I didn’t miss the way the drummer’s eyes darted down to my cleavage, where my robe had come open. I huffed and closed it. Boys.
“Mr. Lake is my neighbor,” the man said as though I hadn’t just caught him leering at me. “He lives over there.”
“No, I live over there,” I said, connecting the dots. “I don’t know what happened to the last tenant, but I live there now, and I don’t appreciate the noise. So knock it off.” With that, I turned on my heel and marched back to my apartment.
Let him start drumming again. I wasn’t kidding when I said that I would call the police to file a noise complaint.
He didn’t start back up, though. It was finally quiet. Something still kept me from sleeping, though.
It was partly that I was nervous about my big day tomorrow. It was such a leap of faith, moving to LA from my small hometown in Illinois. There was something about my new neighbor that reminded me that I didn’t belong here. I wasn’t trying to be a movie star or a musician or anything like that, but I had moved here to work for a big entertainment company.
Granted, I’d be an accountant. That was something that I was good at. I had proven myself in a string of internships while I was in college, and I knew that I had found what I was good at. What’s more, I was excited for the company that I’d be working for. I knew that I would have the chance to excel at my job, and I had a feeling that I might have the chance to move up in the company chain.
Still, all of that didn’t mean I wasn’t worried that I might have made the wrong choice. I didn’t know anyone here, and life was so different from life back in my quiet Midwestern town.
It’s a good thing I don’t scare easily, I thought.
I’d just have to take things one step at a time. The job wouldn’t be that scary once I started it. I knew that. And living in LA wouldn’t be as stressful once I made some friends.
My thoughts drifted back from work to the handsome drummer who lived next door. His drumming, while obnoxious for the hour, had been pretty decent. The guy probably knew the music scene pretty well. I wouldn’t mind getting to know him better. Maybe I could get him to show me around.
I grimaced and rolled over, as though rolling over could shield me from those thoughts. Instead, my train of thought continued: I had probably ruined my chances of getting to know the guy any better with everything tonight.
For a moment, I felt a flash of guilt and disappointment. This wasn’t the way that I wanted my LA chapter to begin. I didn’t want him to think I was some uptight hick with a stick up my ass. No going back now, though.
In any case, it wasn’t like I needed to be distracted by rocker bad boys. I was there to further my career. When I did have the time to date, it wasn’t going to be a man who stayed up all night banging on drums; it was going to be someone quiet and steadfast. Someone who wanted a family and someone who was dependable. Someone considerate, most of all.
I tried to forget about the hottie next door and get some sleep. I had a big day the next day, and that was the thing that I needed to focus on first and foremost. I could worry about the rest of it afterward.
Still, the silence suddenly seemed almost too loud. I rolled over again, pulling my pillow over my head as though I wanted it to be that quiet. Eventually, I drifted off to a night of restless sleep.
3
Jayson
I gritted my teeth in frustration as I watched Mark flirt with the ladies he had brought with him, telling them some made-up story about how he had written the lyrics to the song that we were practicing. I tuned out the story, but I couldn’t ignore what he was doing.
We were here in Luke’s garage trying to rehearse. It was one of the few times we had all managed to be there nearly on time, and I had hoped we would rehearse a few things and then maybe get to work on something new. Finally.
Of course, as soon as I saw that Mark had brought companions, that idea went out the window. They were just here to watch, he had promised. But it was only a matter of time before he got distracted. As he always did.
We had been practicing here in Luke’s garage for all the time we’d been a band. The house used to belong to his parents, until they had passed away suddenly in a freak car accident when he was just out of high school. It was the perfect space to rehearse in, somewhere far enough away from neighbors (and soundproof enough, anyway) that we didn’t need to worry about interruptions.
Today, I couldn’t seem to stop thinking about the fact that my place was no longer in the same class. I hadn’t encountered my new neighbor in the few days since she had chewed me out for drumming late into the night. Nor had I played my drums late at night, though.
I wasn’t caving to what she wanted. It wasn’t that. I just had drummed it all out during the day.
That was what I was telling myself, anyway.
I was trying to focus on right now, though. This disastrous practice. It wasn’t just Mark that was a problem. Carter was no better. He was either so hungover or so blitzed that he kept messing up his chords. Luke and I were the only people who were keeping a beat, and it was starting to piss me off.
“Can we get started already?” I finally snapped. “Look, I’ll forget about working on anything new today because I can tell that’s not going to happen, but we should at least rehearse ‘Maggie Ann Says Goodbye’ if we’re going to play it at our next show.”
Mark stared at me, his eyebrows rising. “Are you trying to tell me that we’re not working?” he said. “We’ve already been through four of our songs and they’ve been fine. We know ‘Maggie,’—I don’t know why you’re acting like we’re suddenly not going to be able to play it. We wrote it.”
I stared at him. There was a part of me that knew he was just trying to put on a show in front of the girls, but that didn’t make it any better.
I exploded.
“Fine?” I shouted. “You think that the other songs have been fine? You forgot half the fucking lyrics of two of them, or made up stupid versions of your own, and neither you or Carter were on beat. You’re wasting our time dicking around when we need to work. There’s a reason that we haven’t debuted ‘Maggie’ yet. I don’t think we’re ready to play it in front of people.”
“Oh, that’s it?” Mark snarled. “You act like you’re the only person in this band who has any say in it.”
“I am, if I’m the one who wrote the song,” I said flatly.
“You didn’t write that song, not on your own,” Mark said. “It belongs to all of us.”
“Name one thing that you added to it,” I said through gritted teeth, even though I knew that this wasn’t what we needed to argue about. “And if you try to play it with the way that we’ve been sucking lately, you can do it without a drummer.”
“The band isn’t all about you,” Mark said, rolling his eyes. “As for sucking, you could try playing on beat sometimes. That would help. Have you even been practicing lately?”
I nearly threw my sticks at him. But we were both interrupted by Carter, who suddenly went over to the fridge and grabbed a beer.
“Jesus Christ,” I muttered, throwing my sticks down. “Everyone in this band had better pull their heads out of their asses if we’re ever going to make it.” I couldn’t keep myself from storming out of there. We needed more practice, but clearly it wasn’t going to happen now.
I headed back to my own house and sat down at my drum set in the corner. For a moment, I was too angry to play. Then, I started in on it, working out all of my frustrations.
The real trouble was that I couldn’t imagine the band without Mark or Carter. As frustrating as they’d been lately, they were founding members. Mark’s vocals were one of the things that we were known for. And Carter was a great guitarist when he wasn’t out of his mind. Not only that, but we had all leaned on one another over the past few years. We had been through thick and thin together. The idea of bringing in someone new now was unimaginable.
Yet.
I just couldn’t help thinking of th
e other possibilities. Could we find someone else to replace the two of them? Someone who could support Luke and me as we tried to capitalize on everything we had built so far, rather than dragging us down together as a team?
I slammed both of my sticks down on a cymbal crash. I didn’t want to think about that.
Was it naive to think that the four of us who had made it this far could keep going? It definitely seemed crazy to think that we could cut out half of the members of the band and keep our momentum, but it wasn’t like I could choose between Mark and Carter. I just wished they weren’t making things so damn complicated.
There was a shadow outside. This late in the afternoon, all shadows were long, but this one was particularly so. My new neighbor, whatever her name was, walking past on the sidewalk, dressed in smart-casual work clothes. I paused in my drumming automatically.
Then, I scowled. I couldn’t quit drumming every time I saw her come home. It was still early evening; it was my prerogative if I wanted to keep practicing. Maybe it would drive her crazy, but that was her problem. I hadn’t had any trouble before she moved in.
And if I wasn’t able to drum freely, I wasn’t going to get any better. Or be able to cope with all the shit that was going on.
Still, there was a part of me that felt bad about it. She had probably moved in there without any warning. Mr. Lake probably hadn’t heard my drumming during his time there, so it had never been an issue before. She likely thought that she was moving into a quiet, somewhat residential area.
That wasn’t my fault, but how she dealt with it wasn’t going to become my problem, either.
I went over there and knocked on the door, waiting for her to appear. The moment she answered the door, she seemed to realize her mistake. She started to shut the door on me, but I was worked up from the thing with Mark earlier, and I needed one thing to go right today. If it was this, then fine.
“Listen here,” I said before she could get a word in edgewise. “I’ve been living here for three years now, and I’ve always been able to drum whenever I wanted to. That’s not going to change now. So I suggest you invest in a good pair of noise-canceling headphones or something and learn to deal with it.”
I glared at her, but as she folded her arms across her chest again, I could see a speculative gleam of a challenge in her eyes. I had to admit, it turned me on a little to see that she wasn’t going to be cowed.
“Learn to deal?” she scoffed. “Have you read your lease terms lately? I don’t want to have to go to the landlord, but there are specific terms in there that stipulate the noise conditions. If you won’t adhere to those and he won’t do anything, well, I meant what I said the other night. I was just being nice because I just moved in here, but I’m not opposed to going to the police if I have to. I’m not going to put up with your shit. So I suggest that you find a way to deal, and maybe invest in some, I don’t know, noise-canceling drums.”
I stared dumbly at her. “Noise-canceling drums?” I finally snapped.
She shrugged. “I’m sure there’s something out there so that people like you don’t bug people like me in apartment complexes,” she said, tossing her hair back. It was then that I realized that it was loose today. The curls were no more contained than they had been the other night, but there was something about the way they played along the creamy skin of her jaw…
I dragged my eyes back to hers, narrowing my gaze. I couldn’t help the way that I was strangely attracted to her and her spunkiness, but I’ll be damned if I was going to let her know that. I wouldn’t let her have the upper hand.
“There’s nothing in my contract about noise,” I told her. “Anything that’s in yours must have been added after I signed on. Which again was years ago.”
She simply rolled her eyes, though. “Well, then I’ll talk to the police about the city noise ordinance. Whatever I have to do,” she insisted.
I stared at her. I couldn’t help but feel vaguely taken aback. This woman had some balls. I couldn’t help but feel admiration that she wasn’t going to put up with my dickhead demeanor.
All the same, I knew that I couldn’t give up. My career was at stake here. My freedom, my future, my release, everything.
Still, there was something about her that drew me in. I found myself wanting to get closer to her. So I did, crossing the gap between us. I leaned in, propping an arm against the door, hemming her in. “Where the hell did you come from, anyway?” I hardened my tone slightly. “Because around here, that’s just not how we do things.”
She stared up at me, her gaze stoic. Somehow, she didn’t seem even the slightest bit intimidated. “Where did I come from?” she echoed. “Out of your worst nightmares.”
I blinked at her and then laughed, shaking my head. I couldn’t help it. She was one of a kind.
Suddenly, the urge to kiss her struck me. The look on her face, though, told me that she would bite my lips off if I tried. I knew that we had accomplished everything that we would here and started to back out the door.
I turned back for one last look at her. Suddenly, with the light catching her in that way, burnishing her hair to a bright copper and making her green eyes look almost ethereal, winning the argument seemed a lot less important.
I stared at her, lost for words for a moment. Before I could gather my wits, she slammed the door shut in my face. I shook my head, but I was grinning as I walked away. My grin widened as she opened the door and shouted one last thing after me: “And the next time you push your way into my apartment like that, I’ll tack on trespassing as well!”
I chuckled.
Things with my new neighbor were certainly going to be interesting. I knew that this feud wouldn’t be enough to take my mind off my worries about the band, but it would at least be a welcome distraction.
4
Leah
I looked around at the group as Piper excused herself to the restroom for a moment. I couldn’t help but feel proud of myself. I might not be friends with most of the women who were scattered in our general vicinity, but I knew all of their names, and I didn’t think that I had offended anyone too badly just yet.
This was the first girls’ night out that I had been invited to with my new coworkers. Piper had invited me, and I took it that this was a weekly ritual. I was hoping that this would end that way for me as well.
I was so relieved that it was Piper who had been tapped to show me the ropes on my first day. She and I had become fast friends, and she had taken her duties beyond the office. She was funny, upbeat, and active, and she had offered to show me around LA as well as find me some friends. She had really taken me under her wing.
This was all still way out of my depth, but I had the feeling that if I stuck around with Piper for long enough, maybe I would start to feel like I belonged here. Eventually.
When she had invited me to this girls’ night, I guess I had expected something a little tamer. Maybe like the opportunity to get to know some of my new coworkers, maybe a karaoke night or pub trivia. Instead, we were at a crowded bar on Sunset Boulevard. The live music hadn’t started yet, but I could already barely hear myself think.
It wasn’t like we didn’t have this kind of thing back home, or some variant of it. This was a Wednesday night, though. Apparently weekdays—and workdays—didn’t seem to matter when you lived in LA. That was going to take some getting used to.
“You’re going to love the band,” one of Piper’s friends said, leaning in toward me so that she could be heard. “They’re really great. We’ve seen them a couple times before, and I think they could really explode.”
One of the other girls laughed and draped her arm around the first girl’s shoulders. “Ignore her. She only says that because she has the hots for the lead singer,” she joked.
“I mean, can you blame me?” the other girl said, rolling her eyes and grinning.
I glanced toward the stage, hoping to catch a glimpse of this attractive singer. There was still no one there, though. I turned back to th
e group. It didn’t matter, anyway. I wasn’t interested in going home with someone that night. I wasn’t interested in getting involved with rock stars in general.
And if I was interested, there’s only one rock star I’d be getting with, I thought, my mind flitting back to my sexy, tattooed neighbor with the bad attitude. That wasn’t going to happen, though. I was here for my career, and I was going to focus on that.
With that in mind, I turned to the girl next to me. “So, what department do you work in again?” I asked.
She groaned and put her hands over her ears. “You can’t use that four-letter word on a girls’ night out!” she proclaimed.
I blinked and looked around. The other girls were nodding in sage agreement. Megan’s eyes twinkled as she leaned forward. “We haven’t gone over the rules yet, but I’m not giving you a pass on that one,” she said. “Anyone so much as mentions work while we’re out at the bar, that means they have to buy a round of shots.”
I made a face. Surely she wasn’t serious, was she? I couldn’t remember the last time I had done shots—maybe sometime in college? Weren’t we all adults here? We all had to be in the office the next morning, and even though the anxieties of my first day on the job had somewhat worn off, I still didn’t want to mess anything up.
But I didn’t want to be the downer, or even more of the outsider than I already was. If this was the way they did things here in LA, then so be it.
Megan caught the bartender’s arm and ordered a round of tequila shots to be put on my tab. I tried not to grimace at that as well. I could only imagine how much shots cost in a bar in LA, even if it was a bit of a dive. I could probably pay my rent for the cost of a round.
Note to self, do not talk about work with these people, I thought.
The shot burned as it went down, and I couldn’t help but cough a little. I was used to having a couple of beers on a board game night, not doing shots with a group of girls who all let out a yell after they tipped one back.
The Boy Next Door: A Standalone Enemies-to-Lovers Romance Page 2