CHAPTER 5
Emma
Why is the last five hundred metres always the hardest?
It’s the same every day. I cruise for the first three kilometres, start grumbling for the next one and then when I round the bend, my house in the distance, every step is a struggle. One would think that if you run every single day, it should get easier. But it doesn’t.
Especially today.
This morning my every instinct had screamed at me to skip my daily exercise and wallow in my house instead. After spending the night lying on the couch, a belly filled with the most delicious cookies ever, playing volume wars with my rude next-door neighbour, I’d wanted nothing more than a pyjama day. Perhaps with some takeaway junk food delivered to my door and losing myself in the new Michael Robotham thriller I just downloaded onto my Kindle.
“Almost there,” I grunt over the music pumping in my ears. Today I’d needed my most hectic playlist to get me moving, and it’s only the pounding sounds of Usher and the thought of the tub of fudge brownie chocolate ice cream waiting for me in the freezer that are getting me through these last four hundred metres.
Three hundred metres.
Two hundred.
One.
Oh, thank goodness.
My watch vibrates, the best feeling in the world, letting me know I can stop torturing myself. I come to a swift halt, resting my hands on my hands and pulling in some deep breaths. In my effort to make this run end as soon as possible, I’d run faster than my normal speed; my shaky thighs and the sweat pooling in my sports bra attest to this vividly.
Once my breathing has returned to normal and I no longer feel like I’m going to collapse (running in summer in Melbourne is no joke), I slowly walk the rest of the way home, silencing Usher and allowing reminiscences about last night to keep me company.
An unwilling smile grows on my face as I conjure up an image of my faceless neighbour when he realised that he was in for another night of Love Actually . And not just any Love Actually, but the version of the movie on steroids. It was almost too much for me. Almost.
A chuckle trickles out of me as I picture him trying to drown me out with some macho action movie. I’d taken a small amount of glee in yanking up the volume, letting the iconic soundtrack take over whatever rubbish he was attempting to watch next door. And I’d won. With thirty minutes still left of my movie viewing pleasure, his side of the wall had gone deadly quiet and I’d known I’d claimed the victory.
Maybe next time, he’ll keep his movie suggestions to himself, I think smugly.
I take the last few steps up to my front porch in little leaps, now looking forward to the day ahead. The one good thing to come from this little neighbourly war is the distraction it’s given me. I’ve been so busy focusing on the elf next door, I’ve almost forgotten to think about Oliver and Lilly.
“Oooh, another present!” I squeal, quietly in case he’s around. I’m almost at my door and there it is, assembled neatly, waiting for me. “I hope he’s packed some cookies.”
Curious beyond belief, I lift the box and rush inside. It’s heavy, but I’m happy to see that there’s a batch of cookies included (my mouth actually salivates like Pavlov’s dogs at the sight of it).
I drop the box on the floor. Without caring about the wrapping, I tear it open and gasp, sitting back on my bum on the hard floor with a thump.
“He didn’t.”
Oh, but he did.
There in the box in front of me is a cat scratching post, a cat bed and a box of kitty litter. And on the note, in his slashed, slanting writing, he’s scrawled:
Dear Christmas Grinch,
This gift seems appropriate for someone I can only assume is a single cat lady.
Nothing else can explain the need to watch that movie Every. Single. Night.
From the Elf next door.
P.S. Hope you enjoy the cookies!
My blood roars in my ears as I read and then re-read and then read again the words on the page in front of me. The jerk actually has the nerve to call me a single cat lady! Just because I’m home alone crying to sappy rom-coms?
Hmmm, well…if only he knew how close this is to being true. I’m one meltdown away from ordering all the cats.
I let out a bark laugh at his audacity. He knows I don’t have a cat, or else he would have seen it over the months we’ve shared a wall, so he’s just being mean. He may be almost right, but he’s also being a misogynistic, stereotyping, sexist jerk. Who, for some reason, is making me laugh.
Giggles bubble up at the idea of him buying these gifts for me. Of him actually taking the time and spending the money to make this point. The more I think about it, the harder I laugh. I laugh until my belly hurts and tears run down my cheeks, holding a cushion over my mouth so he doesn’t get the satisfaction of hearing it. Of knowing his slightly mean-spirited joke actually amuses me more than it insults me.
What he doesn’t realise is that with this gesture, with this single cat lady taunt, he hasn’t ended our war.
He’s just made it go nuclear.
*****
I spend the next hour pacing my living room, alternating between eating his cookies and plotting his demise. Every idea I have seems too pedestrian, too basic, too tame. I need it to be something epic. Something that will drive him crazy.
I know one thing that drives him crazy.
My eyes fall on the Netflix home screen on pause on my wide flatscreen TV and a grin grows on my lips. I know for a fact hearing Love Actually through our shared wall is taking him to the brink of his sanity, so I just need to go with that. Lean into it. Crank it up to the next level.
“It’s simple and perfect,” I mutter deviously.
I plug my phone into the Bluetooth speaker I have placed on my kitchen counter and, so excited I do a little hoppity-hop, I open Spotify.
“There it is.”
Within two taps, I have it cued and ready to go. Seventeen songs, one hour and four minutes of listening pleasure. On repeat. At maximum volume.
“The trouble with love is…” I sing along with Kelly Clarkson. My out-of-tune falsetto is also at full volume and I angle the speaker towards the wall, picturing him standing on the other side, glaring a hole through it. He’ll be thinking I’ve started the movie again and he’ll have to suffer through it for the next two to three hours.
Oh, my pesky neighbour, you have no idea.
After dancing through the full soundtrack, start to finish, I listen to it start up again, only then getting the satisfaction of hearing him groan.
“No, no, no, no, no!”
I giggle as he rants, throwing out words like ‘lunatic’ and ‘irrational’ and ‘ridiculous’. When I hear his front door slam, I rush to the window. With a thrill, I watch him pace up and down, his muscular hands gripping his hair in frustration, showing off some impressive biceps in the process.
“Hmm, jerky neighbour is hot,” I mutter, keeping my eyes glued to him and also staying out of sight.
With one eye on his angry, vibrating body, I lean over and turn the volume up a bit more, watching as he stops pacing to glare at my house.
“Wow.”
The joke is on me now, I think, as I stare at his face from the shadows of my living room. His gorgeous, should-be-on-a-billboard face. The man is delicious. Like his cookies. Even furious-looking with red cheeks and blazing eyes, he’s a work of art.
“This will not do,” I lecture myself, unable to tear my gaze away from him. He’s tall, so tall, with long legs ensconced in soft-looking blue denim jeans and a white t-shirt. His hair is pulled up and away from his face in a half-ponytail, and the stubble on his jaw makes my hands itch to touch it.
“Yikes!” I force myself to turn away from his magnificent beauty, not willing to let my hormonal response dampen this need to destroy him.
And destroy him, I will. If he looks angry now, wait until he’s had to listen to this soundtrack on repeat for the next twelve hours. I have noise-cancelling headphones and a stubborn streak a mile wide. The man may be hunky, but he’ll also be regretting ever taunting me.
I’m a self-confessed crazy single lady. There was never a need to bring a cat into it.