When Josh’s best friend, Caleb, moved in with us “for a few weeks,” I didn’t protest. He’d lost his job and needed a place to stay. Josh and Caleb had been inseparable since college, and I figured I could handle a bit of inconvenience.
But weeks turned into months.
Caleb was charming in public—always smiling, always helpful when others were watching. But behind closed doors, he was a different man. He treated our home like a hotel, and I, like the maid. Dishes piled in the sink after every meal he made for himself. Towels lay soaked on the bathroom floor. Shoes and dirty laundry marked his trail wherever he went.
At first, I asked politely.“Hey Caleb, could you clean up your dishes when you’re done?”He’d just shrug. “I’ll get to it later.”Later never came.
Soon, he wasn’t even pretending. He expected it—expected me to do it.
“You’re already cleaning, right? What’s a few more plates?” he said once with a smirk, slouching on our couch, drinking the last of my wine.
I told Josh. Repeatedly.He waved it off. “He’s just going through stuff. Be patient.”
But I wasn’t just a wife anymore—I was a live-in housekeeper for two grown men. One, I loved. The other, I started to hate.
The final straw came one Sunday morning.
I walked into the kitchen, half-awake, only to find Caleb standing there, shirtless, crumbs all over the counter, a trail of sticky orange juice leading to the fridge. He looked at me like I was interrupting his space.
“You gonna grab the mop or what?” he said, tossing me a smug grin.
That was it.
I didn’t yell. I didn’t fight. I simply walked upstairs, packed a bag, and wrote a note.
“I married a man, not a coward. I’ll come back when you both remember who this home actually belongs to.”
I left.
Sometimes, the only way to get someone to clean up their act… is to walk away from the mess.
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