It was late summer, the crowds that brought in great business during those warm months were now beginning to wind down and return to the usual business that went on during the school year. Homer and Barney were now nearing a full year of working there with many memorable stories to tell that just made working at the bowling alley a great experience. Roger was also nearing a year of working, but now he was making the big decision on whether or not to start college so he could find a better job in four years. He enrolled in the local community college and planned on taking core classes for the time being before deciding what he really wanted.

So Barney and Homer were usually the only ones working the weekdays, reliving fond memories of the great business they had while school was out. Barney remembered how Homer would often look around for a date, but would still come back empty handed. Apparently he just wasn't the kind of person the ladies were attracted to and it was upsetting to think about. Barney had tried on a few occasions but no one was really interested in him either. Roger was just the lucky one, even though he seemed to be getting close to hitting a last nerve with his girlfriend Rosie.

But like most wonderful jobs with low pay, it's hard to make ends meet with apartment rent, electricity bills, food, and gas for the car. It left them with a low amount of money by the end of the week, making it harder to enjoy the finer things in life and keeping them from going out to all the great night clubs on Saturday night. A few times they had to ask their parents for money, Barney's parents were always willing to help, but knew that it was not something they wanted their son to do every month for many years, they knew he needed to figure out what to do in life or be stuck with such a low paying job. Homer's father was always iffy about sharing his cash, Abe wanted to retire sometime in the future and not when he was an extremely old man. It was time they started thinking about what they needed to do.

But of course they did not worry about it right away, and continued to ask their parents for money until they got a rude awakening one day at the end of the month. They were both off work that day, so they got to sleep in and take their time getting up. Homer was the first up that morning; he shuffled his way to the kitchen and grabbed a bowl of cereal with some milk and simply sat down and enjoyed his early morning meal. He listened to the humming of the refrigerator and the sound of birds out the window before he heard Barney shuffle his way out of the room.

Like usual, Barney did not go to the kitchen first, instead, he made his way over to the front door to pick up the morning paper. He opened the door and discovered an envelope on top which he picked up and brought into the apartment with him. He set the paper down on the kitchen table and opened up the envelope to see who had sent him a letter without mailing it. Homer watched him read it as he ate his cereal before responding.

"What's up Barney, is it from a secret admirer?" he asked as he batted his eyelids.

"No the landlord," Barney replied as he continued to read silently while Homer waited wondering what the landlord wanted now.

"Is it good or bad?" Homer asked.

Barney stayed silent for the longest time, leaving Homer sitting there, his spoon halfway between the bowl and his lips wondering why Barney would not give him a straight answer right away. It must have been bad news though because Barney started to give a worried frown.

"He's raising the rent," Barney finally replied.

"What! By how much?" Homer replied as he jumped up to read the letter as well.

"An extra one fifty, but these apartments aren't that great, why raise them?" Barney asked as he set the paper down and walked to the fridge to grab a drink.

"Because landlords are sneaky bastards, but this is really unfair, it's too high for us, we can't afford that. We would have to beg our parents for even more money and no matter how much we save, the bills will keep piling up," Homer said.

"One of us might have to find a second job," Barney said before he took a swig of orange juice right out of the carton.

"Perish the thought," Homer said in an unhappy voice.

"Well what else should we do, it's not like Uncle Al will give us a raise especially at the job we have. Let's face it Homer, it's not the highest paid job in the world," Barney replied with a hint of frustration in his voice. A rare sound to hear and one that made Homer back away in surprise.

"Well we could always ask, he is your uncle after all," Homer shrugged.

"He may be my uncle but that doesn't give us privileges. Unless I don't know him as well as I thought which in that case you could try it and see what happens," Barney replied as he made his way to the cupboard and grabbed a bowl to share some cereal with Homer.

"I'll ask him when we go back in, perhaps we can show him this letter we got and then look pathetic, good way to feel sorry for us," Homer said as he tried to make his eyes all wide like a puppy's

"I think that only works for girls Homer," Barney said.

Homer lowered his eyes before letting out a grumble as he scooped up some cereal. He would think of something, he would not give up trying and hopefully they would get out of this financial crisis easily.

Barney's uncle Al had chosen the bowling business profession well. It seemed to fit him best, especially with the fact that he was not known to wear anything too fashionable or at least presentable for an office building. He always showed up to work in grungy clothes, hair mussed up, and sometimes even without having shaved the morning of. He was simply a slovenly person, he did not care about how he looked, as long as he was out of bed and dressed with a job waiting for him to manage, that was all he wanted. He was happy to take his nephew Barney in as one of his pin monkeys, and he knew eventually Barney would ask him for either a raise or some kind of promotion. At the moment, Roger was the supervisor; he had been so a few months before Barney finally made it into the pin monkey business after his original supervisor left to pursue a career in the pharmacy business. He felt it was good riddance any way, all those diddly's and doodilly's and why God was an awesome God crap really got to him, it was for the better.

Of course these days, the bowling business was slowing down, people seemed to be losing interest, save for the old ladies with carpel tunnel syndrome who came in on Thursday nights. He probably only needed one person to man the whole place, but the boys needed a job so they could take care of themselves, he understood that, he was a young man once as well and having a job was a blessing to them, helped pay for school and any other important issues. But of course he was not surprised when his nephew and Homer Simpson arrived at work one morning carrying a piece of paper and looking like he was ready to ask the dreaded question he had been waiting for. Of course he waited for Homer to ask even though it took a hell of a lot longer than he thought to do that.

He was actually making his rounds and checking up on the bowling alley store when he walked by the two talking what seemed to be about what kind of toilet tissue was softer, God only knows why, when Homer stopped him.

"So Mr. Gumble, you have a minute?" Homer asked.

"Eh sure, this place is too quiet at the moment any way, store's not going anywhere," Al replied with a bit of humor to his voice.

"Read this and tell us what you think," Homer said as he handed his boss a piece of paper.

Al took the paper out of Homer's hand and read what the poor boys were being subjected to. He immediately understood why the idea of a raise would be imminent soon; their apartment bill had gone up, up way too high for pin monkeys like them. He knew he had a heart; the only problem was he knew he could not bring it out for them during this time when things were rough enough as it was.

"You want a raise don't you?" Al sighed.

"Please sir, we are just poor ex students who need all the help we can get," Homer replied as he batted his eyes trying to look as innocent as possible.

"I have some clear eye that can get rid of that dry eye for you there Simpson, but in the meantime I can't help you, I know you both are hard workers who come in when you are supposed to, but you know how business has been. If we got more business maybe, but I don't see that happening anytime soon," Al replied.

"What if I tried to get more business?" asked Homer with a big grin.

Al knew all about employers trying to get more business for their bowling alley. He had heard some interesting stories, his favorite being the one about the kid who thought it would be a great idea to burn down all other alleys in town. Luckily someone else knew of his plan and was reprimanded before it would happen to anyone. Hopefully Homer was not thinking about that, it would be interesting though, maybe profitable yet extremely dangerous. "…If you're thinking about burning down the competitors around town I'm going to pretend you did not tell me about it and stay out of it," Al said.

"Actually I was thinking about getting everyone's attention by firing a shotgun into the air," Homer replied with an even bigger grin.

"That would scare everyone away, someone will probably call the cops on you, and perhaps a mess of dead pigeons on our sidewalks. No I think one of you needs to find a second job," Al said sternly before walking away so there would be no further argument, leaving both Barney and Homer to consider what he had just said.

Homer watched him go, a little frustrated now that there was no way of helping the alley get more profit, not even with a shotgun.

"Were you really thinking about shooting a shotgun into the air?" Barney asked.

"It sounded like a good idea at the time," Homer replied.

The sun was now setting in the late summer horizon, the hour when everything started to close save for bowling alleys and the neighborhood bars who were now getting the evening rush in. Roger Steinbeck was ignoring all these places and instead making his way to Barney and Homer's apartment. Earlier that day, he learned that his parents were getting a divorce. An unexpected surprise and a huge blow for him. What was worse was that he got a talk from his parents about how it was not his fault or his two younger sisters fault, but because his father had told the truth to his mother about sleeping with another woman. He admitted that he had been doing so for many months now and that his love for his wife was starting to wane. The best option was to part ways and Roger was caught in the middle listening to his parents and then talking to his two youngest sisters about how it would affect them.

So of course Roger was emotionally drained and he wanted to be away from the house for a while, maybe a night or two, just to think things over. He drove to Rosie's, surprising her mostly but to her it was not a good surprise. Instead of comforting him, she announced that she was just like his father. She did not care for him anymore. She had not found another man, like his father had found another woman. She only said that he was not as committed to her as she wanted him to be, they never went out much anymore and al the love she had for him had now faded. Roger of course tried to give her the reason that it was because he was trying to save as much money as he could to take her somewhere nice but Rosie did not care and kicked him out after a long and tear filled argument.

So Roger was now driving alone down the road, making his way to Barney and Homer's apartment. He knew they would accept him with open arms and hopefully let him stay for the night just so he could be away from all the negativity at home. He knew they would be happy to see him, they always enjoyed his company when he found the time to visit, they were great friends, especially Homer who was always so happy about things and could lighten up any room if he could. Hopefully Homer would do that for him tonight.

After a few minutes of thinking over the day, Roger found himself in the apartment complex, apparently he got there quicker than he thought. For a moment he sat in the car letting his emotions calm down a bit, he did not want to cry in front of them, just look sad, he hated to cry in front of other guys. But if that happened, they would probably just shrug it off in a day or two and start up a conversation about other life's issues or maybe even watch a great movie. Whatever would happen, Roger just hoped things would work out alright.

Finally he got out of his car and made his way to the apartment and knocked on the door. It didn't take long for Barney to answer and as soon as he saw Roger, he gave his friend a warm smile. "Roger! What brings you here?" Barney asked in a delighted tone.

"Well I hope I am not intruding at such a late hour," Roger said.

"Nah of course not, we were just going to sit down and watch a movie here," Homer replied from the kitchen as he was warming up some popcorn.

"Thank you, I am happy to do so, takes my mind off other issues," Roger said as he found a seat on the couch.

"What kind of issues?" Barney asked as he handed Roger a root beer from the fridge.

"Well for one, you guys weren't my first option for the evening; you see my parents are thinking about splitting up, they told me today. I went to see Rosie to get my mind off of that and well…she kind of told me that we had to see other people," Roger said as he tried to hide his emotions.

"Geeze she had to do that after you learn your parents are splitting up? That's just plain rude!" Homer exclaimed as he added as much salt as he could into the huge bowl of popcorn he made.

"I know, I could not believe how heartless she was, I even told her that but she came up with the excuse that she could not hold it in any longer," Roger said with a sigh.

"I think she could have at least just told you she was not feeling well tonight or something," Barney said.

"Yeah I know, but of course she is a girl and you know how girls are," Roger said as he rolled his eyes a little.

"Women!" Barney said in a sarcastic tone.

"You fall in love with them but they have no interest in you," Homer exclaimed before he took a big gulp of his root beer.

"They want to get married right away," Barney said.

"You spend every waking moment with them yet that isn't enough," Roger said.

"And then you buy them the most expensive gift imaginable then what happens? A breakup any way," Barney said.

"Damn Broads! Boy are they cute!" Homer replied.

The three then started to laugh, something that Roger was glad to have now. It was good to be around friends who seemed to understand, even though one never had a date in his life and the other never had a long commitment. But that was okay, it could have been worse, all three could have been in a big relationship and all three could have now spent the evening crying about it. Instead they were going to watch a movie and just forget about women entirely. Of course Roger could not get the idea of spending the night on his mind so he decided to just let it out and ask.

"Since I am having some issues at the moment, you don't mind if I crash here for the night do you?" he asked.

Barney and Homer looked at each other for a moment; an idea seemed to cross both their minds. Since getting the note about their rent going up, a new idea seemed to form in their heads. Perhaps Roger could help them in their monetary problems. They had enough room for him if he wanted to stay for a long period of time, besides Roger was old enough to be out on his own, he did not have to live with his parents any more, if he wanted to at least. It was really up to him though so they knew they had to ask him carefully.

"We don't mind at all," Barney said.

"Heck, you can even be our new roommate if you want, our rents gone up," Homer tried to say in a nonchalant kind of way.

"Yeah and the more people in here, the less the cost per person," Barney said.

Roger scratched his chin and thought about what his two friends were asking. They sounded like they really needed his help in adding someone else to their apartment. He could not blame them though, finding a second job was hard and working a second job could get very stressful after a while. He knew that, he had done so senior year of high school so he could get the car he was driving now. Never had much free time and sleep was hard to come by, his moods were especially bad and one of the reasons why he broke up with the girlfriend he had during that time. But in the end it was worth getting the car he really wanted to drive, one that didn't break down like the one his father promised him when he learned how to drive. That piece of junk was now somewhere in a lot just rotting and he was perfectly fine with that. And thanks to being the supervisor at the bowling alley, he did have enough money to take care of himself and it was time to start moving out on his own, be away from his family while things got sorted out. Yeah he could help them.

"You know, I think I will take you up on that offer," Roger said with a smile.

"Well then welcome to your new home where problems just melt away when you want them to," Homer replied before gulping down a huge handful of popcorn.

Roger only smiled; this was perfect, three bachelors sharing an apartment together. Watching movies, talking about life and just helping each other out through the months ahead. The only thing they needed to worry about would be what the future held for all three; so far they weren't too worried about it. Maybe in a few years they would be, but not now, they could have time to plan if they wanted, times to dream and times to share. Yup, this was the life, what could be sweeter than that?

A/N: Yeah I know this chapter could have been better but that was the best I could do. The Roger part I actually rewrote about four times before settling with this one, so hopefully I got it down for you guys okay. The next chapter will be the start of the interesting stuff so don't give up on me yet. I still have a long ways to go here with lots of things happening.

In the meantime please review when you can, hopefully my next chapter will be up faster. If not then just be patient, I will update when I can. So have a good week everyone.