How did I find out the stains on my sheets weren’t mine?
The Crusty Patches
My roommate Jenna was holding my comforter up to the light, making a disgusted face.
“Girl, what the hell is this?”
She said, pointing at the crusty patches near the middle of my fitted sheet.
“This is nasty.”
“When’s the last time you got laid?”
I hadn’t been with anyone in four months, not since Nicholas and I broke up. But these stains were fresh. That unmistakable bleach smell was still strong enough to make my stomach turn.
“Those aren’t mine,” I said slowly.
Jenna laughed.
“Right. Must be the [ __ ] fairy.”
But I knew they weren’t mine. I’d been at my mom’s all weekend for my sister’s baby shower. I left Friday morning and came back Sunday night. These stains weren’t there when I’d made my bed Thursday.
“Were you in my room while I was gone?” I asked.
Her face did this thing—a quick flash of something before settling into confusion.
“Why would I go in your room?”
“I don’t know. That’s why I’m asking.”
“You’re being paranoid. Maybe they’re old and you just noticed them now.”
But I knew my sheets. I’m obsessive about my bed. Clean sheets every Sunday, hospital corners, everything perfect. These stains were new. That night, I found a long brown hair on my pillow. Jenna had brown hair, but she always insisted it was auburn. This was definitely brown.
And there was something else: an earring back on my nightstand. It was not mine.
“Hey, Jenna,” I called out. “Did someone lose an earring back?”
She came to my doorway.
“Nope. Why?”
I held it up.
“Found this on my nightstand.”
“Weird. Maybe it’s been there forever.”
But I’d cleaned that nightstand Saturday morning before leaving. The next weekend, I told Jenna I was going to my mom’s again. I made a big show of packing, said goodbye, and drove away. But I only went to the Starbucks three blocks over. I waited two hours, then walked back.
Our apartment door was locked; good. I unlocked it quietly and heard it immediately: voices from my room.
“She won’t be back until tomorrow,” Jenna was saying. “Her bed is so much better than mine.”
I stood frozen in our living room, listening to them in my bed. The squeaking, the sounds in my sheets. I wanted to burst in, but I needed proof. I started recording on my phone, then loudly dropped my keys.
” [ __ ]!” I heard Jenna say.
Scrambling sounds, footsteps. By the time she opened my bedroom door, she was alone, wearing my robe.
“You’re back early,” she said.
Too bright, too loud.
“Who’s in there?”
“What? Nobody. I was just—I was looking for my phone charger.”
The window in my room was open; fire escape. But men’s shoes were still visible under my bed.
“Those are some big shoes for a phone charger.”
Her face went red.
“Okay, fine. I had someone over, but my bed is broken. And get out of my room.”
The guy crawled out from under the bed. It was Tom from her marketing class, the one she claimed was just a friend to her boyfriend, Alex. After they left, I looked at my bed. Fresh stains on my sheets, my pillows on the floor. My entire room smelled like sex and Jenna’s vanilla perfume.
