Chapter Text
It was the smell that made her do this in the first place. Usually, Zanka was very much NOT the type to go and greet her neighbors, no matter how nice and well-put they seemed to be. To be frank, Zanka wasn’t even sure of who exactly her neighbors were and, maybe she did walk past some of them while taking out the trash or going to work, but she absolutely didn’t bother to get to know them. A simple bow always sufficed.
That was until the arrival of someone new. Until then, the apartment next to Zanka’s had been empty and she was more than ok with that. No direct neighbors meant less problems. OF COURSE, those peaceful times wouldn’t last forever, sadly. And so, one week ago, someone moved in next to her.
The building Zanka currently lived in was nothing much, couldn’t even compare to her family’s house by any means, but it was well located : not too far from her job, next to a bus station and the supermarket. It was small, but quiet and nothing ever happened in the neighborhood. She got used to the monotony of her life and grew accommodated with it.
Zanka knew immediately without even seeing the other person because of the noise caused by the truck. Since that fateful day, she never knew one moment of calm : on nights she came back exhausted from her office job, there was always that weird music piercing through the wall that she shared with the newcomer and she painfully learned that they were in fact thin. Sometimes, she would wake up against her will to the sound of broken glass or TV playing too loud.
It was sooo annoying and Zanka didn’t pay to live with this shit, but she could handle it. She sucked it up, teeth buried in her bottom lip, fingers gripping tight on a cup of coffee, eyes glimmering with stress. She went through worse than a disrespectful ass neighbour. And most of all, she didn’t have the energy to just walk next door and scream at them to cut the bullshit. So she didn’t do anything.
But then there was this smell.
It attacked her first on a late night. She was just out of working overtime again and was lost in her thoughts, imagining creative ways to kill her boss, with a takeout meal in a plastic bag on one hand. She bent a little to find her keys in her work bag with her other hand and that’s exactly when it hit her.
A sour smell, the kind that stinks so much that it scratches the back of your throat and makes you unable to breathe, the kind that could make you tear up. Totally taken aback, Zanka could just let out a few coughs and cover her nose with one hand, letting her keys fall on the ground right in front of her door. The smell was so strong and so atrocious that it clouded her mind for a moment. The first coherent thought that crossed it after a little while was :
Enough is fucking enough.
She endured everything FOR A WEEK, without confrontation. All the sleep she couldn’t get, the grieving of the peace she once had, the significant amount of stress that increased because of it all. But she will not let this chaos go on without doing anything. She would not let one fucking neighbor ruin her life even further than she already did by herself.
And so that’s why she, without thinking much, knocked violently on her freshly new neighbor’s door while clenching her teeth and covering her nose, anger building up in her at a concerning rate.
“Yeah, yeah, I’m comin’ jeez !”
The voice that resonated behind the door was deep, but still feminine and had a little singing tone to it. Zanka did not examine it further as someone appeared in front of her on the porch. Without missing a beat, she shouted, letting all her anger, fatigue and frustration of the past week take over her :
“Are ya outta yer mind ?! Did no one teach ya basic human decency ???? First of all that damn noise and now that fuckin’ horrendous smell ???? Ya ain’t alone in here so ya need ta-”
She had a great start with her little lecture, but then her eyes stopped on the person in front of her. She suddenly forgot all that she had to say and remembered all the things that went wrong in her life. She remembered what a huge failure she was, how she was just your average woman unfortunately born in a family of great people, and why she got kicked out in the first place.
In front of her was a woman. A tall and thin woman, with a well taken care of skin that was a shade darker than hers, wearing chunky earrings that made a soft clinking noise when her head tilted a little on the side with what seemed like curiosity and faint surprise. Her hair was tied up messily, a mass of thick dread locks (wicks) falling around her face and on her shoulders because of how long they were, decorated with beads and golden ornaments. Not only did she have those earrings, but she also wore a lot of piercings on her ears and face : two on one of her parted eyebrows, two on each side of her nose’s base and two under her bottom lip.
“ Snake bites.” Zanka’s mind whispered very uselessly.
"… Whoa, first of why don’t we chill a little", said the magnificent woman in front of her with an amused shrug, and that move alone made so much noise because of all the jewelry she was wearing that it made Zanka a little dizzy.
Her voice made Zanka swoon and all she could do was look in awe. Two bracelets were shining at her wrist and Zanka almost choked on nothing looking at her hands, the smell long forgotten. She wore rings on all her fingers without exception, and her nails were elegantly painted in a very dark purple, long and sharp like claws. Zanka raised her head again to look at the other woman’s face and oh, that was a mistake.
In fact, all of this was.
She regretted everything from the moment she left her family’s house to today.
Because her eyes were unreal. A colour so peculiar you couldn’t invent it. When trying to describe it in her head, Zanka found it to be a nuance of magenta or the like. And those eyes were looking at her like they knew everything, like they could see through her, like they were undressing her. That was so… weird, and Zanka didn’t know if she felt uneasy or absolutely fascinated by them.
“So !” the woman interrupted, snapping Zanka back to reality.
“What can I do for you ?” she asked, raising an eyebrow with a smile that was actually a little terrifying, making Zanka feel like she was some kind of food.
She opened and closed her mouth a few times to find her words, cheeks burning as the smell slowly returned to ally with the stranger’s beauty to take her breath away. She coughed and swallowed.
Hard.
"I… Uh, what I was sayin’ is that ya need ta stop with the noise ! And… uh-uhmmm ya better deal with the smell."
She tried her best to be firm while talking, but it was difficult when such a beautiful woman was looking her up and down, a sharp smile on her face like she was calculating the fastest way to take her out (in a deadly way).
Being a lesbian only caused Zanka troubles in her life.
Why is my taste so terrible?, she briefly thought, miserable.
“Uh-uh… And you are ?” asked her neighbor, her pierced eyebrow raised, that damn smile never leaving her face.
Zanka realised that she did not, in fact, introduce herself.
“Oh, uh, I’m yer neighbour. I live in this apartment, right next to yers.”
She pointed to her door, the takeout bag still in her hand.
Must be long cold now, she thought with a little bit of regret.
A spark of recognition lit up her neighbor’s face and she snapped her fingers as her smile widened.
"Right ! Crazy that we hadn’t yet seen each other ‘round, yeah ?"
Zanka couldn’t exactly say that she was actually kind of avoiding her. After all, she was a busy woman, and excuses were not lacking on her part. She didn’t even try to see what she looked like after seeing the truck that brought all of her things in front of the apartment and just quickly moved on. Zanka let out a sigh and realized with slight annoyance that she didn’t take long to get used to the smell still floating in the air. Nevertheless, all of that had to stop.
“...Yeah. Anyway, please stop with the noise and… take out yer trash or somethin’.”
The stranger looked up innocently, and that move made a wave of anger flow back in Zanka, for some reason.
“Sure, whatever, she said flatly.”
Then she leaned on her door frame, hair ornaments jiggling in the silence of the night and placed one hand on her hip, while the other was placed above her head to maintain her. Zanka began to sweat profusely as she noticed that the other woman was wearing a crop top and that her pants were hanging low on her hips, showing her pierced belly button and hypnotizing waist.
Fuck., Zanka thought simply.
Then,
Isn’t she cold ?
“I almost forgot, but the name’s Jabber. Jabber Wonger.”
What a strange name.
“Oh, okay. I’m Zanka. Well, nice to meet ya, I guess…” mumbled Zanka, eyes looking anywhere but in her overall direction, suddenly feeling shy.
Jabber blinked, then let out a muffled laugh, biting her lip like she was trying to hold it in. Zanka found herself a little irritated by that. As she was about to talk back, Jabber interrupted her with a sentence that she was not ready to hear right now, or ever for that matter.
"I gotta say, I’m a little disappointed, not gonna lie. After all, I wasn’t expecting a pretty woman like you to knock on my door only to give me shit about useless stuff."
The expression Zanka’s face made in response to that must have been funny, because Jabber laughed again.
Pretty.
Pretty !?
Jabber, who seemed right out of a magazine, thought she was pretty !?
Her, a pathetic average office woman, exhausted from overwork with bags under her eyes, wearing the most generic office work outfit you could imagine and with a takeout bag in her hand ???
That made no sense.
She was just playing with her.
And just because Jabber was insanely attractive didn’t mean that she could stomp on her like she was above everything. Never underestimate your average plain woman.
“Well, I would have never knocked on yer door if ya weren’t that disrespectful of yer surroundings. So shut up for fuck sake and clean yer mess. I hope I would not have to tell ya that twice. Goodnight.” she responded with the coldest voice possible.
Zanka then picked up her keys without looking twice at Jabber and disappeared in her own apartment. Jabber stood here, watching her leave with an amused look.
“What’s with the attitude ? Kinda hot” she whispered to herself with a grin.
Jabber closed her door as well, taking a moment to breathe in the toxic and familiar smell in the air. She licked her lips, looking at the wall she shared with Zanka.
“Well done, Jabber. Seems like moving here was a good idea, after all.”
Jabber was the kind of person that liked interesting people. Back in her old apartment, she could literally not care less about her neighbors as they were all boring nobodies that didn’t even deserve any attention directed at them. That’s right, Jabber kind of moved out because she was bored and she could. But well, she’s always been like that. Always doing as she pleased and looking for distractions everywhere.
Truth is, Jabber was reluctant to move here. Because it seemed like the kind of place where nothing ever happened, and she didn’t want that. At least, back in where she used to live, she could hear stories of robberies, divorces or gang activities every now and then. It was amusing while it lasted, really. And it’s not the kind of thing you’d hear of living in this proper and well located neighborhood.
But still, she gave it a chance, mostly because she was tired of listening to Cthoni rant about how she needed to “calm the fuck down” or whatever and was ready to do anything at this point to have her off her back.
Turns out it was the good thing to do, after all.
One week in and she already had her eyes on a new toy.
Jabber fell back on her sofa with a satisfied noise, humming a silly song to herself while looking up at the cracks in the ceiling.
This is gonna be fun., she thought, letting a smile slowly creep on her face.
When she opened the door, nothing prepared her for Zanka (that was her name right ?). She was standing there, visibly exhausted in her costume (fresh out of work too ? My, my), her tie a little loose, first buttons of her shirt undone. Blue blazer, blue pants, blue earrings hanging low, brushing against her shoulders. Blue eyes that were not even properly seeing Jabber as she lectured her with a stupid and charming accent. Everything about this was so uncalled for.
Jabber was so entertained.
And the way Zanka looked at her once she took the time to observe who was in front of her. Like she was suddenly conflicted between her anger and… well, something else, whatever.
What was sure was that it picked her interest. Zanka was so easily flustered. Seemed so easy to tease. It would be child’s play to make her lose her mind, wouldn’t it ? And Jabber had nothing better to do. Well, nothing that interesting. After all, she moved out because she was bored.
She has that spark in her eyes that makes me want to push further…, sang Jabber in her mind while untying her hair, letting the locks fall freely around her head and on her shoulders with clinking noises.
So that was her neighbor, huh ? Never crossed paths with her once the past week, but their little talk earlier made up for all of that.
I got a feeling she was avoiding me~, thought Jabber, biting her lips and shooting a knowing look at the wall that separated her from Zanka’s room.
Well, don’t you know ? I love hunting, my dear Zanka. And now that I’ve got my eyes on you…
She closed her eyes with a soft laugh, hands behind her head.
____________________
Thanks to the little tantrum Zanka threw that night, she gained two days of complete tranquility. An entire peaceful week-end.
She could almost believe that what she has done actually changed something.
Key word : almost.
Because it was strange to wake up by herself and not because of some weird noise coming from next door. It was strange to drink her coffee without being constantly annoyed by sounds of loud thuds and muffled nonsense. All of it was… a little sus.
Everything was too quiet.
Zanka didn’t trust Jabber to keep up the good work forever.
And she was right !
Because two days was the only rest she got from then on.
On Monday, Zanka woke up early to the sound of… her own alarm. She turned it off with a tired sigh, getting up like she returned from the dead, her sight blurry and her mouth dry.
Alright, time to go to work, she thought passively.
Coffee, like every morning. Bathroom, like every morning. Fighting with her tie like every morning. A look at the shoes that her mother offered her on her 2Oth birthday before deciding to wear the usual ones, way more comfortable.
Like every fucking morning.
It was like being stuck on a loop every day. Since Zanka left her family and got this job, her life was nothing but a copy paste of the same actions, over and over again. She didn’t even think about what she was doing anymore, or why she was doing it. Life went on, but Zanka didn’t care about anything. And if she thought about it too much, then it started to hurt. And she didn’t need that. So, once again, she grabbed her stuff with her head empty, opened her door and prepared herself to take the same road to the same place to see the same faces she couldn’t give less of a fuck about.
In September, the weather started to get cold. The wind she sensed immediately after opening the door convinced her to go back inside and grab a jacket. And that’s what she would have done if she wasn’t interrupted.
"Oh, hey, neighbor ! Off to work huh ?"
Zanka’s shoulders stiffened as she turned very slowly to her side. And, exactly as she feared, Jabber Wonger was waving at her from her porch with a smile, head slightly tilted to the side with an amused look, like she was mocking her.
Zanka expired by her nose, looking up with a silent prayer to the traitor superior being out there that kept letting her down.
First of all, it was unfair. How could Jabber look so good this early in the morning when Zanka looked like shit ? This time, she was wearing a long skirt with beautiful patterns on it, and she was… not wearing any shoes, okay. Not the first nor the last weird thing about this woman that Zanka will see, she was sure. Jabber tied a bandana around her head, hair still attached as messily as the night they met. Jewelry everywhere once again and…
Zanka’s eyes found themselves attracted to her exposed belly.
Oh… Well that’s new, huh. Zanka was now perfectly awake.
Waistbeads.
Three of them, adding to the noise that Jabber made with each slight move.
“Whatchu lookin’ at ?” Jabber purred with a teasing tone, narrowing her eyes.
Dazed, Zanka still did a good job at showing no emotions whatsoever when looking up at the other woman’s face.
“… How are you not cold ? You’re going to get sick.”
Jabber shrugged, seeming way too cheerful for a Monday morning. Zanka just shook her head with a sigh at her childish behavior.
“By the way, where did your accent go ?” Jabber abruptly asked.
Zanka froze up, eyes wide open and lips tightened. She instantly sensed a flush growing from her neck to her face. Furrowing her eyebrows to shoot daggers at Jabber with her eyes, she tried to seem composed as she answered, thoroughly erasing any traces of her accent :
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Jabber rolled her eyes and Zanka felt like going crazy.
“Come on, you’re being childish.”
Zanka just stared at her with the most offended look that she could afford.
I know she’s not talkin’ !
Jabber leaned on her doorframe once again, lost in thoughts. She started biting her lips pensively, and Zanka fought against herself to NOT look. Then she snapped her fingers, and the added noises of all that she was wearing ripped through the overall silence, making Zanka flinch.
“I get it ! You’re ashamed of your accent for some reason and you’re masking it, exceeept~”
She turned slightly to look at Zanka, like she had her all figured out.
“…You were so mad at me the other night that you didn’t bother, right ?”
Zanka hated everything about what was happening right now. She didn’t respond, instead she violently closed her door before locking it up and walking past Jabber like a responsible adult, and not at all like a sulking embarrassed child.
“You think you’re so clever, huh ?” she mumbled, furious but still somehow holding in her accent.
“I heard that !” Jabber shouted behind her, and she sounded so satisfied that Zanka felt the urge to crush her grinning face with her bare hands.
Jabber’s voice continued to pursue Zanka as she started to go down the stairs.
“Come on, don’t be like that ! I’ve been nothing but nice to you, why the attitude ?” Zanka heard her say with the fakest sad voice ever.
She stopped in the middle of the stairs, to look up at Jabber.
“Nice… ? To me ?”
Zanka couldn’t believe the audacity of this woman. Jabber looked very proud of herself.
“Yup ! Gave you a headstart and all that. The weekend was nice, wasn’t it ?”
“A headst-”
Zanka rubbed her nose, sensing the headache that this conversation was starting to cause her.
“Look, I just want you to be a decent neighbor and keep things quiet.”
Jabber leaned towards her from their apartment floor, raising her eyebrows playfully.
“Oh yeah ?”
“Yes !” shouted Zanka out of frustration. She then realized that it was still early and went back to a more quiet tone.
“Just…leave me alone !”
Then she remembered that she had to go to work and suddenly looked at the watch on her wrist.
“Shit”, she simply whispered before running down the rest of the stairs.
Jabber observed Zanka disappear with a sinister smile before returning inside her apartment to put on a coat. After all, she had to go to work too, sadly.
"Can’t wait to see more of you, Zanka."
It was to be expected, but Zanka got late to her meeting, which has never happened since she first started working for this company. She was mortified. All of this just because she let her sexy- no, annoying neighbor get on her nerves.
Why am I such a mess…, thought Zanka, eyes wandering aimlessly on her computer’s screen.
Plus, she didn’t take anything with her to keep her warm (like she intended before Jabber ruined everything), so she was freezing.
All because of Jabber.
Her mind drifted a little. She could still hear the sound of the other’s waistbeads clinking in her ears, the sight of them even clearer. Her hands, with those stupid long fingers orned with rings.
Huh… The thought warmed her up a little.
Weird.
____________________
Zanka got off work exactly at the same time as usual, thinking about how she hated her job like she did everyday. She decided to go for some groceries before going home. Someday, she was just not in the mood to cook anything, but today was not one of those. She ate out the last four days, and was forced to admit that it started to be a lot.
The supermarket was almost empty, just some lost souls here and there, looking as tired as Zanka. She bought all she needed without even properly paying attention or thinking through her actions. After all, she did all of that a thousand times, in this exact order.
By the time her brain awakened again, she was climbing the stairs to her apartment’s floor. Exhausted, she started to look for her keys in her bag when…
“Fancy seeing you here !”
It took all Zanka’s strength to not loudly groan of displeasure. She settled for another deep sigh.
“Jabber.”
“Herself !” laughed Jabber, jumping on one foot to the other, overjoyed.
This time, she was wearing a coat. Zanka felt a strange feeling of disappointment along with her relief and decided to ignore them both.
“What do you want this time ?”
“Good question ! Well, first of I want to study you oh, and maybe even dissect you, why not.”
Zanka’s heart stopped in her chest. She slowly turned her tired gaze toward Jabber, looking at her with nothing but confusion. Jabber just stood there on her fucking porch, bare foot, smiling innocently like she didn’t say something utterly absurd right about now.
“… What ?”
Jabber’s smile widened, she leaned a little more in Zanka’s direction, her hands buried in her coat’s pocket. Zanka didn’t walk away. It was like she was suddenly paralyzed, and could just watch as Jabber continued to move forward with a pace so slow it was barely bearable.
“Say…”, started Jabber, one of her hands coming out of her pocket to reach out to Zanka.
Zanka felt too stiff. She almost forgot how to breathe.
“Do you need help with all that ?”
Zanka blinked, surprised by the sensation of Jabber’s cold hands against hers. She retreated swiftly, keeping her guard up. Jabber noticed it but just smiled, as if it was the only thing she knew how to do. Her smile irked Zanka to a degree that was getting concerning.
Zanka’s gaze followed Jabber’s, and stopped on the grocery bags she was carrying.
“… No, it’s okay. Weighs nothing”, Zanka responded with a tone a lot more cold than she originally intended.
Jabber shrugged lightly before retreating to her porch, staring at her the entire time. Then she leaned on her doorframe once again, crossed her arms and discreetly checked Zanka out while she was walking towards her own apartment.
She’s not even being cocky, all of that really weighs nothing to her, huh., she noted as Zanka managed the heavy looking bags with zero difficulty.
A light giggle escaped from her mouth as she waved Zanka goodbye, her neighbor looking at her with an expression of perfect annoyance on her face.
“Well bye bye Miss Bad Attitude ~”, Jabber whispered before closing her door with a last laugh.
A laugh that was surely going to haunt Zanka for the rest of the night, she thought before heading inside as well.
And yes.
Peaceful times were over.
I get what she meant by a headstart now.
Zanka had such a monotone life before. She knew exactly at what time she had to get up in the morning, at what time she had to go back home after work, at what time she was free to hang out with the same friends she had for literal years (because she wasn’t exactly the greatest at forming new bonds with strangers). She knew what to eat, where to go, what to do because all of it was always the same. But, for the first time in what felt like forever, all of that became confused and all mixed up in the unknown because of ONE PERSON.
Jabber was everywhere.
Her insufferable habits of doing the loudest and strangest noises right next to Zanka where she could hear it all didn’t take long to start again, somehow even more irritating than before.
Zanka wanted to tear her hair off her head anytime she heard Jabber’s music piercing the walls at the worst times possible of the day.
And the smell came back too, variating from a little disagreeable to absolutely atrocious.
On days when it was too much, Zanka was on Jabber’s porch yelling at her to cut it out, knowing damn well that it was useless but seizing the opportunity to let go of her anger nonetheless. More often than not, those visits were just an excuse to release the frustration she built up.
Zanka suspected Jabber to know that and even to enjoy it a little bit. No, let’s say a lot.
Because one thing she had to learn about Jabber (against her will) was that she was a real weirdo. The type of weirdo so messed up that you come past them once in a lifetime.
Jabber had this habit of going around bare foot at any time for some reason. And it wasn’t even the strangest thing about her.
She liked to surprise Zanka by walking behind her without making any sounds and coming uncomfortably close just to whisper some bullshit close to her nape. She liked to do it the most when Zanka was throwing her trash out. Now, she couldn’t even go without looking everywhere beforehand like she was a preyed animal.
Zanka still had no idea where the smell came from. She tried and failed to recognize it, it was so strange and heavy, she was a hundred percent sure that she never smelled anything like this before.
Jabber had this way of staring into your soul with a creepy smile, like she knew everything you were desperately trying to hide and it was no use trying to escape her.
Every morning when Zanka left to go to work and every night when she came back, Jabber was always here as if she was waiting patiently to annoy the hell out of her with an innocent smile. It was insufferable, and Zanka fell for all of her traps, more and more.
She couldn’t get out of it. This woman made years of routines explode into pieces by her mere presence. Honestly, it was kind of astonishing if you thought about it. Because Jabber was unpredictable. Zanka never knew in advance what she could do or say, it’s like Jabber was just making her dance to her own tempo. If there was something that Zanka loved, it was control. Which is why she absolutely couldn’t stand being pushed around like that, by a woman she barely knew and was clearly not in her right mind.
Everything about it was so wrong.
And the worst of all ?
Was certainly Zanka’s inexplicable attraction towards Jabber.
This too was getting out of control. The attraction she first felt when they met was so sudden and so strong that it was like an unprovoked punch in the guts. And it wasn’t any better now : Zanka had this strange need to… look at her. Sometimes, as she was literally combusting with anger and they were arguing (more like Zanka was angry and Jabber responded just to angry her more), she looked at her smile and at her crazy eyes and all she really wanted to do was to lean in and rip her lips to shreds with her teeth. All she wanted to do was to violently pin her to a wall and see everything Jabber has to show.
Her own thoughts terrified her, but she lost every single battle she fought against it.
Zanka had taken forever to come to terms with the fact that she was attracted to women. But even now that she accepted it, why she had to struggle with strong feelings of lust for her unhinged neighbor was beyond her comprehension. Ending up in those impossible situations seemed to be a thing of hers, apparently.
Everything about Zanka was normal, plain, ordinary. She had nothing special. She was a very stable individual, with no issues fitting in- okay maybe some issues fitting in but who cared about that ? Not her.
But why Jabber ?
Why a woman that drank strange and unknown aromas of teas everyday on her porch barefoot even when it was freezing cold ?
A woman that had no notions of boundaries or personal space ?
A woman that has bitten her lips so much that they actually bled out from it sometimes ?
Not that Zanka cared, though. She didn’t care. At all.
Not about Jabber, not about anything.
It was fine.
She could manage, like always.
She wasn’t curious about what the inside of her apartment could look like, she didn’t want to know why Jabber was the way she was or why she was always so fixated on her specifically, she didn’t want to know what she liked to eat or what her job was.
She wasn’t curious at all.