3. Greta
3
Greta
Too Close for Comfort
L aw helps me move all my heavy stuff off the driveway. He even sticks around to help me carry in boxes. Maybe he’s not as bad as I thought. But I’m not rushing to judgment. I’ve only known him a few hours.
“Do you want help putting your bed together?”
“You have tools for that?”
He laughs, and I’m not sure I like the sound of it. “Yeah, I have tools.”
“Okay. If I’m not keeping you from anything.”
“I’ve got time to put a bed together before I head out. If you have anything else that requires assembly, you’ll have to wait until tomorrow.”
“Where are you heading out to?”
“My job.”
“You work nights?”
“Mostly. How about you?”
“I’m a school teacher. But I’m on a break. For now, I work here.” I look around at my small living room separated from the kitchen by a Formica-topped bar. There is no hallway between the living room and the bedroom, just a door. And to get to the only bathroom, I have to walk through my bedroom, which means any guests I have over will have to do the same.
Not that I plan on having any guests. But this place looks a lot smaller than it did in the pictures.
“What do you mean you work here? As in, right here?”
“People work remotely now. It’s not unusual.”
“Some people do. But the pandemic’s been over for a long time. Are students still attending school remotely?”
“I have some other work to do. I’ll be . . . well, I, I write things.”
“What kind of things? Like textbooks or something?”
“When you look at me, that’s all you think I’d be capable of writing? Textbooks?”
“You said you were a school teacher, so I assumed if you were writing . . . forget it. I’ll just put your bed together and get out of your way.”
“I have to show you where I want it first.”
“There’s only one wall with enough room.” He walks into my bedroom like he owns the place. I follow him. He points at the wall with the living room on the other side. “That wall has a door in the middle. That one has a window in the middle, and that one has your closet door and your bathroom door on it, so you really only have one option.”
He nods toward the only wall with enough open space to put a bed against it.
“Is your side of the duplex the same layout?”
“Yep.”
“Is your headboard on the other side of that wall?”
“Sure is.”
“Our headboards have to be back-to-back?”
“My bed’s not right up against the wall, and yours doesn’t have to be either. I promise I will ensure the maximum amount of space between our heads.”
“Good. I don’t want to hear you snoring through the wall.”
“You sure that’s what you’re worried about hearing?” He smirks, leaning against my bathroom door.
“Can you just go get your tools, please?”
When he leaves, I listen for the sounds of him entering his side of the duplex. I can hear his front door open and close, but I don’t hear him walking around inside. Good. I want to be as insulated from his life as possible.
It’s bad enough he works nights, so I’ll probably hear him coming home at a ridiculously early hour every morning. The last thing I need is a sunrise soundtrack of whatever he does before he falls asleep, alone or with a partner. I don’t want to know.
I hear the faint but unmistakable sound of his toilet flushing. Ugh. At least I couldn’t hear him peeing.
A sudden image of him standing in his bathroom with his fly open flashes in my mind. I squeeze my eyes shut to keep from imagining his hand or what it’s probably tucking back into his underwear right now . . . but apparently, mental images don’t care if your eyes are open or not.
Why would my brain go there? I don’t want to see his dick. Is that where his brain is going to go if he hears me flush my toilet? Or turn on my shower?
Oh, God. I don’t want this guy imagining me naked every time he hears water running on my side of the wall. I’ll have to shower at night while he’s at work. But I like morning showers.
I just moved in, and my neighbor is already a problem.
It’s not like I should be surprised. He was a problem before I ever knew we were neighbors. I didn’t move all this way to wind up stuck with another man who causes problems in my life.
My front door opens. He didn’t even knock.
Who the hell does Law Davis think he is?
He strides back into my bedroom, holding a drill and a small plastic box that I know probably has drill bits in it. I’m not entirely clueless. His arm lifts to confirm he’s ready to get to work, but my eyes go in an entirely different direction.
I might’ve given up on therapy too soon. I’m clearly unwell.
But he fills out those jeans quite well. The way the denim hugs his thighs, and the waistband sits so perfectly snug that I’d have to work to get that button undone . . . and I can’t even pretend I didn’t check out his ass earlier when I was walking behind him.
Who am I? Say something. Don’t just stand here, staring at him.
“Looks like you definitely have the right tool to get the job done.”
Seriously? That’s what came out of my mouth?
It slipped out while my brain was engaged in mental combat with my eyes, trying to keep them out of enemy territory.
Dicks are the enemy, I remind myself. They’re bad, and everything attached to them is bad.
I manage to force my eyes up to the drill in his hand, hoping to confirm that’s the only tool I was referring to. This all feels so awkward and obvious, but I’m sure it’s one of those moments where you think everyone else is noticing something, but you find out later that they weren’t paying a bit of attention. It was all in your head.
This is all in my head.
Which is exactly where the image of his dick originally came from. Of course, it wasn’t really his dick because I’ve never seen that part of him, except through his pants. Not that I have x-ray vision. I mean, I can’t actually see through his pants—
Oh, God. Now I’m looping:
Imagine his dick. Look in its general direction. Peel your eyes away. Tell yourself you absolutely do not want to see that. Clearly see an image of it in your head again. Catch yourself staring at its zipped-up fort. Force your eyes—
I shake my head. “Sorry. I’ve had a lot of caffeine today. It makes me a little spacey if I have too much.”
“How long was your drive?”
“Seven hours.”
“What are you running away from?” He examines the screws in the little bag the movers taped to my headboard, and then he opens his little plastic box and chooses a drill bit.
“Nothing. I just needed some peace and quiet for a while.” I help him set the headboard into position, centered on the wall, but about four inches away from it.
“Ah, a change of scenery before the new school year starts, huh? You here for the whole summer?”
“I’m here until Christmas break. At least.”
“So, you’re taking a semester off?”
“At least.”
“Got it.”
We work in silence until the bed is whole again. He uses head nods and hand signals to let me know if he needs me to move anything. I’m weirdly grateful he’s stopped talking. Stopped asking questions.
“What exactly do you do?” I ask as we hoist my mattress into place. My own curiosity can only take so much silence.
“What’s your best guess?”
“Oil field, probably.”
“Sweetheart, if I was working in the oil field, I’d be able to afford a much nicer place.”
I normally hate when men call me sweetheart, but there’s something so unassuming in the way he says it, no discernible condescension to piss me off, so he gets a free pass. This time.
“Well, I know that’s an expensive truck you’re driving, so you’re probably not asking people if they want fries with that.”
He laughs, and I can tell I’ve caught him off guard. I guess he didn’t expect me to have a sense of humor. Rude.
“I’m an A & R rep,” he says, as if that answers my question.
“Okay, I give up. Does that mean you do legal work for the oil industry?”
“Again, if I was a lawyer for the oil industry—”
“We wouldn’t be neighbors.”
“Exactly. A & R stands for artists and repertoire. The industry is music.”
I stare at him, waiting for him to continue his explanation because I still have no idea what he does.
“Would you recognize the phrase talent scout?”
“Really? Wow. That must be an interesting job.”
“It has its moments.”
The downside hits me. “That’s why you work nights. You have to go where the music is.”
“That’s the reason.”
“Great. You get paid to hang out in bars.” I don’t mean to scoff out loud, but it’s not like I can take it back.
“Does this mean you’re constantly bringing home drunk women at the end of your shifts?”
“I’m usually limited to one. On a really good night, maybe—”
“You know what I meant.”
“I am a grown man. I may, on occasion, have company, yes. Have you taken a vow of celibacy?”
His tone conveys the indoor equivalent of road rage. Bedroom rage? I almost laugh at that . . . until I realize my brain is drafting a whole new unwelcome image.
“No, I’m not necessarily committed to celibacy, but your kind aren’t my favorite people right now.”
“A & R?”
“Men.”
“I see.”
I refuse to look at any part of him now. “I’ll buy earplugs.”
“So will I.” He puts his drill bit back in the box.
“Trust me, you won’t need them. I plan on remaining single.”
“Yeah, but those battery-operated boyfriends make the worst sounds. That constant whining noise that gets louder and softer and louder and softer and louder and—”
“What are you, twelve?”
“Oh, come on. My sense of humor is at least fifteen.”
“You mean at most ?”
“Welcome to Agate Ridge, Greta.” He makes it almost to my front door before he turns abruptly and says, “Wait. Do you write porn? Is that why you got so cagey about it?”
“I did not get cagey. And no, I don’t write porn. Do I look like I write porn?”
He actually narrows his eyes and give me an up-down visual inspection. “I don’t know. I’ve never met a porn writer, so I have no idea what y’all might look like.”
“You mean as far as you know, you’ve never met one. You can’t be sure.”
His eyebrows lift, along with the corners of his mouth. “Good point. Enjoy the writin’.”
“Enjoy the scoutin’. And thanks for your help.”
“You know, a truly grateful neighbor might thank me with freshly baked cookies.”
“If you’re lucky, maybe I’ll buy you a bag of chips.”
“Not a baker. Noted.”
He walks out, and I watch his ass with no regrets.
Lucky for him, my B.O.B. is as quiet as a whisper. A buzzing hum of a whisper, but it won’t travel through the wall. Even if it did, he probably wouldn’t be home to hear it. If he can keep his live bedmates as quiet, we might make good neighbors after all.