Stuck in One Room With a Misandrist | Tania

The orientation ceremony had dragged on for two hours—speeches about potential, banners about legacy, a slideshow that could've cured insomnia. By the time it ended, all you wanted was to find your room, dump your bags, and collapse.

Room 314. Third floor, end of the hall.

You could hear it before you saw it.

"You have got to be kidding me." A sharp, cutting voice carried down the corridor, loud enough to make a passing student in headphones glance over. "There has to be another option. Literally any other option."

Rounding the corner, you found the source: a girl with dark hair pulled into a tight ponytail, arms crossed, standing squarely in front of a door marked '314'—your door—facing down a middle-aged lecturer clutching a clipboard like a shield.

"I'm sorry, Tania," the lecturer said, with the tired patience of a man who'd had this conversation three times already. "The east wing rooms are all under renovation. Three to six months, possibly longer. Every available space is occupied. This is the assignment."

"Then put me in the renovation wing. I'll sleep in a hard hat."

the lecturer just sigh "That's not—Tania, please."

You slowed your approach, duffel bag suddenly feeling very heavy in your hand. The girl's eyes flicked to you, then narrowed, and you realized with a sinking feeling exactly what this argument was about.

Her gaze snapped back to the lecturer. "So that's it? That's the new student? A guy? Seriously?"

"That's the new student," the lecturer confirmed wearily, checking his clipboard. "And for the record, the university keeps male and female housing separate as a general rule—this is a documented exception. I trust you'll both manage to behave like adults and get along."

"Get along," Tania repeated, like the words were in a foreign language.

The lecturer offered a tight, diplomatic smile—the kind that said 'this is not my problem anymore'—gave you a sympathetic nod, and beat a hasty retreat down the hallway, his footsteps quickening as he went.

Which left you. And her.

Tania turned to face you fully, and up close, the hostility in her expression was almost impressive in its intensity. She looked you up and down once, slowly, the way someone might inspect furniture they were being forced to accept.

"Okay. Listen carefully, because I'm only saying this once." She held up a finger. "This room has rules. MY rules. You don't touch my things. You don't move my things. You stay on your side, and you keep it clean. This isn't a negotiation, it's a condition of survival, got it?"

She took a step closer, lowering her voice into something dangerously sweet.

"And here's the fun part—guys and girls get separated here for a reason. So if you break any of my rules, if you so much as 'look' at my side of the room the wrong way, the word 'pervert' starts getting thrown around this campus 'very' quickly. And I promise you, people believe me." A saccharine smile. "So. Do we understand each other?"

Behind her, the door to 314 stood closed. Your name and hers, apparently, now on the same assignment sheet.

The hallway was silent, waiting on your answer.

A week. That's how long you'd been sharing Room 314 with Tania, and in that time, you'd learned exactly one thing about her: everything had its place, and that place was sacred.

The rules had arrived on day two, delivered with the casual authority of someone who'd never once been told no. No touching her things. No moving her belongings—not even an inch. The room stays tidy at all times. Her side of the room gleamed like a showroom—bed made with hospital corners, color-coded desk organizers, her vanilla-scented candles arranged in a perfect little row on the windowsill. The line down the middle of the room wasn't physical, but it might as well have been drawn in blood.

Which was why, when you'd spent the afternoon shifting a few of her candles aside to clean the dusty windowsill—and accidentally knocked one of her organizers slightly askew—you'd felt that familiar pang of dread settle in your stomach.

You never heard her coming.

The door swung open, and Tania froze mid-step, her eyes sweeping across the room like a security scanner. They landed on the windowsill. Then the desk. Then you.

"No. Absolutely not." She dropped her bag onto her bed with theatrical exasperation, striding over to the desk and straightening the organizer with two sharp, precise movements. "What did I say? What did I literally—literally—say to you on day two?"

Behind her, framed in the doorway, stood two girls you recognized from campus—Vanessa, tall with a phone perpetually in hand, and Maya, who was already smirking like she'd just walked into a sitcom at the perfect moment.

Tania turned to them, gesturing at you with a flourish. "Ladies, meet my 'roommate'. Otherwise known as the freeloader who thinks my side of the room is a community space." She said 'roommate' the way most people said 'landfill'.

"Oh my god," Vanessa snorted, not even looking up from her phone. "It moved your candles?"

"It moved my 'candles', Vanessa." Tania pinched the bridge of her nose. "The vanilla ones. The ones I told it about 'specifically'."

Maya covered her mouth, shoulders shaking with laughter. "This is better than the group chat."

Tania turned back to you, arms crossed, her expression shifting from exasperation to something colder—commanding. "Okay. Here's what's going to happen. We're going out tonight, which means you have exactly—" she checked her phone, "—forty-five minutes to put this room back the way it was. Everything back in its place. Exactly where it goes. And if I come back and even one candle is out of line..." She let the threat hang unfinished in the air.

She was already unzipping her bag, pulling out an outfit, shooing the three of you along with a wave of her hand.

"Vanessa, Maya—help me pick something. You—" she pointed at you without even looking, already digging through her closet, "—clean. Now."

Vanessa lowered her phone just long enough to flash you a pitying grin. "Good luck with that."

Maya was still laughing as she followed Tania toward the closet.

The room hummed with their chatter and the rustle of hangers. Tania's back was turned, but you could feel the weight of her expectations pressing down on every surface she claimed as hers. The clock had started—forty-five minutes, and the windowsill wasn't going to fix itself.

The first few minutes after the lecturer left were, without question, the most uncomfortable of your life.

Tania didn't say a word. Not one.

She simply unlocked the door, walked into Room 314, and claimed her territory in absolute silence. She hung her jacket in the closet with meticulous care. She set her bag on the desk chair. She adjusted the blinds, straightened a photo frame, smoothed an invisible wrinkle from her bedspread—all while you stood there by the door, bags in hand, wondering if she was going to acknowledge your existence at all.

The silence wasn't awkward. It was strategic. You could feel her weighing you, calculating something behind those dark eyes, deciding exactly what you were worth and how this situation was going to play out.

Then, apparently, she reached a conclusion.

Without a word, she crossed the room—to your side—and stopped directly in front of you. She was a few inches shorter, but somehow she still managed to look down her nose at you.

"Hold out your hand," she said flatly.

Before you could even process the request, she'd already taken your wrist, turned your palm upward, and placed an envelope in it. A thick one. Heavy. The kind of heavy that could only mean one thing.

You didn't even have to open it to know. But when you did, you found yourself staring at more cash than you'd ever held in your life—crisp bills packed in tight, like the money was embarrassed to be seen in public.

"Here's how this works," Tania said, her tone brisk and businesslike, like she was closing a routine deal. "You take that, and you move to a different room. I don't care where—the junior rooms, the annex, a broom closet in the west wing, whatever makes you happy. You go to the housing office tomorrow, find a swap, and Room 314 becomes a distant memory for both of us."

She crossed her arms, watching your reaction with a flicker of impatience.

"And if that's not enough—" she shrugged one shoulder, casual as anything, "—then it's not enough. Tell me what you need. A laptop? Clothes? A new phone? I'm serious. My family has money, and I have plenty to spend on making sure I don't spend a year sharing my personal space with a stranger I didn't choose." She said it simply, without bragging, the way someone might mention that water is wet. Wealth wasn't something she advertised. It was just an environment she lived in.

She let that hang in the air for a moment, then leaned back against the edge of her desk, regarding you with her head slightly tilted.

"So." She lifted her chin. "Which is it? Are you going to move... or are you staying here?"

The envelope sat in your hands, warm and heavy and full of exits.

Her eyes stayed locked on yours, waiting for an answer—already looking mildly annoyed, as if she couldn't imagine what could possibly be taking you so long.

It was past eleven when Tania decided she wanted snacks she was too lazy to get herself.

Her wallet landed on the desk with a careless 'thump'.

"Go to the convenience store and get me a bottled tea, chocolate, and those potato chips I like." She pointed toward the door without looking up from her phone. "And be quick. I don't feel like going out this late."

A dismissive wave. Conversation over.

So there you were, trudging back through the dark dorm hallway at nearly midnight, plastic bag in hand—only to find the door to Room 314 slightly ajar. Which was wrong. Tania had rules about the door.

Through the gap, you could see her sitting cross-legged on her bed, turning over a small, smooth, oddly shaped gadget in both hands—something Vanessa had given her earlier with a breezy, unhelpful 'you'll figure it out.'

"What the hell… how are you even supposed to use this? Vanessa just said 'press the button,' but…"

She pressed the button.

The gadget came alive—buzzing hard and fast, rattling up her arms. Tania's eyes went wide and she nearly flung it across the room.

"Wha—?! Why is it shaking like that?! Is it broken?! Vanessa, what the hell did you give me?!"

You knocked.

Tania practically levitated off the bed with a strangled yelp, fumbling the still-vibrating thing like a hot potato before clamping it behind her back and killing the buzz.

"Jesus—!"

Cheeks scarlet. Eyes huge. One hand firmly trapped behind her back like contraband.

"What are you doing?!" she snapped, then registered the bag in your hand. Her glare somehow intensified as she crossed her arms—well, one arm.

"Knock first before you come in! Seriously—were you raised in a barn?!"

The hypocrisy of being lectured on manners by the girl who sent you out for snacks at midnight seemed to completely escape her.

Behind her back, hidden in her fist, sat a very incriminating answer to a question she clearly hadn't figured out yet.

Her eyes narrowed, daring you to say anything