I don’t expect a lot in life to come easy. After the toilet-gate at my previous apartment In Prague I thought I was ready for anything the Czech Republic threw my way. I forgot there was one last problem it could actually throw at me, hindering my ability to get in my apartment!
Apartment number three was by far the best apartment I have lived in thus far. For starters it was MUCH bigger. It had an actual living room with couches and a TV that didn’t work. A book shelf with more devices that didn’t work. A stereo that my roommates didn’t think worked till I plugged it in an outlet and holy cow it worked! Full kitchen but the dish dryer didn’t work. A full bathroom with two mirrors and tub with shower rod. Funny story about that, there were no curtains and the tub backed up quite easily so you had to be quick. But I really liked that place! It was charming and felt like an actual home rather than a hotel room.
As I was in the process of moving in, my new roommates warned me of an escalating problem with the door. It had a tendency to lock and stay locked even when you tried to open it with the key. We found that when closing the door you would need to keep the key in until the door was completely shut. Then turn the key and slowly take it out. If you didn’t do this, you or the next person trying to get in would not be able to unlock the door and would need to pray someone was in the house to let you in. So we all agreed to be careful and mindful about shutting the door. It was bound to back fire.
One night my roommates decided to have a girls night out. We invited some girlfriends over for pre-drinks (saves money) before hitting the town. After consuming a decent amount of drinks before heading out we ended up at a dance club while running into more friends and became separated from each other which isn’t out of the ordinary. Several hours past midnight I decided I was done for the night. One, because I was tired and two because a group of Brazilian guys kept cornering me and were trying to make out with my neck. I went home with one of my roommates and a friend. As my roommate and I approached our door all we could think about was sleep. We get to the door, and it won’t open. I try again and nothing. I start repeating a mantra of, “no, no,no,no,no” over and over while trying again. My roommate suggests maybe our third roommate is here and asleep and forgot about the door so we text her. Nothing. We try again, nothing. Next logical step was banging on the door while shouting “Sarah!!!” over and over. Still nothing. It is clear we are not getting in our apartment tonight. And it’s 3am so all we care about is sleep. We call our friend who lives close by and ask if we can crash. We walk over while the reality of being locked out of our apartment sinks in. Our landlord won’t respond till Monday at the earliest. It was Saturday night (morning). All our medications and legal documents were in the apartment. It was also on the 4th floor so we couldn’t easily get in through the window. We get to our friends house with the look of defeat on our faces. She only had one bed so we squished onto to it. The last thing that was said was my roommate tiredly exclaiming, “All I can think about is ways to scale the wall to our window”.
I spent the whole night dreaming of different ways I could break into our apartment. One was climbing to one of our windows from the front of the building since they are never locked. Another was seeing if we could get into our neighbor's house so we could jump from their deck to ours even though it was covered in barbed wire. Another was simply breaking the damn door. Though this door was like a typical hotel door and had no door knob. I still reasoned any door can be broken. I am from the East Bay in California after all! We could find somebody with the screw driver and un-hinge it, kick it, key it, Anything!!
So we wake up after spending half the night sharing a bed meant for one person and what do you know; our roommate WAS in the house! She had completely passed out. She had a friend over who left during the night and not knowing the sacred door rules, slammed it. She felt very bad but I told her I would be more mad about the situation if a wasn’t so damn happy that we were not locked out.
After this incident I always took great care in closing the door. I also took a deep breath every time I had to open it to get in wondering, “Will this be the time I get royally screwed?”
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