the plaintiff: briana from louisville, kentucky. wow she is JUST GORGEOUS. listen it hurts my heart to see a beautiful woman in court, because clawing and fighting on television over $57 should be the dominion of us ugly people, but it’s also a great equalizer and self-esteem boost. it’s like being in the hospital and “getting my exercise” walking circles around my assigned floor, pitifully dragging my IV pole alongside me, and glancing into a room where some nice looking lady is wailing and covered in her own feces: she’s definitely hotter and richer than me in real life, but in here she’s stuck in this under-medicated hell in a gown with her butt out, smelling like old soup, just like i am. anyway, beautiful briana has an accordion folder, which means she is probably going to win.
the defendant: claudia from louisville, kentucky. also beautiful, also carrying an accordion folder. maybe they’ll smack each other with them!
the complaint: briana and claudia were friends until they decided to move in together. things went south when claudia’s boyfriend started hitting on briana, which claudia says she was fine with because they were in an open relationship. oh brother, i can already hear greg losing his shit about THAT.
what does she want: $2781 for rent and cancellation fees, which claudia denies owing.
how it went down: briana and claudia have been friends for eight years. they went to high school together and decided to move in together after college. living together was smooth for the first month (GODDAMN), until claudia’s creepy boyfriend came around and starting ruining everything. of fucking course, things broke bad with the help of a man. the boyfriend would do things like come into briana’s room while claudia was in the shower and get into her bed without an invitation and “start trying things,” which sounds like an assault? maybe he read her pablo neruda poems but i feel like if it was something nice she would’ve said so. anyway, this is how i know i’m old, because my first thought was “oh okay are we in court today because you killed him? i’ve got money on your bail.”
one day the boyfriend walked into the apartment where he did not live and did not pay any rent or bills, and pushed briana off the toilet while claudia watched and did nothing. let me tell you something: if you push me off the toilet, joke’s on you pal, because years of raging intestinal distress have forced me to hone a very specific set of clench-and-release skills and i can weaponize my dumb asshole and shoot a stream of diarrhea at you like a firehose in a matter of seconds.
i’ve had a handful of awful roommates, and i would rather live with the ones who never washed a single dish than the ones who just, like, surrendered 80% of our shared living space to a person i didn’t get to fuck who also pretended he couldn’t read the name i had to write on my personal brick of cheese. when i was 19ish i lived with a girl who not only let her dude post up in our living room all day while we both went to work, but this motherfucker also once helpfully reminded me from his spot on my couch that there was trash i hadn’t produced sitting in the kitchen that needed to go out, and yes after that i absolutely tried to poison him.
claudia interjects to say that briana and her boyfriend would argue constantly (to justify the toilet assault?) and judge mathis asks on behalf of us all why she would continue to bring a person to their house who wouldn’t stop arguing with the woman who paid to live there. I’M SAYING. where do people get the confidence to be this terrible? seriously it is 1999 all over again and i am sitting in my room that i was too poor to hang curtains in watching a tiny tv on mute, stewing as i listen to my roommate and the boyfriend who was definitely cheating on her run up the bill on the landline we couldn’t afford to pay for and wondering how i ended up living in the hell version of three’s company. i had unknowingly signed up for a minimum of twelve months of sharing a bathtub with this bitch and her man and i somehow became a prisoner chained to my affordable portables futon just waiting for them to go to the store so i could make a pot of rice without an audience?! what ever happened to hoes before bros!
the ruling: after the boyfriend got violent with her briana decided she was done with them, but claudia let this motherfucker keep coming over! more than half the time! what a fucking nightmare. briana offered to move and give them the place, but claudia told her to find a new roommate instead because she was leaving. the replacement roommate that briana found fell through, but it doesn’t matter because claudia had the legal obligation to find a new roommate since she was the one vacating the lease. the onus was on her, so she’s fucking guilty. open a relationship with a bank, and pay this girl her money!
i once had this roommate who MOVED TO THE WEST COAST WHILE I WAS AT WORK ONE DAY, unbeknownst to me, just working at the bakery making bread like a herb while this asshole was absconding with my fancy cups. and this was back in the olden days so i didn’t know a thing until i arrived home to find a blinking message on our machine saying “sorry i had to leave but i placed an ad in [the chicago free weekly paper] with our number, so people should be calling to come look at the room any day now.” i spent the next two weeks being woken up by weirdos breathing heavy in my ear at all hours of the goddamn night asking if i had central air or a designated parking spot. i’d rather be punched off the toilet.
did uncle greg say anything fucked up to anyone: “therefore you owe her the amount she’s asking for, and i’m sure you can get it from that fella who liked to jump in her bed, mister open relationship.”
*bangs gavel*