Kyle slammed the apartment door shut behind him. It had been a trying day. There was a raw red thread of irritation winding its way along the hollow of his spine since this morning. It had been one of those days. Waking up in darkness on a gloomy and torrential Monday morning, pant legs soaked by running through a puddle for a bus he still missed. His boss’s supercilious look of disbelief as he related his misfortune. Ok, so he was late now and then. If they paid him enough to afford a car, maybe he’d be on time. Though he already knew Tony’s ready answer to that, too. Sell more, and you make more. Should he go back to school? With what money? Scowling, he brushed the thought away. No point dreaming of what was never going to happen. His dad was right. He should have learned a trade. His brother was already making sixty grand a year, and his apprenticeship wasn’t even done yet. Kyle had never been good with his hands. But as his sales figures showed, he wasn’t all that great with his mouth, either.
It was a familiar feeling, this ever-present low level hum of irritation. It’s not easy, when you’re twenty one, just starting out in life, trying to make your way in one of the world’s most expensive cities. And you don’t know what to do with your life or where you’re supposed to find the direction that everybody else seems to have, that seems to come so naturally to everyone but you. The gnawing feeling that you were born with some subtle but crucial part of yourself missing, a part that everyone else takes for granted and that pushes them on to name and then attain the things that they want. Kyle could pass for a normal person, like anyone else, he knew that. He did it every day. But he couldn’t ignore the space inside that no one else seemed to see. And on days like this, it made him angry.
Passing by the kitchen, he groaned in exasperation. There were the dishes, still piled up by the sink. Of course. The place was disgusting. There was absolutely no way he could afford a downtown apartment by himself, so a roommate was a necessary evil. And mostly, he and Ashley got on great. She was fun, and usually pretty respectful of his personal space. And she always had her share of the rent on time. But she was messy, and sometimes, like now, it drove Kyle up the wall. He muttered to himself as he rolled up his shirt sleeves and filled the stainless steel sink with hot water. One more thing I have to do. Everything has to be such a pain in the ass. Fucking Tony. The dishes clanked and rattled beneath the soap suds like dead men’s bones at the bottom of a warm and murky sea. Furiously, he washed and dried, taking out his impotent rage on the innocent glasses and plates.
*
Even through his headphones, he heard the front door click open. The dry dishes stood in martial ranks beside the scoured sink, and even the fork he had used to eat his cheap microwaved meal was shining spotlessly in the drying rack. He had been home for two hours when Ashley returned. She was often out of the apartment; as well as holding down her full-time job, she was an amateur actor, and was often either rehearsing or performing in the evenings. It worked out well for Kyle, since he often had the place to himself. But today it just fueled his anger. Today her long absence seemed an admission of guilt, as though she was deliberately avoiding him to piss him off more. He stood in the doorway of his room, and Ashley smiled at him as she bustled past.
“Hey, Kyle,” she chirped merrily.
“Hey,” he grunted morosely as he followed her into the living room. Kyle hated confrontation. But the irritation he felt would not be assuaged until he’d had it out with her. He waited for her to drop her bag on the sofa and take a seat.
“I did the dishes today,” he said sullenly.
“Ok,” said Ashley, her voice uncertain.
“It was your turn.”
“Uh, no it wasn’t.” Ashley shook her head, her soft blonde curls falling around her shoulders. She had dyed a pink streak into her hair. She was always trying new colors and styles, sometimes for various acting roles, sometimes just for fun. It was hard to keep up with her ever-changing style. But she always managed to pull it off. When you’re pretty enough, you look good in anything. And Ashley was stunning. The first night he had met her, when he responded to her ad and came to see the place, he had been rendered almost speechless by how gorgeous she was. Kyle wasn’t good with women. The beautiful ones, like Ashley, tended to make his tongue freeze, stuck to the roof of his mouth while he babbled incoherently. It was a wonder he got the place at all. She seemed to find his awkwardness endearing, perhaps as a contrast to the no doubt endless procession of guys who had come to see the place only to try and get into her pants. One of the perks of living here, Kyle remembered, was getting to hang out with a woman who, in other circumstances, would never have given him the time of day. Along with the stunning female friends she occasionally brought over. Not that Kyle was going to do anything about it. Only at night, in his room, alone, he could take the memory of these women with him, pick and choose which ones he wanted for tonight, have them fulfill whatever depraved urges he wished to indulge. Nights past number, Ashley’s form had shimmered before him as he indulged himself in a spasm of solitary relief, only to find himself barely able to meet her smiling eye the next morning. If she only knew…Kyle batted the thought away. He was angry with her, and dwelling on the softness of her pouting lips or the startling green of her shining eyes was only going to hurt his cause.
“Yes it was,” Kyle insisted. “I did them last time.”
“Tuesdays, Thursdays, Saturdays,” Ashley ticked off the days on her delicate fingers. “That’s when I do the dishes. Today is your day.”
“No, I do Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays!” Kyle blustered. “But if you don’t do your days, it just leaves more for me on the following day! It’s not fair!”
“Kyle, Monday’s your day. I’m sure of it. But if I’m wrong, I’m sorry. We can work out a new schedule if you like. Let’s write it down or something.” Ashley’s reasonable tone only infuriated Kyle more. Anger, once indulged, can run away with a person. Kyle was swept up in his own righteous indignation now, casting about for more reasons to be upset.
“It’s not the point!” he raged. “It’s more than just the dishes. This place is always a disaster. I’m sick of looking at it!”
“Jesus, Kyle,” Ashley said, faint lines of confusion appearing on her smooth forehead as her brow furrowed, “take it easy. It’s not that bad.”
“Maybe not to you,” he sniffed haughtily. “I’m sick of living like this.”
“Where is this coming from?” Ashley said. “If you have a problem, talk to me about it, Kyle. We can work things out.”
“We’re talking about it now!”
“No, we’re not.” Ashley stood from the couch, tossing her long hair back from her face. “You’re just yelling at me. I had a long day, and I don’t need this shit, so I’m going to go to my room so we can both cool off. We’ll talk about it later.” Kyle’s blood blazed as he watched her go, angry words hovering like poison on his trembling lips. He choked them back. Deep down, beneath the roiling anger, the better angels of his nature preached self-control. He had a good situation here, and it wasn’t worth fighting over the dishes. They’d talk rationally about it later. He’d had a bad day, and was taking it out on here. Kyle took a deep breath as he told himself these things, yet still a spike of irritation jolted through him as Ashley’s bedroom door thumped closed on him. Cursing under his breath, he stormed towards his own room.
No matter how loud he played the music in his headphones, he couldn’t be oblivious to what was going on in the small apartment. His raised antenna were tuned to Ashley’s every movement as they invisibly tasted and tested the air in the shared home. An hour of silence passed in her room before he heard her on the phone. Laughing, as though nothing had happened. As though there had been no fight, chirping merrily away to someone while he sulked at his computer. Soon after, he heard the door open, and over the bass of his music, a male voice. Ashley had a man over. It happened a lot more than Kyle would like. But looking the way Ashley did, it was hardly surprising. Kyle did his best to be polite on the awkward occasions he encountered them, in the living room or the kitchen. It might have been easier if she had a steady boyfriend, and he could have known who it was who just came into his home. But Ashley was twenty-three, and single, a beautiful girl having fun in a big city. Some men made repeat appearances; others were never seen again. Ashley was no more loyal to any one man than she was to a single take-out place. Cartons of Chinese food mingled with empty pizza boxes and the styrofoam containers from the nearby Greek restaurant in the apartment’s recycling bins, and the men came and went. At least she was open-minded, Kyle ruefully reflected. Open-legged, too, he added out of sheer spite.
A sound made him snatch his headphones from his head. Cocking his head to one side, he listened. There it was again. A slight feminine sound. He heard the bed creak in the room next door. Ashley moaned again. Kyle swore softly. They were fucking, and he could hear everything. Jamming the headphones back onto his head, he cranked the volume up as loud as it would go.
Two songs passed before he lifted one side of the headphones from his ear. Curiosity compelled him. They were well into it now, Ashley’s uninhibited shrieks filling the air and making the walls ring. She was loud when she fucked, he knew from past experience. His pants tightened as his cock rose. He couldn’t help himself as he listened to the sounds of her sexual pleasure, imagining it was him in there with her, his hands clutching at her beautiful body as his hard cock rocked her to ecstasy. Ashley panted and screamed, and Kyle’s breath came in short gasps. He was barely conscious of what he was doing as his hand fumbled at the front of his pants, tracing the noticeable shape of his erection through the material as he rubbed himself to the sound of his roommate’s fucking. The knowledge of his own inadequacy added a raw thrill of humiliation to the desperate arousal he felt. Unable to help himself, he rose from his chair and climbed onto his bed, pressing his ear against the wall they shared.
“Oh yes! Yes! Right there! Oh fuck yes!” Ashley gasped and cried beneath her lover, and he could hear the sound of their bodies as they fucked, could hear every grunt and shuddering breath, as though he were there in the room with them. Kyle closed his eyes, his hard cock pressing against the wall as he listened. With a deafening shriek, he heard Ashley cum in a crescendo of sighs, and the room grew suddenly quiet. Carefully, Kyle picked his way across the bed, terrified now of being heard. Taking his seat, he slipped his headphones back on, but left the music paused. Next door, the bed creaked. He listened to the water running through the pipes in the walls as someone used the bathroom. He heard voices, male and female, as whoever it as returned to the bedroom. They were going out, probably for dinner somewhere. Their laughing voices filled the hallway, and Kyle listened to the door click shut behind them. His erection raged unsatisfied in his pants. He waited until he was sure they were gone. Five minutes. Ten. It was all the self control he could muster. His cock stood out in front of him, leading the way to Ashley’s bedroom.
Inside, it looked as though a bomb had gone off. Clusters of clothes were strewn across the floor and piled in an untidy heap on top of the armchair she had crammed into the corner by the window. Ashley’s room was bigger than his. The windows were closed, and the room reeked with the pungent smell of human pleasure. Hardly daring to breathe, Kyle tiptoed across the carpet. The rumpled red sheet still bore the ghostly impression of her thrashing body, and his trembling fingers traced the edge of the small wet spot her orgasm had left behind. His wide eyes fixed on a pair of black panties that lay in a lopsided figure eight on the bedroom floor. Sinking to his knees, he snatched them up. Still warm from her body. He held them up in his left hand and inhaled her erotic perfume while his right frantically pawed at the front of his pants, releasing the erection that had been trapped inside for far too long.
Kyle stroked his cock as he kneeled at the edge of Ashley’s bed, still warm and damp from her recent sex, and he suppressed the frisson of shame he felt at the degrading act while his flared nostrils drank in the dizzying smell of her. Her moans and screams came floating back to him as though echoing back from the thin walls that had rang with them just moments before, filling his head and overloading his rational brain. His cock leaped in his hand, and he felt his orgasm racing up his pulsing shaft as he spurted his cum in a puddle on her floor. Dizzy, he dropped her underwear and leaned his forehead on the mattress while he recovered his breath. As the dizziness faded, he raised his head, shoving his softening cock back into his pants. He needed to clean up his cum before any more of it soaked into the carpet. Already, the dark patch was spreading as his fluid sank into the deep pile. He turned, rising up off his knees to freeze in wordless horror.
Ashley was watching.
She leaned against the door frame, her arms crossed beneath her breasts, tight jeans hugging her hips with her legs crossed casually at the ankle. Her face was an unreadable mask, one slender eyebrow raised, her red lips tightly compressed. Her eyes glittered like dangerous green jewels as Kyle felt his face redden.
“Ashley,” he gasped, “it’s not - I was -”
“Oh, I know exactly what you were doing, Kyle,” she cut him off. Her male friend was nowhere in sight; Kyle was glad of that, at least. Physical violence was off the table. But fear still climbed his shivering spine like a rat scuttling though his tender bones. What would she do? Would she kick him out? Press charges? In an agony of helpless remorse, he waited for her verdict. “You were jerking off in my room,” she said in a quiet voice. “Were you thinking about me, you little pervert?”
“I - I - I don’t know,” Kyle feebly stammered. There was nothing he could say. She was absolutely right, and he felt a foot tall under her haughty gaze, wishing he could just disappear into the carpet. She was right. He was a pervert. Shame bloomed in his corroded veins like acid.
“Of course you were,” Ashley said, her blonde curls bouncing slightly as she nodded. “Of course you were. How many times have you done this?”
“Never,” Kyle croaked. “I swear, this was the first time. I - “
“You expect me to believe that?” Ashley sneered. “This is so gross. I trusted you. Clean your disgusting cum off my carpet and get out of my sight.” Ashley turned abruptly and strode into the living room. Kyle desperately avoided her gaze as he scuttled to the bathroom for some toilet paper to soak up his ejaculate. He had fucked everything up. He had never felt so low, so ashamed, as he scrubbed his cum from his roommate’s carpet until no trace of it remained, then all but ran to hide in his own room for the rest of the night.