What The Hell Happened?

2

A few days later, Phil went back to New York.

I already miss him so much.

The only reason I hadn't gone to visit was partly because of my job. I needed to be at an International Librarianship Conference next week. Also, because I heard rumours that Alex and Freddie had patched things up, and I most definitely didn't want to run into them, though that'd be unlikely.

Tattooed Neighbour and I had not crossed paths since that incident when Phil was visiting. Even though I hadn't seen him around, his loud music accompanied by his horrendous voice woke me up every morning. I couldn't even place the artist whose music he always played, all I knew was that it was certainly R&B. I was always at the library most afternoons to overseer the activities going on there, so my mornings were often free. But due to my trauma, I had difficulty sleeping at night and I needed to catch some shut-eye in the morning.

It got to a point that I seriously couldn't handle the singing anymore. If he was not singing along to the stereo, he was singing to his MP3 player and if these two were down, he was steaming on his phone and singing along to it, I mean come on! If he wanted to become a musician so bad didn't he know the right way to go about it? Wasn't it enough that my individual life was in an upheaval that he should choose to torture me with his croaky voice? I didn't care how much of an eye-candy he was; I was going to talk things out with my neighbour.

Wednesday morning, I pulled myself out of bed and shower, throwing on some shorts. I powdered my face in a bid to hide the dark bags beneath my eyes and style my hair too, then walked over to his door and knocked.

He opened, wearing a white sleeveless top and grasping a guitar with loose strings - his hair dishevelled from sleep. "Yes?"

"I need to talk to you about your music."

"And I thought you brought me cookies."

"No. I'm sorry. I wouldn't have the energy to bake given that your horrible singing keeps me up all through the f*****g night."

"Well I'm sorry my talent upsets you, but I can't do anything about it. I'll be finishing my second studio album soon and a lot of work needs to be done."

"What are the rest of us going to do in the meantime?"

He shrugged. "I see no one else complaining, except you. Why don't you try using earplugs?"

"Seriously. Isn't there at least something you can do to tone down the noise and make it a bit more bearable?"

"Aside from putting a stop to my project and losing gains - No, there's nothing I can do. You'd just have to endure it."

I was breathing out steam by now. "How can they allow you to make so much noise here? You're not even the landlord."

"Look, if you want to take this up with him, go right ahead. I can't stop you. But I can't compromise anything right now so you can catch up on some beauty sleep. I just can't, I have a project to finish."

"Well, I think I have no choice left but to do that. Thanks for your suggestion." I walked away and heard his door slam behind me soon after.

The second I stepped into my apartment, the singing started again.

Tired, I laid on my bed hating that I had to take his advice using earplugs, grabbing my Bose noise-reducing headphones and placed them on my ears to block out some of the sounds, so I ended up sleeping a bit to Ariana Grade's No Tears Left To Cry. But I slept on my side. The earplugs were only a solution when I slept on my back. As I gazed up at the ceiling, thoughts of my tattoed neighbour ran through my mind.

He'd smelled so f*****g good like cigarettes, musk and man. And to think he was off-limits, mean and sexy fuelled my forbidden thoughts. Just like I'd learned from Dr Ginny, suppression leads to obsession. The more you tell yourself not to think about something, the more you'll think about it.

The mid-morning sun streamed through the window, casting its blinding rays upon my groggy eyes. I noticed the music had stopped. He must have gone out for a jog.

I had a couple of hours before I was due to report to work, so I decided to search for the phone number of the building's owner. The agent who'd helped me secure this apartment had been pretty lax. Figuring he wouldn't take the noise complaint seriously, I had to take it up to the top. I'd never spoken to the landlord before because at that time I wanted to move in, the agent told me he was out of town.

Surfing the internet, I came across the name Chester Finnicky with a phone contact attached which opened up to a voicemail. I hung up without leaving a message because I wanted to speak to someone in person. I traced the address left to the second floor of this building. Deciding to head up there, I slipped on some shorts and brushed my hair.

It was a door tucked at a corner and from the sand particles on the floormat, I could tell that the apartment was uninhabited, but pressing my ears softly against the wooden door I detected a movement from the other side. Knocking gently, I took a deep breath and waited. When the door opened, the sight of him nearly knocked me out cold.

Tattooed Neighbour stood there in nothing but blue sweatpants and that stupid bandana again. I could hear the blood pulsing in my ears as I stared at the sweat dripping down his forehead to his toned chest.

"Yes?"

I really couldn't believe it, I mean this wasn't his apartment. He stayed next door to mine. He couldn't have a second place. "What are you doing here?"

"Fancy you'd say that. This is my place."

"No. Downstairs is. Next door to mine."

"That's right. That's my apartment, this is my home. My Dad stays here with my stepfamily. He's the landlord."

"Oh."

Suddenly, it dawned on me why he was allowed to do as he pleased. His father was the landlord and for all, I knew he must have left Tattooed Neighbour in charge of things while away.

"Well, this explains how you're able to be an arsehole to the neighbours and having no mercy on our eardrums."

"Well, I'd hardly compare my creativity to noise-making. Have you checked out my songs online? They're trending right now and I get paid like half a million bucks a month, which goes half of what you'll earn at your library job in five years. So, who do you think is the real loser now?"

Behind him, I could see a dusty living room with a dining section, close to the built-in bookshelves. There was a huge stereo with Pop music playing at a low volume. Why couldn't he always play his songs like that?

"You know, if you played your songs this way our lives would be a lot better."

"Look, I don't have time for chronic complainers like you. There are a lot of things we can spare saying to each other later so let's just go about our daily affairs, yeah?"

Such a d**k. This was a waste of time.

"Well, clearly this visit was in vain. Enjoy your cleaning."