This is an automated archive made by the Lemmit Bot.

The original was posted on /r/nosleep by /u/Jegg33 on 2026-08-08 17:49:58+00:00.

---

Part 1

Part 2

This is my last post about my roommate.

The day came where his band was supposed to play at the local park.

He decided he would drive us. Getting into his car for the first time, it felt familiar somehow.

We arrived at the park where the stage and lights were set up; the place was packed with people and noise.

The entire town must have been there. Our landlord and some friends of mine, and my parents, even sent a message saying they might come.

If there was a time to do something, it would be now, and I know his ego won't fail me in what I need to happen.

He tapped me on my shoulder; looking at him, he smiled and said, “Hey, I have to go. Try to have some fun, okay?”

I gave him a smile back. “I will."

He went off backstage, then eventually came out with his other band members; cheers overtake the quiet.

He comes up to the microphone, and he immediately finds me in the crowd with his eyes.

“Hello! We are the Thought Forms!”

People roared, and even I almost made a sound.

When they started their first song, my heart rate picked up, nervous for what I had to do.

I forced my foot not to tap to the rhythm.

I moved through the crowd, locating a friend of mine.

“Hey! This is great!” they said excitedly.

“I know, I'm excited for when he calls me up on stage. Could you record that when it's time?”

“Oh shit, yeah, of course!”

I took the paper I had written my speech on out of my pocket and read it and read it again until I was sure of what I wanted to say.

The first song ended.

Then the second ended as well.

Then Tim took a breath, and as they were cooling down from the last song, he spoke.

"Hey, everyone." The crowd quieted. "This next one is for a very special person."

He smiled. "Someone I've thought about for a very long time."

My stomach tightened.

"Could Rae please come up to the stage?"

A spotlight snapped on. It landed directly on me.

I worked my way through the crowd; it wasn't much of an issue. Everyone stepped aside for me like it was their cue.

I moved past the security and up the stairs, paper clutched in hand, as I arrived at the microphone with claps from the audience I was once a part of.

I saw the band get ready, and before anyone else could do anything, I quickly went forward to the microphone.

“Before this goes any further, I have something I wish to say first.”

I unfolded my paper again, and as I got ready to say what I wanted, I realized that this wasn't my speech; it was a flyer for the band.

His face plastered onto it with a smile.

I panicked, feeling around for the words I just read a minute ago in a stray pocket, and there was nothing; he changed it.

Looking over, a real smile on his face, one that knew it was winning.

“Well? What was it you needed to say?”

I held the flyer in my hands as I glared at him.

I felt what I wanted to say slipping away from me.

“Tim is my roommate. I have known him since high school, and the entire time I have known him.”

I paused trying to think of something else to say, but nothing came; the harder I thought, the more I thought of saying things he wanted to say.

I took a breath and just said anything I could think of.

“His real passion was playing polka music. Back when we first met he had an accordion instead of a guitar.”

“And when he plays this song for me, I would ask it to be played with his favorite instrument.”

The crowd, who had cheered before, had gone completely silent.

“More than that, he actually hates this band and this place, so I think going back to his roots would be very enjoyable, and he'd actually be signing it, and there wouldn't be a track he would lip-sync to.”

People started to murmur in the crowd.

Tim stared at me, half in disbelief, half in anger.

“What are you doing?”

"I'm just telling the truth.”

Even with the anger I could feel building inside of him, I kept going.

“I remember all sorts of things about him he's most likely forgotten, like how he says other more impressive names at coffee shops when placing his order instead of just 'Tim.'"

“Or how he put his foot into wet concrete because he wants a Hollywood star of his own but is too underground to ever be that known.”

I kept going; every false truth I put out into the microphone, the more laughter I got from the crowd, and the more I leaned into the absurd statements.

I heard some people in the crowd start to stir a different noise.

“What am I doing here again?”

“I thought I knew Tim better than that.”

It was working.

“He’s cried at more children's movies than I can count, and he forced calluses on his hand to make it look like he practiced the guitar more than he does.”

"OH, and most people don't know this, but I actually had a roommate before Tim—"

Before I could finish, the crowd's laughter and confusion silenced.

Looking around, I saw cups and phones and papers hit the soft grass all at once.

Everyone was gone.

Behind me lay instruments on the ground as the band and staff had vanished as well.

Then I looked over; he was standing there, holding his guitar by the neck in his hands, shaking.

“I almost had it. It was almost perfect, but you put a blemish on it.”

The way he was looking at me was the way he looked at me behind my back, cold, with no emotion except the anger in his voice.

“We were meant to be perfect, but you had to say all that in front of everybody!”

He took something and threw it out into the now empty space where the crowd was. The small box hit the ground; I knew there was a ring inside.

"Don't worry!” He said, the smile returning to his face that he always kept on. “We can fix this! I can fix this!”

Before I knew what I was doing, my legs ran.

There were no birds, no sound, no people, just the sound of my feet and the sound of Tim's feet behind me.

No matter how far I ran, his footsteps never got farther or closer.

He was waiting for me to get tired.

I ran for so long I couldn't feel my feet.

Eventually, I gave out, falling down, my hands scraping against the ground as he finally gained ground.

“Let's just start over.”

His voice was gentle.

”I'll take us back to this morning, and we can do it all again without the silly little script you had.”

I sat there, staring at him. I realized something. I do know my roommate.

“That last thing I told the crowd, that was the truth, wasn't it?”

He froze. Staring at me like I had said something worse than before, for the first time I saw fear on his face.

“I did have a roommate." I got lost in thought.

"Don't do this.” He pleaded with me. “Am I so bad you want to go back to Him?”

I stayed quiet.

“You can just come back to the stage with me, you can accept me, and you won't have to live with the truth; I can be real. We can be real.”

After a quiet and long moment, I answered. "I'm afraid I can't run any longer, and I can't have you becoming real either.”

He stared at me, and after a moment, he let out a sigh.

A long, exhausted sigh.

“Did you really have to say I liked polka?”

I laughed for the first time in months.

And then he vanished.

The roommate I had before was someone I did know for a long time.

He was a part of a band, and he was very special to me.

He got caught up so much on himself and his career that he got onto substances, and eventually, he started to hurt me.

I was blinded by what I thought of him. I let the physical and mental abuse continue

Eventually, it got to the point where I called the police on him after he had a episode so bad there was no other choice.

The scars he gave wouldn't heal easily, so I pretended like he never existed.

And that led to something, or someone else being made in his absence.

I woke up back in my apartment.

His belongings, the memories, and the music are all gone.

I wandered around aimlessly, trying to find him, trying to see if this really was the truth.

I remembered this feeling of loss.

I reached into my pocket; after digging around, I pulled out the same flyer from before.

His face was still there, flipping it over. I saw his signature and a note.

“Try to have some fun, okay?

In your mind always— Tim"