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Driver has an attachment problem. He’s accepted this about himself. He doesn’t attach to people the normal way, or in normal amounts. He’s either completely disinterested—not in a negative way, just lacking any desire to seek out further contact—or, on rare occasions, completely obsessed.
He has no interest in normal relationships. Friends, lovers, colleagues. He wants to be alone, except for that one special person, who he craves in every way except what’s considered normal.
It’s not quite the same as being in love. Driver doesn’t want sex or marriage or devotion. He’s not even jealous when his special person is dating or married to someone else. What he wants is to know everything about them. To know where they are at all times, and that they are safe. He wants their every need provided for, whether he’s the one providing or not. And he wants access to them in ways that he knows are generally considered unacceptable.
That’s why he keeps his problem to himself. He knows it’s not hurting anyone, but other people, and sometimes the law, don’t see it that way.
The one thing he doesn’t know about himself, however, is why he gets attached to these specific people. He has a taste for innocent types, yes, but it still seems random who sets it off and who doesn’t.
Proximity might be part of it. This is the second time he’s fallen for someone who lives one door down in the same building.
Dr. Ryland Grace teaches at the local middle school. His salary is low, despite his advanced education. Driver knows this because Grace does not own a car, and he lives in the same building as Driver. Anyone who had the money to leave this dump would.
Driver is glad Dr. Grace can’t.
Dr. Grace spends most weekends at home. If he leaves, it’s for a grocery run or other short errands. He seems to have exactly one friend, who he meets for coffee in the mornings. She never comes up to the apartment, though Driver has reason to believe Dr. Grace is sometimes invited to her place of residence. Driver knows she is married and has children, though he’s never seen the family. The ring on her left hand and the toddler paraphernalia in her purse tell him all he needs to know.
She is not having an affair with Dr. Grace. Their behavior around each other exclude this possibility. Driver finds this amusing. He knows what it’s like to befriend a married woman. The suspicion that follows. He can imagine how awkward the husband is around him, the fights they have about him. Unless, of course, he’s not interested in women at all.
Driver still isn’t sure about the answer to that particular question.
In the weeks he’s been studying Dr. Grace’s patterns and behavior, he’s noticed no interactions that announced attraction. Dr. Grace is very obviously single, and does not seem to be particularly interested in pursuing a relationship at this moment in time, but Driver finds it frustrating that he has no idea who Dr. Grace would prefer, if he was putting himself on the market.
His fashion sense could go either way. A little sloppy for a gay man, but the patterned sweaters profess a touch of femininity that a straight man might balk at. The bicycle is perfectly standard, and without a car Driver can’t judge his taste in vehicles. His mannerisms are little somewhere in the middle, too. He could be bisexual, or he might not even know his own sexuality.
Driver was sort of like that. He knew himself well enough to know that no label fit. He’d fallen for both men and women, but he wasn’t attracted to people in the usual way, so it didn’t feel right to refer to himself as bisexual.
Something stirred in his chest at the thought that Dr. Grace might be in the same boat.
The door opened and closed in the hall. Driver stood at attention, listening to Dr. Grace’s footsteps disappear down the hall. Monday morning, time for his schoolteacher to get to work.
Driver peeked through the curtains, waiting for the man to swerve out of the parking lot on his bike. He was in that awful yellow raincoat again, and a smile spread across Driver’s face at the sight of it.
He let the curtains fall back into place and laid back on the couch. Excitement thrummed through his veins, but he had to be patient. Twenty minutes. In case he’d forgotten something and doubled back.
Driver closed his eyes, and saw Dr. Grace behind his lids. A sheepish laugh and a confused smile, some nervous fiddling with his glasses. His usual state.
“You have a nice car.” The first thing Dr. Grace had ever said to Driver, as they took the elevator up together a few days after he moved in. Driver had smiled and nodded. Dr. Grace looked confused, rubbed a hand behind his neck.
“You’re in 304, right? We’re, uh, neighbors.” A gulp. “My name’s Ryland.”
The elevator seemed to move so very slow. Everything stopped, and there was only this man, standing in front of Driver. This sweet, lonely man, begging for someone to take care of him.
“Nice to meet you,” Driver had said, and the doors opened, ending their conversation.
Driver sits up. Twenty minutes have passed. He puts on his gloves and his hat, plucks a paperclip off the counter, and slips into the hall.
The building is quiet. Most people don’t get up as early as Dr. Grace. Driver strides casually down the hall and stops in front of his door. 303. He straightens out the paper clip, then folds a curl into the end. It’s simple work, picking the lock. The pins cooperate, like they want to let him in.
The knob turns, and the door opens.
The entry way is undecorated, save for a welcome mat on which to wipe his feet. Several pairs of shoes, in various states of disrepair, are flung about. All Dr. Grace’s size.
Driver shuts and locks the door behind himself.
The apartment is sunny, somehow, despite the wet day outside. White walls bounce light from the windows. The place seems to glow.
Dr. Grace owns a sofa. A loveseat, specifically, though one cushion is worn down from use, and the other is pristine. Driver wipes his hand across them both. The shape of Dr. Grace’s body, held in this piece of furniture. The invitation of a second body, never accepted.
Driver touches a finger to his cheek and smiles.
The television is small and old. Probably second-hand. Driver turns it on, hitting the mute button as soon as the picture appears. It’s been left on the Discovery channel. Driver can picture Dr. Grace, eating his dinner on the sofa, watching a documentary about lemurs or kelp.
The nerdiness continues on the coffee table. Science magazines, non-fiction library books. A book of sudoku puzzles. Driver opens it to find one he hasn’t finished yet. Numbers etched in the corners of cubes, scribbled out and rewritten. The ink smells fresh. He lets his nose rest in the cleft between the pages for a moment before putting it back just as he found it— on an angle, one corner off the table.
The kitchen is relatively clean, though Driver suspects that’s more due to Dr. Grace’s lack of cooking skills, and less to his impeccable cleanliness. Ramen and TV dinners pile up in the trash. There’s some bananas on the counter and clementines in the fridge, so at least he’s not in danger of scurvy. He seems to like yogurt cups and cheese sticks. He owns one frying pan and two saucepans. He has a blender in the corner that looks like it’s never been touched. Perhaps a smoothie phase long forgotten? A new year's resolution, broken before the end of January?
Driver turns the gas stove on, just to make sure it works. His hand lingers on the knob, watching the little blue flames lick the air.
He could make Dr. Grace a real meal. Marinara sauce from scratch, crushing tomatoes in the pan. Chicken filets hammered flat, or meatballs shaped by hand. Warm soup when he’s sick. Fresh vegetables in the summer. A spoon passed between lips. A smile and a hum, Dr. Grace saying that tastes so good!
Driver slows his breathing. He’s getting excited. He turns the stove off and winds around to the hall.
The bathroom reveals no great secrets. Dr. Grace uses bar soap and men’s 2 in 1 shampoo and conditioner. He has a razor and shaving cream for his beard. His toothbrush is wet, just used.
Driver holds it under his nose, smelling the toothpaste. Inexplicably, he wants to put it in his mouth. He sets it back in the cup with a shaky hand.
The bedroom is where Dr. Grace hides his posters and paraphernalia. His desk is covered in science toys and figurines from Star Trek, and a few other properties Driver doesn’t recognize. He memorizes them to research later.
The computer is, of course, password protected. Driver chews his lip thinking of the secrets held prisoner behind that screen.
His dresser is full of punny tees, knit sweaters, and teacher-slacks, though he has some sweatpants, too. Driver wants to see him in those. Comfortable, cozy, soft.
Blazers and button-downs hang in the closet, along with an array of ties. Driver finds the one Dr. Grace wore most recently and runs his fingers along the length of it. How unfair, that this slip of fabric could hold Dr. Grace so tightly, wrapped so closely around his vitals, snug against his warm pulse.
There’s dirty laundry in a basket, as well as strewn around the room. Driver clenches and unclenches his hands, resisting the urge to tidy it.
The bed is unmade. Of course it is. Dr. Grace has no reason to make his bed, when he tumbles out of it in the morning and returns to it at night, never to be seen by any eyes but his own.
And now Driver’s.
Driver touches the mattress. The sheets. Thrown aside in a curving wave. Dr. Grace slept here, but an hour ago. The bed’s not warm anymore, but it’s not quite cold, either.
Driver lifts one knee onto the mattress, then the other. He slides his hands up towards the pillow and bows his face towards it. He can smell Dr. Grace’s shampoo, Dr. Grace’s sweat. He buries his face in the pillow and breathes deeply.
He hasn’t really discovered anything he didn’t already know. His schoolteacher is a man with many walls. Driver wants to penetrate them.
He curls up in the spot on the bed where Dr. Grace was lying. He closes his eyes and imagines he is Dr. Grace, sleeping alone at night, as he has for many years. He wonders what sort of longing that loneliness puts in him. Who does he crave, to take up the space beside him?
Driver shivers all over. It’s a new, strange feeling.
He wants.
He wants it to be him.
He wants to lay beside Dr. Grace in bed.
He wants to be the body in the dark, taking the weight of loneliness from the night.
Driver opens his eyes, and there is the nightstand in front of his face. There’s something he didn’t see before. So small, he didn’t notice, but now it’s inches from his eyes.
A washer, sitting just beside the base of the lamp.
There’s no evidence of Grace having any mechanical hobbies. There’s no workbench, no tools, no bolts to even fit the washer. Just a washer.
Driver picks it up. The pad of his finger presses into the ridges inside the hole. Yes, it’s the right size. He was just working with washers this size. He just had a bag of them in his pocket, not a week ago. The bag was open when he got home.
Of course, maybe Dr. Grace found it somewhere else. Maybe it fell off a piece of furniture. Maybe he left it on the nightstand and completely forgot about it.
But Driver didn’t exactly believe in coincidence.
He smiled, slow and long, then brought the washer to his lips. A gentle press. A kiss for Dr. Grace to find, when next he plucked up the washer on his nightstand and twirled it in his fingers, longing for Driver.