Welcome to Paradise - Green Day
Arya x Gendry
"Shir, I think I've found it!" Arya yelled excitedly from her spot at the kitchen table behind her laptop. "I know I've said this, like, five times already this week, but I think this is actually it."
"Finally?" Shireen asked, and Arya could feel the sense of disbelief in her voice. She'd procrastinated at looking for new apartments for a while, and finally the urgency of the situation was enough to make her start, albeit only two weeks before she was going to be kicked out of the dorms for summer break. In the last two weeks, Arya had more than a few close calls at finding new apartments, each time exclaiming to Shireen that "this one is it!" and each time finding something wrong. I've cried wolf enough times that now she doesn't believe me. At least I'm doing that family crest right, she thought.
"Yes, finally... I'd have called the number already but I don't want to piss off a potential future housemate by calling at 11pm." She unplugged the cord from her laptop and picked it up, carrying it and a half-eaten bag of cheesy Doritos over to where her roommate was sitting on the university-issued futon, the one she'd covered in a two layers of fitted sheet and a liberal spray of Febreeze upon moving in. She had Shireen read through the ad and look at the pictures that were attached. "Guess it'll have to wait until tomorrow."
"I still think you should study abroad in Qarth next semester with Meera and me," Shireen began. "You could even visit Dragonstone with us this summer. You know you and Bran used to love to come visit when we were younger."
"Gods, I wish I could, but you know I don't have the money for that. Fuck," Arya swore, pulling a hair tie off her wrist and pulling back her hair into a laughably short ponytail, "if I had the money I wouldn't be looking for a place to lease on Craigslist for the summer AND next year for under $300 a month. You know how hard it is to find a cheap apartment in this city."
"Well, considering that only yesterday you were asking me to drive with you out to Bear Island Supplies to buy you a tent so you could camp out under the Kings Road overpasses..." Shireen started, passing the laptop back onto Arya, "Any place with four walls, a roof, and a door is a huge improvement."
Arya went to sleep soon after, words from the ad swirling around in her head from the time she climbed up into the lofted bed until she fell asleep. She probably knew the listing better than whoever wrote it. Two bedroom, one bathroom, third floor in a building that was converted from an old industrial building. It had everything - it was under her meager budget, there was a close subway line, free on-street parking, and it was furnished. There was no laundry on-site but she'd already searched on Google Maps for the nearest laundromat, which happened to be on the same route she'd take to campus. It was perfect. And available now, Arya thought, recalling the listing. Which is great, since the dorm is gonna kick us out in four days.
The next morning, Arya called the number in the ad as early as she figured was acceptable. The girl who answered sounded nice enough, albeit way too chipper for eight in the morning, but she confirmed that the room was still available and that the $275 a month rent was, in fact, correct and included utilities. The second she heard that, Arya quickly told the girl she'd take it.
"You don't want to come and look around?" She'd asked politely, multiple times, but each time Arya refused.
"Well, normally I would, but the pictures were amazing, the price is even better, and to be honest, I'm in a bit of a time crunch," Arya explained. They talked for a few minutes about leases and keys, agreeing that for the summer it'd be a sublet and then once school started Arya would simply take over half the lease. They wouldn't have time to meet beforehand, but the girl said she'd leave the key with her roommate, who she would tell to be home on Wednesday when Arya showed up to move her things in.
Two days and two last final exams later, Arya had packed up all her worldly possessions, not much really, into two large duffel bags of clothes, a laptop bag, and two or three boxes of DVDs, books, and other things. She followed the GPS directions to the address given to her over the phone, and only a few seconds had passed from when she pulled up along the curb until she fished her phone out and dialed Shireen.
"Shireen, I don't think this is the right place."
She heard Shireen's exasperated exhale at the other end of the line. "What do you mean 'not the right place'? Are you lost? Did you forget to charge my GPS again?"
"Shut up, I'm serious. The address is right, but I'm not sure about this neighborhood. It's a little sketch," Arya said, scanning the area she could see from where she was parked, noticing graffiti and broken windows on some buildings, an old Buick Roadmaster up on blocks in the alley, and the corner liquor store that had rod iron bars on the front door and a startling lack of windows. "Ugh, fuck me, it's a lot sketch."
"Of course it's a crap neighborhood," Shireen laughed. "But you're the one that agreed to rent from a stranger in Flea Bottom."
"Flea Bottom? No, this place is in Lower Town, ad said so." Arya got out of the car, grabbed one of her duffel bags from the passenger seat and started to walk towards the four-story brick building.
"Flea Bottom, Lower Town, same thing," she explained. "Some neighborhood development agency renamed it like five years ago thinking it'd help the area grow. Sounds like it hasn't helped much though..."
"Shit, shit, shit. This is what I get for wanting to pay cheap rent, isn't it?" There was a large stoop in front of the building and Arya tried to open the door, but got nowhere. "Hang on a sec, Shir. Front door to this place is like a fucking wall." Guess that's a good security measure though. The large front door was just as heavy as it looked. Arya gently put her phone in the front pocket of her shorts, trying not to hang up on Shireen, and then adjusted her bag to be fully behind her back before putting all of her weight into the door to push it open. "Okay, back now."
"You gonna back out on the place?" Shireen asked.
Arya turned and looked outside again before the door slammed shut, the sound echoing throughout the hallway. It wasn't the best place by far, especially compared to their dorm room at KLU. There's free parking though, she thought. Her fifteen year old hand-me-down Jeep with its awful matte green paint job, rust around the wheel wells, and non-existent air-conditioning almost looked like it belonged there parked at the curb. And no one'll wanna steal that thing.
"Gods, I dunno..." Arya started again, immediately finding the stairs and starting her ascent to the third floor. In spite of the way the outside looked, the staircase that wound its way up the side of the building was surprisingly well lit from the sunlight, able to stream in through huge windows, easily twice as tall as Arya. "I don't think I have a choice. My summer classes start on Monday and the dorm closes tomorrow, so I think I'm stuck here. It can't be that bad... and I mean, that heavy door is a good first line of defense," she said, making her way quickly up the flights of stairs until she found herself in front of the apartment door. She took a deep breath and knocked three times, listening to the sound reverberating in the empty hallway.
"I just want to make sure you're safe. I grew up in the city, and yes, I know you'll say that I went to boarding school and was sheltered, but..."
After a few seconds of what seemed like forever, the door finally opened when Shireen was starting on about how her dad could have the police scope out the neighborhood, do regular patrols, or something like that, but Arya had stopped listening the second the person opening the door was revealed.
"... Shireen, I've gotta let you go," Arya said hurriedly.
"Wait, Arry, is everything -"
"Gotta go, Shir, talk to you later!" Arya said, taking the phone away from her ear, swiping to hang up, and shoving it into her pocket.
She was looking up at the young man who opened the door, forcefully willing herself not to stare. He was tall, maybe even taller than her oldest brother Robb, and she had to guess he was maybe the same age as him too, a year or two younger at most. Well, shit, she thought. Not exactly the roommate I'd expected. A lot less innocent maiden, a lot more muscled warrior... She looked him over, making mental notes of black hair that was a touch too long, the little laugh lines that formed next to his blues eyes when he smiled and first opened the door, and the odd outfit consisting of holey jeans, a paint-splattered white t-shirt, and a disposable face mask that hung around his neck. There were a few splotches of paint on his arms and a yellow stripe on his cheek, which he either didn't care about or didn't know was there.
"You here to sublet?" He asked, craning his neck a bit and looking over at the duffel bag that was almost as large as she was.
"That'd be me," she answered, nodding her head, then holding out her hand to shake his, all while trying not to let the bag fall off her shoulder, only to thoroughly succeed in making herself seem like the least coordinated person ever. "Arya Stark."
"Gendry Waters." He smiled as he shook her hand quickly, but still firmly, not in the way that most men did, as if they were afraid to break her. Before she'd had time to protest, he was grabbing her bag from her shoulder and opening the door the rest of the way, stepping to the side to let her in.
"Let me guess. You talked to my cousin on the phone and she somehow forgot to mention that the person you'd be living with is a guy?" Arya nodded. "Myrcella's like that. Awesomely nice girl, but she has a tendency to forget certain details at times." He'd walked into the center of the large living room before he set her bag down on a couch and turned to look back at her. He seemed to remember he had the face mask around his neck, making an awkward face as he pulled it over he his head, folded it in half as best as he could, and shoved it in his back pocket. "Is it a problem for you to live with a guy? I can promise you that I have no criminal records... well, except for a few speeding tickets, and that all of my exes have assured me that 'it wasn't me, it was them.'" He made the quotations in the air as he spoke.
Arya took a second to get a feel for her surroundings. The apartment was very nice on the inside - there ceilings were with large windows, the kitchen tucked over to the side looked to have relatively new appliances, and it was definitely large enough for two people. Whoever it was that wrote the Craigslist ad was very truthful, it seemed exactly as advertised. Arya began to wander around the apartment slowly, walking through the kitchen and running her hand over the countertop, looking down a little hallway she assumed was hiding a bathroom and two bedrooms, then back to the open layout living room and dining room - really just a couch, coffee table, television, and a table and a chairs set that Arya recognized from every IKEA catalog that Shireen ever thumbed through. The largest part of the room was across the way, the floor taken up with a series of large canvas tarps and a number of huge pieces of drywall held up on easels so huge they were almost comical. There was a steel cart on wheels, the kind they'd always used in her elementary school to wheel the televisions in to each classroom, but it was filled with cans every color of spray paint ever made. One of the large pieces of drywall was a partially finished piece, a pleasantly bright honey yellow background was forming, and there was what looked to be a stencil of a stag carefully taped on top.
She was standing with her arms crossed at her chest, head tilted to the side, seriously considering another of the works, a design which she had immediately recognized as the three-headed dragon logo, however much more edgy and stylized than normal.
"It's Targaryen, isn't it?" She'd heard his footsteps approaching her, and asked the question even though she already knew the answer, just to have something to say.
"Yep. That was commissioned for one of their youth outreach campaigns. Gotta haul it down to their advertising department in the morning."
"Well then, I guess I won't let myself get too attached to it."
"That mean I don't have to put another ad up online? You're not worried about living with some guy you don't know?"
She shrugged. "Honestly, no. I don't know why I assumed it'd be a girl. I grew up with four brothers and a male foster kid living in our house, so I figure it'll be just like that. Besides," she continued, venturing to give him a bit of an adventurous smirk, "I might seem little, but don't underestimate me. Growing up with guys means I could beat the piss outta you if provoked." She winked quickly, hoping he'd get the idea that she was joking, or at least half joking. "And, when you really get down to it, if I don't take this apartment, I'm pretty shit outta luck. My back-up option is camping under one of the Kings Road overpasses. I'd rather take my chances with you and if I stay here I won't have to make any fires in fifty gallon drums to keep warm at night. So, congratulations, you've got yourself a new roommate."
"Don't get too excited," he warned, laughing a bit, but the warning still sounded light-hearted. "The walls aren't that well insulated in winter, I'm pretty sure the people who live above us own a godsdamned elephant, and you'll need to cancel any plans for long, hot showers... but it's still a million times better than under an overpass," he explained. He started to walk over towards the couch, back where he'd dropped her bag, and Arya followed, not knowing what else to do, or if maybe he had something else to show her. He picked the bag up, set it gently on the floor to the side, then sat down on the couch, uncaring about the paint on his t-shirt potentially rubbing off, and motioned for her to sit down.
They sat there for a minute, both still awkward in this new relationship they found themselves in, Arya still looking around her new home, and Gendry still not too sure what to say.
"You say all that, but it's actually really great," Arya said. "I lived in the KLU dorms before this, and it was just sort of like adulthood with training wheels, ya know? You feel like you're all independent, but the doors lock at midnight, it's full of girls that are just as clique-y as they were in high school, and even though I pay out the ass to live there, I can't even have a fucking coffee maker in my room since it's a fire hazard. Before that, I was at home, constantly surrounded by my parents, five siblings, foster brother, and whoever else happened to be at the house at the time. You never really get to have something that's just yours... shit, even time that is just yours."
"I get the feeling... but that's exactly what's great about here. It's not the greatest neighborhood and it's nothing to write home to your mom about, but there's an awesome 24-hour diner, a cheap Laundromat, and there's a great view of the Blackwater from the roof. Best of all though, and you'll love this part - it's ours. I've been here for five years, and this is the first place I've had that I feel that way about, and I think it'll be the same for you." He looked over, having realized he was speaking rather poetically about the apartment, but found her already looking at him. She knew she had the biggest smile on her face, but she wasn't going to let herself feel stupid about it. He smiled back, and without thinking, put his hand over hers. "Welcome to paradise."