Thy Neighbor

Chapter Twelve

You should do it. It wasn't like you were waiting for the right person. You were waiting for the right time. Trevante would be worth it. He does look like he knows what he's doing. You weren't saving yourself or anything like that, you know that. Trevante likes you. You Googled the price of that bottle. $300. That could pay for your books, shit. Yep, you're going to do it. Him. You're going to do him.

Trevante monopolizes the squat rack every time he's in the gym. No one dare comes close when Trevante would level up, every ninety-pound plate clinking in unison. Seeing him would put the fear in most. He loves his imposing size, staring at himself in the mirror every time that he could. The scrawny kid from high school was no more, that kid afraid of his father was gone. The bigger he grew, the more we felt like he was able to fight back from all the pain he witnessed as a kid. Or appear as if he could fight back. The fear from others left him pretty lonely. But he had his weights. They were friends enough.

"You're not going to say bye to me?" Veronica, the gym manager, yells from behind the desk at the gym. She always made it a point to show off their situation in front of others, hoping to make her co-workers jealous for bagging their finest client. She knows she is just a plaything for Trevante and does not care to be anything else. The status of being with him is enough to keep her holding on.

Trevante wants to ignore her. He needs to get home, his dinner date with Ciara is soon to come. A dinner date he didn't want to do. He felt a way about Ciara's seemingly dismissal of his gift, imagining a moment where Ciara would run into his arms and tell him 'thank you' a thousand times to his face. It was a $300 bottle, for goodness sakes. He then wanted her to say that she didn't deserve it but he'd tell her that she did but that he had another -- a better -- gift for her if she wanted it. And she'd say 'yes'. And he wouldn't give a damn about keeping the noise down.

But she turned him down when everything in the air and universe said that it was the best time for them to do what they both wanted to do. He still couldn't get over the fact that she chose to not have sex with him. It felt challenging. In all other circumstances, it would have happened already. Ciara isn't like all circumstances.

So he thought dinner would give him an opportunity to wax all of her fears away. And to show her that he's more than just her neighbor who sexes everything moving. He could actually act interested and engaged. Their friendship would be the start of something ... and enough to make her relent.

Trevante reluctantly pulls the earbuds out of his ears. "Yo, hey, sorry. What was that?"

"You forgot to say bye to me." Veronica says, biting her lip to punctuate her thoughts.

"Oh, my bad."

"It's okay, Tre. I, uh, am about to get off from work. You want to hang out?"

Common sense is telling Tre to tell her 'no'. But Trevante's penis always won over common sense. And if he wasn't going to get any from Ciara, he's going to score some, someway.

"I don't have that much time tonight but yeah. Text me when you're out front."

Veronica gleefully grabs her things, turning to look at her coworkers whose faces were covered with bewilderment. Nothing new.

Hey! Are you back yet?

We can do Chinese if you want to...

You fell asleep, didn't you lol.

This is stupid. I'm knocking on your door lol

7:30 turns into 8:00 which turns into 8:30. With every 30 minutes and every text, Ciara grows slightly more annoyed. She knows he didn't forget, he must've tired himself out so much at the gym that he fell asleep. So tired he's sleeping through the jazz music she hears blasting from inside of his apartment.