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Noel was a man who I slept with but did not know. It’s for this reason alone that I don’t blame him for what happened. Neither of us bothered to take the time to know more about each other than our daily schedules and sleeping habits. He was the kind of man who’d go to a Chinese restaurant and order chicken fingers. He bought books he never read for the artwork on the covers. He told friends he listened to Schoenberg when really he didn’t, it was just that he liked the way the name sounded on his tongue. He is the kind of man you end up with in spite of yourself, and it is only later, when you’re at the grocery perhaps, and he’s debating the caloric count of two different types of muffins that you realize this was not how your life was supposed to end up, but it happened anyway and here you are. Here I am.
I have thought of other uses for Stud. He sits on the floor with me while we watch reruns on television. We watch sitcoms mostly, shows without too much conflict, with little suspense. We watch things we know will end happily once they’re over. Infomercials are good. Watching, I am always surprised by all of what I never knew to need. We read plays, sometimes reenacting scenes from Shakespeare’s The Tempest or Twelfth Night. I read mostly and sometimes my throat aches, but Stud never gets bored.
I do not know my neighbor. I hear him late at night coming home. He shuffles his feet when he walks, and I listen to the scuffing sounds his shoes make against the wooden floor as he goes to his apartment. He can never find his keys, and his hands fumble in his pockets for them. Sometimes he talks to himself, a fluttering of curses about his day or laments of errands he forgot to do. I know that when he’s frustrated, his words become a mix of English and Spanish. He often forgets to call his mother. The walls that separate us are thin. I wonder if he knows that I can hear him. He plays audio books on his stereo, and if I listen closely I can make out the words. He has long conversations in the early morning that sometimes escalate to arguments. Sometimes when they’re over, I hear him start to sob. Or at least I think I do, I can never tell. This is all of what I know of him and still I do not know his name. I have never even seen his face. He could be anyone. If I saw him on the street he would be a stranger, and yet he is anything but.

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Posted on February 9th, 2009 in Fiction

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952 Written by Unknown

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(?)Shop / Featured Product

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More Fiction

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Save this article

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Sharing is good for the soul

Enlighten your friends

Mr. Stud

952 Written by Unknown

Comments by 952 People

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