Needed: One life and one roommate. (open)

[Nicole Gallagher]

The last of her advertising flyers printed out from the machine right as the phone began to ring, causing a quiet sigh to emit from Nicole's lips before she got up and grabbed her phone, cutting the ring half way through it's fourth vibration. "Yeah?" She didn't bother to look at the caller id, knowing full well it was the boyfriend she'd left in Los Angeles when she'd moved back to Vermont for her graduate school. He called all the time. Not only was it enough for her to have to keep her phone off completely in class, lest the constant sound of a vibrating phone disrupt the professors, but when she did finally turn it on, several messages would have been left, all saying the same thing. 'Why aren't you picking up? Where are you? Answer me. Pick up the damned phone, Nicole! Seriously? Are you hooking up with some other guy right now that you can't just answer me, cause I know you can't be that busy all the time.' It was sickening.

The voice was exactly who she expecting, and the tone wasn't much different. He was pissed about something. "Why aren't you picking up when I call you? Your phone isn't dead; you have a charger, Nix, and really, you barely respond to the messages I leave you." People complained about girlfriends who were clingy, and wives who nagged, but none of them had anything on Steve, who refused to acknowledge that a long distance relationship could work even without calling every five minutes. Especially when Nicole was here for a reason, and that was to study and observe and work. She rolled her eyes and picked up the pile of papers, her phone lodged in the crook of her neck.

"I have classes, and I have work, and I have a life, Steve. Besides, you don't leave a whole lot to respond to. Anyway, you weren't nearly this needy when I was in LA, you know. Hell, you were kind of aloof, which, you know, meant I got freedom. And not call schedules. I'm not going to call you every two hours, nor am I going to answer calls from you that often. I told you went you can call me that I wouldn't be working." It was a shame he couldn't see the look on her face as she said all that. It was nice to get it off her chest. The relationship had become a lot more trouble than it was worth, and to be perfectly honest, Cole had no idea just how much longer she could keep up with him.

There was a long pause in the conversation as, Cole could only assume, Steve collected his thoughts. However, when his more-that-familiar voice returned to the line, it had a nasally quality that hadn't been there before. Like he'd just burned his hand on a toaster. "I just want to get to be near you. When you were here, you were here, and I didn't have to think about being with you. I could just knock on your door whenever I wanted. You were just there. It wasn't like an entire country was between us. Why'd you have to go there for your classes. Why'd you have to do classes at all. My acting could have supported us fine here." Cole sighed, unhappy about the tone and the words. She was tired of being blamed for this.

"I came to school here because this is where what I wanted to study is, and I'm not living off your starving actor salary while you run around going to casting calls all day begging for parts in low budget commercials, as though you were a legitimate actor. You. Can. Not. Act. You cannot act. I get that you're calling cause you think you're being supportive and stuff, but cut the crap. I don't want to be tied to a phone all day." The other end of the line had gone very silent when the quick words had slowed to annunciate the clear insult of Steve's acting skills. Nicole knew it was a bit of a low blow, but that didn't make it true. She had a better shot at landing a leading role than her boyfriend did of becoming even an extra, and Nicole had no fantasies about being a good, or even decent actress. Steve was just that bad.

Even after she finished, there was only silence on the line, as though the boyfriend was holding his breath in a tantrum. The oh so dulcet silence before a torrential storm. "I CAN SO TOO ACT! I'LL SHOW YOU! If you don't want to be tied to the phone, then fine. I won't call, I won't so much as think about you. We're over, Cole, I hope you have a fabulous life at schooooool. You'll see. You'll be sorry when I'm the next Brad Pitt! You'll see what you missed out on when the tabloids name me the sexiest man in the universe!." He hung up, causing Nicole to burst into laughter at his choice of actors that he would be like.

She didn't feel any sting yet from the break up. Sure, it would come with time, but for now, the calluses she'd built up as a kid were protecting her, and besides, she had a roommate to find. She tapped the papers on the small square table in the middle of the studio to line up the edges and glanced over at the door to the bedroom that was, thus far, only used for storing boxes of stuff that had yet to go up on the walls or onto bookshelves, or just about anywhere but in the cardboard. Nicole gathered her purse and slipped the phone into it, grabbing her keys with her now spare hand. Steve was one less thing to worry about now, and she was fairly sure he would be calling in a maximum of twenty-four hours to apologize and beg to get back together with her. She hadn't made up her mind yet whether she'd do it.

God, she needed to take the night and actually have a little fun. With a bottle, or with a guy. It didn't make a difference. Hell, she'd even take both. But she needed to get the flyers up first, so off she went, out of the flat, locking the door behind her, just in case, and down to the street, stapling flyers on the telephone polls as she walked along, and in shop windows as she passed them by. Eventually she wound up in the café, with only one advertisement left to hang, and she stuck it on the small bulletin board situated for that exact purpose near the door. Hopefully someone would find it and need a cheap place stay, and to split rent. She sunk into a chair then and ordered a cappuccino when a waitress came over. She didn’t need it. She just needed company. And a roommate.

Search: Roommate
Female searches roommate in two-bedroom apartment downtown. Male or Female okay.
Quiet part of town, expansive studio area and kitchen, cheap rent. Must
be able to pay half rent (approximately $400) and half utilities. Slobs
need not apply.

Call Nicole Gallagher at (###) ### - #### if interested.

(apologies for the length, whoever responds. I got carried away)

[Eric Penrith]

Item 21: Acquire living accomodation.

Criteria: Must have roommate; must have internet access, must not be creepy.

Time alotted: Two hours.

[/i][/blockquote]

With a flick and a tick, the timer began, and Eric took to the task of acquiring suitable living accomodation for himself. For years, it had always been someone else who provided shelter for him; be it parents, relatives, or school. But no more, he had said! No more would the great Eric Penrith be someone else's burden, excluding the chosen roommate! No, he would be a vital part of a unit, a symbiote of a household, not simply a parasite! So, naturally, the techno-savvy young man jumped upon the World Wide Web, and began to surf as he had never surfed before! Oh, woe to thee who stood in his way! Within two chimes of the clock, he would have a place to live, he vowed, beyond this cramped hotel room!...

Reality hit like a cold cloth after half that time. It was always something minor. "Must not mind animals" - animals meant dirt, dirt agitated him to no end, out. "Romantic Literature Student" - that sort of literature made Eric want to commit imminent seppuku, even more so than most classics, out. Little things just kept popping up. It seemed there were no neat freaks with an appreciation for science, or atleast a hatred of literature and psychology, advertising on the web. The irony of this burned into Eric's very soul. As strange a time as any to find that most advertisements restricted him not by cost, money was no issue, but by detail.

After an hour's fruitless searching. the young man closed his laptop, and altered his schedule upon the PDA.

Item 21: Redirect - search nearby establishments for paper ads.

Criteria: Unchanged

Time alotted: One hour

[/i][/blockquote]

With that, Eric carefully tucked in his cotton, white, polyester shirt, pulled on his quilted jacket, and calmly strode the seven and a half paces to the door. Locking his room behind him, he noted that it was fifty hundred and ninety three paces to the nearest establishment with a bulletin board of any kind, Kali's Kafe (spelt with a 'K', presumably, to honour the Indian Goddess). Every step inside the hotel, the young man counted out - not through any need to, but merely as something to do. The hotel staff scared him, the entire building was dull and badly made up, and he wasn't too keen on sparking off because he found the need to set the building's generator back a few centuries. He had a habit of doing that; sparking off when he got bored. Always had to be doing something, Eric. Once he was safely out of the building, he did find it far easier to examine the sidewalk, or the buildings passing by, or the people, though he avoided the latter for obvious reasons. People did not like getting stared at, and Eric could empathise with that - getting stared at made him nervous aswell.

Within a few minutes, he had come to Kali's Kafe, and was disappointed to find only a few roommate advertisements. One was discounted because it was a thirty year old woman, the second because the man obviously had the literary abilities of a small, lobotomised tortoise, but the third seemed...acceptable. $400 was far from too much, and he used utilities sparingly. The studio would be appropriate for 'powering down' after a few charges, if only because of the space. It was pleasant, and acceptable. If the 'female' was about his age, it'd be satisfactory.

Without skipping a beat, Eric yanked out his phone and keyed in the number. Of course, the fates conspired in such a way that the phone of a nearby young woman began to ring.[/size]