Chapter 1: The Roommate's Pamphlet

As of 5:00am this morning, Alexander Hamilton was homeless. Burr always told him that his mouth was going to be the thing to get him in trouble, but he never guessed Burr would actually be right about something for once. He had been dorming with a three guys from the debate team for the first month of his college career when they suddenly decided they'd had enough of him. Ok so, maybe it wasn't so sudden. Alexander just could never resist his constant urge to roast Thomas Jefferson and John Adams. They're both assholes, Alexander told himself. They deserved it.

But, understandably, one could only take so much roasting, and Jefferson and Adams soon reached the end of their ropes. Aaron Burr, never one for confrontation, tried to remain completely impartial to the quarrel going on between the three; the only opinion he voiced being that they were all being extremely immature. His un-alignment shattered, however, when Alexander got fed up about having no one on his side and accused Burr of having no opinions on anything. Alexander could remember exactly what he had said to the stoic man clear as day. "If you stand for nothing Burr, what do you fall for?" Burr immediately chose a side after that and, unsurprisingly, it sure wasn't Hamilton's.

So that's how Alexander Hamilton, Political Science major and straight A student, ended up on the streets after only a month of living in New York. It's not like Alexander was super worried. It was summer still; classes hadn't started yet for people who took the summer semester off. Plenty of freshmen were moving in soon, Alexander just happened to be early. Surely there's going to be plenty of people in need of roommates. Alexander told himself as he approached Starbucks, in desperate need to put his duffle bag down (with everything he owned in it, he never was a man of many belongings) and a break.

Alexander ordered himself a Caramel Flan Frappuccino (he deserved a break, sue him) from a cheery barista named Maria and sat down at the booth closest to door. It was situated against a large window, which Alexander ended up people watching out of when he decided it wasn't worth digging through his duffel bag for his laptop. It was really just an excuse for Alexander "Non-Stop" Hamilton to actually relax for once. The coffee was nice. It reminded Alexander of his life in the Caribbean.

More specifically, it reminded him of the flan his mother used to make for family dinners before his dad left. The flan his mother used to make for the two of them before they both got sick. The flan Alexander learned to make in the days he had gotten better, the days before she died. The flan Alexander made for his cousin the night before he-

"JOHN NO GET BACK HERE!" Alexander is shocked out of his revere. A boy comes running down the sidewalk, looking to be about Alexander's age, all mischief and freckles, his shoulder length brown curly hair bouncing wildly behind him as he runs at a break-neck speed. The boy stops abruptly in front of a lamppost, whipping out a bottle of superglue and a piece of paper from god knows where, and expertly glues the edges perfectly to the post in record time just to take off again. Another boy, more of a man really, comes running up just as boy number one (John, Alexander assumes) disappeared around the street corner.

The second guy stops at the lamppost just like the first one, but doesn't seem to have anything to add to it, laughing (why was he laughing?) at the paper as he attempted to take it down. The paper holds fast. As the guy struggled with the paper and shook his head in disbelief, Alexander got a good look at him, much better than the glance he'd gotten of John. This guy was tall, really tall, and really buff. He had his small afro contained in a headband stretched across his forehead, and he was dressed too fashionably to be chasing someone. Clearly he hadn't planned on it. He had on nice white jean jacket over a navy blue t-shirt (matching his headband) with a pattern of tiny white stars. Not to mention the widely ripped blue jeans, showing off large expanses of his chocolate colored skin. "John I swear to god!" The guy takes off again, still laughing without a care in the world.

Alexander shook himself out of his staring, closing his mouth all the way, realizing he had been gaping the slightest bit. He decided to take his coffee to go, the air conditioning was making him rather cold anyways, and walked outside to see just what, exactly, was this mysterious John posting around town that had his friend so hysterical.

When Alexander made it to the post, he leaned in closely to read what seemed to a letter of sorts. This should be good. What Alexander got was even better than good, better than great even. The letter stated:

"Hey! Are you looking for a roommate? How about 3 obnoxiously loud males who occasionally drink too much and have board game night on Wednesdays and movie night on Thursdays? Don't like cooking your own meals and enjoy having a 6"2 burly guy constantly doting on you and forcing delicious food down your throat? Don't mind a French foreign exchange student walking around in his underwear 24/7 because he doesn't understand American culture? (It's all a lie he just wants an excuse to not put on pants.) Have enough sanity to listen to a college student rant about how cute turtles are, how amazing Disney is, and how fun football is? Then you've come to the right place!

But in all seriousness though, we have a room open in our four-bedroom apartment and we could use the extra person paying rent. It has a big living room and Frenchy bought a giant flat screen TV with a Netflix we all use and a sweet kitchen. You'll even get your own bathroom! That has to sound at least a little bit enticing. Right?

Call us (431) 591-3332

Signed,

John Laurens (And Hercules and Lafayette who didn't agree with the beautiful and extremely elegant choice of words in this flyer but were too lazy to write it themselves so they can deal with it)"

Perfect, Alexander thought.