Page 52 of The Legend Next Door
He responds to my message with a laughing emoji.
I feel a ridiculous, out-of-proportion level of pride for making him smile.
So, what happened to your date?
Relax. Friends do that too. They ask each other about their lives and relationships. It happens every day.
Jeremiah leans against the opening of the sliding glass door near his pottery wheel, looking down as he types. A gentle breeze picks up a curled lock of hair and disturbs it. It floats for a moment and then falls onto his forehead, gradually settling back to its usual position.
I wasn’t feeling it.
Okay, okay. I admit, friends don’t typically feel such a rush of relief hearing about a canceled date that their shoulders drop by two or three inches and their chest caves, but whatever. I care about Jeremiah. I don’t want him going out with a perfect stranger and getting into God knows what kind of trouble. It would be completely different if I knew for a fact that the guy he was planning to meet up with was a nice, decent man who wasn’t too young for him, who deserved him, and who didn’t pose any danger to him.
How come?
He scrunches his face and shakes his head almost imperceptibly. The way he does it makes me think he’s shaking his head at himself, not at me.
I dunno.
Guess I was more in the mood to get into bed with a book than with a random.
Must be some book to win out against getting railed.
I stare blankly at the message I just sent.
Jesus. What is happening to me?
I’m standing at my window watching my neighbor text me with a level of interest that’s hard to explain. I’m excessively relieved he’s home and not on a date, and for some inexplicable reason, I keep steering our conversations to sex today.
Not only that, my dick is hard.
Rock hard.
Maybe I’m the one who needs to get laid. Maybe it’s been too long, and it’s finally gotten to me.
Yeah, that could be it.
It has been a while. Almost a year and a half, and even for someone who’s grieving, that’s a significant period of time. I used to have a raging libido. Maybe it’s coming back. Maybe that’s what’s happening. I have needs, and my body is starting to remember what they are. Jerking off is all well and good, but sometimes you need contact with another human being. Sometimes, you need connection and touch more than you need to get off.
Maybe that’s where I am.
Across the blackness of the shadowy garden separating us, Jeremiah takes a sharp breath and shakes his head at himself again. He fights a smile as he types.
Something like that.
He watches my window after he hits send. His face is turned up, gaze intense and unblinking. My lights are out and my sheer curtains are drawn. I’m completely hidden from view. I know he can’t see me.
There’s no way he can see me.
It feels like he can though. It feels like it does when he’s with me. When he looks at me and slices through the bullshit, and sees who I am.
It’s like that for me. Maybe it’s like that for him, too, because he looks up at me for the longest time, for so long, I stop feeling like I’m here in the present and start feeling like I’m somewhere else altogether. Like I’m someone else altogether.
Eventually, his head dips and he raises one hand. His movement is hesitant. A little reticent. Unsure and abashed. His fingers splay out, hand opening, palm showing.
Then he waves.
Being the utter dumbass I am, I raise my own hand and wave back despite knowing damn well he can’t see me.
