what doesn't kill you ...

I had an interesting night. Come to think of it, I cannot actually recall a night … ever … where I experienced such levels of pure hatred and wantonly violent intentions.

I was chilling with a buddy of mine last night, over at his pad, when I get a text from Chris (my roommate and best friend of 11 years) at 10.29 saying nothing more than "What the FUCK is going on in our apartment?" Afterwards he called me up and informed me that one of our other roommates and her boyfriend (who has essentially been living with us without permission for a month or so now) had a friend over. Fine. They were apparently already quite drunk, and had been smoking it up in the dining room (fine and not fine), and evidently were pretty rowdy at that point. I got home not long after and naught had changed, so Chris and I just spent some time on the front porch, chatting.

Until we decided to head into the front room and watch a movie. That's when things got far more interesting. Due to aforementioned company's high levels of drunkenness (and quite possibly low levels of giving a shit), they were being pretty loud and obnoxious. So much so that we could hear them easily in the front room. Low and behold, they were discussing how deeply their (our roommate's and her boyfriend's) hatred for us ran. They talked about how much "they'd" like to move out, but how they were locked into the lease, but on the plus side Jay was getting free rent and utilities at our expense. They talked about how much they'd like to ruin our lives and make us pay for being such losers. They talked about how to best "destroy us."

A little bit of back-story. When this roommate moved in last September, she was as sweet as could be. She hung out with us, she chatted with us daily, we all cooked together, it was great. Then she met this guy (if that isn't cliché I don't know what is). Despite being nearly 30, this guy looks and acts like a 16-year-old wicked-mad goth kid. Pretty much at all times. Never in my life have I seen such an amazingly clear example of one person mentally poisoning another. Since then she's become confined to her room with him at all times. She's ceased to talk to us, look at us, or engage us in any way.

Back to the story. As if this didn't upset us enough, they continued to plow forward with their discussion. The boyfriend was proudly bragging about how – through living there – he had been able and continued to do so many things to us that "we didn't even know", and that if she (our roommate) would only give him permission he would "let himself loose" and "rage against" us. He would "reign down world war III upon" us. He would "destroy" us. As I said … pissed-off 16-year-old goth kid. This is of course in addition to all the other apparently terrible and disgusting things he's already been doing to us without our knowledge, such as peeing in every sink in the house with surprising regularity and lord knows what else. Obviously I don't trust any of the food in the house anymore, and this morning I took a few of my more prized (and pricey) possessions to the office for safekeeping. That was something else: he was constantly bragging about how soon he was going to wreak havoc upon us by destroying some of the things we care about more than anything. No idea what that could be, but it definitely will be interesting to see what impression he has of what we truly care about. After we went to bed they migrated to the front porch and proceeded to get louder, drunker, more obnoxious and more destructive. They were screaming into the night, cheering, yelling, and smashing beer bottle after beer bottle on the sidewalk out front. Chris went out once to request they be quiet. They didn't say anything for a few seconds, then the friend said "yeah, sure, no problem." Chris thanked them and went back to bed. As he was leaving he heard the friend quietly (and most likely in response to a glare from the boyfriend) say "what? At least I didn't kill him." They got louder, and I slept with my jacket against my door, just so I could know in the morning if anybody had entered my room. No one did. Even so, I only got an hour or so of sleep throughout the night.

I don't know what to do. I don't think there really is any answer that's going to work without giving us more problems before making it better. I'm perfectly happy letting her out of the lease and going to the expense of finding somebody else to sublet, but I honestly can't see either of them going willingly. As much as they obviously loathe us, to move out would take away his free ride and put them into a place not nearly as nice and most likely more expensive (we get a very good deal on our place). If they could even find a place, which undoubtedly would take some time. Moreover, that's a solution-oriented answer. I don't see them as being solution-oriented people. I see them as needing something to focus their hatred on, and I see them as, more than anything else, wanting to cause as much trouble and chaos as possible. They used the term "anarchy" far more than necessary.

I have no idea what to expect upon returning home. Honestly, I suspect that very little if anything will be out of order … if for no reason other than the fact that they were unbelievably drunk last night, and probably too hung-over today even to move, much less "reign down world war III upon" us. But hey, I've been surprised before. They certainly drink enough to have built up a healthy (or not) tolerance, and may just bypass the hangovers in lieu of "complete and utter anarchy." Told you they used it a lot.

And now I'm at work, completely exhausted and having gotten here 40 minutes early this morning just to get out of the house. I would be far less concerned about all of this if it were not for the fact that I long have suspected this guy to be very near the edge psychologically. In other words, I'm concerned there may be a possibility that he easily could become completely irrational and/or violent with little to no provocation. Of course, I could be wrong. He very likely could be a big, mean talker and little more. But how do I find out? Wait until he becomes violent with someone in the house – which may well never happen – all the while knowing he's probably peeing in all our food and doing god knows what else to us without our knowledge? I really would rather not.

Of course, it hasn't killed me yet …