Up close and personal with BTS (18+)

Chapter 14 - The Man Next Door (JJK)

It wasn't that you could hear exactly what was happening, just that there was a continual thrum through the walls of some kind of music and, occasionally, muffled vocals. The problem was, it was a super expensive apartment complex so she knew he must be going full sonic to be heard at all with the soundproofing, and because it happened at 3 am or some other random time, her sleep was disturbed and she was starting to lose her mind from tiredness. There would be weeks where it was absolutely fine and then two days in a row with the music then nothing again for a month. It was unpredictable and annoying but she'd managed to ignore it for the most part. Until today.

Today had not been the best day anyway. At work her clients had been demanding, her colleagues irritating and her single-ness was exacerbated by the fact she had been the 7th person at dinner when everyone else was coupled up. Gross and unacceptable. This dry streak was lasting too long and lying in bed now, tossing and turning at 109am because the next-door neighbour was doing karaoke was making her night as bad as her day had been.

Deciding she didn't want an actual confrontation with the random guy next door, she climbed out of bed, slipping on a robe and scrawling a note that she decided she'd slip under his door asking politely for him to turn it down. She knew it was a he, had seen him leaving when she was locking up her apartment one day, hat pulled down on his head, back the only thing she could see. And what a strong back it was, hidden behind a baggy t-shirt but as he hit the elevator button, tattoos came out on display and his back flexed under his shirt. She'd be ridiculous not to have noticed how attractive he was but she hadn't met him in person yet and didn't want it to be in the middle of the night.

As soon as she left her apartment, tugging the robe tightly around her body, she could hear the music even clearer. The walls obviously did their job as much as they could but here in the hallway, it echoed even more and she wondered, even though there were only a few on their floor, how the other residents coped with the noise or maybe they were just far enough away that it didn't keep them awake. She'd only been here for a few months, transferred straight from her high-paying job in New York into an even better-paying job here. The rents on the building were exorbitant but the benefits of amenities and location outweighed that and so she sucked it up and reveled in the international experience. Still, she'd not be happy to pay the rent she was paying if she was going to be kept up at night like she was now.

The note was slid under and she rang the doorbell before walking away. Even if he wouldn't hear it, there would be an alert on his keypad and maybe he'd see it and turn it down. She got back to her room, door about to close behind her when she heard a door open in the hallway, wondering if it was him or another resident coming to complain. Either way, she'd done all she could do for now and hopefully, the note did its job.

She slid the robe off, tossed it over a chair, and climbed back into bed. The voice had stopped, just the thud of the music going now and she closed her eyes, waiting for it to disappear completely. And then her own doorbell rang and she felt her heart race. Had he come to have it out with her? Surely he'd just turn it down and not try to engage but she was assuming if he thought it was OK to be this loud so late at night, he was likely not sober. Grabbing for the robe again, she padded across the floor, checking the security camera at her door to see who was standing there. But no one was and as she looked down at her feet, she saw her own note returned to her and reached for it, frowning.

Her very polite ' Can you please turn it down? It's late and I have work in a few hours' had been crossed out and quick handwriting was written under.

'Sorry, just another 20 minutes. I'm singing to some people I love.'

'Well, that's kind of cute,' she thought, giving him the 20 minutes needed to serenade whoever he was trying to win over, and then she'd get some shut-eye. But 20 minutes dragged into 30 minutes and she was back knocking on the door and sliding another note under it, yanking her robe into place as she stomped through the hallway. And only a few minutes later, her note was returned again.