Love Thy Neighbor (2 page)

Yet, then again, what
man
did that?

Why couldn't
she
have what those teenagers had? Why couldn't
someone kiss
her
on the cheek like that?

Maybe she wasn't worthy of such a type of guy.

Perhaps she was meant for abusers, liars, cheaters and losers.

Maybe she was below them, even.

Nine years without a guy was eating her alive, breaking her heart,
swallowing her in an ocean of hopelessness and loneliness. Nine years
was a long time not to be loved and cared for. God had made men for
women and women for men. The two were supposed to be together—even
human anatomy proved that via Sex Ed in school.

Janna closed the door, tossed the package on the floor, and slid down
the wall, crying. Would the heartache ever go away if she never met
somebody? Or would she one day be reduced to a middle-age woman with
frizzy gray hair who hoarded cats and became the bitter weird lady on
Smith Street?

Only time would tell. Unfortunately, time would run out for her to
bear children. It would also make her more undesirable in the years
to come.

Chapter 2

The name of her vibrator: Orgasmic Delight. Yes, just another cheesy,
laughable title for the many sex toys that create an experience both
serious and pleasurable.

For over a decade she had been using her fingers, sometimes (but not
often) produce: cucumbers, carrots, zucchinis. After they came to
room temperature, of course. At age seventeen she masturbated with a
cold cucumber and thought her privates had nearly frozen shut. After
that, she made sure whatever she stuck in her love canal was warm.

Orgasmic Delight was over seven inches long, flesh colored—it
looked like a real penis—with a girth of almost three inches.
And, boy, did it do the job—way better than fingers or produce.
As far as she could remember, it felt like the real thing when it was
inside her, but the real thing
was
a distant memory. She had
lost her virginity to Ben—he was the only guy she'd had sex
with—and had only slept with him twice, back when hormones
raged and judgment failed. At the ripe age of twenty-two, she hadn't
been ready. Nor was she really ready now. The thought of having sex
with a guy both fascinated and frightened her.

Janna must have stuck her vibrator in and out of her body a few
thousand times that day; but sadly, ever time she came, it only
reminded her that it was just a toy, a piece of rubber without life
or soul behind its fake, invisible thrust.

Sleep took her early that night, into its cold, dark arms and into
oblivion where life was much more tolerable. The place where she
thought she belonged.

***

A car horn—sharp and whiny—woke her at 11:22 the next
morning.

She sat up, her hair in messy tangles, and looked toward the window,
to the bothersome sound.
Why must you beep?

It honked again, shorter in duration. What followed was a laugh, a
male
laugh. An attractive-sounding male laugh. The kind you
might hear from a heartthrob such as Russell Crowe. The kind that
makes you get out of bed even if you're tired as hell.

Throwing the covers aside, Janna got up, glided across the hardwood,
and drew back the blinds. There were two people, a guy and a girl,
carrying things from a white Honda and into the house across the
street.

Womp-womp-woooooomp!

-The Price is Right loser sound echoed through her head. Her heart
instantly deflated.

A couple. A damned couple. Why does it have to be a couple? Why
can't it be my knight in shining armor?

Then again, she couldn't tell what the guy looked like; she could
just barely make out that it was a man. For all she knew, he could
have looked like the Toxic Avenger, ugly and deformed and like fire
ants on the eyes.

I wanna see him even IF he IS married!

Janna didn't remember hurrying out of her bedroom, rounding the
banister, or descending the steps in one airless scuttle. Door. Knob.
Twist. Pull. Warm air brushed against her face. The sunlight made her
squint.

She peered across the street. Her pulse increased, her soul burned,
and her heart felt like it deflated again when she saw him. He took a
box out of the trunk, carried it toward the now occupied house.

Oh. My. God!

Breathtaking.

He was a pleasantly-scruffy, six-foot-tall hottie with lean muscles,
bright-blue eyes—the color of Maui water—and curved,
parenthesis-like dimples below his apple-shaped cheeks. His hair,
part light brown and part dark brown, was shaggy, covering his head
in waves. Stubble coated his face well, enough to make him look
adventurous without making him look unkempt. The box he was carrying
must have been heavy, because it made those biceps, triceps, and
shoulders of his really
pop
through the fabric of his
tight-fitting shirt.

Janna wondered if she was drooling on herself, if her loins had
exploded in a burst of...
Orgasmic Delight.

Was the man across the street a mirage? A figment of her unbridled
imagination?

Never, not once in her lifetime, had she had feelings for a guy this
fast, based on looks alone.

He blew her away. He blew every guy she'd ever seen away.

Was this love at first sight? The fable that teenagers believed and
adults dismissed as lust?

No, this went deeper than that. Had to. Janna felt a connection to
him within only seconds. She wanted to know everything about him,
every detail abo—

The woman...

Janna forgot all about the woman, his darling wife.

I could just claw her eyes out!

The petite blonde, who was probably on a rector scale of an eleven in
a man's eyes, stepped outside and went to the car to get some more
things. She had big boobs, a cheerleader's face, an hourglass figure.

I can't compete with that, with her...

Janna's stomach churned, and a thousand negative thoughts—
I'm
ugly I'm fat I'm no good I'm a mess I'm worthless No guy could ever
want me I'm dirt I'm meant to be alone I'm
—circled through
her mind like that flashing beacon had done earlier. Except this was
much worse. These corrupt thoughts consequently led to one of the
worst anybody could ever contemplate: suicide. The permanent solution
to all her problems. Maybe, just maybe, she'd be better off dead; at
least then she wouldn't have to deal with these desolate feelings
anymore. The consistent pain would forever go away, forever begone.
She wouldn't have to worry about anything ever again.

Terrified of and by the thought, she slammed the door shut, as if the
thought were an intruder trying to force its way into her house.

It didn't work.

If anything, the awful feeling grew stronger, like a black weed in a
white jungle, small and singular but resistant to anything with the
power to kill it. This emotion, this overpowering blackness, she
knew, was here to stay.

Unless something within her life changed... very
soon.

***

At around nine that night, Janna lay in a bathtub full of warm,
steaming water, gazing up at the drop-tile ceiling, counting the
several tiny dots impregnated into each tile, trying to distract
herself from her suicidal thoughts.

Three hundred and forty-seven, forty-eight, forty-nine, fif—

The dots seemed to multiply. She lost count. The caring left her.

Too exhausted to continue, the woman relaxed—tried to relax—and
glanced at the razor blade lying on the left edge of the tub. Sure,
it would do the job, but would slicing through the wrist hurt? Would
it be too bloody? How deep would she have to cut to sever a vein?

Remember paper cuts, Jan? Those burned like fire when you turned
the page of a book too fast. This is hacking your limb wide open!

On the right side of the tub: a large bottle of aspirin. Tylenol. The
highest dosage, over-the-counter aspirins allowed by law. They would
do the job, too, but what if they didn't work and she had to have her
stomach pumped? That'd probably be worse than cutting herself.

Or maybe...

She closed her eyes, took one last breath, held it, and drifted
underwater, where she waited to die. As soon as it became too much to
bear, she'd breathe in some H2O. It wouldn't hurt, right? Suck in a
little aqua, and then peace. Right? Maybe she'd meet her soul mate in
Heaven.

Seconds passed. A minute.

She opened her eyes. The warm water felt hot against them.

Bubbles...

Two minutes and counting.

Air—she never knew how much she'd missed air till now, when she
didn't have any.

Janna clenched her fists and kicked her feet about, splashing water,
thumping against the tub with her heels. Her eyes widened, looking
enormous while under the veil of water. Her lungs felt like they were
going to burst. They screamed for oxygen. The room beyond her
brightened, started to spin.

Three minutes.

More bubbles.

More thrashing.

A left hand knocked the razor to the floor; a right hand knocked the
pill bottle into her soon-to-be watery grave with her.

I can't hold my breath anymore!

And she didn't.

She opened her airways, and water came barreling in through the wrong
pipes.

It wasn't the instant, painless death she'd expected. It actually
hurt. Her lungs exploded with fire as they took in what didn't
belong. Panic surged through her whole body. Survival instinct kicked
in.

Janna jolted upright, coughing, gasping, searching desperately for
air, which she found but could not yet breathe. Then, after hoarsely
expelling the water stuck in her lungs, it became easier. The panic
gradually subsided. Her eyes narrowed a little. Her breaths slowly
relaxed, and she told herself she would never
ever
consider
doing something this idiotic again.

In a way, the young woman thought, her life was much the opposite of
this stunt. In suicide she tried to take charge, do something,
accomplish something—even if that meant her end. But in life—if
you could call it a life—she didn't take charge. She didn't try
to better herself, or change things for the better.

In the end, all she really did was... exist.

Chapter 3

Sleep didn't come easily for her that night, nor was it pleasant. Bad
dreams came and went, came and went, too fleeting and not important
enough to remember. All they did was leave bad feelings behind to
haunt her in the early afternoon hours.

Something pulled her out of sleep, and her eyes flew open. They
stared skyward at the drop-ceiling her father, God rest his soul, had
thought would make the house look nicer. Nope.
What woke me?

A smell?

A sound?

A sound!

But what sound?

Then it came again: a strong, bottom-of-the fist pound on the
downstairs door.

Janna peeked at her watch: 3:07. It transitioned to 3:08.

I slept that long?!

Brushing away the thought, she got up, went downstairs, unlocked and
opened the door without looking into the peephole. She decided she'd
be surprised for once.

It was a nice surprise.

Her handsome, sexy new neighbor.

From close up, he was even more attractive than she'd first thought.
Every feature was perfect, lulled her in.

“
Hello,” the man said,
his voice deep and captivating, while possessing a subtle grittiness
in its timbre.

Janna couldn't respond. Her voice box refused to work, and her mind
refused to process any sort of logical thought. She was lost
somewhere in those aquatic blue eyes.

“
Uh, Miss? You okay?”

She came out of her head-over-heels daze, but she didn't know how.
Her heart fluttered like a butterfly's colorful wings.

“
Yes, I'm okay.”
Am
I drooling on myself?

“
Anyway, I just moved in
across the street. Name's Baron.”

What do I say?

“
Oh. I'm Janna. Nice to meet
you.”

They shook hands. His was slightly rough and dry; hers was very soft
and sweaty.

“
Anyway, I was wondering if
you had a lawnmower I could borrow... that's something I forgot at my
old place, and as you can see, the grass needs cut pretty bad.”

Yeah, Baron, you can borrow MY lawnmower ANYtime.

Shit, I hope I didn't say that out loud!

“
What?”

Baron giggled. His smile was flawless. “Lawnmower??”

“
Oh, sorry. I'll go back
around and get it. Meet you around the side.”

“
Great, thanks.”

He turned and jogged down her three porch steps, his small,
cargo-pants-sheathed tush jiggling as he went. Janna felt her
hormones race through her body, flowing to places she didn't know
existed. Places she thought had stopped functioning a while ago. She
shut the door before it became too much for her to control.

“
Please! Just this once! If
you exist, God, please don't let him be married to that bimbo I saw
yesterday. I know I don't pray much or go to church often, but I will
if You let this happen!”

Tears filled her eyes. Warmth filled her soul. And just last night,
she'd tried to off herself.

I must be crazy!

When she'd been with Ben, she kind of felt this way, but to a lesser
degree. He was someone with whom she had to
learn
to acquire
feelings for. Now it was much stronger, powerful, and the only thing
she knew about him was his name.
Baron. Baron and Janna. Sounds
good to me.
She knew she was getting so far ahead of herself she
might end up in the next decade. But there were some emotions with
certain people that were impossible to control, ignore, or figure
out. This was one of them—a connection to another human being
beyond the scope of science, philosophy and physiology.