…photographing my passport. He’d found it in my desk drawer, laid it flat on my bed, and was taking pictures of every page. Then he pulled a folded document out of his jacket and held it next to my signature on an old tax form, comparing them.
I didn’t answer my roommate’s text. I called my landlord instead, from the break room, my voice shaking. He was quiet for a moment. “That’s strange,” he said. “Your roommate’s boyfriend called me yesterday. He said you were moving out and wanted to transfer your half of the lease to him. He said you’d sign the paperwork by Friday.”
I hadn’t told anyone I was moving. Because I wasn’t.
I called the police next. Then, finally, I called my roommate. I didn’t text. I wanted to hear her voice. “Don’t go home,” I said. “Is Cody with you?” There was a long pause. “No,” she said. “I texted you because I just found his second phone in my car. It’s full of photos of your stuff. I think he’s been using your name.”
She hadn’t known. She was crying. She’d been dating him for four months. He’d told her he was “between apartments.”
The police were waiting when Cody came out of our building at 1:15 with a backpack. Inside it was my passport, a forged lease transfer, and three credit card applications in my name. Detectives later found he’d done the same thing to two other women in two other cities, using roommates he’d dated to get inside.
I changed every password that afternoon. My roommate changed the locks herself. We sat on the kitchen floor that night and ate takeout, both of us too shaky to sit on the couch.
We still live together. She hasn’t dated anyone since. My old phone is still on the shelf, recording. She asked me to leave it there. She says it’s the most honest roommate either of us has ever had.
