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aurora-in-the-dark · 3 years

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Neighbors, Pt 2

"Harald. My name is Harald." he said softly in the awkward silence."The only one who calls me Mr.Jourgensen is my boss when I've made a mistake."

"Harry?" Lena said and blinked away tears while smiling almost shyly. "You're a Harry then huh?"

He almost said that nobody called him Harry except it suddenly struck him as tremendously sad that nobody, in fact, called him Harry. He would also have to explain, or at least he felt as though he'd have to, that nobody really called him anything at all because he knew next to nobody outside of his work. And that seemed even sadder just now.

"Well, my middle name is Rolf so Harry seems less...fraught." he said and felt a surge of relief when she grinned at that too. "Look, uhm, if you'd like, if it's not too forward, uhm, you can come next door. To my place. We can call a locksmith, you can wait with me until he, or she, gets here. I don't think Mr. Ziniewicz will mind as long as you give him a key."

"I couldn't, I mean, I couldn't." she said and looked away. He was surprised at the disappointment he felt. "I couldn't impose. I've disrupted your day enough already. And it's not even eight. Good god."

"Nonsense." he said, trying his absolute best to sound neighborly and friendly and not desperate. "I'm already ahead on today's workload. I, well, I started early and I think I'd be more at ease if, well, if I knew..."

"That Matt couldn't cause me more problems?" That's very kind and sweet of you." Lena reached out and brushed his hand with hers. "Okay. I mean Matt definitely seems like he doesn't want to mess with you."

"Uh, well," he fumbled for words since he wasn't sure he deserved such credit. Rather than take claim to something that might not be true he retreated to safe territory. "What about your cat?"

"He'll be downstairs with Ms. DeKuyper." she said as she grabbed her purse from a small side table. "He's gotten out before and he always goes there. She feeds him sardines. The litter box will stink to high Heaven's but Chairs will be okay. Let's go then, huh?"

In a slight daze he led the way out into the hall, checking for Matt even though he was certain he couldn't have returned to the sixth floor as quickly as that. The tension didn't ease until he was locking the deadbolt on his own door. He turned from the door to see her gazing about his living room. She seemed...puzzled.

"Uhm, you haven't just moved in have you?" she asked, looking at him with raised eyebrows. "This sounds horrible, being that we're neighbors, but...I have no idea how long you've lived here. Months, I mean, at least? I've seen your name on the mailbox at least that long."

"Oh, well..." he caught himself assuming the pose, the way he stood when uncomfortable or chastened, both hands clasped together at his waist. Very deliberately he let his hands separate and hang by his side. "I've lived here almost, uh, well, five years come April."

"What? Really?" She looked genuinely surprised, much to his puzzlement.

"Yes."

"And you work from home?"

"Yes." He pointed to the small desk with his computer on it. "Right there. I work, well, here."

"Okay." she said with what seemed a doubtful tone and turned a slow circle, taking in the room again. "No television. You don't watch television?"

"No."

"Stream?

"What?"

"Do you stream? Watch things online?"

"Uhm, no."

"Well, you don't game. That's not a gaming rig." she said as she gazed down at his computer. " No speakers. Headphones?"

"I have a Bluetooth."

"No, for music! How do you...you don't listen to music either?"

"Uhm," he held back a sigh but just barely. He was disappointing her, he knew it. "Not really. No."

"Well, I can't really complain." Lena said with a half grin. "You're the perfect neighbor. You're not noisy, and you don't complain about my noisiness."

"You aren't noisy. Not at all."

"Baxter in 611 would disagree." she said with a little shake of her head. "Ya know, you're living in the sales brochure right?"

"I'm...what?"

"Well, ya know," she said with a grin that might be mocking, might be mischievous. "It's very clean, neat, sparse...I mean it doesn't even look like anybody lives here! Did this place come furnished?"

"No. That wasn't an option."

"So you picked out this furniture? On purpose?" She ran a hand along the black wood armrest of his white cloth covered reading chair. "There's no color! It's all black and white! You have just one print on the wall and even it is black and white!"

He looked around without moving his head. He liked his room, found the decor pleasant and soothing. Apparently he was wrong in this. He became aware that his hands were again clasped at his waist but this time he let them remain there.

"What, are you into post modern minimalism?" She seemed to hesitate in her examination of the window treatments. He realized then that he should have curtains and not just venetian blinds. "I mean, where are you in this room?"

"I beg your pardon?"

"You. You, Harry. Your personality. Where is it?" She looked at him with an intensity that made him cringe inwardly. "This room says nothing. Who lives here? Who are you? What are you like? What do you like? I don't see..."

She noticed, finally, his small bookcase tucked into the corner behind his reading chair and the standing lamp. She stepped over to it and without asking his leave pulled a book from the shelf.

"The Dream Songs" she read the words on the spine out loud. "John Berryman?"

"A poet." he said softly, letting his eyes drop to his hands. "I like his writing very much."

"Sexton, Plath, Carroll, Rimbaud..." she tilted her head to more easily read the spines. "Apollinaire, Eliot, Brecht. Blake, Pound, Neruda, Anaïs Nin? These are all poets?"

"Yes."

"Wow. These books, some of them are old!" she said and, to his great relief, carefully replaced the tome she had withdrawn from the shelf. "These books, I mean, some of them must be expensive huh?"

"Some are. Yes." This encounter was not going well. It was not going the way that he might have wished but it was going precisely the way he would have expected it to if he had in fact ever expected such as this to happen.

"I've never read much poetry. Dickinson and Whitman in school" She stood a moment, her eyes tracing the volumes filling the four shelves. "Are these all poetry?"

"Yes." he replied quietly as his eyes took in not her but the rest of his apartment. His plain, bland, meager home. His neatly ordered sterile abode, devoid of signs of a life lived. The comfort of the familiar was crumbling. He was wrong to find such a barren place reassuring.

"Wow. This is like a hidden rainbow then." she said in a tone of almost wonderment. "Beautiful words and images, whole worlds hidden until you open the covers to release them"

He looked at her then. Befuddlement. That was the word that rose into his mind as he looked into her eyes. His embarrassment, the shame that had settled over him, they were both washed away by her smile. It had seemed that everything he did, all that he was, it was all wrong. Except it wasn't. One thing was right. One thing. And one was enough for him.

"Would you like some coffee?" he asked, trying to build off his one success. "I have some made. I could get you a cup before I call the locksmith."

"Coffee would be nice." she said, but rather than waiting for him to get it she came with him into the kitchenette. "So do you write? Poetry?"

He looked away quickly which was answer enough for her. He felt her hand touch and then grip his forearm. The thrill of her touch was muted by the fear of the question he knew she was about to ask of him.

"You do. Could I...would you...allow me to see it?"

He couldn't say yes but didn't know how to say no. He knew he was a poor poet, but even the stumbling cadence of his verses told of things that nobody else knew and would probably not want to know. Even his dreams and visions were unremarkable and ordinary.

His breath stopped abruptly and completely at the feel of her hand tenderly cupping his chin. Very gently she turned his face towards hers. Her eyes were a perfect summer sky, her smile the sun on a warm sand beach. He had never seen anyone so beautiful in all of his days. She deserved better than Matt. She deserved far better than he for certain. She deserved someone who could bring to her face the smile he now saw, but at will and whim, not merely by accident. Not through a kind hearted sympathy towards his bumbling, awkward hesitancy.

"We know each other now, right?" She said without taking her hand away from his face. "You came to my rescue when you had no reason to. I mean, I only sort of kinda knew what you even looked like but here we are."

"Yes." he said without moving his mouth, concentrating entirely on the warmth of her skin on his.

"And I think I like you." she said and smiled like an angel bestowing grace upon the penitent. "I'd like to know you better. And, well, you don't say much out loud. But I bet your poems say plenty."

He was terrified. Part of him wished he had stayed at his desk regardless of what took place next door. He had not though and now here he was, trapped by etiquette, his sense of what was the proper thing to do. She wanted to know him. Nobody ever wanted that. He was a nonentity, a background extra in the lives of others. His words, the words that were his and told the tales nobody else ever heard, they were the only thing he had that felt like a sanctuary. She was waiting though, with kind eyes and a smile that, for this moment now, was his alone.

"May I read your poems? Please?"

"Okay."

#short story #short fiction #stories #creative writing #storytelling

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aurora-in-the-dark · 3 years

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Neighbors

He heard her turn on the faucet, knew she was making coffee. It was a Wednesday. The one day of the week she let herself sleep in an extra hour. Since she almost always worked late on Tuesday she would almost always forego her morning exercise routine come Wednesday. This morning she was listening to jazz as she went about her preparations for breakfast. He didn't recognize the artist but he seldom did. The only music he ever listened to was that which came through the wall between his apartment and hers.

He knew far more about her than he was entirely comfortable with. It wasn't as though he made a deliberate or determined effort to ascertain her actions. He led a very quiet and rather meager life and the walls were especially thin, even by the standards of a cheap apartment block. Being that his was a corner apartment she was his only neighbor. In spite of this he often found himself unsettled by the extent to which his neighbor's activities were both comprehended and expected. Even being an incidental observer often felt somehow wrong.

He heard the murmuring that he knew was her talking to her cat. Chairman Meow. That was her cat. He knew this because Chairman Meow apparently had a propensity for getting into her plants. He had never seen her cat and so visualized a rather generic gray and white beast of absolutely average proportions. She spoke to Chairman Meow quite often and he found that small fact oddly charming. He did not have a pet. Had never had a pet. He wasn't entirely sure what one did with one, but then he wasn't sure about many things. She seemed to enjoy having one and so that was good enough in his mind.

He finished another audit and forwarded the file. His anti-virus software helpfully informed him of another threat blocked. He grinned a very small grin. The security served his employer more than it served him. Anybody hacking into his computer would be greatly disappointed at their feat. No dark secrets waited to be found. His search history was blank. He used the computer for his work and nothing else. It wasn't that he lacked curiosity or a desire for knowledge. He was quite well read but did his reading from actual books. The librarian at his local branch had more than once thanked him (in jest he assumed) for keeping her in a job. His most prized possessions were leather bound first editions that filled a small bookcase. Their format would never become obsolete requiring an upgrade to access.

He was jolted back into the immediate by a loud banging on the door of his neighbor. It was not a polite seven thirty in the morning knock. He felt a shiver of alarm dance up his spine. What was this then? Whatever was about to happen was neither routine nor a casual disruption. The knock came again, even louder and he found that he had risen from his chair.

Next door he heard her silence. He could "see" her poised, uncertain. Then she crossed from her kitchenette towards the front room. He heard her open the door but noticed she did not undo the chain. 'Good. That's smart' he thought as he found himself drifting towards his own door.

"Matt! What are you..."

"Let me in. Let me in now!"

"Are you...are you drunk?"

"Lena let me in goddamn it!"

He moved all the way to his front door. He knew this Matt. Well, he knew what he looked like, what he sounded like. Matt looked almost perfectly like the stereotypical 'frat boy'. Handsome, blonde, fit and fashionable in dress. They had crossed paths in the stairwell more than once although the other didn't acknowledge him in any way. Not even with a noncommittaly pleasant polite greeting. Matt was also crude, demanding and rather childish in his attempts at manipulation. This he had learned, totally against his will, because Matt always seemed to choose a spot immediately next to the shared wall when he complained about the things which he considered unfair (which seemed to be everything that wasn't exactly as he wanted it to be).

"You're drunk!"

"So what? Let. Me. In."

"I don't have time for this. I have to get ready for work. I have to..."

"Liar!"

"What?"

"I talked to Ross. Kelly's boyfriend. Didn't knew I knew him did you?"

"Look, you're being loud and it's early and I don't need you..."

"Taking two weeks off huh? For what? For what? For what huh? You said works been so busy, so much going on you haven't had time! Yeah, so busy but you can take two weeks off?"

"I don't have to explain anything, I don't have to justify...hey!"

He heard the splintering of wood and a thud and knew that Matt had just forced the door.open, tearing the security chain out of the frame of the door. Before he had time to think through the consequences he found himself out in the hallway. Matt had already entered the neighboring apartment. The door stood open and he was surprised when a large rotund orange tabby cat came racing out into the hallway, feinting his direction before darting off towards the far reaches.

"Get out Matt!"

"I ain't going nowhere! No I ain't!"

"Everything okay?"

Speaking those two words from the entryway brought all attention to him and it was a great deal more attention than he was comfortable with. Matt spun to face him, his bloodshot eyes glaring fiercely. Lena, who had backed halfway into her living room and had both hands up in a warding gesture, looked almost as much confused as relieved at the unexpected intervention.

"This ain't your business bruh." Matt said, squaring up and throwing back his shoulders. "So get the fuck out."

"She asked you to leave." He said with a calm that resided only in his voice. He reached out a hand to touch the wood splinters jutting out from the ruined door frame. "This doesn't look to me like you were invited in either."

"Hey fuck you!"

"If you aren't going to show any respect to her, you could at least respect the other people who live here."

"You looking to get wrecked bruh?" Matt said and did his best to assume a menacing visage. Maybe that usually worked. Matt seemed the type to be ill equipped to adapt to things that didn't follow his plans. The young man moved towards him with the swagger of a bully whose bluff was seldom called but it didn't garner the desired reaction. He wasn't sure what Matt saw that put a stop to his strut. Maybe it was the complete lack of reaction to the dominance display. Matt would probably have retained his confidence had he known that his opposite's impassive immobility came from having no clue what to do next.

"Matt see, just, Matt go! Go! You're drunk, just...just go."

"I think you should leave." he said, meeting Matt's angry gaze without blinking. "Now would probably be a good time."

There was a strangely prolonged moment of stasis. Nobody moved or even seemed to breathe. He wondered if it felt as odd to the others as it did to him. Everything seemed to lean towards him expectantly, as though things would not move forward without some impetus from him. Fortunately Matt made a move first.

"Yeah. Whatever. I got questions that you gonna answer," Matt directed his words to Lena but kept their gazes locked. "And you, tough guy, maybe I'll see you round. Find out just how tough you are."

"Okay." he said, which apparently wasn't the appropriate response. Matt scowled, then moved past, leaning away as he made an uneven path to the door. He turned to keep his attention on the young man (young? By what, three or four years?) until he disappeared into the hall. He listened to the sound of retreating footsteps, heard a door creak open and then quickly close again. Probably Mrs.Hildebrandt.

"Thank you and...god I'm sorry! Too early for this shit. Ugh. I just...crap."

He turned back to face her. Had they ever spoken before this? A brief hello? He didn't think so. People tended not to notice him. It didn't bother him. Well, not much. He was average, ordinary, unobtrusive in his presence. He could hardly be upset with the reactions of others to his inherent qualities. That would be, well, pointless. Now though he had made himself noticed. She was noticing him now and he was not being proper. He was supposed to respond.

"Uh, it's okay." he said, trying to sound polite but not overly dismissive. "Your cat though, uhm, he,or she, uhm, it got out."

"What?"

"Headed towards the stairs." he said, taking in every detail, trying to make a memory that would stick. "He, or she, is pretty fast."

"Oh dammit." Lena said and ran a hand through her hair. Hair that fascinated him. It was short but shaggy, bleached white with bright blue tips that, he noticed, matched her eyes. "God, ugh ugh ugh. What a rotten morning!"

"I could...uhm, I could try to catch him. Or her. For you."

"It's a him." she said and smiled. She had incredibly kind eyes, a pure smile."Thanks but Chairs won't come to anybody but me. Besides I'm sure I've disrupted your morning enough. I'm sure you have to get ready for work."

"I work from home." he said, and then a thought struck him. He pointed towards the window. "Do you mind if I...?

She shrugged and nodded assent. Silver earrings glinted and jingled. She didn't seem to understand his intention but joined him as he pushed a curtain aside. As he'd suspected he spied Matt standing under the awning of the corner grocers across the street.

"Damn him!"

"He doesn't seem entirely rational right now." he said. Loitering about would have been sign enough but additionally the morning was cold with a freezing drizzle falling. No normal person was going to stand outside in such weather voluntarily.

"Ya know he's...he's not always this horrible."

"Obviously."

"Obviously?"

"Well," he paused, somewhat confused by her question. "You wouldn't be with him if he were a horrible person."

"What are you, the anti-dad?"

"Excuse me?"

"Bad joke, sorry." she said as she stepped back from the window. "Right now I'm tending towards my dad's view. Damn. I'm gonna have to call the super about the door too."

"I can explain to him how it happened but..."

"I don't think it's gonna help. Since I'm dating the freak."

"Uhm, I was going to say but Mr. Ziniewicz isn't here today."

"What?"

"He's at a funeral. His brother. There was a note." he paused, feeling awkward because he'd always had a sneaking suspicion that he was the only one who ever read the notices on the 'Tenants Topics' bulletin board in the entryway. "Any, uhm, emergencies we're supposed to have the repairs done and the landlord will..uhm...will...reimburse us?"

She had grown increasingly more pale and still as he explained what they were meant to do. Why she reacted in such a fashion he had no idea. Was he doing something wrong without realizing it? It couldn't be financial. The repairs would not be expensive. Did she need money? He could loan it to her. If she would allow him to.

"I'm scared Mr. Jourgensen." she said in a whisper. The two words before his name stripped the thrill of discovering that she knew it. "I was going to have him change the locks too. I don't trust him right now. I don't trust Matt the way he is, and with..."

"Should we call the police then?"

"He hasn't done enough for them to hold him. It'll just make him angrier."

Her eyes were shining. She was going to begin crying and what was he to do then? He knew that there was a middle ground between panic and inaction, a way to do this right, and oh God did he want to, just this once, do something right.

#short story #stories #creative writing

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aurora-in-the-dark · 3 years

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I am running around in circles, in search of the place we once called home.

A place where your smile offered me warmth despite the coldness of my skin.

Thank you for the prompt @deadpoetlynn

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aurora-in-the-dark · 3 years

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You freed me from thinking we were incomplete without each other. It makes more sense now because each time I drowned in my own sorrow I saw you floating on the top with a smile on your face. Your feet touched the coast and mine the rock bottom of abyss. This is where you turn into a bad dream.

(I am awake now)

#female writers #original poems #poetry #poets on tumblr #tumblr poems #tumblr poets #tumblr writers #writers of tumblr #writerscommunity #poets corner #poetry community #prose #love poem #likeforlikes #musings #poemsociety

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aurora-in-the-dark · 3 years

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Do you have any poetry prompts?

Hi! I don’t I think we have any ones on on the blog from the past, but I can make some up.

1. Describe a color without using the color’s name.2. Describe an emotion without using the emotion’s name. 3. Write about your biggest regret.4. Write about your hardest decision. 5. Write about the best (or worst) day of your life6. Write about your dreams for the future. 7. Write a tribute to your best friend. 8. Write a tribute to your enemy.9. Write a tribute to someone you wish was still in your life.10. Write about what you think happens after death. 11. Tell the story of the sun and the moon, of night and day, of death and life, etc. 12. Write about one of the five senses.14. Write about the best (or worst) feelings in the world.15. What would you want your younger self to know?16. What do you want to remember when you go through hard times? 17. Write about the small beauties in life. 18. Write to your childhood pet. 19. Write about a utopia.20. Write about who you are/ who you used to be/ both.21. Create a personality or story for the passerby you saw earlier. 22. If you died and could only bring one object with you to the afterlife, what would it be? 23. Describe the place you feel most at home.24. Describe your worst flaw.25. Describe your greatest strength.26. Look at the world from the view of a bird. 27. Look at the world from the view of a god. 28. If you had to send aliens a poem about Earth, and that’s all they had from humans, what would it be? Would you be convincing them to stay away or to come help? 29. If you gave a poem to a newborn baby, one that they would grow up with and treasure, what would it be?30. Write about the last dragons.31. Write about the first humans. 32. Write to the last human on Earth. 33. Write to the dinosaurs as the meteor descended. 34. Write to your guardian angel. 35. Write to your childhood imaginary friend. 36. Write to the ghosts that won’t move on. 37. Write as if the poem was an ancient spell.38. Write about unrequited love.39. Write about young love. 40. Write about the worst heart break you could imagine happening to you.41. Write to your future soul mate. 42. Write from the POV of an immortal.43. Write about a moment that caused you to grow up.44. Write from the POV of the oldest tree in the world… about to be cut down. 45. If you want people a hundred years from know to know what life is like right now, what would you say?46. Write to your childhood hero. 47. Apologize to someone you’ve wronged. 48. Describe music to a deaf person.49. Why do you write?50. Write your ideal last words.

- Lynn

#poetry prompt #poetry prompts #writing prompt #prompts #poem prompt

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