Page 56 of Hello, Listener
My memories get interrupted by her soft whimpers.They’re practically next to you fucking in her room.Reluctantly, I turn just slightly and look in through the miniscule opening between her door and the cheap molding around the doorway, slowly widening it as I move the tip of my shoe in the tiny space.
They’re both in there.This can’t be happening.I knew that it was.But I didn’t want to believe it.My skin gets hotter the more I stand in the hallway while I practice the act of voyeurism. Like a reflex, my hands ball into a fist once again. The tips of my nails digging into my palms are the only thing keeping me together and refraining from entering the room.
The way she moves her hips on Lee's lap is so fucking hypnotizing. I stare at the curve of her ass as she takes every bit of him. He lies there on her bed with his hands behind his head, and he stares up at her like she’s a fucking goddess.I wonder if he knows his goddess was fucking his best friend not too long ago in that same spot.
Lee moves his hands around her back and unhooks her red bra. It falls around her thighs, which are straddling his lap. He takes her round breasts in his hands and pulls on her perfect nipples. I bite my lip, picturing myself biting down on her breasts justas I had done before. He sits up and kisses down her chest and stops at each one of her nipples and takes them in his mouth. Their intimate show has me surveying them with my blood boiling beneath my skin.
Thalia arches her back and places her hands behind her on his extended legs. He moves his lips past her breasts and up to her neck.What does he whisper in her ear that makes her moan in the most addictive way?He pulls her in closer to his chest.
My body heats with rage, and I close in the small space between the door with the pointed end of my dress shoe. My soft steps continue on the dingy gray carpet in her short hallway.
While looking over her living room, I wonder if Lee knows how Thalia straddled my lap in here on her couch.My gaze moves to the small, dark corner in her kitchen.Or if he knows I stroked my dick to the view of her fucking herself to the sound of my voice.I start to make my way out of the apartment, not before giving her cat one last pat on his head.
Distraction
“Fuuuuuuck!” I scream in my car, a death grip on the steering wheel. My body vibrates in my seat with anger. “FUUUUUUCK!” I cry louder. This time, while punching the middle of the wheel, signaling the horn to go off in the parking garage. I ignore the painful effects it has on my throat.What she did was worse than any physical pain she could have caused.
“I did everything I could to make you mine!” I yell at Thalia as if she were sitting in my passenger seat. My eyes burn from the tears I try to hold in. “You weren’t supposed to be like her! You were supposed to be mine and mine alone!”
My body shakes, and I try to take a few breaths, running my hands over my face. My tears fall hard onto my coat in my lap.You knew this was going to happen when you followed them into her apartment.The agonizing voice stands out in my mind.
“Yes, but I wanted it so badly not to be true. I just want her to want me like I want her,” I answer my unwanted thoughts aloud. I flower down at the key to her apartment with hate, anger, love, and sadness all at once. It feels tiny in my hand when I putthe key in the middle of my fist and squeeze as hard as I can. Icrave to feel anything other than what I feel right now.The metal ridges are hard on my skin, but it isn’t enough. I pull out my car key from my coat pocket and push it into the ignition, and another defeated sign leaves my lips.
My drive home is the longest it has ever felt.
The sunrise starts to peak over the horizon as I sit in silence through the long stretch of road in the middle of the busy city. My body feels numb and tired. I go through the deadening motions of driving when I pass through the large buildings and bright lights.
While I endure the many minutes of dissociation, I manage to find my way home. My body drags as I make my way inside my house and throw my coat on the back of the couch, and kick off my shoes in the middle of the living room floor.
Today, I couldn't give a shit about their rightful place.Nothing fucking matters anymore.My aching head pounds against the tense silence in my large house.I need a drink. Maybe you’ll disappear from my thoughts. At least just for today.I grab a smoky gray whiskey glass from a long row of identical glasses in one of the cabinets. My bourbon glows in the bright light in the kitchen. Trying to make itself known from my liquor cabinet. I generously pour the amber liquid until it reaches near the rim.
While closing my eyes and with overly shaky hands, I put the glass to my lips. The warm liquor slides down my throat, and all I can think about is her.
She was so beautiful when I first saw her behind the bar. Images of her face keep flooding my thoughts. Her large, piercing hazel eyes met mine, and it was as if we were frozen in time.
Her gaze stayed on me when she watched me drink the first drink she made me the night we met. The memory of her tripping over her words during our first conversation causes my mouth to turn up in a slight smile. My eyes gloss over with my hot tears, and I tip the glass back, making the liquor flow quicker to the back of my throat.Fuck, I love you, and I don’t think I ever truly loved anyone else.I grip my glass and pour in more bourbon, filling it to the rim again. “I need you to go away. Why won’t you go away?” My sobs echo through the empty house.
With each drink, she stays in my mind, embedded in my brain like a fucking computer virus. I lean my forearms on the granite countertop with my head in my hands. Just her face comes to mind and I rub my eyes to try to black it out. With each moment, my palms digging into my eyes, my vision goes dark, but my memories of her become clearer.
I recall all of her sweet grins, ones I’ve caught from when she glanced up at me. The first time I held her small, delicate hand in mine as we crossed the street from The Neon Rose to my car. I smile coyly at the memory of how excited she looked when I called her my “little crime solver” at the diner. It fades when I remember what soon came after,“I’m not ready to be alone right now.”I hear Thalia’s voice repeat inside the torture chamber that is my thoughts.Oh, please, not this one. Anything but this one.
I grab my drink with my shaky hand again and engulf what it contains as if I have been dying of dehydration, pouring more bourbon into the glass for the third time.
Oh, God, that fucking night. Why did I have to go in there with you? Why did you let me be alone with you if you knew you were going to shatter me to fucking pieces?My body continues to vibrate witha plethora of different emotions. Sadness and anger are at the prominence of my mind.
“If you kiss me, there isn’t any coming back from me. I won’t be able to stop myself.”I play the somber flashback in my head like my mind is a projector, replaying the events fromthe night on a large screen in front of me. Blankly, I stare ahead towards my empty living room. I am the only one who came to watch the sad son of a bitch fall for the hot, edgy bartender.
A tale as fucking old as time.
My absent stare continues while I go over in my head what I said to her that night.“I’ve waited so long just to fucking kiss you.” Why did you kiss me, Thalia? That fucking kiss that made me fall harder for you!
I throw the now-empty glass against the backsplash above the kitchen. It shatters and leaves shards and tiny splashes of bourbon in the sink, on the counter, and across the kitchen floor. My mind falls back to that same night.
“I need you, Alan.”Goosebumps cover my arms while I still hear her moans in my mind.
I stand up and run my hands down my face, now saturated with tears. Without warning, my body on autopilot, I find myself walking to my bedroom. I start searching for something—anything that will help me feel the pain I feel right now. I grab the baseball bat I’ve had since I was a kid. It sits in the corner of my bedroom like it’s figuratively lit up under a fucking spotlight. My hands run down the smooth wooden handle and grip around the smaller end. With my eyes filled with a mix of rage and tears, I move towards the kitchen.
As I stand in the middle of the large space, I scan around at the freshly painted cabinets. “Oh, God, I wish you were here!” I scream. My loud voice bounces off the surface of the cabinets and the walls. “Why won’t my thoughts of you go away?!”
