by C. C. Wood
Some nights it was just his loud ass music that woke me up. Others it was his television blaring until four a.m. And there had been three occasions, including last night, where his trysts with women and the subsequent noise had woken me.
As the cacophony continued, I glanced at the wall as though I could see him. God, he was a douche. Why anyone would think that playing their stereo that loudly in the middle of the night was okay, I would never know.
Then I had a deliciously evil idea. I grabbed my phone and set an alarm for six a.m., just three and half short hours from now. Then I ran into my living room and found my recording of Wagner’s Tristan und Isolde. I knew that second semester of music history would come in handy someday. Since Wagner sounded like screaming in German to those who weren’t hardcore opera fans, I was pretty sure Troy would hate it. Especially since he tended to listen to classic rock after he got up around ten in the morning.
Content with my plans for revenge, I curled up under my blanket and went to sleep.
I pulled into my driveway at noon figuring five hours of Wagner on repeat would be punishment enough for Troy. When my alarm went off at six, I had rolled out of bed and taken a quick shower. Just before I left the duplex at 7 a.m., I set up the stereo in my bedroom, programming the CD player to repeat the disc. As I was walking out the door, I pressed play on the remote. Then I got the hell out of there because I didn’t think it would be long before my neighbor would be banging on my door.
Since it was Saturday, I went to the local greasy spoon and ate a leisurely breakfast with lots of good, strong coffee and then read the paper. It was almost nine by the time I finished, so I drove to the local mall and shopped for a couple of hours. My last stop was the bookstore. I bought several bargain books, some CD’s, and a café mocha.
As lunch time neared, I decided I was tired and hungry so I headed home. After I pulled under the carport, I put the car in park and glanced around. I didn’t see anything, so I hopped out of the car, grabbed my bags, and scurried into the duplex. Wagner was still blaring from my stereo. Grabbing the remote, I shut it down. I put together some tuna salad and made myself a tuna sandwich with alfalfa sprouts. I was grabbing some chips to go with my lunch when the banging on my door started. I nearly dropped my half-full café mocha because it was loud. I had a bad feeling that the person pounding on my door was my neighbor.
So I did the smart thing, which was also the cowardly thing, and ignored it. After a few minutes, there was silence. I sighed and went to my little breakfast nook. As I was about to take the first bite of my sandwich, someone starting knocking on the side door that led to the carport, which opened up into my kitchen-slash-nook. It looked like Troy was in the mood to be persistent. I started to ignore him again but he added yelling into the mix.
“I know you’re in there! I can see you through the blinds.”
I scowled at the window to my left. The blinds were closed. How the hell could he see me? I leaned over and noticed one of the slats was a little askew, and I found myself eyeball-to-eyeball with the horse’s ass. Well, shit. I sighed and abandoned my lunch.
When I opened the door, I got a load of my neighbor for the first time. Wow. Okay, so now I kind of understood why all those girls kept going home with Troy. He was certainly easy on the eyes, with short black hair, chocolate brown eyes, and probably the most beautiful skin I had ever seen on a man. He was definitely of Latin descent and exactly my type. Especially since he was inconsiderate. Latino and a dick. Yep, the exact kind of man I usually fell for. Well, I usually fell for them before I realized they were assholes. Since I knew better, there would not be any of that going on between me and Troy.
Also, he was dressed like a drug dealer or, at the very least, a thug. His clothes were nice but street. And the bling. I liked bling, but his consisted of a heavy chain around his neck and a huge diamond stud in his ear. That was not the kind of bling I liked. Great, I lived next door to the ultimate in bad boys.
I was also not the only one taking a moment to check out their neighbor. Troy looked me up and down twice before he finally focused on my face. He seemed surprised before the angry expression returned.
“I’m from next door. Could you not play your music so fucking loud on a fucking Saturday morning for five fucking hours?”
Wow, someone was pissed. I leaned against the doorjamb and crossed my arms over my chest, settling in to let him have it.
“Well, that depends, Troy.”
His eyebrows rose. “How exactly did you know my name?”
“Well, Troy, you had a Betty Boop impersonator in your bed screaming it two nights ago at two-thirty in the morning. Oh, and that girl who likes to be spanked was moaning it rather loudly last week. Then there was the one who wanted you to suck her toes. Wait, the spanking girl and toe girl were one in the same.”
He lifted his hand, palm out, to stop my monologue. “I think I get the picture.” A dull flush crept up his neck into his face. “So the wall between our bedrooms is that thin?”
I nodded. “Yep.” I popped the ‘p’.
“And Wagner this morning was to make a point?” he asked.
Now it was my eyebrows that rose. A drug dealer that knew something about opera, now that was a surprise.
“You could say that,” I replied. “I’m sure you appreciated Wagner as much as I appreciated your death metal in the middle of a very good dream last night.”
I was shocked when he grinned. Not just because he was smiling but because he had some of the whitest teeth I had ever seen and a damn nice smile. Too bad it was wasted on a guy that probably sold crystal meth to high school kids. How he’d managed to hook up with all those girls, I would never understand. Then again, straight-laced girls usually did like bad boys and that smile said he was unmistakeably a bad, bad boy. Being gorgeous didn’t hurt either.
“Well, neighbor, I’ll be sure it isn’t a problem in the future and I am sorry. If I had realized the walls were so thin, I would have been more discreet. Oh, and I apologize for interrupting your, uh...good dream.”
“Apology accepted,” I said politely. Ignoring his suggestive pause when he mentioned my dream, I started to step back to close the door, thus ending the conversation.
“Wait,” he said, “I don’t know your name.”
I just smiled and shut the door in his face. I stood there and listened for a moment. At first there was silence, then I heard Troy’s footsteps wander away.
I went back to my tuna sandwich but my appetite had disappeared. I was in deep trouble. My new neighbor was exactly the kind of man I preferred. He was also exactly the kind of guy who would stomp all over my heart. I decided that my sandwich would wait until later. I wrapped it up and stuck it in the fridge.
I decided that a nap might be in order. After having my sleep interrupted the night before and getting up so early, I was tired. Also, I liked my sleep. Most nights I preferred to sleep nine or ten hours but I could easily sleep twelve a night over the weekend. My friend, Nat, used to make fun of me all the time because she slept less than anyone I had ever met. She joked I was sleeping my life away. I told her that people who got very little sleep died young.
“Only the good die young and I’m a bad girl,” was her reply.
I couldn’t argue with that point. Especially since she was right. She was a bad girl.
I grinned at the memory and decided to try to do girls’ night out with my friends Natalie and Catherine as soon as possible. Since Nat was pregnant and Cat had a brand new baby boy, I knew it would be hard to pry them out of the house, but I needed some time with my girlfriends. Now that I knew exactly how hot my new neighbor was, I needed their take-no-prisoners attitude and bullshit-free words of wisdom.
I decided to text my friends later in the evening, after my nap. I went into my bedroom and stretched out on my bed. I set an alarm on my phone for two hours later, and it was lights out.
A loud buzzing sound dragged me out of my nap. I opened my eyes and blinked. The s
creen on my phone lit up as it vibrated on my nightstand. I snagged it and answered.
“Hello?”
“Amy?”
It was Grayson Garrett, the man I was dating. I sat up and pushed my hair away from my face.
“Hi, Grayson.”
He paused. “I’m sorry. Are you sick or something?”
I cleared my throat. “No, I was just taking a nap. My neighbor was loud and woke me up at two-thirty this morning, so I decided to catch up on some sleep.”
“Oh.”
I waited for him to say something else, but he didn’t.
“Is there something you wanted to talk about?” I asked.
“Oh, yes. I wanted to see if you were busy tomorrow,” he answered.
I smiled happily. Grayson could be a little awkward, but he seemed sweet. We had been on several dates and he was nothing like the men I usually dated. A little old-fashioned and average, but he was a gentleman.
“No, I’m not busy. Well, I do have to play for church but I’m free after twelve.”
“Wonderful. How about a picnic?” he asked.
Call me corny but a picnic sounded romantic and lovely, especially on a cool October day in Texas.
“I would love that,” I said.
“Great. I’ll pick you up at one o’clock.”
“See you then, Grayson. Bye.”
I hung up and glanced at the time. Apparently I slept through my alarm because it was almost five in the afternoon. I dragged myself out of bed. Before my nap I had changed into yoga pants and a camisole. I decided to just stay in my comfy clothes and chill out on the couch watching chick flicks. I sighed when I realized that it was Saturday night, and my big plans consisted of eating junk food on my sofa while I watched movies.
I was twenty-nine years old and spending Saturday night alone. All I needed now was a few cats. I decided not to think about it and go water the mums on my front porch before I settled in for what Nat liked to call a Man Candy Movie Night. I climbed off the bed, running a hand through my hair.
I wandered into the kitchen and filled up my watering can. I liked my porch to look pretty and reflect the seasons. During the spring and summer, I kept bright petunias in the pots along the edge of my porch and steps. I used red and gold mums in the fall, and, around Christmas, I decorated a tiny live Christmas tree.
When I walked outside to water, I smelled something. I stood there for a moment, pouring water onto the soil of my plants. Then I realized it was pot. Again. Someone nearby was smoking pot. Normally I wouldn’t really care what people did in the privacy of their own homes, but I figured it was my neighbor. I was tempted to go inside and call the cops. It would be an easy way to get rid of Troy and his noisy habits. I decided to wait and see. It did seem that I had called it correctly about Troy. He either liked to smoke shit, or he was dealing. If he was dealing, I would turn in his ass in a heartbeat.
This wasn’t the first time the scent of pot smoke had permeated my yard. He moved in weeks ago, so maybe he just smoked occasionally to take the edge off. That, I could deal with. Well, maybe. I just hoped that his place didn’t get raided by the cops in the middle of the night. I liked my little duplex. If shit went down I would have to move, and I really didn’t want to. Even if our landlord evicted Troy, I would never feel the same about the cute little place.
I finished with my plants and stomped inside. Why the hell did I have to be so fair-minded? I put away the watering can and started assembling my junk food feast. I pulled a bottle of white wine from the fridge. After I poured a glass, I put a bag of popcorn in the microwave and hauled a tub of ice cream out of the freezer.
A few minutes later I was stretched out on my couch under an ultra-soft microfleece blanket. After my meeting with Troy, I wasn’t in the mood for chick flicks anymore, so I pulled out a couple of action movies with lots of half-naked, muscular men in them. My friends, Nat and Cat, called them Man Candy movies and she was right. They were delicious. At least they were also calorie free.
I decided to start my movie marathon with The Transporter, one of Nat’s favorites. I was enjoying a greased up, shirtless Jason Statham when an odd noise interrupted me. It stopped immediately, so I chalked it up to a cat or something. When it happened again a couple of minutes later, I stuck my spoon into the pint of ice cream I was devouring and paused the movie. I listened for a few moments and realized that the strange noise was coming from Troy’s side of the duplex. I waited until it happened again.
There was a loud scraping sound coming from the back of the house, so I walked to my bedroom. The bumping and scraping continued. I stood in the middle of my room, confused. I wondered if maybe one of his doped up customers had killed him and was trying to get the body out of the duplex. That would certainly solve my neighbor problems. Though it would be my luck he would come back to haunt me, noisier than ever.
“Fuck me.” The frustrated yet sexy voice belonged to my neighbor.
I heard a groan and then something heavy move across the floor. I got on my bed, which was against the wall that my bedroom shared with Troy’s side of the duplex, and put my ear to the drywall. I heard another screech. Suddenly, I knew what he was doing. Troy was rearranging his bedroom.
I rolled over onto my back on the mattress and laughed at the ceiling. Maybe my payback this morning had done the trick after all.
The next morning I got up bright and early and got ready for church. When I graduated from college with my degree in piano performance, I immediately got a job as an accompanist for choirs in the Garland school district. The pay wasn’t great, but it did pay the bills and provided me with health insurance. To supplement my income, I took a job playing piano at a church. I hadn’t realized how well some of the larger churches would pay until I finished school. If I had known before, I would have been applying for jobs while I was in college. There were very few jobs that allowed you to work one day a week for three hours and get paid that well. Maybe it wouldn’t buy me Louboutins, but it did keep me in cute clothes and Starbucks, which was good enough.
After church, I chatted with some of the members, including my landlord, Davis. That’s how I got my half of the duplex. I started working at the church while I was living in an apartment and I mentioned to the choir director that I really wanted to find a bigger place with more privacy since I needed to be able to practice piano several times a week. My neighbors in the apartment complex complained a lot about my practicing. I tried to be considerate about when I practiced and the volume of my playing, but some people could never be pleased.
Within a week, Davis had contacted me with information on some of his properties, and an offer to give me a tour of them.
“How are you getting along with Troy?” Davis asked.
I paused for a moment before answering him, trying to decide exactly what to say. Instead of tattling like a five-year old, I just said, “Fine.”
He studied me for a moment with a small smile on his face. “Have you gotten to talk to him much?”
I shook my head. “I think yesterday was the first time we’ve spoken since he moved in. He isn’t home much.”
For a second, I thought Davis looked absolutely disappointed, but the expression disappeared quickly.
“That’s too bad. He’s a good guy. Maybe after he’s been there for a while you’ll get to spend some time together. I think you two will hit it off.”
My eyes widened when I realized that my freaking landlord was trying to set me up. I almost blurted out right then and there that Troy liked to smoke pot but just managed to bite my tongue. I had just decided yesterday that I wouldn’t say anything.
Instead, I just nodded. “Maybe.” I made a show of glancing at my watch. “I’m meeting someone for lunch, Davis. I’ll see you next week, okay?”
I said my good-byes to the music director and the pastor and headed home. I was still shaking my head at the idea of Troy and I together. Davis must have been blind to miss the signs that Troy was not a straight arrow, whi
le I couldn’t be anything else. I might have gone a little wild right after college but now I was much calmer and a rule-follower.
I chuckled to myself as I changed into a pair of jeans, a light blue camisole, and topped the whole ensemble with a soft gray cashmere cardigan that had been a Christmas gift from my sister. I pulled a pair of calf hair, zebra print, knee boots over my skinny jeans. They were my favorite pair of boots, and they had cost a fortune. I wore them constantly during the fall and winter.
I added a little make-up to the mascara and powder I had worn to church that morning. After I smudged shadow on my lids and glossed my lips, I realized that I had left my cell phone in my car. I ran a brush through my hair before I headed out to the carport. As I opened the passenger door, I saw a flash out of the corner of my eye. I turned, almost falling face first into the naked, sweaty chest of my neighbor, Troy.
I gasped and jerked back quickly. “God, Troy. You scared me to death!” I shouted.
Wearing a tiny smirk, and not much else, he looked completely remorseless. Whatever he had been doing outside and shirtless, it had caused him to work up a sweat.
“Sorry,” he said. “I was out for a run and noticed you out here. I thought I would stop and say hi.”
I reached into my car and snagged my phone out of the console. “Well, hi. I’m sorry, Troy, but I’m expecting company.”
I caught my eyes wandering over his sculpted bronze torso and forced my gaze back to his face. Holy cow he was built. I had yet to meet a pothead whose body looked like Troy’s so he must only partake occasionally.
He was standing there, his breath a little heavy, in nothing but a pair of black athletic shorts and running shoes. It took amazing willpower, but I kept my eyes above his shoulders. From the way he was smiling slightly, he knew it. That alone broke the half-naked man spell. Arrogant jerk.
I heard a car pull up and glanced over Troy’s shoulder. I saw Grayson’s white sedan at the curb in front of the duplex.
