He looked around his new apartment smiling. The smell of the fresh paint greeted him. He took a deep breath to inhale its aroma. He looked around at the furniture he had just finished moving into place. He thought he had done a pretty neat job. He was exhausted and sweaty having had cleaned the place from top to bottom and moving around the heavy stuff to their proper places. He flopped on the sofa and turned on his new 37 inch TV that was hanging on the wall.
He was Michael Kein, standing just above 6 feet, with jet black hair and blue eyes. He graduated college with a business degree and landed a pretty neat job thanks to his father's influences. The only downside was that it was in a different state, a place he had never been to and had no friends or family to turn to. Michael had scouted the area few weeks before and managed to find a descent apartment. After all the farewell parties, felicitations and the swayed emotions, he had made his journey and moved in just the day before to start off a new life. The whole process had been hectic and tiring. On the first day he had only managed to organize the bedroom. The bed had looked so inviting after the tiring journey that he had crashed on it for a brief nap and woken up half a day later.
Now that the unpacking was all done, he went to the refrigerator to grab a beer. His eyes focused on the cakes that he had bought. He groaned inwardly. As he was the new tenant it was customary for him to get acquainted with the neighbours and he had bought the cakes for the occasion. Seeing the cakes he knew he had just one more thing left to do.
Michael turned off the TV and removed his clothes throwing them onto the hamper. He stepped into the shower and let the cold water run down his body. He took a considerable amount of time getting soaked in the water and cleaning himself up. After putting on some fresh clothes, he fished out the two cakes he had bought. He put them in two separate bags and stepped out into the hallway.
The apartment complex consisted of many floors and he resided on the 4th floor. Each of the floors contained two to three apartments. The floors containing just two apartments contained more bedrooms and space whilst the floors with three apartments mostly had one or two bedrooms and limited space, yet a very comfortable space to live in. On Michael's floor there were three apartments. Right in front of Michael's door was the elevator, while on either side of it were the stairs. Michael's apartment was at the centre.
He started towards the apartment at the left and rang the bell. It was answered by a merry older couple. After introducing himself as their new neighbour, he was ushered in.
The apartment was bigger than his and had two bedrooms. Most of the walls had pictures of them and of young people who were probably their children. Ornaments stood on top of tables and cabinets. The apartment itself had the aura of an older couple. Mr. and Mrs. Parker as he learned were retired bankers. After their retirement they had moved here in order to be closer to their children and grandchildren. They asked questions about him, and he briefly talked about his background, why he moved here and about his job. Mr. Parker gave him some interesting and valuable advice and launched into a series of stories from his young days. Mrs. Parker kept bringing him sweets to eat and doted on him saying he reminded him of one of her children. After spending some time with them Michael politely extricated himself after promising them that he would drop by from time to time.
He stepped out of the apartment, all smiles with the remaining cake in hand. He walked across to the remaining apartment and rang the bell. He hoped that it wasn't another older couple behind the locked doors. He heard the click of the lock and then the door opened.
"Hi, I'm..." he started but was lost for words as he took in the sight of the beauty in front of him.
His breath caught for an instant. She had gorgeous brown hair that was full, lush and long. She was tall, not as tall as him and looked to be a couple of years younger than he. His eyes took in her lovely brown eyes beneath the dark eyelashes. Even though she was dressed in a loose T-shirt and shorts, it did little to hide the beautiful curves of her body. He gazed at her beautiful face totally taken by her.
Her eyebrows arched in question, and he realized that he had fallen short of constructing a proper sentence. Michael gave himself a mental shake, cleared his throat and started again.
"Hi, I'm Michael Kein, your new neighbour," he said with a smile pointing at his door. He realized how foolish that looked and let his arm drop on to his side.
"Oh hi, I'm Kayla Hartman," she replied holding out her hand, a smile brightening her face.
He shook her hand, part of him reluctant to let go of her soft hands. He remembered the cake and offered it to her.
She smiled again, graciously taking it. "Thank you, please do come in," she said opening the door fully.
He entered looking around at her apartment. The structure was different than his but it was roughly the same size.
"Please don't mind the mess, I wasn't expecting any company," she said clearing out the sofa and the chairs.
He sat down on the chair as she took a seat on the sofa. As he looked at her again, he had the nagging feeling that he had seen her somewhere before but just couldn't place where.
"I just moved in the other day," Michael said trying to start up a conversation. He usually wasn't slow and have always had a way with words. But somehow her beauty had left that part of his brain completely incapacitated.
"Yeah, I saw loads of delivery people. I would have come greeted you earlier but I had an exam and I was studying for it. I was dead exhausted today after it and crashed right after I came home."
"Sorry if I woke you up."
"Nah, I was up earlier," she said waving it off with a hand, "although I still look a mess I guess."
He completely had to disagree on that. If this was how she looked a mess, he wondered how much more perfect she can be when she was not a mess. "Nah, you look stunning." Should he have said that he wondered. That was outright flirting.
She however took it in stride and smiled at the compliment.
"So you are in college?" Michael asked his eyes fixed on hers daring not to let them wonder.
"Yeah, I'm a Junior. I'm doing Business Administrations," she replied.
"Hey, no way, so did I."
"Really?" her eyes lit with a smile. "Could you please, please help me out with some of my subjects," she pleaded bending forward and grabbing his hands.
He wondered if she was doing it on purpose as her cleavage was clearly on display to him. "I would love to," he heard himself reply. He found it a bit odd that she would ask such a thing from a complete stranger but who was he to complain.
Her eyes beamed. "Thank you so much, Michael."
"Please, call me Mike."
She smiled again. "So Mike, what about you? What do you do?"
"Well I graduated last year. I did an internship over at my hometown. Then I landed a job in RalMex, so here I am."
"Wow, RalMex? Really? I hear that it's really hard to get into it."
"Yeah, I had to go through a bunch of interviews and tests. Dad helped too."