Chapter Text
Charley first noticed his new neighbour when he watched him carry an entire stack of plywood sheets like they were made of cardboard.
It was stupidly hot that day, the kind of dry Vegas heat that made the asphalt look like it was actually melting, even though the sun was already down and the street was sitting in that leftover oven-warmth heat that Vegas kept after dark. Every rational part of Charley’s brain said the right move was staying inside his air-conditioned house and pretending he didn’t exist. Instead, he was halfway down the driveway with the trash bags when he caught the movement next door and, well, any last bit of his rational thought just… drifted off.
The guy was tall, with broad shoulders and tan skin that looked actually sun-kissed, not spray-tanned like half of the girls at his school. Tank top, jeans slung low on his hips, dirty work boots. Dark, slightly messy hair, a little stubble like he rolled out of bed already looking unfairly good. He had the kind of build that said he lifted heavy stuff for fun and probably had opinions about power tools. He should have looked sweaty and miserable in this heat, but he didn’t seem bothered by it at all.
Charley didn’t realized he was staring until the trash bag slipped out of his hand and dropped to the driveway with a wet thud.
“Smooth,” he muttered to himself.
The guy glanced over at the sound. His eyes were dark. That was Charley’s first thought. Not just dark, focused. Like he’d just zeroed in on Charley and everything else blurred out.
“Hey,” the man called, voice low and easy like they’d known each other longer than three seconds. “You mind if I use your cans? Mine haven’t been delivered yet.”
Charley’s brain, still occupied with ‘holy crap hot neighbour’, lagged a second.
“Oh. Uh….Yeah. I mean, yeah, go ahead. Trash cans. Not, uh…”
He choked on his own sentence, then considered throwing himself into the garbage and closing the lid.
The man’s mouth curled, slow and amused, like Charley had just done a magic trick for him.
“Nice to meet you, ‘Yeah Go Ahead,’” he said at the same time. “I’m Jerry.”
“I’m…Charley,” he blurted, because apparently his mouth had given up pretending it was attached to a functioning brain. “I live here. Obviously. I mean…Not in the trash. In the house. My house. With my mom. I…”
“Good to know,” Jerry said, lips twitching. “The trash would be a downgrade.”
He crossed the short distance like it was nothing, close enough now that Charley caught the smell of sawdust and something warmer underneath, something that made his chest feel tight and jittery at the same time, like walking out of a dark alley into the bright neon sun. Jerry nudged the fallen trash bag with his boot.
“You, uh, want a hand with…that?”
Charley looked at the bag, now leaking an embarrassingly gooey mess all over the driveway.
Kill him. Kill him now and save everyone the embarrassment.
“No, no, I got it,” he said too fast, grabbing the bag like it hadn’t just betrayed him. “I’m very capable of carrying my own garbage, thanks.”
“I can see that,” Jerry said, sounding entertained. “You always take it out at this time of day, or is this a special occasion?”
“What?” Charley threw the bag into the can harder than necessary. “No. I just…my mom asked…So.”
“So you’re a good son,” Jerry said. “I like that.”
The words landed oddly in Charley’s gut, like a compliment and something else all tangled together.
He cleared his throat. “You, uh. Just move in?”
“Yeah, yesterday,” Jerry’s gaze did a slow sweep of Charley’s face, down his torso, like he was cataloguing him. Not leering, not obvious. Just…taking stock, the way someone might look at a new house they planned to stay in a long time. “Been busy getting the place in order.”
Charley glanced at the plywood, the open garage, and a bunch of boxes stacked neatly inside. “You fixing it up?”
“Something like that.” Jerry leaned his weight onto one hip. “You should come by sometime. I could use a local guide.”
“For…what, Home Depot?” Charley tried to make his voice light, but there was a thread of nervous energy in it he couldn’t quite hide.
Jerry smiled, and it did dangerous things to his already handsome face. “For the neighbourhood. People. Spots to avoid. Spots to…enjoy.”
His eyes lingered on Charley just a second too long on that last word. Heat crawled up Charley’s neck. Okay, so this was, what? Just how older guys talked? Confident, a little suggestive, not to actually mean anything?
Probably.
He shoved his hands into the pockets of his shorts. “Yeah, I mean. It’s not exactly exciting out here. Strip’s thirty minutes that way. There’s a crappy mall. A couple of bars I’m not old enough to go to. Not much to tour.”
Jerry’s gaze sharpened, some humour flickering there.
“So how old are you exactly then, Charley?” Jerry asked, his eyes doing that slow sweep that should be illegal.
“S-Seventeen,” Charley said. And then, because his mouth hated him: “Eighteen in a couple of days….”
Jerry’s eyebrows lifted. “That right?...Good to know.” The way he said it made Charley feel like he’d accidentally handed over some classified information, and Charley’s stomach does that weird flip again.
He laughed it off. “Yeah, right...”
Jerry huffed a soft laugh, eyes still on him. “You got plans? After you’re legal?”
“That’s…not a weird way to phrase that at all,” Charley said before he could stop himself.
Jerry’s teeth flashed in a grin that was almost wolfish. “Relax. I meant college. You know. Higher education, bright future and all that.”
“Uh-huh.” Charley’s heart was pounding a little too loudly for how casual this supposedly was. “Maybe UNLV. Haven’t decided yet. You from Vegas?”
“Been around,” Jerry said. “…Decided to put down some roots.”
The way he said it made Charley picture something sharp driven into the desert dirt, digging in deep and refusing to let go.
“Well,” Jerry added, stepping back slightly, “I’ll let you get back to your…garbage endeavours. Thanks for the cans, neighbour.”
“Yeah,” Charley said, feeling weirdly like he’d just stepped off a roller coaster. “Anytime.”
Jerry turned away, lifting the plywood again like it weighed nothing. Muscles in his back and shoulders flexed under the thin material of his tank top.
Charley absolutely didn’t look. Much.
He went back inside, brain buzzing, and almost ran directly into his mom.
She eyed him over the glow of her phone screen, thumb pausing mid-scroll. “Was that the new neighbour you were talking to?”
“Yeah,” Charley said, trying to sound normal. “His name’s Jerry.”
She raised an eyebrow. “Is he…single?”
“Mom,” Charley groaned.
“What? I’m allowed to look. He seems…nice.”
Of course he does. Nice. That’s one word for it.
“Please stop thirsting after our new neighbor while I’m within earshot,” Charley muttered, heading for the fridge. “It’s…. traumatic.”
She laughed. “Get used to it, baby. I have eyes.”
Charley grabbed a soda and tried very hard not to think about the fact that, apparently, so did he.
The thing was, Charley had been sure he knew what he liked. He liked girls. He had Amy, didn’t he? Amy, with her big eyes and sharper mind, the girl who’d decided he was worth a shot even after he’d spent the better part of sophomore year being a massive dork with Ed. He liked the way she looked at him, the way she grounded him, the way she kissed him when they were alone in his room and his mom wasn’t home. He had a girlfriend, a pretty one, and he was happy about it.
That was simple.
What wasn’t simple was hot-neighbour-Jerry saying things like ‘so you’re a good son’ or ‘I like that’ and giving him looks that felt like being slowly roasted alive. Charley tried not to think about it. He failed. Hard. He told himself it would probably just fade. One awkward driveway encounter and done.
It didn’t.
Jerry, it turned out, had a real talent for being exactly where Charley was without ever looking like he was trying. By the end of the week, Charley was starting to think he was cursed. He was wheeling his shitty motorcycle up the driveway after school, backpack slung over one shoulder, when Jerry’s front door opened and he stepped out like some kind of beer commercial for people who liked the typical bad guy type and bad decisions. The sky was already darkening, that deep in-between blue before full night, the last smear of after-sunset glow fading low behind the houses. Streetlights hummed to life up and down the block.
“Evening, Charley,” Jerry called, like they do this ‘casual conversation thing’ every day. “Long day?”
“Feels like it,” Charley said.
“Thought so,” Jerry said, coming down his walkway, keeping lazily to the shadowed side like it was somehow his second nature. “You look about two assignments away from a meltdown.”
He wore a fitted T-shirt this time and jeans that made the phrase ‘nice ass’ involuntarily skitter across Charley’s brain. He wondered if it would be rude to punch his own subconscious.
“Some of us have homework,” Charley said as he kicked the bike stand down, the metal thunking against the pavement. “You know… learning math, and the slow, inevitable collapse of my sanity.”
Jerry pulled up beside him, close enough that the brush of his shirt skimmed Charley’s bare arm when he shifted. Charley’s skin prickled like someone had flipped a switch under it.
“You don’t sound very convinced about that ‘learning’ part,” Jerry said.
“That’s because Pre-Calc is a scam,” Charley shot back before he could stop himself. “Nobody needs that much math unless they’re building a spaceship.”
“You planning on building a spaceship?” Jerry’s eyes crinkled at the corners.
“On this GPA?” Charley snorted. “I’ll be lucky if I can afford a bus pass.”
Jerry looked at him for a long second, head tilted, like he was examining something under a magnifying glass.
“What?” Charley asked, suddenly self-conscious.
“Nothing.” Jerry’s voice softened just a fraction. “You’re funny when you’re not busy tripping over your sentences.”
Charley stared at him.
“I…I don’t trip over my sentences,” he said, immediately tripping over that sentence.
Jerry’s grin flashed, pleased. “You sure about that, kid?”
“I’m not a kid,” Charley said automatically. “I’m almost…”
“Eighteen,” Jerry finished for him, like he’d been holding onto the number. “Yeah. I remember.”
For some reason, that made Charley’s mouth go dry. He fumbled for the safety of sarcasm. “What, you keeping a calendar on your fridge?” he scoffed. “Circle the date in red? Charley’s Legal Day?”
Jerry’s gaze flicked down his face, slow, lingering. When his eyes returned to Charley’s eyes, there was something darker there.
“I don’t need a calendar,” Jerry said quietly. “I’ve got a good memory.”
Charley swallowed. His heart was beating way too hard for a casual sidewalk conversation. “Okay, um, that’s…slightly creepy. But, like, cool creepy. You know. In a…possibly stalkery way.”
Jerry laughed, a low, warm sound that sank under Charley’s skin.
“If I were stalking you,” he said, “then you wouldn’t even know about me; in fact, you wouldn’t even see me at all.”
It should have been a joke. It sounded like one. But there was an edge to it that made the hairs on the back of Charley’s neck stand up.
He covered it with a lopsided smile. “You say that like it’s not the creepiest thing you’ve said so far.”
“I’ve got creepier,” Jerry promised.
Charley believed him.
“Anyway,” Jerry continued, shifting his hand to rest on the handlebars, leaning in just enough that Charley caught that familiar warm smell again. “You’d better get inside before your spaceship math teacher assigns extra credit or something.”
“Yeah,” Charley muttered, “wouldn’t want to disappoint Pre-Calc.”
Jerry’s fingers tapped lightly on the rubber grip, their arms almost touching. They were suddenly close, close enough that Charley could see the lighter flecks in his dark eyes, the way his pupils seemed a little too wide for the amount of light left.
“Hey,” Jerry said, and his voice had gone softer again. “You need anything, you knock on my door. Middle of the night, whatever. Got it?”
It was such a weirdly earnest offer that it caught Charley off guard.
“Like…sugar?” he said weakly. “A cup of flour? You gonna lend me your lawnmower, Mr Rogers?”
“Maybe,” Jerry said. “Or if somebody gives you trouble.”
“I can handle myself,” Charley protested.
Jerry’s gaze slid over him again, up and down. Not cruel, not dismissive. Just thorough.
“I don’t doubt it,” he said. “But sometimes it’s nice to have backup.”
Something about the way he said it made Charley’s chest tighten. He didn’t know why.
“Yeah,” he said quietly. “Okay.”
Jerry let go of the handlebars, tapping them once like a parting knock. “Get inside, Charley. Homework’s not gonna do itself.”
Charley tried to roll his eyes, tried to make his voice flip back into sarcastic. “Thanks, Dad.”
Jerry’s smile turned crooked. “Trust me. I can be a lot of things, but your dad is not one of them.”
Charley decided that was the absolute worst time for his brain to supply the phrase ‘Thank God’. So he wheeled his bike the rest of the way up the driveway, locked it, and didn’t breathe right again until he was inside the house.
If Ed had still been talking to him, Charley would’ve told him. He would’ve said something like, Dude, my new neighbour is weirdly intense and might be hitting on me and I think I’m having a sexuality crisis. Ed would’ve cracked some joke about sparkly vampires or HBO and talked him down or made it worse, but at least it would’ve been something.
Instead, Ed hadn’t even texted him in weeks. The last time they talked, Ed had been tense in a way that didn’t fit him at all. He wasn’t pacing like he usually did for dramatic effect. He was pacing because he couldn’t sit still.
“I’m telling you, something’s wrong,” Ed said, running a hand through his hair, voice thin. “I’m serious, man. People are missing. Not just kids we barely know. Adam is gone. Fucking Adam of all people, Charley.”
Charley frowned. “He probably needed some space, and I don’t know…skipped town? I mean…it’s Vegas.”
Ed stopped pacing. He stared at Charley like the words physically hurt him. “You really don’t get it, do you? It’s fucking Adam, Charley. You think Adam would disappear on purpose? Adam? He gets anxious ordering at Taco Bell.”
“Okay, but…”
“No,” Ed cut in, voice cracking with frustration. “Don’t ‘okay but’ me. You think I’m stupid? Adam’s been scared for weeks. He told me he thought someone was always watching him or something. And he thought he heard stuff outside his window. He wasn’t making it up.”
Charley froze. “You never told me that...” Charley hesitated. “Ed… sometimes you guys hype each other up. You know? Horror movies and late-night creep talk. Maybe Adam just psyched himself out.”
Ed froze. It wasn’t anger yet. Just this… quiet disappointment.
“We used to do this together,” he said softly. “Me, you and Adam. The ghost hunts. The stupid vampire jokes. The ‘what if we’re right’ talks. You were the one who believed me the most.”
“Yeah, when we were twelve,” Charley said, trying to laugh. It sounded wrong coming out.
Ed’s face tightened. “I miss that guy. The one who actually looked at stuff. The one who didn’t pretend everything was fine and normal just to impress his girlfriend.”
“Hey, that’s not fair...” Charley snapped.
“No?” Ed’s voice rose. “You ditched me, Charley. You ditched me and Adam the second Amy looked at you twice. You stopped coming over. You stopped hanging out. You stopped...caring.”
“That’s not…”
“It is,” Ed said, and the hurt in his voice was so raw that Charley shut up. “That was us,” Ed shot back. “And then Amy happened, and you dropped me and Adam like a bad habit.”
“That’s not true,” Charley said, but it sounded weak even to him.
Ed laughed once, sharp and humourless, and scrubbed a hand over his face. “You ditched us, Charley. You just fucking did. You think I didn’t notice? You stopped hanging out, you stopped texting first, and you stopped caring about the stuff that mattered to us. You traded me and Adam for kissing in your bedroom and pretending everything was normal.”
“Ed. I didn’t…”
“You did,” Ed said quietly. “You just didn’t look back long enough to see it.”
Charley’s stomach sank. “Ed… I didn’t know you and Adam felt that way...”
“Of course, you didn’t know. You weren’t around,” Ed whispered. “You weren’t around for a long time....”
The silence after that sat heavily between them.
“I care, Ed”, Charley said quickly. “I do, I swear.”
“No, you don’t,” Ed said, sharper. “Not the way you used to. Not the way you pretend you still do.”
Ed swallowed hard, eyes shining for a second before he blinked it away. “You were supposed to be my best friend, Charley”, he said softly.
“That’s not…Ed, come on…”
Ed stepped back like the air between them burned. “You can keep pretending nothing’s wrong. That’s your choice.”
His voice dropped to a hurting, tired whisper.
“But don’t lie to yourself and say you didn’t lose us long before any of this started.”
“Ed…”
Ed shook his head.
“I hope you will fucking get it someday,” he said. “Being right about something terrible and having the one person you trusted look at you like you’re crazy.”
Ed picked up his backpack.
“Forget it,” Ed muttered. “We both know you’ve moved on. Just… don’t say I didn’t try to fix this.”
The door clicked behind him. And he didn’t text him back the next day. Or the next. Or any day after. And now there was this…thing with Jerry that he couldn’t talk to anyone about, because what was he going to say? Hey, my ex-best friend thinks there is a monster in my neighbourhood, and anyway, my next-door neighbour might be flirting with me, and my brain short-circuits whenever he stands too close. That conversation wasn’t happening. So instead, Charley put his head down, focused on school, on Amy, on pretending everything was normal. Like it was all going to be okay.
Until the night Jerry walked into the convenience store where Charley worked. The store was dead, the way it always was after ten PM on a weeknight. The hum of the fridges was the loudest sound. Charley was halfway through restocking energy drinks and trying not to fall asleep standing up. The bell over the door jingled.
“Welcome to…” he started, then looked up and froze. “Oh. Hey.”
Jerry stood in the doorway, hands in his jacket pockets, like he’d just casually decided to stroll into Charley’s reality again.
“Hey, yourself,” Jerry said. His eyes flicked to the name tag on Charley’s shirt with mock curiosity. “Charley. That your name? Wild cause I know a kid with the exact name who also happens to be my neighbor.”
Charley rolled his eyes before he could stop himself. “Yeah, yeah. Very funny.”
Jerry walked past the aisles slowly, like he had all the time in the world, eyes skimming over the shelves but not seeming particularly interested in any of it.
“You do everything?” he asked. “School, taking out the trash, convenient late-night capitalism?”
“I contain multitudes,” Charley said. “I’m like a very tired Russian doll.”
Jerry’s mouth quirked. “You work here every night?”
“Few nights a week.” Charley closed the fridge, wiped his hands on his jeans. “Why, you planning on becoming a regular? Because just so you know, we are currently out of, like, everything exciting. Including my will to live.”
“I’ll take what I can get,” Jerry said, and there was a double edge there that made Charley’s pulse skip.
He moved closer to the front, leaning against the counter like he’d done it a hundred times before. The store’s bright fluorescent lights should have made him look washed-out, but they didn’t. If anything, they just made the lines of his face sharper, like he’d been drawn in ink instead of pencil.
“You allowed to talk,” he asked, “or am I ruining your very serious candy-stocking schedule?”
“You are deeply obstructing important gummy worm operations,” Charley said. “But I can make an exception this time.”
“You're generous, kid,” Jerry said lightly. “I like that about you.”
“There it is again,” Charley muttered. “You sure you’re not confusing me with someone else? You barely know me.”
Jerry tilted his head. “You sure about that?”
Charley frowned. “Pretty sure I’d remember forgetting our long and meaningful conversations.”
“We’ve had some pretty meaningful talks over trashcans and homworks,” Jerry pointed out.
Charley snorted. “Yeah, right.”
Jerry’s gaze drifted over the empty store. “You working here alone?”
“Yeah,” Charley said slowly. “Why?”
“Just seems like a bad idea,” Jerry replied, too casual. “Kid your age. This late. On this side of town.”
“I can take care of myself,” Charley said again.
Jerry’s eyes came back to him. “You keep saying that.”
“Because it’s true,” Charley shot back, annoyed at being treated like a helpless puppy. “What, you think I’m just gonna get kidnapped between the beef jerky and the lotto tickets?”
“It happens,” Jerry said. “People disappear.”
There was something…weighty in the way he said it. Charley’s chest tightened.
“You mean those missing people?” he asked. “Look, that’s…no one even knows if that’s…”
Jerry looked at him, and for a second, all the lightness drained out of his face.
“You believe in monsters, Charley?” he asked quietly.
The question landed like a stone.
Charley suddenly remembered long nights in Ed’s basement, horror movies playing on a loop, Ed enthusiastically explaining vampire lore between mouthfuls of popcorn. All the rules. All the jokes. He’d grown out of it. That’s what he told himself.
He lifted his chin and said grimly, “No...Not anymore at least according to my ex-best friend.”
Jerry’s lips curved up, but it wasn’t quite a smile. “You should.”
The bell over the door jingled again, making Charley jump. He tore his eyes away from Jerry to ring up a guy with a case of beer and a blank stare. It took two minutes. By the time Charley looked up again, Jerry was at the back of the store, staring into the glass of the beer fridge. He watched him for a second, hands resting on the counter. Something in his chest was buzzing, like his body was fully convinced there was danger here but had no idea what shape it actually took. Or maybe that was just what attraction felt like when it was pointed in the wrong direction. Wrong direction but why does it feels right? Charley wonders to himself. This is…this is just hormones or something, right? He’s a good-looking guy, whatever, anyone with eyes would notice.
So why did it feel like more than that?
Jerry finally grabbed a six-pack and wandered back to the front.
“High class,” Charley said as he scanned it. “You really know how to treat yourself.”
“I’m on a budget,” Jerry said, watching him. “New house, remember?”
“You really commit to the suburban dad bit,” Charley said. “Next thing I know, you’re gonna be grilling in socks and sandals.”
“You imagining me in socks and sandals, Charley?” Jerry asked, low.
“I...no,” Charley sputtered, heat rushing to his face. “That’s…that’s not what I…”
Jerry leaned in a little, resting his fingertips on the counter. They were close enough now that Charley caught that warm smell again, something sweet and metallic underneath the generic store scent. It hit him harder this time, almost dizzying. He sucked in a breath without meaning to, and it was like something inside him jolted awake, like stepping into a patch of sunlight after being in the dark too long. His skin prickled. His mouth felt suddenly very dry.
What the hell?
And then he notices Jerry went very, very still. His eyes flashed, no other word for it, as he inhaled, nostrils flaring the slightest bit. For a heartbeat, his expression was stripped of its usual lazy humour, something sharp and hungry flaring there instead, like he’d just been handed something he hadn’t tasted in years. The air between them seemed to thicken.
“Uh,” Charley said, voice coming out unnervingly high. “You okay, dude?”
Jerry blinked, and when he finally looked at Charley again, the hunger was banked. Somehow tucked neatly behind the usual smirk, but the edges of it were still there, like embers under ash.
“Yeah,” he said slowly. “Yeah, I’m…great.”
He leaned in closer, and this time Charley could feel his breath against his cheek.
“You switch shampoos?” Jerry asked, voice soft enough that it didn’t quite carry past the counter.
“What?” Charley stared. “No? I…I don’t think so..."
"Why? Do I smell bad? Is this a deodorant emergency? Be honest. I can handle the truth.”
Jerry’s gaze dipped to his throat, lingered there, then lifted again.
“You smell…” he started, then seemed to rethink the sentence halfway through, lips twisting in amusement at his own expense. “Different.”
Charley’s brain did a full stop.
“Different how?” he asked weakly. “Like…bad different? I knew I shouldn’t have tried that new deodorant…”
“Relax,” Jerry said, a little laugh slipping out. “It’s not an insult.”
“‘You smell different’ is exactly what a person says before they tell you you stink,” Charley insisted. “Like a polite ‘you reek, please fix it.’”
Jerry’s eyes darkened again, considering him.
“No,” he said. “Trust me. If you stinks then I wouldn’t be this close.”
Charley’s heart stuttered.
“Oh,” Charley whispered. “Cool. That’s… cool. Totally normal thing to say to your teenage neighbour.”
Jerry’s mouth curved. “You complaining?”
“I didn’t say that,” Charley blurted. He clamped his lips shut a second too late.
Jerry’s smile sharpened. “Didn’t think so.”
Charley scanned the beer with far more force than necessary, the barcode beeping like it was personally judging him.
“That’ll be, uh, nine fifty-two,” he said, voice cracking.
Jerry handed over a ten, fingers brushing Charley’s palm in a way that felt absolutely not accidental. It was a simple touch. There was nothing dramatic about it. Skin to skin for maybe two seconds. But Charley’s whole body lit up like someone had plugged him into a socket. His brain fizzled, static replacing whatever he’d been about to say. Jerry’s gaze dropped to their hands. His pupils blew wide for a fraction of a second. Then he smiled, slow and satisfied.
“Keep the change,” he murmured.
Charley swallowed. “T-that’s, uh. Forty-eight cents?”
Jerry shrugged, taking the bag. “Big spender, remember?”
He walked backwards a step, still facing Charley.
“I’ll see you around, Charley,” he said. And that's not a question. More like a statement.
Then he turned and left, bell jingling cheerfully behind him, like this was just any normal customer and not a walking crisis that threatened Charley's very own existence.
The second the door shut, Charley dropped his forehead onto the counter.
“What the hell was that?...” he muttered to the empty store.
Nobody answered.
Charley tried to be normal after that. He tried really hard. He went on dates with Amy, let her drag him to a horror movie she wanted to see, kept his hands on her waist and his eyes mostly on the screen. He did his homework. He even texted Ed a few hesitant 'hey man, you alive?' messages that went unanswered.
Every time he thought maybe things were settling back into some kind of pattern, he’d wheel his bike out to the sidewalk and find Jerry already on his porch with a beer, watching him with that lazy little smile. Or he’d look up from mowing the lawn and see Jerry leaning against the porch rail next door, eyes on him like there was nothing else worth looking at.
Always at night. Always, once the sky had gone dark and the streetlights were on.
And Jerry never seems to push harder than Charley is comfortable with. Not exactly. He didn’t say anything explicitly. Didn’t cross any bright lines. It was all in the looks, the way he lingered, the way he always seemed to stand just close enough that Charley could smell him. And whatever switch had flipped that night in the convenience store, that first moment when he’d really breathed Jerry in. That switch wasn’t flipping back. Every time now and then, that scent hit him like a quiet punch. Warm and metallic and something else, something that made his pulse stutter and his stomach flip, like standing too close to a bonfire and not knowing if he wanted to step back or step in. Amy smelled like perfume and lip gloss and the shampoo she sometimes stole from his bathroom because she liked the way it made her hair feel. Jerry smelled like…danger. In a bottle. If danger could bottle itself and sell out in minutes.
He is so screwed.
The third encounter that really did him in happened in his own driveway again. He’d just finished washing his mom’s car, shirt sticking to his back, hair damp. The sun had already slipped below the horizon, leaving a strip of orange clinging low over the desert while the rest of the sky went dark and the first stars pricked through. Porch lights glowed up and down the street. It should've felt calm and peaceful. Instead, his senses were humming before he even heard footsteps.
“You know,” Jerry said from behind him, “if you keep that thing any cleaner, it’s going to start developing self-esteem issues.”
Charley yelped and spun around, almost dropping the hose.
“Jesus,” he gasped. “Can you, like, wear a bell or something?”
“I’d rather not,” Jerry said. “Kind of ruins the whole mysterious vibe I’ve got going.”
Charley squinted at him. “Is that you admitting you have a mysterious vibe?”
“Oh, absolutely,” Jerry said. “I cultivate it.”
“At least you’re honest,” Charley muttered.
He turned to shut off the hose, aware of Jerry’s eyes on him.
“You’re jumpy,” Jerry observed.
“I have a neighbour who appears out of nowhere,” Charley shot back. “Maybe I’ve just got survival instincts.”
Jerry hummed, coming closer. “I dunno. You work nights alone in the middle of nowhere, walk home in the dark, let your guard down around guys you barely know…” He trailed off, stopping near the front of the car. “Not exactly textbook survival instinct behaviour to me.”
“That’s your way of saying I’m stupid?” Charley asked.
Jerry’s mouth curved. “My way of saying you’re…interesting.”
He walked around the car, trailing his fingers over the hood.
“You get all this from your dad?” he asked.
It was such a sharp left turn that it took Charley a second to follow.
“All what?” he asked. “The house?”
Jerry shrugged one shoulder, eyes flicking toward the front door, the yard, the car in the drive. “The setup. The life. The suburbs life.”
“Oh.” Charley stared at the windshield wipers like they’d personally wronged him. “He left when I was a kid. We kept the house. My mom kept…everything else.”
Jerry’s eyes softened, almost imperceptibly. “He walk out or drive?”
Charley blinked. “That’s…a really specific question.”
“What can I say, I’m a specific guy,” Jerry said. “So which was it?”
“He, uh. He left a note,” Charley said, staring at the damp concrete. “Then he drove. I heard the engine. I didn’t…watch him go.”
Jerry nodded slowly, like that fit some internal puzzle.
“He sends postcards?” he asked.
“He did sometimes a while back,” Charley said. “From boring places. With boring apologies.”
“And you still hose down your mom’s car and take out the trash,” Jerry said. “Good kid.”
Charley snorted. “You say ‘kid’ one more time, and I’m keying your car.”
“I know where you live,” Jerry pointed out. “You’d be easy to track.”
“You think I’m scared of you?” Charley shot back, even though a not-insignificant part of him kind of was.
“I think you should be,” Jerry said, and smiled. “But you’re not. And that’s…intriguing.”
“That’s not how most people react to someone saying they should be scared of them,” Charley said. “Just FYI.”
Jerry stepped closer again, the porch light and the last bit of sky-glow catching in his eyes, making them look almost…golden. That was weird. They were brown. Weren’t they?
“You’re not ‘most people,’ Charley,” he said.
The words landed heavily.
Charley swallowed. His throat felt tight. The scent hit him again, even stronger this close, and he fought the urge to take a deeper breath.
“What does that mean?” he asked, trying for light and landing somewhere around breathless.
Jerry didn’t answer right away. He just looked at him, really looked, gaze flicking from Charley’s eyes down to his mouth, down his throat, then back up again. It was the most naked he’d ever felt while fully clothed.
“Means I’ve been around a long time,” Jerry said finally, “and people like you don’t show up often.”
“People like me,” Charley repeated. “Right. Is this a ‘you’re special’ speech? Because I gotta tell you, man, that’s kind of generic.”
Jerry huffed a laugh. “I’m bad at compliments, huh?”
“You think that was a compliment?” Charley asked. “You need Yelp reviews.”
Jerry’s smile sharpened again, more teeth this time.
He stepped in, just enough that Charley’s back hit the car with a soft thump. Not hard, not aggressive. Just inevitable.
They were close now. Really close. Charley could see the faint shadow of stubble on Jerry’s jaw, the way one of his eyelashes was bent at a weird angle. If anything, Jerry felt cooler than the night air, but it still made Charley’s nerves spark like he’d stepped too close to a live wire.
“Fine,” Jerry said quietly. “I will be direct then.”
Charley’s heart hammered so loudly he wondered if Jerry could hear it.
“Direct about what?” he asked, trying to keep his voice steady.
Jerry’s eyes flicked down to his mouth for the quickest second before returning to his eyes. It was subtle, almost easy to miss.
“I like you,” Jerry said. Clean. Simple. No flourish.
Charley’s brain blue-screened.
“You… what?” he managed.
Jerry braced a hand on the car beside Charley’s head, close but not touching him, giving him plenty of space to move away if he wanted. Charley didn’t.
“I like you,” Jerry repeated. “You are funny. You are stubborn. You make stupid jokes when you are scared or nervous instead of running away.”
“You think I’m scared?” Charley blurted. “Of you?”
“I think you’re smart enough to know I’m not exactly harmless,” Jerry said. “And stubborn enough to stand here anyway.”
“Okay, that’s…” Charley swallowed, words tripping over each other. “You can’t just…you’re my neighbour, and you’re a guy. A guy who is way older than me, and aren't you like what? Thirty something?... And you being a really hot guy on top of that doesn't change anything.“
A small, amused spark flickered across Jerry’s face. “So you do think I am hot.”
“I didn't say that...” Charley said weakly. His face was on fire.
“You literally just did,” Jerry countered. “Quote: ‘really hot guy.’ End quote.”
“Shut up,” Charley muttered, cheeks burning. “This is…I’m straight.”
“Straight guys don’t usually notice how hot other men are,” Jerry said softly. “Or get flustered when they lean in.”
“You don’t know that,” Charley said desperately. “Maybe I’m just…polite. And smell-sensitive.” God, kill him now.
Jerry’s laugh came out low and fond. “You’re cute, you know that?”
“Don't call me cute,” Charley snapped. “…And I have a girlfriend!”
“I know,” Jerry said.
That took him aback. “You do?”
Jerry’s smile turned a little sharper. “I have eyes,” he said. “I’ve seen you with her.”
“And you still…” Charley gestured wildly between them. “This...You’re still…hitting on me?”
Jerry hesitated for the first time. Just a breath.
“I tried not to,” he admitted.
Charley’s stomach flipped. Hard.
“What do you mean you tried not to?” he asked.
“Yeah,” Jerry said. “I know it didn’t make a lot of sense. I move in, I’ve got my own plans, and then there’s this kid across the street with comeback lines and too-big T-shirts, and he kept surprising me whenever I saw him.”
Charley stared, thrown by the word choice. “That’s…creepily poetic.”
Jerry shrugged, unbothered. “And you have a smart mouth, and you think fast despite your nervousness whenever you see me.”
He broke off, eyes glinting, like he’d just remembered he was saying this out loud.
Charley’s face burned hotter. “You could have just said you thought I was annoying.”
Jerry’s lips twitched. “I could have. That would have been easier.”
He looked at Charley with an honesty that made something twist inside him.
“It hits me harder than it should, the more I get to know you,” Jerry said quietly.
He paused, eyes steady on Charley’s.
“You make me feel weird thing, kid,” he finished simply.
Charley’s breath stuttered. He hadn’t been expecting something that straightforward. Jerry stepped half an inch closer, close enough that Charley felt the warmth of him, close enough that he forgot how to breathe properly.
Charley’s voice came out barely above a whisper. “Like what?...”
Jerry held his gaze, his own breath steady and calm.
“Like something I haven't feel in a very long time,” he said, no theatrics this time. Just truth.
And the world narrowed down to the inch of space between their mouths. Charley’s breath stuttered. His fingers dug into the cool metal of the car behind him, gripping like it was the only thing keeping him upright. He should move. He should. This was wrong. He had a girlfriend. This was a man. His neighbour. His clearly unhinged, definitely too straightforward, neighbour.
“Jerry,” he said, and his voice came out thin and shaky. “This is…I don’t…”
“Tell me to back off,” Jerry said, eyes locked on his. “Say it like you mean it, and I will.”
The thing was, Charley opened his mouth.
He meant to say it. He really did.
But what came out instead was, “I’m confused...”
Jerry’s expression softened in a way that hurt to look at.
“I know,” he said quietly.
He lifted his hand from the car, fingers hovering near the side of Charley’s face without touching, like he was afraid that if he did, he wouldn’t be able to stop.
“I’m not going to take anything from you, Charley,” he said. “Not without you knowing exactly what you’re giving.”
The phrasing was strange enough that it snagged at Charley’s awareness, but he was too busy not drowning in those dark eyes to unpack it.
“Whatever you just said, it's real?” Charley blurted. “Right? You’re not just…messing with me?”
Jerry’s mouth quirked. “If I were messing with you, you’d already be on your knees begging.”
Charley’s brain short-circuited, going entirely blank for a solid five seconds.
“I…what…why would you say that to me?” he finally sputtered.
“Because your face when I do is adorable,” Jerry said, delighted.
“You’re a menace,” Charley accused weakly.
“And you’re still not telling me to back off,” Jerry countered.
Charley’s throat worked.
“I don’t know what I’m doing,” he admitted, feeling weirdly exposed. “I have a girlfriend. I thought I was…one thing. And now there’s you, and you keep saying insane stuff and…being all that…”
“Being all what?” Jerry asked again, voice low.
“Like...trouble,” Charley said helplessly.
Jerry’s smile was sharp and bright and pleased. “Fair.”
He pulled back then, just enough to give Charley room to breathe again.
“You don’t owe me anything,” he said. “You don’t owe me an answer. You don’t owe me whatever the hell your brain is imagining right now.”
Charley made a strangled noise at that.
“You do owe yourself the truth,” Jerry added. “About what you want.”
“Stop saying things like that…” Charley flailed his hands, at a complete loss.
“Like what? About kissing your very hot, very older neighbour?” Jerry supplied cheerfully.
“I hate you…” Charley muttered.
“Nah...You really don’t,” Jerry said with a grin.
He stepped back further, putting a safer distance between them, though it didn’t make Charley’s heart slow down much.
“My door is always open if you ever want to ‘figure it out’,” Jerry said lightly. “You can knock. Or don’t. I’m not going anywhere.”
“That sounds kind of ominous,” Charley said, trying to get his breathing under control again.
“Good,” Jerry said. “I was aiming for ominous.”
He turned to go, then paused, glancing back over his shoulder.
“And Charley?” he added.
“What,” Charley sighed, half-exasperated, half-exhausted.
“You’re not as straight as you think,” Jerry said, winked, and walked away.
Charley stared after him, mind spinning.
He stayed there a long time, back against the car, heart hammering, trying to decide if he was more terrified by the idea that Jerry was wrong, or by the possibility that he might be right.