One
Olivia
Of course it had to rain the night my car broke down. What was it they said about San Francisco weather? If you don’t like it, wait a few minutes and it’ll turn into freezing cold, wet rain ruining your night? Or maybe that was just me.
Still, after getting home from work downtown, changing at the speed of light, and gathering my art supplies, I’d had to take the bus to art class. Hardly anyone had shown up—it was just a ‘continuing education for adults’ thing, and most of my classmates were hobbyists—and we’d spent two hours doing watercolors, which I hated. Now I was standing at the bus stop in the dark and the icy rain, my sketchbook clutched to my chest, the watercolors on the pages probably soaked and running. I sighed and stared hopelessly down the darkened street, trying to glimpse a bus.
It was my own fault. What was I doing taking an art class, anyway? I had a good job—or it would be a good job, once I moved up the ladder—as a junior graphic designer at an ad agency. I didn’t make much, but it was enough to pay my bills. I just had to keep my eye on the goal so I could move up to a senior position and forget about being an artist. I’d been down this road before, and it had gone down in flames. When was I going to learn?
I tucked myself beneath an overhang as the rain came down harder. I had to get home and fall into bed so I could get up and go to work early tomorrow. I didn’t technically have to go in early, and they wouldn’t pay me for it, but it was a good way to impress my bosses for the next time there was a promotion on the table.
I had no hope of affording a place downtown, where I worked, so here I was in the south end of San Fran. Luckily for my tiny paycheck, I’d found a small apartment in an old 1960s complex called Shady Oaks, which boasted low rent, a nowhere location, a complete lack of upkeep for the past fifty years, and a dried-out pool. Shady Oaks, for all its grotty ugliness, was the best thing about living in San Francisco. Because along with the water stains and the iffy management, it also featured the hottest guy I’d ever seen living across the way.
My sexy neighbor was an accident. Honestly. Shady Oaks was built in a square around an inner courtyard, featuring the mentioned dried-out pool, with the doors and walkways outside instead of in—kind of like a motel. It was with pure surprise that I’d looked out my window the first night I moved in and saw Mr. Hot Dark and Handsome walking up the stairs and along the open corridor to his place across the way. Dark hair, worn just a little long and tousled. Big, tall body that moved like liquid mercury. Black shirt that stretched across his shoulders and worn jeans that lovingly cupped his ass. Work boots. Stubble. Cue Olivia, standing in her dark window, practically drooling, watching him walk.
I don’t normally do that—stare at guys all pathetic and forlorn. I was used to artsy guys. Beanies, soul patches, corduroy pants. Their idea of a date was to smoke some weed and take you to an art gallery while politely hoping for a blow job later. Mr. Hot Dark and Handsome was not, in any way, an artsy guy. He looked like his idea of a date was to give you a few shots of tequila, throw you down in his back seat, and give you anal. He was unlike any guy I’d ever had anything to do with, which somehow made it insanely hot. And from my window, I had a perfect view of him. For two months and counting.
I wasn’t stalking him—I didn’t even know his name. You just can’t help seeing someone often when they live across from you, you know? Especially if you look out the window a lot. So I had learned a few things about him: 1 – He had a tattoo on the back of his left hand that I hadn’t seen up close. 2 – He never had a woman over that I could see. 3 – He kept regular hours, so he must have a job somewhere, though occasionally he was gone at night. 4 – He drove an old Chevy that he parked in the crappy gravel lot right next to my semi-functioning Civic. 5 – He kept to himself and didn’t talk, so I didn’t know what his voice sounded like. 6 – I’d sketched him exactly sixteen times. 7 – He knew what I looked like, too.
It happened when he saw me get out of my car, on one of the days it was actually working. I’d come home from work, and when I hauled my junk out of the car and turned around, there he was. Mr. HDH—Hot Dark and Handsome, getting out of his own car and looking at me. I was still wearing my office clothes, which were now wrinkled, and I’d tied my hair back and mostly lost the day’s makeup. Up close, in daylight, I saw that he had amazing dark green eyes beneath the slashes of his brows, watching me with brooding intensity. I was so startled I barked out a quick “Hi” and nearly ran up the stairs to my corridor and my door. I didn’t look back, but I felt him watch me the whole way.
I’d run into him since then, once almost literally—I came around the corner of my corridor, heading for the stairs to the parking lot, and nearly bumped straight into his chest. I stepped back and looked up to find those green eyes watching me again. He had a great chest. An awesome chest, from what I could see. I was wearing a cotton skirt and a t-shirt under a hoodie that time, because it was Saturday, and for a brief minute I wished I was a sexy siren type like my sister Gwen, instead of a twenty-five-year-old office nobody who had flunked out of art school.
Mr. HDH didn’t seem to mind. His gaze flicked over me, checking me out in a way that was quick, thorough, and unmistakably male. Then he gave me the ghost of a smile and went on his way.
I should have been offended. But all I could think was: My hot neighbor just checked me out, and he liked what he saw. The quick, dirty smile told me that. I could tell an appreciative look when I saw one. I’d floated a little for the rest of the day, cotton skirt and hoodie and all.
It was exciting, but none of it changed my life. I still went to work every day, then came home and secretly worked on my drawings and my art projects at night. I called my mother and my sister. I went to art class. I read books. I didn’t date. And I often watched out my window in the dark, looking for Mr. Hot Dark and Handsome so I could sketch him yet again.
My sketchbooks were definitely getting wet in the rain. I had them tucked tightly in my arms, but the rain was blowing its cold drops everywhere. The wind blew back the hood of my rain coat and sent water down my neck, into my eyes. It was dark, and I was the only one at the bus stop. Apparently the handful of other people who came to art cla