Thanks to Madge and THIS POST, I had to remember something I really wanted to forget. I blame Madge.

The year: 2003.
The place: Rat-hole Canton Lofts.
Who: The Boyfriend Down the Hall (Yes, it's true. NHL is Dead to Me is not the first boyfriend I dated from 'down the hall'--but he's the BEST by far. Read on.)
What: Disgusting Towels.

It was December. I had packed on my usual extra twenty pounds of fat for the holidays and hibernation (What? I'm German!). I was lonely and bereft. I was ready for some kind of companion that did not include The Estrogen Fishbowl. Enter Stinky Towel Boy. He lived down the hall with his beagle named Sherman. Sherman stank and whined a lot. Stinky Towel Boy had crooked, yellow teeth and a receding hairline. He was twenty-three. He was short and skinny. He was obsessed with me.
I didn't like him immediately, and then, like a cancer, he just kept coming back. I pushed him away for awhile, so he told The Estrogen Fishbowl I was a 'freak', and started flirting with one of my lesbian friends. This did not go over well with The Estrogen Fishbowl. However, Stinky Towel Boy did provide me with a lot of free alcohol and a free cable hookup (he worked at the local cable station). So, for two months, I hung in there. The whole time, I tried to figure out how to break up with him and his whiny, stinky, farting beagle.

This is what did it:
Using his bathroom, I realized the smell of the entire apartment EMANATED from the bathroom. A towel was hung on the floor. It was damp and covered in dog fur. There was no toilet paper. There was no sign of a toothbrush. There was no soap. There was a ring around the tub dating back to the early Phoenicians. I came out quivering.
"Um," I said, "What's that smell in the bathroom?"
"What smell?" Stinky Towel Boy was playing video games.
"There is a smell, and no soap, and no toilet paper, and...how do you bathe?"
"Sherman sleeps in there. He likes to use my towels." This was perfectly reasonable, I guess.
"I imagine you use the same towel even though the dog sleeps on the towel?" I asked, tapping my fingers.
"Yeah. He's clean."

"What do you use for soap?" I asked.
"Soap bothers my skin," he said.
"All soap?"
"Yeah, pretty much." Video game has not been paused.
"What about brushing your teeth?" I asked.
"I forget a lot," he said.
"You forget?"

And it all came rushing back over me. The jeans that were too short. The 'punk' shirts smelling slightly. The towels. Oh, God, the towels.

"You realize," I said after a small gag, "that we must now break up."
"WHAT?" Finally, the video game was turned off. The dog farted ominously from the sofa.
"I don't like you anymore. I haven't liked you for awhile, but I didn't know how to tell you. And I can't date someone who forgets to brush his teeth. I can't," I am now making an inventory of the apartment and slowly backing towards the door.
"But...but I love you!" Ewww.
"No, you don't. You need a maid. And air freshner. And Lysol. And a toothbrush."
He began to cry. Bawling. Sobbing. He crawled toward me on hands and knees and wrapped his skinny, pale arms around my legs.
"YOU CAN'T LEAVE ME!"
"Actually, I can, and I am going to. Please let go of my legs," I instructed calmly.
"BUT WHO WILL TEACH ME HOW TO CLEAN?"

He did. He really did ask that. Over and over.
Somehow, I detangled myself from him that night. For weeks after, I found notes stuffed under my door, entailing the torture of loving a cold woman like me, suffering through the loss of love and a broken heart. Stinky Towel Boy wrote volumes of really horribly poetry and left them for me. I tried. I really did. I wanted to read them, if anything, for their entertainment value.

But I couldn't. Because each note smelled of Stinky Towels and the Farting Beagle.

Finally, he gave up and just bought some soap. I hope wherever he is, he smells better. And I hope that horrid dog yelps loudly in the bathroom everytime a towel starts to smell.