AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Ugh, wine… I love you, so why do you do this to me?” I muttered as I pulled a pillow over my face. “Can't live with you, can't live without you. Sheesh, it's almost like we're married.” I tossed the pillow aside and pushed myself up to sit on the edge of my bed. It took me a moment to get motivated. I stood and stretched my arms and legs, glancing around my new bedroom. There were still a few things I wanted to do, like hang pictures and paint one wall to give the room a splash of color, but all in all, it felt as much like home as any place could after one night.
I picked up the empty wine glass from next to my bed and was ready to head to the kitchen to whip up a hearty breakfast. Food always seemed to help when I had a mild hangover and I was in dire need of some energy to get me through everything I needed to accomplish before classes began Monday morning.
First, I ambled over to the curtains and threw them open, basking for a few moments in the warm sunshine that flooded through the window. I even slid a window open and listened to the sounds of the birds. It was a lovely morning and the view from the window was nicer than I had expected considering we were in an apartment complex. Thankfully, we had an end unit that faced a park. Right outside my window grew a tall, sprawling oak tree that seemed to be full of birds, judging from all singing and tittering of their morning song. It was a beautiful moment until…
I heard it. Again.
The heavily-muffled, but nonetheless audible, sound of voices—a guy’s and a girl's—grunting, groaning, gasping, and moaning while what I assumed was the bed frame thumped against the wall between our rooms at an accelerating, intensifying pace.
“Oh. My. God. Seriously?!”
I hurried out of my room, dropped the wine glass off at the kitchen sink, and then rushed over to Leslie's room where I knocked on the door. “Hey, Les, you up?”
“Yeah, girl, gimme a sec, I'm just getting changed.”
Leslie opened the door a few minutes later, looking refreshed and sprightly. “Morning, Brooke!” she said with an ear-to-ear grin. “I slept so well last night! I feel like a million bucks! How about you, did you get a good night's sleep?”
“I did, kinda. Although I think I had a bit too much wine last night after you went to sleep.”
“Oh yeah? How much more did you have?”
“Umm. I finished a bottle.”
Leslie threw her head back and laughed. “Wait. Are you serious? Wow, you might need to tone it down a bit, you little alcoholic, you!”
I blushed. “Alright, Mom,” I said. “I'll try to be a good girl from now on, okay?”
We both chuckled, but then I got back to my original reason for knocking on her door.
“Okay, enough about my wine addiction. There's a little bit of a problem. It's my room.”
She raised an eyebrow. “For real? What's wrong?”
“Come on, I'll show you.”
We walked over to my room and stepped inside. Leslie started looking around with a slightly confused look on her face. “What's wrong, Brooke? Everything looks fine to me. Please, please don't say that this place is haunted or something...”
“No. Well, depends on how you look at it,” I said. “Just keep quiet for a minute and listen.”
We both stood in silence and I hoped I hadn’t waited too long. Sure enough, the sounds of what was happening on the other side of the wall started to echo through. They weren’t as loud and c
lear as before, but they were audible enough to be easily recognized.
Leslie's eyes widened as she covered her suddenly-gaping mouth with one hand. “Oh, my God, Brooke! Are they… Surely they aren’t… You know!”
I folded my arms across my chest and nodded. “Oh yeah. They are.”
“Oh, my God, it sounds like a porno.”
“Yep. Right next to my bed. Literally a foot or two away. Nothing but this feeble excuse for a wall separating what's going on in that room from us.”
She scrunched her face in disgust. “Eww! I mean… just… ewwww!”
Then we both paused, kept silent, and listened again. It seemed like it wasn't going to end any time soon. We shot each other an uncomfortable glance and then both burst out laughing. It was the only way we really knew how to deal with the weird, awkward ridiculousness of the moment.
“Good Lord, Brooke, did you hear this last night, too?”
“Yep. I had to use my earphones just to be able to fall asleep.”
