Because of His Love

Chapter 1: Allyson - Home

Someone new is moving in upstairs. I live on the bottom floor with my brother. Directly across the hall from my apartment is a convenience store my landlord owns and stocks. There's a private tenant only entrance that requires a code to enter and a street facing entrance to the store. Mrs. Jackson lives beside me. She's around sixty years old and sweet as candy. There's a stairway between us. Across from her apartment is our laundry facility. You need change to use it, but the landlord is super cool and has the machines set to twenty-five cents per load.

I know there are four apartments on the second floor. The one directly above me is the one the new tenant is moving into. It's the only one available. I can see the U-Haul from my window. I get excited when new tenants move in. I only get to visit Mrs. Jackson. My brother hates people in general and the only reason I get to visit Mrs. Jackson is that she told my brother, Tyler, in no uncertain terms that it's a free country and he has no say in whether or not I can visit her. Well, that and she told him she would shove her cane up his nose sideways if he tried to keep me from her. I think she likes me.

Directly above Mrs. Jackson is Tracy and John. Tracy is her daughter. So John is her son-in-law. They won't be here too much longer. They're planning to find a three bedroom house once the twins are born. They know they're having a boy and a girl. Tracy has promised me that I can visit them once the babies are born. I know John has been looking through real estate. They often visit Mrs. Jackson while I am there. They're like family to me. I've gotten to feel the babies kick several times during the pregnancy.

The guy who lives above the store is around my age and his name is Quinton. He works a lot and smokes a lot of weed. He mainly smokes in his car because he doesn't want to cause any ill-effects to anyone in the building. I know he smokes weed because he smells like weed when he visits the store. He always comes in through the street entrance and out through the tenant's door. He buys lots of snacks. He cracks jokes with me. Sometimes his boyfriend comes to visit. He flirts with me. I tell him Quinton is my friend and he should behave.

Above the laundry facility is a girl named Samantha. She's a few years older than I am. She works nights so I barely see her. I only see her twice a week. On Fridays when she leaves for the weekend. She stops at my door and drops off her weekly laundry with me and pays me $30 for washing her clothes. I usually pocket what I don't use. She doesn't care. She's always nice to me. I see her again Monday morning when she rolls in from whatever it is she does on weekends. The first few times I did her laundry, I tried to give her the money back, but she refused it so I started keeping it.

I've shown the empty apartment to prospective tenants so I know how the second floor is laid out. There's the stair way inside. There's also one outside and a wrap-around balcony. It's wide enough that anyone can set up a small table set and still have space to walk around. I sit on the balcony sometimes when Tyler is sleeping just so I can get some distance from him.

Tyler is my brother. He lives with me because I have a two bedroom apartment. After I moved out, my parents moved into a tiny one bedroom trailer on the other side of town. There's no room for Tyler there. My mom practically begged me to let Tyler live with me. He had just got out of prison for meth or some other drug. I don't really remember. She pays the bill for him to be on house arrest so I really don't have a say in it any more.

I love how my apartment was designed. From the interior of the building, I have a small sitting room. The first bedroom is off that room toward the interior stairs. The bathroom is between the bedrooms. Two small steps go from the doors to the main part of the room. It has a big corner tub with two sets of shower heads. The kitchen takes up the middle of the apartment across from the bathroom. I have lots of counter space. Next to that, from the exterior entrance is the living room and the other bedroom.

Tyler has claimed the living room side as his. He occupies that bedroom. Sometimes I hear him open the exterior door in the middle of the night. Those are the nights Melody comes over. They have loud s*x and she's always gone by the time I wake up in the morning. I don't like her. When I do run into her, she rude and spiteful. I don't think she realizes that Tyler is my stupid brother.

Tyler doesn't like any of my neighbors. He's paranoid that they will call the cops on him. He still uses drugs, but not in my presence. He does so when he goes to work. He doesn't have a full-time job, he only works part-time at a gas station. I would rather he gets a regular job so he can help pay the bills instead of just running them up. I told him once that if he didn't do anything illegal, he wouldn't have to worry. That only got him to slam my arm against the counter and he pulled my hair.