Off-Third is WSN’s satire column.

Do you remember how, during the summer before your first year, your dear mother warned you to not dorm with your best friend? 

Utter rubbish. 

I’ve been living with my best friend for the last month, and it has been heaven on Earth. Personally, I love the $200 communal white noise machine she has conveniently perched in the middle of our room; 10-hour YouTube videos of fire crackling, and whale noises and gentle drizzling at 75% volume is precisely what I need to ensure a good night’s sleep. I adore the way she watches TikToks before her 8 a.m.s out loud. Oh, and there’s absolutely nothing I appreciate more than being kicked out at midnight so she can talk to her long distance boyfriend that she met on Omegle. 

Having a live-in best friend is a more intimate relationship than any other I have ever been in. The bathroom, of course, is the most accurate portrait of our newfound intimacy. The poop streaks on the toilet bowl and yellowing floors are just another welcomed insight into her life. Moreover, I sport a head full of black, exotic Indian hair, so I cannot say I have the pleasure of claiming ownership over the mass of red strands in our shower drain. 

We used to see each other two, maybe three times a week to binge our favorite Bollywood classics, feast on vegan sushi or gossip about anyone and everyone that breathed the wrong way in our direction. Now, I watch as my beloved $4 Trader Joe’s spicy hummus slowly empties over the duration of the week, and I put in my fifth work order request for the toilet she clogged. 

As a non-confrontational individual, I like to choose happiness and channel kindness. Do I mind the growing stench of dog food from my kitchen? Nope. Do I secretly resent her for taking the bed closest to the window? Absolutely not. Do her medically frightening snores disturb my carefully enforced circadian rhythms? Forget about it. 

There are, perhaps, a few things that I did not expect to learn from living with my best friend. Sure, her fickle sleep schedule and penchant for cooking putrid fish on all days of the week is mildly unsettling, but all the other habits are just… quirks. I’ve never met anyone that eats their rice with ketchup or licks their entire hand clean after they finish it. Where will I ever find someone that feels comfortable enough to ask me to take some pictures of her for her side hustle on funwithfeet.com? 

She is, after all, my best friend. My favorite person on this continent. She does drag me to the gym five times a week. She does let me borrow her cute bras. She does make sure I’m eating my recommended seven portions of fruits and vegetables. 

Don’t listen to your mother, kids. Go ahead and sign that lease. Put down that $300 deposit with your bestie — you won’t regret it. 

WSN’s Opinion section strives to publish ideas worth discussing. The views presented in the Opinion section are solely the views of the writer.

Contact Aksha Mittapalli at [email protected].