Claire's Home

Chapter 4

It has been 3 days since I saw Noah and that awful encounter last Wednesday. I'm still punishing myself with hitting him and accusing him of being a criminal. Self-punishment for me means working my ass off in cleaning my place—making sure it's spotless—doing my laundry, buying groceries, and running to keep myself fit. I know this don't seem like a punishment but I'm a lazy person and I love to procrastinate, so doing these things is a big deal to me.

I've been so guilty and embarrassed that I hadn't show up on our agreement to have dinner with Mary, afraid that I may unexpectedly see Noah there again.

But to make the matters even worse, Noah happened to be my other neighbor. My apartment is between him and Mary. Mary's on my left and Noah's on my right.

I have been so cautious going in and out of my apartment so that I won't see either of them until I overcome my embarrassment.

Why did this family decided to live separately but not really separate is the biggest question for me now.

Mary told me he was on a business trip abroad, hence, we haven't seen him around for the past weeks.

Turns out Noah is a hotshot businessman. He mostly deals on real estate. He owns some properties outside of Canada which is why he was out of the country once in a while.

Mary showed me some local newspaper where he was in some of the business news page.

He looks so confident and cold on those photos. It makes me think there's some dark past behind those piercing eyes of him and it makes me a bit curious of his personality.

From what I have encountered so far, he's very closed off. Mary told me that it's just Noah's personality and he likes to keep to himself most of the time. He have some friends but rarely goes out and when he does, it's mostly about work and to run some errands.

I also found out that his main office is the building infront of where I work. So I guess the chance of seeing him at work is very likely.

I'm still looking for an opportunity to apologize and make amends but like Mary said, he's been holed up in his apartment. It may be a good thing since I'm not yet ready to face him.

After finishing up on the chores, I take a shower first and prepare to go to Mary's. I just wore comfy clothes since she texted me that we'll be cooking something easy and jokingly threatened me that if she doesn't see me today, she will call the authorities and force to open my door.

I knocked on Mary's door and she opened it allowing me to go inside. I noticed right away that she's not alone and that Noah's sitting on the living area watching TV.

He looks up and I stiffened immediately. I felt my blood drain from my face and my hands started to sweat. He just looked at me for a moment and return his eyes on the TV.

Mary then guides me towards the kitchen and I released a sigh of relief.

"Relax, no one's going to hurt you." Mary said smirking at me.

I playfully rolled my eyes at her and started washing my hands. I'm still slightly panicking deep inside but just ignored it for now.

We're going to cook roasted chicken and some stir-fried vegetables for our dinner tonight with Noah, obviously. I started washing and cutting the vegetables while Mary prepared the chicken.

As soon as we finished cooking, I set the table for three and Mary called Noah over to eat.

He immediately went and sit down beside Mary, so the both of them is infront of me.

I can feel the atmosphere getting awkward so Mary started talking to break the ice.

"So, Noah, everything good at work?"