feeling guilty after the eighth consecutive night of free dinner. Unless the man was trying to butter her up to break some bad news to her, she should be the one buying him apology dinners, not the other way around.
So Lia went back to not talking to Chase.
Yes, she even stopped eating free dinner. She imagine this confused the man further because of a couple of nights later, he made her a dinner at home. Using the only pot he owned. He made spaghetti.
She was worried, to say the least. She braced herself. But she could not refuse to have dinner with him this time. After he had actually take the time to cook it himself. She had to eat it. Whatever it tasted like, she had to eat it.
In hindsight, she probably shouldn't have blindly accepted his food offerings.
"Chase?"
"Yes?"
"This one doesn't have milk, does it?" she was halfway through her plate by then.
The man stopped eating and looked at her wide-eyed.
"It...does..."
"Chase! I have lactose intolerant! I told you this already!" Lia told him when he offered her a slice of cheesecake a few nights back and she refused.
"Shit! I'm sorry, I totally forgot!" this was the first time she heard him cuss.
"How could you forget about that?"
"What's the big deal about it?" he answered back, raising his voice only a little. "Lactose intolerance isn't that deadly, is it? So you will probably fart a little... so what?"
"You're horrible!" Lia spat out at the man before she could leave the kitchen to sulk away in her room - or rather our bathroom - he came back with...
"And you broke the vacuum cleaner,"
Chase was struggling to keep a neutral expression on his face when he saw that realization dawning on mine.
"You jerk!" and this was the first time Lia cussed directly at the man, the first of many probably, "You knew about the vacuum cleaner?!"
"I figured it out. After nearly two weeks of me offering you free dinners thinking that I had done something wrong to you... I noticed that the vacuum cleaner was missing, so yeah, I concluded that your sudden shiftiness had something to do with it. Have you been avoiding me for days because of the cleaning tool? You know I bought meals worth two vacuum cleaners in the past week alone, right? And I am also an electrician, Lia. I can always fix it if there's a problem."
"Well, y-you deserve that! You definitely do. Ad don't ever think that I am going to pay you back for the vacuum cleaner or even the free dinners you offered after you forced-fed milk on me! That's just beyond-"
"You should chill out," the man interrupted her rant nonchalantly, "I didn't put milk on the spaghetti you just ate."
"Wait, what?"
"It is not milk that you ate, but soy," the handsome jerk said with a huge smirk pasted on his face, and then he graciously added, "But I sure would loved to hear you fart a little."
Lia should have brought out the broken vacuum cleaner and thrown it in the man's face.
*****