The sound of traffic disappeared as the front door to my apartment building shut behind me. The weight of the groceries in my hands was already taking its toll, the vinyl handles nearly ripping through my fingers, but it would only get worse. I hadn't thought about logistics when I'd signed the lease and moved in back in February. Back then, my only concern was the frigid Chicago winters. Now it was late June, Chicago was a sweltering temperature I hadn't expected, and I had to walk up three flights of stairs with bags in my arms.
After contemplating the task before me, I took the first step onto the old, squeaky staircase. It was slow going, but eventually, I'd made it up to the third floor, with only one more to go. Before I started up the last flight, I heard the door open below me, the sounds of cars speeding past making their way up to me briefly before it closed again. The stairs creaked again, and I wondered which of my neighbors had just arrived home.
I didn't know the person who lived on the first floor, only that he was an older retired guy who seldom left his apartment. There was a single mom with her grade-school-age daughter on the second floor, and directly below me was Anthony, an Italian guy in his forties who looked like his only job was working out. He was always dressed in gym clothes and must have weighed twice as much as I did in muscle alone. Maybe he was a trainer.
The fourth-floor apartment was my rented domain, and above me was Veronica. Whenever I heard someone else on the stairs, I hoped it was Veronica, not that I'd ever had a real conversation with her. We were friendly enough in the halls, but I was always nervous around her because she was, to put it plainly, drop-dead gorgeous. She had dark brown hair and olive skin, with big brown eyes and a series of cute freckles that almost blended into her tan skin across her nose and cheeks. Her smile was brilliant; she had shining white teeth and curving lips that could make a man buckle at the knees.
I continued up the steps, and as I stepped onto the fourth-floor landing and set my bags down to find my key, I heard the footsteps on the flight below me. It was Veronica. I fished around in my pocket, my fingers grasping the metal of my keyring just as she stepped onto my floor.
"Hey, Max," she said. I felt butterflies in my stomach and turned towards her. Yep, just as beautiful as always. Veronica wore a fitted athletic jacket and biker shorts that came down to just above her knees, clinging to her perfect thighs. I tried not to let my eyes linger, and met hers.
"Hey, Veronica, how was your day?" I asked. Smooth, I thought to myself ironically.
"Kinda sucked, if I'm being honest," she replied, stopping to talk. We'd spoken before, but our conversations had never been longer than a few sentences.
"Why's that?" I asked.
"How long do you have? For starters, my boss was riding me all day yesterday, micromanaging everything I did because he needed my work for a presentation he has to give next week. Like, if you need me to do something, why don't you let me get it done instead of wasting half my day? And then, some asshat tripped the fire alarm in our offices and wasted even more time, so I had to go into the office for three hours this morning to finish up even though it's Saturday. Then I go to the gym after work to burn off some steam, and this guy was creeping on me the whole time. I just want to do my inclines, alright, not get ogled by a fifty-year-old divorced dad. Now I'm here, and my friends just canceled on our plans, so I have nothing to do but sit around annoyed all day," she ranted, making this the longest conversation we'd ever had, and I hadn't said ten words yet.
"That sucks. If it makes you feel any better, I also don't have plans, but that may be because I've only made a couple of friends since I moved here," I said lamely.
"You don't know anyone in the city?" she asked, looking at me with her head tilted a bit.
"Not really. I work for a small company with only a few other employees. Met a few people at a soccer beer league I signed up for, but that just started a few weeks ago."
"Huh. Why don't we hang out sometime? Then you'd have one more friend, and I've got a lot of friends, and maybe you'd make friends with them, too," she replied. I never knew she was such a talker until now.
"That would be awesome, I'd like that."
"Why not now? We both established we have no plans and we'd be bored, let's be bored together," she offered. I had to stop myself from leaping with excitement. Veronica was not only talking to me, she wanted to hang out.
"Um, yeah, I could do that," I replied.
"Cool. Let me take a quick shower and rinse off the sweat, and I'll come back down?" she asked, looking genuinely into the idea. I smiled.
"Yeah. See you in a bit," I replied. She nodded and headed up the stairs. I calmly opened my door and carried my groceries inside.
The moment my door shut, I was off to the races. Fuck, I hadn't expected company, I wasn't prepared for it at all, and now Veronica, the mysterious neighbor I'd been developing a thing for was coming over, and my place was a minor disaster.
I set the groceries down and ran into my living room, picking up some clothes and a jacket, and for some reason, one misplaced shoe. Making a mental note to not make a huge mess just because I lived alone, I ran it all to my room and came back with a vacuum to clean up the rug. In my other hand, I had a candle from the closet and I set it on the table, lighting it before stowing the lighter on my desk.
I carried on at a breakneck pace for ten minutes or so, half-completed tasks being finished haphazardly. I'd just finished loading the dishwasher when I realized I hadn't put my groceries away, and started tossing food into my pantry and refrigerator. I was nearly out of breath when the last item was sorted out, and just in time; there was a knock on the door.
The sound jerked me back into reality. I stopped and took a deep breath, then shook my head and walked over to the door. My heart nearly stopped when I opened the door to find Veronica waiting for me.
Her hair was still wet, which somehow made her look even hotter. She'd donned a tight white t-shirt and short denim shorts, and was smiling happily when I opened the door.
"Hey, Max," she said for the second time that day. Stepping aside to make room, I let her in. I noticed she'd come down barefoot, and I almost short-circuited when I realized she wasn't wearing a bra; I could see the faint shape of her nipples through the thin material of the shirt, capping off her ample breasts. I immediately looked away, hoping she wouldn't notice.
"Come on in. Can I get you anything?" I asked.
"I'm good for now," she said and found her way over to my couch. I would have offered her a spot, but it was interesting to watch her confidence in making herself at home in my apartment. "So, where are you from, Max?" she asked as she sat down.
"I grew up in the suburbs of Atlanta," I replied as I moved to sit on the other end of the couch. "Went to college in Boston, worked in San Francisco for a while, and now I'm here," I replied. "What about you?" It wasn't the most interesting question, but we had to start somewhere, right?
"I'm from Florida, grew up in Orlando. My family is still there, but I moved north for work. They think I'm crazy for living in a place where being outside is painful for so much of the year. My sister Bianca sends me memes making fun of it constantly," she said with a smile.
"What do you do for work?" I asked.
"I'm a financial analyst. I know, boring as fuck," she said with another grin. I couldn't help but stare for a moment; she looked so pretty, but I snapped out of it. "I'm a forecaster for a consulting firm. Pays well but kinda sucks sometimes."
"Could be worse. I'm in software sales," I said. "Pays well as long as I make quotas, and sucks most of the time either way."
"Ok, Ok, doesn't have to be a competition, both our jobs suck," she laughed. "So what do you do for fun, neighbor?" she asked.
"Well, that soccer league is a couple of nights a week. Otherwise, not much around here yet. Video games, movies, and books, I guess," I said.
"Oh, what games?" she asked. I raised my eyebrow.
"I have a PC that I built and a Switch, and a lot of games. A lot of Fortnite lately, it's not my favorite game, but my friends play, so it helps me keep in touch since I keep moving around the country," I said. She nodded.
"My sister Zoey plays, believe it or not, she's making a decent living as a streamer back home. I was never that good at shooters. Did you play Tears of the Kingdom on your Switch?" she asked. I nodded enthusiastically. I couldn't believe she was a gamer and that we might have something in common.
"Of course. I grew up with Zelda," I replied.
"Me too, can I show you something?" she asked, and I nodded. Then, before I could even register what was happening, she'd pulled her shirt up to reveal her flat, toned stomach. I was so surprised and also entranced by the expanse of soft skin she was showing off that I almost didn't notice the reason she'd pulled her shirt up. On her rib cage, just below her breast on her right side, she had a small Triforce tattoo, three triangles stacked together to make a larger triangle. The bottom left triangle of the three was brightly colored. I tried to focus on the tattoo and not the soft swell of underboob she was currently flashing in my direction.
"My sisters and I each have one of the pieces," she explained, watching for a response.
"That's the coolest idea for a matching tattoo," I said, and she grinned at me.
"I know! My sisters and I were all huge nerds growing up; we got bullied and everything. Then we hit puberty, and one after another, we got hot, if that's alright for me to say about myself, and suddenly no one cared that we liked nerdy stuff. Hell, Zoey makes a living because she's a hot nerd. People suck," she added, "but what are you going to do?"
"Well, I was a nerd who
didn't
get hot after puberty, so at least you had that," I joked.
