Creeper
He sits in his car, a red 2011 Toyota Carolla, parked close to the curb in front of her house.
The car had belonged to his mother. Since he had inherited it from her he had wanted to take a spray can to it, turn it into an art car, but he was never brave enough. Instead he claimed it for himself by littering the space in front of the passenger seat with old fast food bags and wrappers and grocery store receipts. His mother would have disapproved and when her disembodied judgement became too much he would clean it all up, only to toss more trash there the next day.
Tonight he has his head tilted up, looking at the bedroom window. Her window, lit bright against the twilight turning dark with the coming storm.
The curtains are open wide and the window so clear it is like the contents of the room beyond are magnified. He can see her vanity and the mirror behind, the chair with a gray hoodie draped over, the poster of Bowie’s Aladdin Sane on the wall oppite next to the closed door.
He sees no movement but he continues to stare. He knows he is being a creeper, but he doesn’t know what else to do. He needs just a glimpse of her. He thinks that will make him happy, will quell the deep sadness. He tries to outmaneuver it, but tonight he finally failed, left his room alone to drive into the night. But the sadness followed him and he found himself here.
He’s got the stereo on, but quiet. He doesn’t want to be noticed here, to call attention to himself. The Blue Öyster Cult Agents of Fortune CD is playing. He can only play it in the car. It had gotten a huge scratch and it would no longer play on his computer. For some reason the car stereo would still play it. Only a minor skip near the beginning of Don’t Fear The Reaper, but it was still listenable.
Somehow the dark tone of BÖC speaks to him. It both enhances the sadness and makes it more bearable. A lot of the music he listened to these days was for this purpose. He honestly did not know if this was healthy or not. Was it wallowing? He didn’t know. He just knew that making it through the day felt like a monumental success. But what choice did he have? Not make it through the day?
The bedroom door suddenly opens and his heart falls to his feet as he sees her come into the room and close the door behind her. She immediately moves out of sight into the room, but he can see her shadows move across the wall as she blocks the lamplight.
The night has grown very dark with the clouds congregating in the sky over the house, a sliver of deepest blue between the roof and the black.
This makes the window shine almost to the point of a spotlight in contrast. Only her body moving around the lamp dims the brightness for moments, like a spinning beacon in a lighthouse.
He sees her move back into view in front of the window. She has a wipe in her hand, wiping her face in tight circles, removing her makeup from her forehead, her cheeks. She puts her lips over her teeth to wipe under her nose and on her chin, staring close into the mirror. She wipes her eyes in careful, deft swipes from the bridge of her nose out to the side of her eyebrows.
He is fascinated. Enthralled. Of course he had seen his mother take off her makeup all his life, but he hadn't thought what it would be like to se a girl he knew do something so normal yet so intimate, so full of vulnerability. He hadn't thought of seeing her do it, and it endears her to him even more.
He forgets about everything but the moment. He wants to go to her, to tell her how she makes him feel, how she makes him forget the demons that rage in his body, the life that hurts with each breath.
And then, just as quickly as he’d forgotten, he is back in his body. He remembers, and with a deep shaking breath he looks away from her, looks down at the black grass. He bites down on his back teeth till they hurt, opens his jaw again but it feels like marble.
He takes another breath, this one faster and sharper, and he looks up again. Just as she is removing her t-shirt and begins removing her bra.
He immediately looks away, cursing himself both for having seen her at all and for not being strong enough to keep looking. But he couldn’t look. The right thing was to look away. The right thing was not to be here at all. His cheeks suddenly feel hot with shame. He closes his eyes tight, so tight he thinks he might crack is eyeballs apart, and he taps the side of his head with his fist, repeating, “stupid, stupid, stupid.”
He breathes again, sharp and deep, without wanting to, and the breath brings him out, and he opens his eyes. He can’t help but look up again at her window.
She is there, standing in front of the window buttoning her pajama top. For a moment he thinks she sees him, she seems to be staring right at him, and he starts to panic. But she doesn’t see him. The light in her room is too bright and all she sees is the reflection in the glass.
And her beauty, standing there in the warm glow, as if the glow is emanating from her, feels to him like the only thing tethering him to the earth.
She reaches up with both hands, as if she is embracing the whole of the world, and grabs the curtain on each side and pulls them closed.
The curtains are thick and block the light completely except a bright uneven crack down the middle. He can see some movement behind the crack, but can make out no details. As he looks one last time the first of the rain begins to spit down. It falls at a severe angle, as if each drop is thrown by an angry god atop the clouds. The rain pings against the window and rolls down in rivers and streams.
He turns away, bites at his lip and turns the key. The car pops to life and he pulls carefully away from the curb, turning on his lights against the dark.