“I really love that you’re going to bang your hot neighbor.”
I am so tipsy that I barely even remember hailing a cab or walking up the stairs to my apartment. I vaguely remember the driver saying, “You’re not going to bang who?” so I guess I was thinking out loud again. But I’m definitely not going to bang him.
Now it’s eleven on a Saturday night, and my heels are making a lot of noise as I stomp lady-like toward my front door and take my time fiddling around with the lock, jangling my keys. Gosh, I hope I’m not bothering anyone with all the noise I’m making as I return home alone…and it certainly seems like I’m not bothering anyone. Which is fine.
He probably went out, and that’s good. He should. Maybe he went to see Vanessa. If so, good for him. That would make him a total idiot and I’d feel a little sick about it, but good for him!
I restlessly wander around my tiny apartment, picking random things up and then putting them back down. I don’t want to go out again, but I have too much energy to just get into bed. I have to do something. I check my phone to see if Sebastian sent me any messages. He’s been in such a weird funk the past few days. I barely see him when I’m at his office because he’s holed up in his studio, and when I do see him, he just moans a lot and needs emotional support.
He has not sent any messages.
I realize that I am staring at an overflowing laundry basket, and now I can cross one more thing off of my Will-Do list for today. Get back on track with my weekend plans. The plans that don’t involve thinking about or banging my hot neighbor.
Again, I barely remember walking down four flights of stairs while carrying my laundry basket and detergent, which is a tad alarming. But not as alarming as walking into the laundry room while thinking about Matt McGovern and then seeing Matt McGovern leaning against one of the washing machines, arms crossed, facing the door like he’s waiting for me. I don’t scream, but I do stand frozen in the doorway. Because he is looking at me in a way that he has never looked at me before. The way a man looks at a woman in a nightclub. His eyes move so slowly down the front of me to the cement floor.
“Nice boots.”
“Nice what?”
“Boots. On your feet.”
“Oh! Thank you.” It’s weird that I forgot to take off my high-heeled boots before coming down here. Normally I’d be in my Ugg boots. Normally, I wouldn’t be trying to make so much noise while walking around the building. I finally remember how to move and place my laundry basket on the floor in front of the other washing machine, the one against the opposite wall from the one he’s using. “You doing laundry?”
“No, I just like to come down here to think.” He’s grinning at me. Well, at least he’s not frowning. “Are you doing laundry?”
“Yes. I’m doing laundry.”
“You really shouldn’t be doing laundry down here by yourself at night.”
“Good thing I’m not by myself, then.”
He blows air out of his nostrils, which I am counting as a little laugh. I made Matt McGovern laugh a little. What a magical night. I think we can be friends.
“You have fun at your thing?”
“Yes, I did.” Even though I was thinking about you the whole time.
“Great.”
“Did you have a good evening?”
“Fantastic.”
“Great.”
I don’t think the laundry room has ever smelled this good, like clean clothes and dirty man and dear Lord—how can anyone look so attractive in sweat pants and a T-shirt? It’s just not right. Maybe if I don’t look at or smell him, it will be easier to be friends. If I were smart, I’d keep my eyes shut and hold my breath until I can get away from him.
As I bend down to place all of my clothes into the washing machine, I am suddenly very conscious of how unbearably amazing my ass probably looks in these jeans and decide to squat instead. I don’t want him to think I’m bending over to flaunt my amazing ass in his face. But I can’t squat. Because my jeans are too tight. So, my soon-to-be-friend Matt McGovern is getting a sweet eyeful of premium Bernadette Butt. I know this, because I peek over my shoulder and catch him staring. Instead of quickly looking away, his gaze slowly rises to meet mine.
“Nice jeans,” he says. “They look expensive.”
I clear my throat. “They weren’t cheap.”
“Guess that’s one of the benefits of working for Sebastian Smith.”
“And one of the benefits of living in this building,” I say coyly. I wait for him to smirk before turning back to face the washing machine.
“You’re mixing your lights and darks?” He just can’t stop judging me.
“It’s a big machine and I don’t practice segregation. So far, in my whole life, I’ve only ruined two white shirts.” I shrug. “They’re just clothes.”
“You’re as serious about laundry as you are about being a vegetarian.”
“Except I don’t even feel guilty about turning white shirts pale blue. You having any luck with the apartment hunting?”
“I’m not having any luck finding the time to apartment hunt.”
“Oh really? I would have thought you had plenty of free time, given that your cool downtown friends refuse to hang out with you up here and apparently you don’t like to hang out down there anymore.”
“Oh, I like to hang out down there,” he says in a tone of voice that makes me wonder which “down there” he’s referring to. “I’ve just been avoiding going down there lately.”
I don’t turn around to look at him because I don’t think I could handle it if he’s staring back at me and also because my eyes are bulging out of their sockets. “Umm…you mean because of your girlfriend?”
“Ex-girlfriend.”
“Did she get in touch with you at all? After this morning?” He doesn’t respond while I’m pouring the detergent into the detergent drawer, while I close the detergent drawer, or while I check my pockets for the quarters that I forgot to bring. I swear under my breath.
When I turn to ask him if I can borrow some from him, he is right there, two inches from me. There are four quarters in the palm of his large, capable, open hand.
“Thank you.” I watch him as he reaches around me to drop the quarters into the slots. He notices me shivering.
“Cold?”
No, I just had another orgasm zap while watching you insert things into slots. “Yeah. It’s chilly down here.”
“Cold water? You have to choose your settings.”
“I do know how to operate a washing machine.”
“Proceed.”
He steps back to the other washing machine and re-crosses his arms. He’s never going to answer that question I asked about his ex-girlfriend, so I’ll ask another one.
“How’d you meet her? Vanessa. If you don’t mind my asking.”
He looks down at his feet and scratches his head. “At work.”
“Really?” That’s surprising. “Isn’t she a model?”
“She is now. I mean, she was doing some modeling when we first met but just to pay for law school.”
“Oh. So she’s a lawyer? A model slash lawyer?” A unicorn. Your ex-girlfriend is a fucking unicorn with perfect bangs, and you’re here in a laundry room with me on a Saturday night?
“She never ended up becoming a lawyer. She didn’t finish law school because the modeling jobs became so lucrative. So now she’s just a model.”
She’s just a model. I finally start the load and turn to face him. He’s still staring at his feet. Still having feelings about his ex-girlfriend. Mixed feelings, I’m sure, but feelings nonetheless.
“She must miss Daisy.”
He snorts. “I’m sure she must.”
“Have you been seeing other people?”
“Other people?”
“Anyone?”
He shakes his head, almost imperceptibly.
“Fooling around?”
“Is that a request?” He smirks, big-time, revealing a dimple.
“When I request something from you, Esquire, you’ll know it.”
Dimple’s staying put, and I will take that as a “no” to my question.
“Surely you’ve gotten hammered at strip clubs with your bros.”
“Not since I was in my early twenties. Your concern is touching.”
“Awww. Were you afraid of getting into a Ross and Rachel ‘we were on a break’ situation?”
There goes the dimple. “I am a thirty-two-year-old man—I don’t make life decisions based on episodes of nineties sitcoms.”
“Except for this time.”
He sighs. “Except for this one time.”
I lean against my washing machine and cross my arms over my chest, mirroring him. “I think that’s sweet.” I need to stop asking questions about his ex-girlfriend. I need to stop wondering why they broke up. He needs to stop staring at me because it’s cold down here in the basement and my nipples are pointing right at him, like hey you, yeah you, over here! “So, why’d you guys break up?” I can’t believe I asked that. I don’t usually ask guys this many personal questions. I don’t usually ask anyone this many personal questions.
He takes three slow steps toward me, arms still crossed, brow furrowed. “I think we’re done talking about my ex-girlfriend.”
“What do you want to talk about?”
I drop my arms to the side and push back against the washing machine just as his arms reach out on either side of me. He presses his hands down on top of the laundry machine and lowers his mouth to my ear. “I want to talk about you, Bernie.”
“Don’t call me Bernie,” I whisper.
And then my butt starts vibrating against the metal of the machine. It’s the phone in my back pocket. I am staring at Matt McGovern’s mouth as it hovers, inches away from mine, but instead of doing what every single cell in my body wants me to do, I reach for the phone and look down to check the Caller ID.
It’s Sebastian. If he’s calling me this late on a Saturday night, it’s because he’s really stressed-out and needs to talk.
“I have to take this,” I say, watching his jaw clench. “It’s work.”
9
Matt
“It’s work,” she says.
Fucking millionaire artists and their Saturday night work calls.
The cell phone reception down here is terrible, of course, so I back away from her and she runs out of the laundry room in her sexy black boots, leaving me with the heavenly scent of her shampoo and a dick that’s about to start doing jumping jacks in these sweat pants.
I’m glad she left.
This would have been a bad idea anyway.
Coming down here to do my laundry was a dumb idea. Normally I’d have my laundry picked up and delivered, like my aunt does. Instead, I decided to hang out in a basement on a Saturday night in the off-chance I’d run into my neighbor.
There’s about twenty minutes left on my dryer cycle and half an hour for the load in the washing machine. No point waiting around.
I count to twenty and then go up to my apartment. Bernadette left a scent trail along the stairwell and in the hall outside our units. I can hear her talking just inside her door, in a calm soothing voice. Her boss is probably having one of those “it’s so hard to be a rich, famous painter that people expect brilliant things from” kind of breakdowns, and it’s her job to remind him that he’s a genius and everything’s fine.
He just better not ask her to do any actual work for him now.
Daisy doesn’t even run to the door when I come in. She’s all curled up on the dog bed on the living room floor with her chew toy. I am not having much luck with the ladies tonight. Some days the magic works, and some days it doesn’t.
I go to the guest room to change into a pair of jeans. Jeans that are better at keeping my body’s secrets from beautiful, fragrant, sassy young women who happen to be doing laundry within a few feet of me in revealing little sweaters and tight jeans and sexy black boots. I can hear her through the vent now, still talking in that soothing voice. I don’t like that she’s talking to him while she’s in her bedroom, but at least she’s still at home.
I also don’t like that I care so much that she’s talking to her boss, when she could be talking to me…when she could be not talking to me.
I pull my phone out of the pocket of my sweat pants and toss it onto the bed while I change. There’s another unread text from Vanessa on there that I’m going to have to look at eventually. I didn’t hear from her at all after running into her a few weeks ago, but two hours after seeing her and that Todd guy this morning, I got a “Great to see you!” text. I didn’t respond to it because what would I say? “Not very great seeing you with your new boyfriend, and oh, by the way, since when do you have a new boyfriend?”
Then I got another text from her that said: You look like you’re doing great. That girl seems nice…
I didn’t reply to that one either.
That girl is nice.
But I’m not going to get into a text conversation with Vanessa about what kind of relationship I have with her because I don’t have a relationship with her.
I can hear Bernadette laughing in her bedroom. Sounds pretty fake to me. There is no way that Sebastian Smith is funny. I’ve seen pictures of him. He looks like an interesting guy, he looks like a charismatic guy, but there’s no way he makes her laugh for real. I could make her laugh. I could make her feel all kinds of good things.
I zip up my jeans and pick up my phone to open the message from Vanessa, the one she sent four hours ago: Glad you’re happy, Matthew. You deserve it.
Well, isn’t that swell of her to say so. What a great ex-girlfriend she is. I don’t even care if she’s trying to alleviate her own guilt about moving on so quickly or if she’s trying to leave the door open a crack for me to tell her I’m not happy. I just know that when Bernadette Farmer put her arm around me this morning and rested her head on my arm in front of Vanessa and her Todd guy, all I could think about was how sad it is that I spent so many months of my life trying to convince myself that I had to make things work with Vanessa when she never once did anything like that for me. It was a small thing, but it was an act of kindness. And I’d been trying to keep that wall between us for a month.
Fuck that wall.
Fuck our differences.
Fuck Sebastian Smith.
I do deserve to be happy.
It doesn’t have to be complicated.
It doesn’t have to be messy.
I’m tired of wondering what Bernadette Farmer is like in bed.
I’m going to find out.
I don’t hear her talking or fake-laughing anymore. It doesn’t feel right to just knock on her door, and it doesn’t seem cool to just open my door right when she happens to be going back down to the laundry room, and it definitely wouldn’t be cool for me to just go down and wait around for her to show up. I pick up my laptop and open up iMessages, type in her email address. Let’s see if Miss Farmer is still busy with work…
Me: If there’s an art emergency, I just want you to know that I’d be happy to wake up one of the other neighbors to get them to finish doing your laundry for you.
BF: Art crisis averted. You may continue being a surly neighbor.
Me: Surly?! Surely you don’t mean that. Would a surly neighbor buy you a hot dog from a street vendor when you were planning to do something else?
BF: …I really am sorry about…you know…what happened earlier…
Me: We’re done talking about that.
BF: Surly!
Me: I didn’t mean that in a surly way.
BF: How would I know that if you don’t include an emoji?
Me: I deeply regret texting you.
BF:
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br /> Me: How do you know I’m not still in the laundry room?
BF: How do you know I’M not still in the laundry room?
Me: Because you just asked me to accompany you back down there. Are you drinking MORE wine?
BF: …Shut up, McGovern.
I give Daisy a kiss on the head before grabbing more quarters and heading out the door. I’m willing to bet that Miss Farmer forgot to bring her own again. True to form, just as she steps out into the hallway and locks her door, she curses under her breath and starts to unlock it again.
“I got quarters,” I say. “Hot dogs are on you next time.”
She smiles as she holds out her hand. “My hero.”
“Once again, let’s not get too excited.” When my fingers graze the palm of her hand as I place the coins in it, I swear I notice her shiver again. She does look like she has magical fingers. Aunt Dolly was right about that.
She has changed out of her sexy black boots and into a pair of furry slipper boots, but it does nothing to dampen her appeal. We say absolutely nothing, all the way down to the basement. The overhead basement lights are on all the time, and while it’s far from romantic, I think it’s safe to say that we’re both acutely aware of how sexy it feels to be the only two people down here in the middle of the night. To be honest, it feels sexy to be the only two people living on the top floor of this building as well. It almost feels like we’re roommates more than neighbors.
But we aren’t.
We are two steps away from being something other than friendly neighbors, and I am so ready to take those steps.
I put my wet dark clothes into the dryer and start folding the dry light-colored ones on the table along the back wall of the room, while Bernadette hastily shoves all of her wet clothes into the dryer. It’s kind of refreshing, this lack of reverence for her clothes. The two women I’ve lived with—my mother and Vanessa—gave their wardrobes the same careful consideration and attention as their skin and hair, which meant that any tear, stain, split-end, wrinkle, or pimple signaled the end of the world.
The Brooklyn Book Boyfriends Page 29