Bad Neighbor

by Molly O'Keefe

  “That’s boxing.”

  “Yeah, I know, I’m just…if you’re going to be serious about this, don’t you need some guy in your corner to squirt water in your mouth? To tell you to do a few more push-ups? Hit the cow carcass one more time?”

  He was smiling at me. “What?” I lifted a hand to my face, sure I had egg yolk on my chin.

  “You talk a lot.”

  “I do.” I winced.

  “I like it.”

  Well, that was pretty nicely done.

  “And no,” he said. “I don’t need any of that stuff. I’m all right on my own.”

  I looked up, about to argue because was anyone really all right on their own? Wasn’t that the lie introverts told themselves? Being an introvert myself, I’d told myself that lie one or three hundred times.

  “I felt that way before I got an agent. I had some work and I was making money, but when I got an agent it was like my whole life worked better because she was getting me better jobs and better pay. It’s not exactly the same thing.”

  “It’s not.”

  “But sort of?“

  “No.”

  He was watching me so intently that I shrugged and went back to eating just so I had something to do. I noticed he did not go back to eating. And the vibe between us got chilly.

  “You have a brother,” I said, having polished off the avocado. There was never enough avocado if you asked me.

  “Yeah. You got family?”

  “Not here.” I didn’t want to talk about my sister. I wasn’t supposed to be talking about my sister. I mean, it seemed so ridiculous that Jesse would have anything to do with the guy she was running away from, but I wasn’t taking any chances. “Where’s your brother?”

  “Here. In the city.”

  “You close?”

  “Not anymore.”

  “What happened?”

  “I don’t know, what usually happens? I disappointed him. He pissed me off. My parents aren’t around to make us apologize. Who the fuck cares?” His words were hard and sharp. Little projectiles he threw at me.

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Fuck, what are you apologizing for?” he snapped and I sat back. “Sorry,” he muttered, dropping his fork on the plate. “I’m not good at this…shit.”

  “What shit? Talking to people?”

  “Talking to people I want to fuck.”

  I blinked. Blinked again.

  “Stop,” he said with that laser intensity I’d grown to expect from him. Like he couldn’t be bothered with peeling me apart and instead was just going to slice me right open. “Stop with the wide-eye act. Last night—”

  “I don’t do that kind of thing. On the regular.”

  “No shit,” he laughed, but it wasn’t joyful. Or kind, really.

  “Why…why are you being mean?”

  “Because I am fucking mean. What did you expect?”

  “Okay,” I said and stood up on shaky legs. “This was a mistake.”

  “Running away?” he asked. “How am I not surprised?”

  “You’re being awful. Am I supposed to just stay here and take it?”

  He didn’t say anything. Just sat back with his arms crossed over his gray tee shirt, and watched me. I stepped for the door and then remembered my bodum. I couldn’t leave it here—it wouldn’t survive in this hostile environment—so I reached back and grabbed it. Sloshing coffee on myself, but I barely felt it and could not care.

  “Bye Jesse.”

  “Yep.”

  Numb, I got back to my apartment, unlocking and then shutting the door behind me when I was inside. I could be prickly when it came to talking about my family—but he was fucking nuclear. He just bombed that whole thing because he didn’t want to answer questions about his brother.

  I had issues, but jeez.

  There was a knock at my door and before I could turn and answer it, it was open and Jesse was walking through. His face set like a man who had business to do.

  And I was the business.

  “What—?”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Okay.”

  “I’m not that guy,” he said, stepping up to me, crowding me against my kitchen counter.

  “What guy?”

  “The fucking make breakfast for you guy.”

  “No kidding,” I said with a smile like the slice of a knife. “What guy are you?”

  But my body knew. My body knew what guy he was. And like he knew he didn’t have to answer, he didn’t bother. His mouth was on mine.

  He kissed me like it was the end of the world. Like this was the last thing he was going to do on this earth before everything went up in smoke. And I’d never been kissed like that. And I’d had no idea what I’d been missing.

  A kiss like this? Full-mouthed, lips and tongue and teeth, a hand gripped hard around my braid? This was something I could get addicted to. This was something I could stop my life in order to get. This…

  This was sex. Sex the way it was in movies. And books.

  I felt primal all of a sudden, and I realized that I was kissing him the way he was kissing me. My hands were fists in his shirt. I sucked on his tongue. Bit his lip. I ate him like he was an avocado and I was starving.

  My back hit my fridge because he’d pushed me there. His hand cupped my chin, lifting my head as he backed an inch away from my mouth.

  “I’m sorry I’m a dick,” he whispered, his breath washing my lips, my face. Covering me in his scent.

  I swallowed back the words I’m sorry I’m so sensitive because I was tired of being that girl. The girl who made the people who hurt her feel better for having hurt her. I said instead, like I was in a movie: “Make it up to me.”

  His lip kicked up, his eyes got heavy. Dark. I could feel him against my belly. A hard thing and I pushed against him, just pressed my belly to his, trapping his cock between our bodies.

  “Yeah,” he said and licked my mouth. Not a kiss. A lick and I gasped, my skin on fire. My brain sparking and short-circuiting.

  Jesse kissed my breasts, palmed them roughly in his rough hands. Bit the hard nipple through the silly fabric of my silly dress.

  I gasped, a choked “Yes” coming out of my throat.

  And then he was on his knees in front of me, pushing my skirt up. Hands cupping the backs of my thighs. Some sound gurgled out of my throat and I stopped breathing.

  “Lift your skirt, Charlotte,” he breathed and I did what he asked. With shaking hands I lifted my skirt until it was just his breath against the black silk of my underwear.

  My eyes were closed, my head tipped back and when his tongue touched me, a tiny taste through the silk of my underwear, I jumped. I jumped and groaned, and he groaned and went back for more.

  Guys had gone down on me before, sure. But they’d seemed sort of tepid events. Uncomfortable for everyone involved. Nothing like this. Not ever like this.

  Not standing in my kitchen, with him on his knees in front of me. Not through my underwear like some kind of electric barrier between his body and mine.

  No one like Jesse.

  “Spread your legs,” he murmured and I did. And he licked me deep and hard, my underwear soaked. From him. From me. I twitched and moaned and he went back for more, his hands sliding up from my thighs to my ass, where he palmed me, gripped me.

  Held me still.

  And ravaged me.

  I held my skirt with one hand and braced myself against the counter with the other. He pushed my underwear down to my knees and I had to swallow back cries as he found my clit with his tongue and slipped his fingers inside me.

  I was made of lightning and fire. I was twitching out of my skin. The pressure inside my body too much to bear and I had to crack, something had to crack—and then he sucked me into his mouth and I came. I came so hard my knees buckled and I would have fallen if he hadn’t caught me. His hands braced against my stomach.

  Condoms, I thought. I didn’t have any. And we were going to need some. A bunch. He
stood up in one fluid movement, his hands leaving my hips to hold on to the counter behind me.

  I was panting like I’d run up and down a flight of steps and he was staring down at me, his face…shiny. I stepped out of my underwear, leaving it a silk puddle on the floor.

  “We need condoms,” I said, watching his tongue part his lips to lick at what was left of me all over his face.

  He shook his head and kissed me. Sweet and soft. “I’m sorry I was an ass,” he said and stepped away.

  “No, don’t…leave. Not like that.” I gestured weakly to the erection in his pants. I thought of the day when he’d fixed all my stuff and I’d had that little fantasy of going to my knees in front of him and I stepped forward, ready to give him that.

  Wanting to give him that.

  But he caught me. Shook his head.

  “You don’t want…that?”

  His mouth quirked and he shook his head. “I was an ass to you today. That shit you said about your agent and me getting a trainer, you were right.”

  Oh God, my God that was so… gentlemanly.

  “You shouldn’t be scared of wanting more,” I said. “Of thinking you deserve more.”

  “Well,” he said, looking dubious, “let’s not get carried away.”

  “You’re forgiven and I want to give you something,” I said. “Last night…today?”

  He nodded, his face red and tight like he was just barely holding on, and I had no idea what was holding him back, but it was real. And he wasn’t going to try and break free. His fingers on my shoulders slipped underneath the straps of my dress and slowly pulled them down, until they were limp against my arms.

  “You can give me this,” he whispered.

  “What?”

  “You can let me see you. Your body.”

  He found the zipper at the back and slowly, while I breathed hard in my throat, he lowered it. The bodice of my silly dress fell away and instinctively I caught it.

  “No,” he breathed, his eyes past dilated. He wanted to see me. Like this. In the milky sunlight coming in through my bumblebee curtains.

  I let go of the dress and it fell down, away from my breasts. I caught it at my waist and wished that my hair was down instead of back in this braid so I could tilt my head forward and hide.

  “Jesus,” he breathed and lifted a trembling hand toward my breasts. They were big. And I never thought much of them. But Jesse seemed… transfixed. His fingers stroked the pale skin, a blue vein just visible under the surface. My pink nipples were hard and painful and he ran the backs of his fingers across one and then the other.

  “I was right,” he whispered. “You’re so fucking soft.”

  “It’s…they’re…” I made some gurgling sound of despair and tilted my face away.

  “Fucking perfect,” he said. “Fuck. Charlotte. I’m sorry.”

  And then, like he couldn’t stop himself he reached into his shorts, pulling the elastic band down so his cock sprang free and I stared openmouthed as he palmed his cock, stroked himself, hard and fast three… four times and then groaned.

  His hand gripped my shoulder hard enough I might be bruised tomorrow.

  And he came in gasping, grunting spurts. A white arc of come splashing against my dress. Against the bare skin of my stomach. Over his hand.

  Immediately, like it was an instinct and nothing else I wanted to lick his hands, I wanted to taste his come.

  “Fuck,” he breathed, his head pressed down on mine and I could feel his sweat. “Sorry.”

  “No,” I said, fast and eager. “Don’t… don’t be sorry. That…” I couldn’t not grin at him. “That was really hot.”

  He laughed wearily and tucked himself back under his shorts. I began to shrug into my dress but he stopped me. He reached back behind his head and pulled his shirt off, in what had to be the sexiest way to take off a shirt ever in the history of both shirts and men, and then cleaned off my stomach. Wiping away what he’d left behind.

  And then he did the same with his hands. Balling the shirt up in one hand when it was done.

  “You all right?” he asked.

  “Fine,” I laughed. “Great.”

  “Someday,” he said, “you’re going to tell me what you’re doing here.”

  “I told you… my boyfriend kicked me out.”

  “Why don’t I believe you?”

  Because I’m a shitty liar.

  I blinked up at him, stunned a little that that was what he was thinking about and then, before I could formulate some lie, he was gone.

  And frankly, I didn’t know what I was doing here.

  Chapter Eleven

  Charlotte

  It was a completely stupid idea. I totally understood that. Like in the pantheon of bad ideas, this wasn’t like… nuclear bombs, but it wasn’t quite as harmless as the Slanket either.

  I’d had my hand smacked by Jesse plenty, I didn’t need to go searching out more reasons for him to be a dick to me. Perhaps any other woman would think Jesse had some kind of personality disorder, and frankly I had plenty of evidence pointing me in that direction. But there was something about him, something in the way he watched me out of the corner of his eye that reminded me a little of… me.

  And because I was an idiot, I put the curtains I’d picked up at the hardware store—that had been on super discount because they were dark and ugly as hell—and propped them against the door.

  I was just going to leave them there, but then I realized if I did there was a 100% chance of them being stolen. Maybe I’d knock and then run away, so when he opened the door they’d just be there.

  Which was also dumb, because he’d know they were from me. Like some random stranger would go around leaving curtains against his door?

  “This is so stupid.”

  “What is so stupid?” a voice asked over my shoulder, and I turned to find Jesse standing there. Dressed head to toe in gray sweats, drenched in sweat.

  “You’re not supposed to be running,” I said.

  His eyebrows lifted. “I’m not?”

  Oh man. It was like I’d just confessed to stalking. “You just usually don’t… you know…run at this time.”

  “I don’t?”

  Oh, okay. Now he was laughing at me and I felt the awful blush creep up my face.

  “I’m not stalking you.”

  “Clearly.”

  “It’s just our walls are thin.”

  He nodded. “They are.”

  “Stop laughing at me.”

  “Okay.” He leaned forward and kissed me, a light brush across my cheek. Agreeable Jesse was more potent than angry Jesse, it was like having a furious dragon curl up in my hand. “I’m running more because I have another fight in two weeks.”

  “Oh.” That news sent dread spinning through my stomach as I remembered his swollen busted-up hands from his last fight. The way he stumbled down the hall, his shoulder against the wall so he wouldn’t fall over.

  Awful. All of it awful.

  “That explains what I’m doing outside my door,” he said. “What are you doing?”

  “I bought you curtains,” I blurted. “Stupid right? Just… make fun of me and I’ll be on my way.”

  He pulled the ear bud out of his other ear and pushed the gray hood off his face and I had to look away. That’s how handsome he was. How perfect and raw and hot.

  My mouth literally watered.

  “You bought me curtains?”

  “Sure did. I mean, don’t get excited, they were on super discount. I think they’re… denim. Yep. I bought you denim curtains for like ten bucks.”

  He looked at me with this weird little smile on his face. “No one has ever bought me curtains before.”

  “Well, that’s swell, I’ve never bought anyone curtains. But I just figure with the non-orgy orgies you have, you should have some nice thick curtains over your windows so weirdos like me don’t just show up and watch…”

  Oh. Shut. Up. Charlotte.

  “You just ca
n’t stop talking, can you?”

  “Nope. Not even a little.”

  He picked up the plastic bag with the curtains in it. The clearance sticker told him exactly how little I paid.

  “It was stupid,” I whispered, reaching out for them. I didn’t know what to do with him. Where exactly he was supposed to sit in my life. Where I was supposed to sit in his. All I knew was that I wanted more of him. I wanted more sex. And more kissing. I wanted to stroke his hair and talk about wrestling and what made him so upset about his brother that he couldn’t talk about him.

  I wanted more of Jesse. More than I’d ever wanted from anyone else outside of my sister. I hadn’t realized how much room Abby took up until she was gone.

  “I’ll take them back.”

  “Nope,” he said and opened his door. He walked through, leaving me behind him in the hallway, unsure of what was happening. “You can come help me put them up.”

  “I don’t… there’s no curtain rod.”

  “I’ve got duct tape,” he said with a grin that was really the end of me.

  I felt a little bit like I was making friends with a bear. Some creature that might snap my head off one minute or curl up in my lap the next, and I couldn’t blame the bear for being a bear. Not really.

  I could blame myself, because it wasn’t smart to befriend a bear. I knew that. Perhaps it was simpler to have sex with the bear and avoid anything else. But somehow I bought the curtains. And somehow I walked right into his apartment.

  In the bedroom, my breath hitched and my palms got sweaty and I fumbled with the package as I tried to open it. Jesse pulled the duct tape off the sheets on the wall, and the “curtains” fell to the floor, revealing Jesse’s view.

  The parking garage.

  He stood staring at it for a moment, long enough that I noticed.

  “You okay?”

  He nodded and bent over, wadding up the sheets.

  “You… nervous about the fight?”

  “The guy I’m fighting… he’s pretty legit.”

  “And you aren’t?”

  He grinned at me, letting me know how legit he was. “He’s just got sponsors and shit, you know? A guy in the corner who squirts water in his mouth.”

  He tossed my words back at me with a smile that did nothing to hide how strangely uneasy he was. Pensive.