The apartment across the street had floor-to-ceiling windows and no curtains. I noticed it the first week I moved in—late August, heat still clinging to the brick, air thick enough to chew. Every night at 11:17 p.m. the lights in the living room came on and he appeared.
Tall. Lean. Dark hair that fell forward when he bent to unlace his boots. He always started the same way: kicked off his shoes by the door, peeled his shirt over his head in one smooth motion, tossed it onto the back of the couch. The lamp on the side table threw gold across his shoulders, down the long line of his spine, the shallow dip above his ass. I never saw his face clearly, always angled away or shadowed, but I memorized the rest: the way his back flexed when he stretched, the narrow waist flaring into hips, the V
