Now, whoever they were, I was going to meet them.
I stomped through the snow, hearing it crunching underfoot even with the music. The top of the snow had refrozen with the frigid night but I didn’t feel a thing, I was too angry. I had to work tomorrow, be at the garden shop at eight which was only a few hours away. I’d been woken up with AC/DC’s “Hell’s Bells” and had been tossing, turning and fuming ever since. Now my blood was boiling and I was going to have to take care not to lose control. I had a temper, unfortunately. I didn’t blow often but when I blew, I blew.
And one of the reasons I was angry was because if Tim was here he’d be doing this. He’d have done it three hours ago, approximately halfway through “Hell’s Bells”. Tim liked his sleep but it wasn’t that. He didn’t tolerate anything that might bother his girls. If it woke me up, it would wake him up and he would know I’d been disturbed and that would tip it for him and he’d be out the door like a shot. He’d take his gun and he’d take his badge and he’d take his pissed off, big man, hotshot cop attitude and he’d put a stop to it, make no mistake.
Fuck, but I missed him.
I made it to my neighbor’s front door and didn’t delay. I lay on the doorbell and knocked on the door, knowing they’d never hear one or the other and even with both it would be a miracle to be heard over that sound.
It was now Van Halen. David Lee Roth was singing “Panama”. Another of my favorites. It was a memory song. Good times were had when that song was played, good times being ruined by that song being used to piss me right the fuck off.
I knocked louder and kept my finger pressed to the buzzer.
“Hello!” I shouted to the door.
It was thrown open, the blazing lights from inside blinding me for a second, then I focused, my blood cooled about a hundred degrees and I stared in complete shock.
“Who are you?” she asked on a shout over the music.
Holy shit, it was Kenzie Elise. Kenzie Elise. Kenzie freaking Elise.
I’d seen nearly all of her movies (except when she started to branch out and do those crappy art house films which made little sense to me or the critics, even though she was doing them trying to become known as a actor rather than a rom com sweetheart and she kind of failed at this endeavor).
I loved her movies, especially the rom coms (the thrillers were pretty good too). I loved her. She was awesome.
But now, with her standing in a crackerbox house, in a crackerbox neighborhood, in a small town in Indiana, I was staring at her in shock.
Kenzie Elise couldn’t be my neighbor. That was impossible.
But there she stood, tall because she was really tall anyway but she was also a step up and she was wearing sky-high, platform stripper shoes with straps that wound up her skinny calves. And skinny they were. She was ripped; every muscle in her body could be seen. As could her breastbone, prominent and, I had to admit, immensely unattractive. I could see all this because she was wearing an emerald-green, lace teddy, deep-cut down her non-existent cleavage, high-cut up her bony hips. She had to be ten, fifteen, maybe even twenty pounds underweight. So skinny, it was a little scary. But she had that trademark mane of wild, long, strawberry blonde hair, cornflower blue eyes and cute-as-a-button face.
And she was standing in the doorway of the house next door, the blue eyes in her big head on her stick-figure body staring down at me.
“Who are you?” she repeated and I jumped, coming out of my trance.
“Um… your neighbor,” I replied. “Could you turn the music down?”
“What?” she shouted but when I was going to respond, her blue eyes left me and looked over my head.
I saw lights flash on the house and I turned around to look too.
A shiny, black, new model Ford pickup truck was turning into the drive.
Shit!
I turned back to see she was smiling, really pleased about something. Her face had gone soft and knowing in an intimate way that made me feel highly uncomfortable.
From the look of her Daddy was definitely home. I was big time third wheel of this particular party and I needed to get out of there.
“Listen, can you turn the music down?” I asked on a shout but she ignored me, her eyes riveted over my shoulder.
I’d seen the lights go out and now I heard a door slam.
“Excuse me!” I yelled over the music, getting a bit desperate. “I live next door,” I lifted my left arm to point at my house, “and your music is really loud. Can you turn it down?”
“Hi lover,” she purred and how she purred over that music I couldn’t imagine but she did it.
I turned around and froze.