The Third Amendment (Patreon)

So the third amendment to the US constitution says "No Soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house, without the consent of the Owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner to be prescribed by law." There was a discussion around this on Imgur where people were theorizing what it would be like to house a few soldiers in their home. Unfortunately I can't find the discussion now, though I remember one of them talked about having to wipe up dip spit.

It has been kind of nagging at the back of my head how this could become a story. The fundamental premise of having soldiers impose their stay, sleeping in the room next to you is kind of interesting. Violating and potentially hot at the same time.

Best I can think of right now is US going slightly more authoritarian, and the third amendment is removed in the "Great Rewrite" prohibiting abortions and same-sex marriage and whatever else are hot items on the right. This is then promptly followed by an Executive Order stating that citizens engaged in unpatriotic behavior may have to house soldiers for observational reasons and ultimately social cohesion.

That right there is already too political of a story to write it properly. But let's think more about how a story would look like.

You are informed that you have to allow up to three soldiers to sleep in your living room, allow them exclusive access to the living room between 21:00 and 07:00, and access to the rest of the apartment at all times. You get a pamphlet describing all of the rules, covered in slogans from normalized "Support the Troops" to borderline sarcastic "Strength through Unity."

The afternoon the day after there is a hard knock on the door and seconds later you hear a key turn and three soldiers with weapons and backpacks enter your apartment. "Where's the living room?" the first one asks, no smiles nor greetings. They all file in and close the door behind them. It's not nine yet, but you don't really have anything you need to do in the living room. You can eat in the kitchen and watch videos on your computer.

You've just finished dinner when one of the soldiers walks into the kitchen. He's wearing BDU pants and undershirt, but left the rest of the uniform and gear in the living room. His naked feet are wearing flip-flops. He is carrying his black rifle in one hand and a canvas pouch in the other. "Can I clean it here?" he asks. "Yeah, sure. You need anything," you ask. "I got it."

You quickly remove the table cloth and drape it over a chair. He quickly pulls the weapon apart in a well-rehearsed sequence that you suspect is far slower than what he is capable of. You clean away the last parts of your dinner while he picks out tools and brushes from his canvas pouch in silence. You go back to your bedroom to read on your iPad. Through the wall you hear murmurs and the occasional laugh. Once the guy in the kitchen is done you hear him open the door to your living room announcing "Done. Kenning, your turn." You close the bedroom door and try your best to ignore what is happening around you in your apartment. At some point you fall asleep, because you are awakened at some point in the morning. Your alarm hasn't gone off yet, so you just lie there listening to shuffling in the bathroom, living room, and wherever else they are moving. Then you hear the apartment door opening and closing, and everything is silent. Your phone says 6:24. Already dressed you look around the apartment. Nothing is terribly out of order. The furniture in the living room is moved around a bit, mostly to make space on the floor, and it needs a good vacuuming to get rid of the sand. All your towels are wet in the bathroom. Your kitchen table has a few scratches and mini-spatter of oil droplets, but nothing you would notice if you didn't look for it. Besides, it was a cheap table.

The next day no one came by, but the day after that was when the real rotation started. Typically there were three soldiers hosted, though when one rotated out there could be a night or two with only two soldiers. No one stayed longer than two weeks. It made your apartment constantly feel crowded, and not like you really lived there. The irregular times and shifting routines made your sleeping pattern a mess. The toilet was often occupied when you needed it. All the floors were dirty. And even when you were alone in the apartment there was a faint smell of weapons oil, military warehouse, and male bodies.

Most of them stayed for themselves, perhaps saying hi when they arrived. Some were friendlier and wanted to chat, or invite you for dinner with them. Technically they weren't allowed to share food with civilians, but that was quickly overlooked when you offered homemade chili and beer. Technically they weren't allowed to accept "possibly contaminated or poisoned food and beverages", but most cared even less about that rule. From all the late stragglers arriving during the night from a bar round many were clearly loose on the no-alcohol rule as well. But the rotation meant that no one stayed long enough to really get to know them.

And then you had the true believers. The soldiers that were fully on board with the government agenda. Those who agreed that you were as much a threat to the country as any external army. They saw their week or two in your apartment as their opportunity to belittle you, humiliate you, and abuse you. They kept looking for as many things as possible to report you for, and the way the rules on "honoring and assisting housed troops" were written it was easy to find things to hold over you. And once they had revealed themselves as one of those assholes, you were on the hook. "Hey, civvie! Remember that report I talked about yesterday? What if I didn't file it, what's it worth to you? What if you came in here and polished my boots for me. No, don't walk like that. On all four! Now lick it! Lick the boot real fucking shiny."

Well, that kind of political dystopia is a bit outside of my normal writing, so I'll pass on actually writing anything set in this universe.