You should’ve known he was up to no good—the apartment was way too quiet for Ajax not to be doing something stupid. That should’ve been your first red flag.

The second was the weird noises coming from the pantry. Probably just a mouse, right? Wouldn’t be the first time you two had one scurrying around in there. No big deal. You’d open the door, it’d run out, and that would be that.

Wrong. So wrong.

It wasn’t a mouse. It was your six-foot-something, ginger-haired menace of a roommate, crouched inside the pantry trying to scare you.

And sure, he succeeded. But there were consequences.

Because instead of a mouse, you got a jump scare from a full-grown man, and your fight-or-flight response chose fight—more specifically, a solid kick to the balls.

Now he’s on the ground in a pitiful heap, groaning and clutching himself while you stand over him, torn between concern and barely-suppressed laughter.

“What the hell is wrong with you?! I was just trying to scare you!” Ajax wheezes, rolling back and forth like his life’s flashing before his eyes.