So show me I'll show you

Chapter 1 - A distraction

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Ever since Taehyung moved into the apartment complex three years ago he quickly found out that the apartment on the same eye level as his across the path was empty. Blinds and constant darkness, while active lights in other apartments showed life, Taehyung simply concluded that the owner of that particular place chose not to live there nor rent, thus the emptiness.

Taehyung knew his neighbors, he knew every single one of them. Who they were and what they are doing, even though he met and spoke only with a few of them daily. Taehyung was a writer and his job often consisted of observation of human behavior and the world around him. His style was mostly thriller/dramas with the realistic storyline and erotic touches here and there, just to make his characters spicy and more ordinary. He admired the heroes and loved happy endings in general, but he strangely never written one. He was not pessimistic, on the contrary, as a twenty-five-year-old he was a very positive person, but he deemed that in a harsh reality where his main characters lived was no room for miracles and utopia. His lines were brutally honest on one part and complex and deeply secretive in the next, his plots very intense and mind-taking which often took his readers on a true mental roller coaster, straining their brains to think of the story outcomes and catch the killers themselves. So, before every story, every book, it took months of careful preparation, curious investigation and observation.

And so, naturally, Taehyung knew everything about his neighbors, their habits and lifestyles, whos fighting, whos fucking, whos sad and whos happy. Taehyung knew it all, which made him especially curious about that empty apartment with the blinds always shut. He even wondered at some point if someone lived there, but never opened the window, which was ludicrous. He spent hours sometimes thinking of the reasons why or creating the plots and hidden crimes, but the fact remained, the apartment was empty.

Now sitting in his recliner chair, phone on the ear in one hand and his head in the palm of the other, completely exhausted from the almost third day without sleep, struggling with the writer's block, while his publisher Hoseok rant on the other side of the line.

-'Taehyung, you can't continue like this. You need to rest. I can't use you if you are dead tired with a writer's block on top.''

-''I don't have writer's block, I'm just tired.'' – Taehyung lied. He had a writer's block, he just didn't want to admit that.

-''Tae, don't lie to me. I know you very well. I know your breaking points. Besides you know how much I dislike when you lie to me.'' – Hoseok said his tone calm with the whiff of danger in it. Taehyung knew he should stop and just listen to him, obey, as he did before and just let go into the sensation of complete and utter bliss of the lack of control. Taehyung shook his head, trying to clear his mind.

-''Hyung, I'm telling you, I'm fine. My head is fine, it's just my body is tired, my eyes keep closing, but I can't sleep, my mind won't shut down.''

-''Then use the sleeping pills.'' – The other man suggested. Taehyung groaned.

-''I don't want to use that shit, they make me foggy. I just need to meditate a bit.''

-''The natural pills are not bad Taehyung. It could relax you and help you to sleep.''

-''I took one once and I slept for three days, Hyung. I can't have that, not when the date got closer and I only did like half of the book.''

-''You told me you finished 85% of it.''

-''I wrote 85% but I keep tumbling and changing things. I'm not satisfied with it, it needs to be perfect and it's not!''

-''Taehyung, it's ok, calm down.''