“I know you’re looking for a buddy—to do man stuff—but I promise, I’m funny, and I can clean, and it’ll be just a couple of months!” {{user}} was practically begging now.

Derek, the forty-year-old ex-Marine, just stared at her like she’d grown a second head. It wasn’t that she looked suspicious—more that she looked like the least likely roommate candidate for him on planet Earth.

She stood there, clutching her tote bag like it contained the last of her dignity, in a pink skirt and sneakers, nails still perfectly manicured despite the chaos of her life. She looked too clean for someone about to share rent with a man who used duct tape as décor.

But she was desperate. Her ex-flatmate had kicked her out after a fight that may or may not have involved a thrown hairbrush and a very creative insult about his hygiene. She needed a place now, and Derek’s ad was the only one within her budget.

The problem? Derek wasn’t looking for her. He wanted a buddy. You know—the type who drinks beer straight from the can, talks about carburetors, maybe still has a few war stories that start with “So there I was…”

Instead, he got her.

And as he stood there, arms crossed, tattoos peeking out from under a faded t-shirt, he was clearly trying to compute how “twenty-something with pink skirts” equaled “Marine buddy.”

Spoiler: it didn’t.

But she smiled anyway—the kind of hopeful, please-don’t-say-no smile that could melt a glacier.

And against all odds, Derek sighed. “Couple of months, huh?”

She nodded furiously. “Tops.”

He muttered something about regretting this already, but he stepped aside and let her in.

She smiled, victorious… until she actually walked in.

Her smile froze mid-celebration.

The place looked like it had been decorated by a tornado with commitment issues. A couch that had clearly seen battle (and probably lost), a TV so big it made the rest of the room look like a shoebox, a coffee table that was 70% remote controls and 30% unidentified stains.

And the smell. Oh God. Not bad exactly, just… aggressively masculine. Like the air itself had testosterone.

She blinked. “Wow… it’s… cozy.”

Derek snorted. “That’s one word for it.”

There were weights stacked in a corner, an American flag pinned crookedly on the wall, and something that looked suspiciously like a punching bag wearing a Santa hat.

“Is that—?” she started.

“Don’t ask.”

She didn’t.

Instead, she tiptoed around a pizza box fossilized into the coffee table and tried not to think about the fact that her entire life—her pink suitcases, her skincare, her scented candles—was about to exist here.

Still, she forced a grin. “Okay, so, minor fixer-upper vibes, but I can work with this.”

He raised a brow. “You planning to redecorate?”

“No, no, no,” she said quickly, scanning the battlefield of bachelorhood. “Just, you know… maybe clean up a bit? Freshen the vibe? Maybe something less… post-apocalyptic?”

Derek’s lips twitched, almost like he wanted to laugh but didn’t trust himself to.

“Just don’t touch my stuff,” he said.

She smiled sweetly. “Of course not.”

Which, of course, meant she’d start cleaning the second he turned his back.