Chapter Text
Dave lived in a roomy apartment. The refrigerator worked, the shower didn’t leak, and breathless solicitors had to climb the harrowing flights of stairs. It was a good apartment. There was only one catch.
He had a door in the middle of his wall.
It wasn’t a bad door. Creamy color, wooden structure, panel door. The door remained as a remnant from some old family from some old time, but it lead to the neighboring apartment. He didn’t need more room, and his one friend (sister, librarian, smirks too much, wears black lipstick and purple cardigans, twenty cats) had her own apartment closer to her work. After a painful afternoon of sorting things out with the landlord, who had an infinite closet of striped shirts, he finally agreed to get a neighbor. He left the landlord with a deliberate list of the qualities he wanted in this neighbor.
1. Quiet
2. Minds his own business
3. Not a complete jackass
So he got John Egbert.
The knocking on the door began early in the morning, in the annoying shave and a haircut beat, and he opened his front door, expecting it to be solicitors he could shoo away with no little problem. Instead, he got a pie unceremoniously shoved into his chest, and a man standing there with a bag of boxed baked goods, grinning up at him.
“Hi! I’m your new neighbor. I got you apple pie, because my dad always said you should get your neighbors cake, but I figured you might be a pie guy. Also, cupcakes. Can I come in?”
Dave was already saying no when his new neighbor barged in, setting the food on top of the counter.
“Your place is real nice! You really fixed it up. Anyway, I’m John Egbert, and I’m going to be living next door to you. You know we have a door together? You’re free to come in, any time, any day. I mean, you can borrow a cup of sugar or something. Or you could just drop by and visit!” John took his hand and shook it up and down, grin spreading on his face. Dave tried to artfully extract his hand, but the grip was annoyingly strong, and he gritted his teeth in endurance.
“Never going to happen,” he said, wiggling his fingers to try and feel the tips. “I’d prefer if we left that door locked. Forever. Archaeologists find door and it’s still locked, shit closed up tighter than an asshole clench, that type of sphincter lock.”
“Good one. What’s your name?”
“Dave, and it’s not—”
“Hi, Dave. Do you like cupcakes? I brought like a thousand cupcakes.”
Dave wasn’t a fan of cupcakes, but he was too busy massaging his hand for blood circulation to correct him. He stood there in his bathrobe and pajama pants, seething at him for ruining his day. But seething never got him anywhere, and John happily opened the box of cupcakes.
“Your place is real nice,” John said, piling out the fifth cupcake onto his shiny counter. “You work in technology or something?”
“No,” Dave mumbled, drawing his thin bathrobe closer to his sides. “Stocks.” But for once, he could follow John’s logic. He might not understand the need for a meet and greet with the neighbors, but technology did flourish in his apartment. He had a mounted high definition television, a closed case full of games, surround sound, and swaths of wires peeking through behind his cases. He was suddenly embarrassed at how lived-in his apartment appeared. The couch was decidedly lumpy with obvious ass prints and an empty chips bag sat on top of his coffee table. He didn’t want his annoying neighbor to get the idea that he was some sort of weirdo who only left the apartment for work.
Except that he really was some sort of weirdo who only left the apartment for work.
“So you do math?” John had built a small architectural foundation with the cupcakes, licking the frosting off his fingers.
“Yeah, I trade huge amounts of money everyday and work with a fluctuating market. So yeah, ‘math.’”
“Cool.” John sucked his finger, glancing over to the swords over his television set. “Are those real?”
“They’re real.” He was seized with a striking image of John holding one, dropping it on his foot, and bleeding all over his apartment. “Don’t touch them.”
“I’m not going to touch them! Don’t worry, I respect personal boundaries.” John turned to open his refrigerator, stepping back. “What happened to your food?”
“That is my food.” It was a good amount of food. He had a half-eaten bowl of cereal inside. His cabinets were filled with cereal and chips, and he couldn’t quite fathom what was wrong with that. But apparently the high and mighty John had a problem, shaking his head, making small tsking sounds, and stuffing the pie and cupcakes into the empty shelves.
“That’s it, I’m bringing you dinner tonight.”
“I work late.”
“I’ll put it in the refrigerator! Don’t worry, Dave, we’re gonna be great friends.”
“No.”
“Anyway, speaking of work, I should get going. My lab needs me! Or it doesn’t, but I need my lab. Is there anything I need to know about this place? You can give me the inside scoop.”
“I don’t know,” Dave said, raking his fingers through his hair and distracted by the horror of the door constantly swinging open. “The stairs are—You know, I don’t want you to poke your nose around here. It’d be annoying as hell. I could seal off the door with plaster or duct tape or whatever the hell people use to seal up doors, and I’d pay for it. All expense trip to staying in your own place.”
“I won’t snoop! I get it, math stuff is secret stuff. I will just put stuff in your kitchen! Okay, I really gotta go, but! I will see you later.” John waved, collecting his bags and opening the door in the middle of the wall. Dave caught a glimpse of Nick Cage’s gloomy face on a poster hanging in the apartment, and several boxes that were still unpacked, before John closed the door. He stood there, gripping his sides and seething.
He finally had to start getting dressed for work, throwing his clothes haphazardly on the bed and pulling on his suit. He had enough money to get a nicer place. He should move. That was the only option, to move far, far away from this place and this neighbor who turned out to be a loud, intrusive jackass. His frustration left his tie more frazzled than usual and his suitcase banged against the table.
It was on the elevator that he began to call Rose. He never took the stairs, which were notoriously small and slippery. The elevator wasn’t much better with the thousand reflective mirror surfaces. He stared at his drawn and pale face with his mouth twisted in a grimace, as he listened to Rose’s reprimanding answering machine.
“I’m moving,” he told the machine. “Soon. I got an annoying as hell neighbor and I can afford a cabin in the middle of the woods. Yeah, he’s that annoying. His name is John and he can’t keep his grubby paws to himself. He’s the most annoying thing I’ve ever met. Call me back, unless you’re busy. If you’re busy, call me back quicker.”
When he came home late at night, he found a heap of lasagna wrapped in plastic in the refrigerator. A post-it note sat on top, a blue smiley face drawn on top. He dumped it in the trash, then the cupcakes for good measure. He ate the apple pie, stabbing his fork into the tin as he watched late late late night television, chewing and seething.
--
The third morning, he was woken up by a water gun streaming in his face.
The fifth morning, a pie slammed into his face when he was leaving for work, and he had to change his suit. He was still finding lemon meringue cream in his hair, flecks of it sticking to the corner of his shades, all throughout the day.
The second week, he opened the refrigerator and thousands of coiled paper snakes sprang upon him with an ancient wrath previously reserved for Indiana Jones movies.
The third week, he had devised up at least five perfect ways to make John’s untimely demise look like an accident.
“So my lab assistant was like, science and ghosts don’t go together, and I was like, kinda, except you have to remember Ghostbusters, but that’s the exception to the rule? Like it’s all those weird hocus pocus stuff, mostly, but it’s interesting to kinda think about it. Theoretically, if it did go together, and it wasn’t a buncha bull, how it would’ve turned out. But right now, most ghost science is bull.”
“Hate to break this inflammatory nerd-out, but don’t you have work?” Dave was still in his suit, jacket hanging on the chair and his sleeves rolled up, and scrubbing away the glitter on his briefcase. Another joyful prank from his joyful parasite, who was sitting at his kitchen table and eating the breakfast he had brought over. Toast, poached eggs, and a side of sausages. Even Dave gave in and had eaten a bit of that.
“Not today! I might go out to visit my sister later. She works at the museums of plants ‘n stuff, sometimes she brings me plants ‘n stuff.” That would explain John’s balcony. Dave didn’t bother to wander outside too much on his own balcony, but when he did, he could always look over and see John’s balcony covered in a forest.
“You have a sister, too, right?” John stuck his fork in his mouth, glancing over to the few picture frames scattered around the apartment. Dave had cultivated the sophisticated sleek look to his place, with the exception of the spots that he actually used, but the magazine cut-outs had all shown picture frames for interior designing. He put them up. Most of them were his own work, shots of crow shadows and close-ups of park benches. But a few had him and his sister, her eyes always knowing.
“Yeah. A real flighty broad.”
“She looks nice.”
“She’s not nice at all. The second worst person in this city.” The first, of course, his good neighbor. “She lives with her girlfriend not far from here.”
“Lucky, I always have to take twenty trains just to get to Jade.”
He assumed Jade was his sister’s name, but he didn’t bother to ask him. If he asked, he might give the impression that he was genuinely interested, and he was genuinely not. He scrubbed at the glitter, fingers already wrinkling under the water, and tried to ignore the fact that his neighbor was swinging his legs underneath his kitchen table. He already knew more about John than he ever needed to know. John Egbert plays the piano, enjoys watching sports, laughs hard enough to snort milk out of his nose at corniest joke, way too into bad movies, had a Nick Cage boner visible from satellites.
“You have a girlfriend?” John asked, breaking him from his seething thoughts.
“No.” And he ate enough shit with Rose’s knowing looks. So what if he was old and single, he wasn’t particularly lonely. The people who had sex with his mother on Xbox were more than enough friends for him.
“I don’t, either. We should go to a dating thing sometime. Like a mixer? It might be fun.”
“Those things are hellholes of vapid singles who just don’t want to go to bed alone.” Dave toweled off his briefcase. “Mixers are where hope goes to die.”
“Or where hope goes to live! Like on an incubator. I will keep an eye out on mixers in the local area. Actually, I am still pretty new to this neighborhood. Which grocery store is the best, you think? I like the one across the street, but it doesn’t seem too fresh.”
“I don’t go out.” Dave dropped into a seat by his table, stealing a sausage and biting into it.
“You sure don’t. You want to come with me and my friends tonight? We’re just going to the bar, maybe watching the game.”
“I don’t need your pity invites.”
“It’s not a pity invite! I want to hang out with you. Come on, split from work a little early, and I will buy you a beer or something. Delicious, right? Beer. Beeers.”
“It’s a pity invite because you’re doing it out of some fucked up notion that you have to feel sorry for me. You honestly think I’d have fun with your goofball friends who I don’t even know and watch a game for some weird sport? You’re out of your mind. It’s torture enough to hang out with an idiot like you, the nerd king with the huge teeth. I never wanted you here and I can’t believe you actually have friends.” Dave drank his orange juice, swallowing rapidly. The silence lingering made him realize his tone had been more acrid than he intended. It wasn’t that he wasn’t annoyed. He was damn annoyed that people thought he was so desperate for human interaction that he would jump for any bone like that. But he usually kept his voice in a mumbling tone, and he had raised it, bitter and angry, and it must have been a first because John looked cowed.
It didn’t make him feel as good as he hoped.
He never tried to hide how much he despised John intruding on him, but this seemed like the first blow to actually land. John kept his eyes on the plate, pushing around his eggs with a fork. He had to bite down the impulse to apologize. Even though it was the truth, there was something suddenly sad and haggard about his eyes that sparked the urge to grovel and beg before him to make it go away.
“Sorry,” John said. “I didn’t think of it like that.”
Dave mumbled something like assent, the awkardness settling into his bones. He resisted the strong itch to jump out of his seat and start out the door, running for his work and anywhere except sitting at that quiet kitchen table where everything seemed so sleek and too dull. John dropped the fork, curling his fingers together.
“And that whole mixer thing is stupid, anyway. I mean, I only want to go because I don’t like sleeping alone, you’re right. Totally lame. But we could just go watch a movie or something, you know? Something way unnerdy.” John stood up from the table, collecting the plate and fork. “Sorry, Dave.”
Dave kept his eyes on the half empty glass of orange juice, listening to the door shut. He could hear John walk around for a while, the floorboards squeaking, then to the apartment door open and close. John must have left to take twenty trains to see his sister, leaving behind a few packages of food and Dave alone with his thoughts. He dumped the rest of the orange juice down the drain, watching the pulp swirl down, and grabbed his cell phone. He sat on his couch, listening to the rings.
“Good morning,” Rose said, her voice pleasant. “Is this about your neighbor again?”
“He’s an ass.”
“I’ve surmised as much. Especially from all the previous phone calls this month. I can’t remember the last time you called to wish me a good day, just the litany of your hatred against your new neighbor. John this, John that.”
“He’s a really big ass.”
“What did he do this time? Put jam in your jelly jar?”
“No. Yes. I don’t know, he’s just an ass.” He ran his fingers through his hair, his reflection warped in the clear coffee table. She must have understood his incoherency. Her voice softened kindly, more sympathetic.
“I’m surprised you’ve put up with him this long. I don’t remember you as kind to anybody who annoys you.”
“I’m not. Annoying shits are annoying shits.”
“So what’s different about John?”
“Fuck, I don’t know. He’s a twerpy little shit.” He combed through his hair again, the cream colored door complacent against the wall. “But he means it. He honest to God means everything he says and he doesn’t have an agenda. It’s different if a jackass has an agenda. It’s easier to take potshots at some selfish bastard, but he’s got Disney eyes and a pure heart of gold.”
“I feel it’d take more than a metal heart to wear you down.”
“Yeah, well. I don’t even care he’s in here, touching my stuff. It’s his whole damned personality, the way he’s so stupid. He’s an idiot.”
Rose seemed to breathe in thought, and he could almost imagine her, lounging on a stupidly luxurious felt chair, curling a strand of hair around her fingers. He missed her, sometimes, in ways he’d never tell her. He had one friend, and that one friend might as well have been twenty trains anyway. She might complain about his load of voicemail calls, but that was his way of missing her without telling her.
“Perhaps I should drop by for a visit,” she finally said, voice ringing loud and clear.
“Your girlfriend can hold down the home front?”
“Lord knows. Schedule it in, little brother. I’ll deal with your nightmares.”
“You are my nightmare, old hag.” But he did schedule her for a visit, and dragged himself away to prepare for work.
He stayed late at his office, finishing up with some cold calls and closing his research on his laptop. By the time he drove home, the stars had already begun to glimmer through the suffocating smog, and he knew he had lingered around the office to avoid John. He honestly hadn’t thought it could get worse than getting pied in the face, but he was wrong. He defiantly refused to admit any wrong to himself while simultaneously feeling terrible about doing wrong. He’d been right, John had been a jackass with his pity invitation, but at the same time, he didn’t feel right.
By the time the elevator reached his apartment at the top floor, he saw that he hadn’t needed to stay late. No light peeped out from John’s door. He still must be visiting his sister.
Despite this, trepidation filled his night. He drank some soda, the fizz melting away at his teeth, and turned halfway on his couch. He couldn’t watch his show with full attention, muscles tensed in case John barged through the door, like always. But there was nothing. No wrapped food in his refrigerator, no pranks lying in wait from his bookcases. Just the interior design he had based on fancy magazines and the canned laughter from television. He turned off his television and went to bed.
He made good enough money to choose a high end bed. He personally tested the mattresses until he found The One who conformed to his shape. But that night, his bed seemed too big.
It was as if he didn’t want to sleep alone.
At three in the morning, he finally stopped tossing and turning and tossed himself out of the bed. Barefoot, he approached the door in the middle of his wall and stared it down. The door loomed before him, representing everything that he hated. Rose would have something smart to say about it, but he didn’t. The knob felt cold, but he twisted the door open with an incriminating squeak of the hinges that never seemed to follow John’s entrances. Tingling ran down his spine, like he was intruding. John had always been eager with invitations to his own house, though. But logic didn’t stop the strange feeling in his limbs.
The apartment was dark and he could barely make out the furniture. The layout was basically the same as his own apartment, though he had some remodeling done on his own place. But he padded to the refrigerator, opening it and letting out the tinny light. John kept his refrigerator fairly well stocked, and he might have been hungry enough to take something, since he hadn’t eaten that night. But there was some food prepared already, not wrapped, but with a little post-it note that said “dave.”
He lost his appetite.
Instead, he took the plastic jug of apple juice. He twisted it open and drank it, some drops trickling out of his mouth and down his jaw. But it tasted sweet and juicy and good, refreshing in the chilliness, full in his stomach. He drank half and put it back into the fridge, feeling maliciously satisfied. It wasn’t the worst thing he’d done in his life, but he felt a sick appeasement.
He closed the refrigerator door and walked back into his own apartment, closing the door behind him. He settled into his couch, pulling an overpriced pillow underneath his head, and fell into a dreamless sleep.
--
Dave smoked. Everyone in his office building smoked. The smoke breaks were rewarding and ample time to try and ease out insider tips, though he rarely. But in his usual life, he didn’t smoke too much. He smoked when he was stressed.
He was smoking now.
The cigarette ducked up and down between his lips, his arms crossed as he gazed down on where he had locked his keys inside his car. Everything seemed to be unraveling. His dearly beloved sister was supposed to show up that night, he had a big account to close today, and there was a new awkward level when he talked to John. Maybe if John never visited his apartment again, that would have been fine. He could have eased out of ever communicating with him, dissolving their relationships to brisk nods and long silences in the elevator ride up.
But John insisted on visiting him, unannounced, and always bringing him plates of food. He never invited him out again, or even mentioned his friends again, but ignoring the subject only made him uncomfortable. John tried too hard to make everything right, and he didn’t try at all.
He peered into his car, the tinted windows lit up by the cigarette glow. The keys sat distinctly on his passenger seat, and he had no way to get at them. There was no way around it. He would have to be late to the meeting, and just hope that the Adams account wouldn’t close because he was too much of a jackass to not lock his keys into the car. He woke up his cell phone, already spinning the screens to look up train times.
“Dave!”
He flinched, and half-turned to watch John jog up to him. He shouldn’t have been surprised, since he parked into the apartment’s parking lot. But he was surprised, and wondered for a moment if he could play it off like he didn’t recognize him. His day was shitty enough without adding a healthy dose of John.
“Hi! Wow, what a coincidence. I was just on my way to work.”
“Yeah,” Dave said, clutching onto his briefcase. “You should probably get going.”
“What’s wrong? Did you lock yourself out of the car or something? I have done that. It is pure nonsense.”
Dave flushed. This was the first time he’d done it, but John had a smarmy knowing look on his face. Instead, he focused his attention on the sky. The pure blue color shone over the brick buildings, dark birds landing on thin telephone poles. It would have been a beautiful day if it wasn’t such a shitty day.
“I’ll give you a ride,” John said, dangling out his car keys. “Then you can just call someone to come and fix it while you work. Problem? Solved.”
“Thanks but no thanks, eager beaver. I’ll just take the subway to work.”
“Come on, Dave.” John grinned at him, charming as always. “My car can probably get there faster.”
Even though it would have been a pain to find the station and figure out the schedule, his heels still dug into the tar when John pulled him by the elbow towards his car. His silver briefcase hit the side of his thigh, and he stumbled along. John’s car was like John’s clothes: terrible. Papers covered the interior of the car, cardboard boxes sitting in the backseat, and obnoxious furry dice dangled from the rearview mirror. The seats were old and there was nothing sleek or new about this car. Dave threw a wistful glance at his own car, sitting there with curved lines and seat warmers, and then slipped into the car that smelled faintly like mothballs.
He closed the door with a slam.
“It’s great, because I’ve actually been meaning to talk to you.”
He opened the door.
John started up the car, reverberations echoing over the frame of the car. Dave had to close the door again, the car rolling down the parking lot and onto the street. The vibrations thrummed from the seat into his frame, leaving him irritable and shaken, not stirred. He’d rarely seen John outside of the fluorescent light of his apartment, or even looked directly at him at all. He did now, propping his chin on his hand. John wasn’t particularly handsome, or at least not as handsome as he was. The only thing special about his stupid face was the way his mouth seemed to incline upwards, perpetually ready to smile. But John seemed healthier and happier in the daylight, basking up the rays with fingers tapping on the steering wheel.
“I guess I still think about that fight we had, you know? I’m no super smart person, Dave, you gotta level with me sometimes.” John bit down on his lip, eyes distant and glued to the expanding horizon. The swollen city heat clogged the sights, the thin bars of black gates disappearing into glass buildings, pointing towards the sky.
“What do you want me to say?” Dave picked at the edge of his briefcase, uneasy. His eyes only darted up to give the occasional motion for him to turn right or left, ducking down again in embarrassment.
“I want you to say what you want to do! You’re right, going to a bar and watching sports is not your thing. But I still want to go somewhere with you. Wherever you want, my treat.”
“I don’t really care.” That was true. Dave liked staying inside and working his way through his Netflix queue. But he didn’t feel like shouting at John again, so he kept his voice low.
“You know, there’s this super fun event at my job. Is it okay if I take you? Just you and me, it’s our destiny, that sorta shtick. I think you’ll really like it.”
“Fine, sure. Whatever.” If it shut him up.
“Really? Wow, Dave, thanks!” John kept his eyes on the road, but he grabbed his hand and shook it. His grip was strong, like he last remembered, warm and strangely soothing despite the strength. He let his small hand get crumpled up, the fingers sticking out. John released him, but Dave withdrew his hand into his lap and pretended not to feel the warmth flowing from his hand.
“Here. I work here.” He waited for John to roll the car to a stop in front of a parking meter. He expected John to drive away, hopefully into a volcano, after he finished dropping him off. But he wasn’t so lucky, and he gritted his teeth as John darted out to hold the car door open for him.
“You work in a really nice place, Dave,” John said, eyes wide and scanning up the building. He had to admit that he did choose a nice place, the reflective windows bouncing off the rays of light and phantom images of adjacent buildings whispering against the sides. Everything was sleek and everything was wealthy, people passing on the streets with stiff dark suits, clean black dresses, dark gray coats, and pearls decorating necks and wrists. Dave blended in perfectly with the crowd, opting against a coat in the warm spring day. He knew he looked good and handsome, suit perfectly tailored for his size. He glanced up, but no birds arched across the sky.
“I should get to work,” Dave said, turning away. “See you later.”
That was a mistake. He could almost hear John brightening up at the admittance that they were seeing each other later. A fatal weakness, he had exposed his throat to the enemy, and all he could do was hurry into the building. He mumbled a small greeting to the receptionist and security guard, sliding through his ID to get through the doors, stuffing himself into the crowded elevator and finally getting off onto a floor. His office was clean, as always, and he cracked open his laptop to start his work.
“Davey boy,” he heard someone say, and he reluctantly glanced up. It was that man whose name he never remembered, who wore the strange cuffs and had a strange flush to his face, like he was always burning. The man took long strides into his room, shoulders squat over his shoulders and knowingly looking down the window.
“Sup.” He hated responding to his name, but he hated almost everything about his job. Except for possibly watering the plastic plants in his office. He enjoyed that.
“Who was that, taking a joyride with you? Looked like some kinda chump. The way he dressed, man, my gramma dressed better than that, and she’s dead!” The man guffawed to himself, slapping his knee. A real hearty sort of guy, not like the youngsters entering the field with their slicked back hair. Like Dave.
Dave slid his pen over his fingers, trying to respond. On one hand, John was a chump without a fashion sense. He’d seen it. Even though John had been on the way to work, he’d been wearing a rumpled blue dress shirt and blaring red tie, each clashing in a furious war. The shirt had been too pale and the tie too strong. But hearing the man laughing to himself about John didn’t feel good, either.
“Yeah, a real chump.” Dave took his mug, something he designed himself, company logo emblazoned in comic sans. He closed his laptop and left to fill his cup with weak coffee, because apparently nobody could afford either good coffee or two-ply tissue paper. It wasn’t like he loved his office, but he somehow felt irritated at the man for insulting John without even knowing him, and irritated at himself for feeling irritation.
--
He tried to go home early, but he’d gotten lost in trying to find the subway station and only managed to find it using a tourist site on his phone. He’d nearly fallen asleep in the soothing lull, leaning against the divider and sitting in the cold and lumpy seat. His stop had been fairly close, leading him to cast doubts over John’s brave claim about his car being faster than the subway. Though he tried to call Rose, her phone was busy, and he resigned himself to tapping his toe on the elevator ride up.
He’d given Rose a spare key, but no light emitted underneath his door frame. She must not have arrived yet, though judging by the light from John’s door, his good neighbor was already home. He hastily unlocked his door and relocked it once inside, throwing his briefcase onto his couch and trying to clean up his mess. He stuffed the chips bags into chips bags, and he was halfway starting to wonder about chipception when he heard the door open from the wall.
“You’re late.” He’d recognize that melodious and judgmental voice anywhere and he turned to see Rose standing in the doorway. She looked like she just stepped out of his memory, a hop and a skip from childhood. A black headband, a dark purple cardigan, dark leggings, and that knowing smirk.
“There was the—subway—” He peeked behind her. “Were you in his apartment?”
“I was in his apartment.”
“Why were you in his apartment.”
“The short answer, tea. The long answer, quite fine tea.” She stepped back into John’s apartment, leaving him to trail behind her reluctantly. He felt a residual sense of guilt, like he was a trespasser. The last time he’d come into the room, he’d wrapped his lips and dripped saliva into apple juice that would’ve been given freely.
In the light, John’s apartment looked even shabbier. Dave couldn’t remember what his apartment had looked like before he remodeled, but he hoped that his apartment wasn’t as crappy as this. Movie posters plastered the walls and half his things were still stuffed in boxers. He’d apparently taken the effort to assemble half a table before giving up. But he had to admit, the apartment was quaint. What it lacked in anything substantial, it made up in friendliness. The refrigerator was practically sagging in tiny magnets, the ghost sheets were apparent from the half-open door in the bedroom, colorful clothes strewn over the suitcase, and heavy books piled on the floor with sheets of paper sticking out of them.
The teapot, cracked and rugged, sat on the kitchen counter where Rose had apparently been sipping her tea while she waited for him. An empty basket, yarn stuffing the sides, sat near the stool, and Dave knew she’d brought her cat.
“Hi, Dave.” John grinned up at him, sitting on the couch. A black cat was patting his nose, almost like the cat was playing with some amusing lesser human who needed pets and treats. He was still dressed in his obnoxious clothes.
“I was about to go into your apartment when your neighbor invited me into his room to wait. The tea is quite good.” Rose raised the teacup to her lips, smiling at him. “We’ve had a friendly chat.”
“Yeah, your sister is way cool. You should’ve told me that earlier! And her cat is cool, too. I have named him Dr. Meowgon Spengler.”
“His name is Mutie.” Rose sipped at her tea, elbows pressed against the counter and her lips curved in amusement.
“He is mad adorable. Do you want to hold him, Dave?”
“I’m fine.” Dave sat on the stool, weaving his fingers together. “What have you guys been talking about?”
“Cats, mostly. And invasion of privacy.” Rose smiled at him, knowing. A jab of guilt struck Dave in the chest, and surprising awkwardness descended upon him. It wasn’t felt by Rose or John, but he felt the guilt of dragging his sister into his mess. The situation was wrong. Rose had always known everything about him from day one, and she knew all the details about his childhood more than he could remember himself. He’d always fought for privacy, but he had always known secretly that there was never a privacy that Rose could not see. But now he was trying to shield the entire situation from Rose’s eyes.
“I don’t mind it,” he said, almost urgently, in his mumble. “Just as long as he doesn’t touch the turntables.”
Rose raised her eyebrow, but John had already sidled close to them, carrying Mutie in his arms and petting the kitten with reckless abandon. Whatever she was going to say, she only sealed her lips together and took another long sip of tea.
“What’s up with the turntables?” John asked, stroking down Mutie’s tail. “I’ve never touched them, anyway.”
Dave turned towards Rose, and she arched her eyebrow again. Today was a day for exposing his weak throat, apparently, and he cursed himself for his indiscretion. He must have revealed something to her by either not telling John to screw off or immediately telling him the reason himself, quietly asking Rose to say it for him. He ran his finger along the counter, trying to ignore her.
“They were a gift,” he said to the floor, “from my guardian. I don’t even use them anymore, but I used to be the shit at them.”
“You should show John sometime,” Rose said.
“Yeah! That would be really sweet. Would you?” John glanced at him, all shiny-eyed and pleading and annoying in his honesty. Again, he inadvertently glanced at Rose and again, she looked at him like she could see inside his heart.
“I guess.” He poked at his teacup. “Sometime.”
“I mean, unless it’s too much to ask, I haven’t known you all that long.” John shyly bit his lip, as if trying to take the words back. Dave shrugged in response, too busy trying to defend himself from Rose’s gaze.
“Haven’t known my sister all that long, either, but that hasn’t stopped her from wrecking everything.” At John’s questioning stare, he flushed and continued, aware of Rose’s impassive impressed smirk that he would reveal so much to his neighbor. “Same father, different mother. I was adopted.”
“I found him on Facebook. Truly amazing, technology. Are you Facebook friends with him yet, John?”
“Oh, nah. But we should be.”
“Like hell we should,” Dave said, but John only grinned in response. He had an easy way about him with strangers that Dave lacked. Where Dave walked stiffly, John had loose limbs that carried him through the conversation. John had an ease and a knack, and he opened himself well to Rose. Dave was pleased that he didn’t have to talk much through the conversation, Rose and John exchanging jokes through the night and Dave occasionally snorting when the nerdy corniness got the best of him.
It was three in the morning before Rose started to yawn, delicate with her hand over her mouth. John bid her good night and they stepped over into Dave’s apartment, letting the door swing behind them. Dave was preparing the guest bed when Rose stepped into the room, nighty down to her ankles.
“I haven’t seen you having so much fun for a while,” she said, head resting against the frame. “You used to have fun like this before you got drawn into your job.”
“It’s not the job.” Dave sat on the bed, elbows on his knees. Rose glided to sit next to him, hands folded across her lap.
“Then what is it?”
“I don’t know, shit happens. You start as a kid and everything’s all hunky dory, then you grow up and you gotta do shit. That’s all there is to it. It’s not the job, it’s not the place, it’s not anything.” Dave snorted, rubbing his thighs. “It’s just shit.”
“It is shit,” Rose said amicably. “But I’m glad John cheers you up.”
“No way. He’s a chump. A loser. Did you hear his jokes? Godawful jokes, the last time I heard that skeleton joke, I was in first grade and still sucking my thumb like my fingers were damned lollipops.”
“You laughed.”
“At how stupid a guy has to be to still make that joke. He’s an annoying guy, Lalonde. Let it go.”
“He seemed excited that you were going to visit him at his work,” she said, tilting her head. Short strands of hair fell down on her face, and he brushed them back like he did when they were children. She smiled at him and he dropped his hands, sighing.
“Yeah. I don’t know if I should go. I said yes because he was begging me to go, groveling, all Dave if you don’t go the world is going to kasplode.”
“I think you should go. Though be careful, Dave Strider, it might be fun.” Her eyes lit up with mischief, and she climbed into bed. The cat was already snoozing away in the basket, making cat snores. He stood up, watching his sister carefully lie down with the blankets tucked up to her chin. He’d forgotten how much he missed her. It wasn’t that he was lonely, keeping to himself at home.
But it wasn’t that he was pleased to be alone, either, and he took her hand to squeeze it.
“I hate him,” he told her.
“I see,” she said, and he hated when she said that. She never really meant that she saw his point, but that she saw things that even he couldn’t see. But she was tired from her trip and Dave wasn’t going to drag her patience with his adamant declarations that John Egbert was an infection on the building. Her eyes fluttered shut and she fell asleep. He turned off the lamp and went into the living room, hands stuffed in his pockets and head stuffed with thoughts.
An apple sat on his kitchen counter that he hadn’t noticed before. A post-it note was stuck to the side, a familiar smiley face sketched over the paper. He stuck the note onto his refrigerator, the only thing on there now. He considered John’s refrigerator, covered with pictures of himself and his family and friends, childish ghost magnets and flyers to various events and notes about his work. But the post-it note felt like it was enough on the blank slate, and he grabbed the apple to mosey into bed, reminding himself to tear the note down before John or Rose could discover it.
He didn’t sleep immediately, sitting on his bed with his laptop open on his lap. Eventually, he signed onto Facebook, and like he expected, John’s friend request floated up to seek him out. He accepted him and closed the laptop, biting into the apple, and stared at the blank wall before him.