Neighbors With Benefits: Chapter 54

I was in one of those dreams where I was distantly aware that I was dreaming, but have the presence of mind to care.

Aiden, Dante, and Bash were in bed with me. A huge bed, impossibly large, like the entire floor of this room was one giant mattress. Plenty of room for us to have our naughty fun. I was kissing Dante, who passed me over to Bash. I blinked and he became Aiden, while the other two planted soft kisses on my back and legs.

I surrendered to how good they all felt. Muscles and lips and fingers, wonderful fingers, everywhere I turned. Three was the perfect amount; I wasn’t sure how I had ever been satisfied with just one boyfriend before.

I didn’t want it to end.

Strong arms held me by the shoulders and shook me. Gently at first, but then rougher. More urgent.

I blinked my eyes awake, and the face that hovered over me didn’t belong to any of my three lovers. It was an older man, maybe in his sixties, with a pale face. He wore thick-framed glasses that were taped together at the bridge, but behind them were soft, kind eyes. Those eyes immediately made me relax.

Until I realized he was wearing camo-printed clothes. There was a dank, dusty smell. I sat up and quickly took in my surroundings: I was in a living room crowded with boxes and stacks of newspapers, the kind you would find in a hoarder’s home. The window to my right had blackout curtains and heavy blinds; only a thin sliver of light from the street lamp outside penetrated the room.

Street lamp. That’s what I had run into while trying to get away from Voldemort.

Oh my God.

“No,” I said, trying to suck in enough breath to scream. My throat was closing up, making it difficult.

“Please don’t scream!” the man insisted. He struck out an arm in my direction, but then took a step back, like he was trying his best not to make me uncomfortable.

I closed my mouth shut. Partly because I doubted anyone could hear me inside if I screamed, and partly because he seemed like he genuinely wanted me to relax. And not, like, in a serial killer kind of way.

Alarms were still going off in my head though, insisting I was in danger. I slid my hand into the pocket of my workout shorts and found my phone. Could I dial 911 in my pocket without looking? I doubted it.

“What… what happened?” I asked.

Voldemort tensed, as if I was unsettling him and not the other way around. “I was getting my mail. From the mailbox. I do it every night. I pick a time when nobody is out. You’re usually home by now. Or at the other house. But when I was getting my mail, there you were. Standing there. You ran into the lamppost and fell down. I brought you inside.”

He sounded defensive about the whole thing. Like he expected me to get the wrong idea. Or like he had other motivations for bringing you inside, and is now trying to defend himself.

“You knocked yourself out, so I brought you inside,” he repeated stubbornly. There was something off about him.

“That was, um, very nice of you,” I said in my most grateful voice. “But I’m okay now, so I should probably leave…”

I stood up and immediately became dizzy. My vision blurred and the room spun.

“Easy,” Voldemort said, bracing my arms and lowering me back to the couch. “You have a concussion. I think. Saw it a lot in the Navy. Tall guys hitting their heads on the bulkhead. That’s why I shook you awake—you’re not supposed to sleep when you have a concussion. It’s bad for you.”

My head was pounding, I realized. I touched the source of the pain, my forehead, and felt a bandage.

“I cleaned you up,” he said, once again defensively.

Okay. I got scared and ran into a lamppost. I knocked myself out, which made sense since my memory was fuzzy, and he brought me inside. He had helped me.

I felt myself relax. All of this was normal. I didn’t have any reason to be afraid.

“But I’m glad it happened,” Voldemort said. He held his hands in front of him, twiddling the thumbs nervously. “I want to talk to you.”

There it is. He wasn’t just helping me.

“I would like to go outside now, please,” I said with a calmness that I didn’t truly feel.

“No,” he blurted out. “First we need to talk.”

Images of horror movies ran through my head. That creepy guy in Silence of the Lambs especially. I imagined being thrown into a deep hole, and Voldemort lowering food and water to me in a bucket on a rope.

“Maybe we can talk another time,” I said patiently. “When I feel better.”

“You’re afraid,” he said. He sounded shocked. “Why are you afraid? You shouldn’t be afraid!”

All stoicism disappeared, and I blurted out, “Because you’re Voldemort!”

Behind his glasses, he blinked in surprise. “What’s a Voldemort?”

“He’s the bad guy from Harry Potter!” I said in a rush. “You would know that if you weren’t a scary hermit!”

“You think…” He swallowed hard. “You think I’m a bad guy?”

“Well… yeah,” I said.

He bit off a single word: “Why?”

“You’ve never gone outside,” I said. “You block all the windows. You have all those signs on your fence, and in your yard, warning people to stay away. You’ve booby trapped your front yard.”

“I’m… agoraphobic,” he said. “It means I’m afraid of open spaces. Or going outside. It’s the opposite of claustrophobia. And I hate solicitors. Especially during elections. Someone is always knocking on my door, and ringing my phone, and pressing my doorbell four times a day.” He touched his temples with both hands. “I just want everyone to leave me alone. I just want everyone to stay away. But you were injured, so I tried to help you, and now you’re calling me names… Do you really have a bad guy nickname for me?”

He sounded so hurt by the end, and confused, like a dog that didn’t understand why it had been kicked. His eyes were so big and innocent behind his glasses, and I couldn’t bear to see the pain I had just caused him, so I looked around the room.

“What are those?” I asked, pointing toward the window. “Binoculars? And some sort of plastic dish antenna?”

“It’s a parabolic microphone,” he explained.

“I’ve heard of those!” I exclaimed. “They let you hear things from far away. What do you need those for? Spying on everyone in the neighborhood? Listening to conversations that are supposed to be private?”

He hung his head in shame. “I’m lonely. I want to feel like part of the neighborhood, even though I can’t leave. You are all so friendly to each other. I feel… left out.”

Was he lying? I didn’t think so. He seemed genuine lonely.

But that didn’t mean he wasn’t dangerous.

I heard a clatter deeper in the house, like dishes shifting in a sink. Tensing, I asked, “Who else is here?”

Voldemort held out a hand. He was still blocking my escape. “Just calm down…”

“Who?” I demanded. “If you don’t tell me right now I’m calling the police.”

Footsteps drew closer. I pulled out my phone, holding it like a weapon. Against Voldemort, I felt like I had a chance to leap over the couch and escape. But against two people…