Windows_by_JM_Snyder

Chapter 2

The house next door’s been empty for a good six months. I remember John talking about buying it at one point, though he was living with me at the time. Two houses, that would’ve been classic—he could’ve kept his playmates over there and I’d never have known. We even took in the realtor’s tour once, looked around inside, but that’s as far as John went with it, thank God. I don’t know what I’d do if I had to see him now on a daily basis. My hands still shake with anger just thinking about him.

It’s a small house, one story, what they call a bungalow, with a wide front porch framed by twin columns and probably dates back to the late twenties. A Sears home, I think—mine is, too, but I have the second floor option with two bedrooms upstairs. I’m in the middle of redoing one of them, the one where John used to keep his clothes and things to separate them from mine. I’m putting in a computer room there, though I’ve only managed to get the walls stripped so far. I haven’t really had the time to devote to the project until now. But I have the next few weeks off—shutdown at the plant, plus an extra week and a half for vacation, which makes it a month, starting Monday. I’ll get the room knocked out and that’ll finally be the last trace of John from this house.

I do like the place next door, though; it’s cute. It’s only a few feet from my house, and my windows look into every room. There’s a kitchen, a large combination living room/dining room in the front, two small bedrooms in the back, and one bathroom between them, that’s it. A privacy fence hems an in-ground pool, and there’s a patio out back too, I like that a lot. It’s not too private, though—from my second room I can look down inside the fence at the tiled deck and the pool. I wonder if Bradley’s the swimming type. With those trunks he had on, that tan, those arms, I don’t doubt the backyard was a big selling point for him.

I should go over, do the good neighbor routine and just say hi, introduce myself since our houses are only four or five feet apart and my chain-link fence stops where the wooden pickets of his begin. But I remember the look Rudy gave me, possessive, smug, and that stops me. I’m not playing Mr. Rogers to someone like him.

Because it’s nice out and my windows are open, I hear them all day long as they finish moving in. Bradley is loud, to say the least—always laughing or pouting or yelling at Rudy to put that down, right there, right there, is he deaf? The type of guy who makes a big production out of everything. I must admit a part of me likes that—I’ve always been partial to the flamboyant ones. Me, I’m wallflower material; I disappear in crowds and nobody looks twice at me, no one really notices I’m there unless I want them to. I’m unforgettable, I know, and I’m a damn good lover—I bring home flowers and chocolates out of the blue. I’m amazing in bed, I know that too, but I’m not one to do the whole club scene or cruise the muscle bars, I’m not one to hold hands in public or kiss in the front yard. I’m sure of myself and my sexuality but it’s private, it’s mine, and I don’t have to flaunt it.

But a guy like Bradley thrives on that. I can easily see him on the beach hitting on anyone with a d**k in a tight Speedo, or in a movie theater giggling with his lover as they share a tub of popcorn, or in the grocery store flipping through the latest issue of Cosmo and asking if these actresses even look in the mirror before they leave the house, who’d let themselves be seen in public dressed like that? He’d make life fun, I suspect. He’d make it dramatic and real and alive, every emotion felt to the hilt, every day lived to the fullest. Yeah, I could really use a boy like that, if only to lose myself in, make me forget about John, help me move on.

Only he’s with that Rudy jerk and I don’t need anyone else right now, I’m doing fine, really I am. So I turn on the TV, cranking the volume up loud, but it doesn’t quite manage to drown out the sound of Bradley’s voice or his bubbly laughter. When I heat up a frozen dinner in the microwave, I stand at the sink and tell myself I’m not watching him through the window, I’m not.

But there are no curtains next door yet and I can stare straight into the living room, where Bradley’s stretched out on a couch with one arm flung dramatically over his eyes, the light from a floor lamp casting his skin into bronze. His chest and arms and legs look so smooth, sculpted like a work of art, and I can see the thick bones of his hips, the slightly rounded abdomen beneath his belly button where his trunks hang down too far to be decent. I don’t realize I’m staring until the microwave beeps and startles me. As if he hears it, Bradley stirs and calls out, “Rudy? I’m hungry.”

If Rudy replies, I don’t hear it. Come over here, baby, I think, extracting the hot tray from the microwave. I got something I think might fill you up.

Where the hell did that come from? I’m usually not like this—I don’t talk trash and moon over boys like a lovesick teenager. I’m thirty-two, my pining days long over. And Bradley might have a hellacious body but I wouldn’t be surprised to find out he’s barely legal.

He bought the house, my mind whispers.

I try to ignore it—I’m not going after someone right now, especially not anyone I live next to and not anyone who already has a lover, I’m not playing that game at all.

Still, the voice is insistent and as I eat my dinner over the sink, I watch Bradley on his couch and tell myself banks don’t finance mortgages for kids just out of high school. And he keeps saying it’s his house—I hear every word he says, like he’s onstage and the whole world is an audience to his life. I wonder what it’d be like, to live that large.

Bradley draws in a deep breath and calls out, “Ruuudy! Baby, I’m hungry.” I smile into my tray and wonder what it’d be like, to love someone like that.