Chapter 3

Only he’s with that Rudy jerk and I don’t needanyone else right now, I’m doing fine, really I am. So I turn on the TV, cranking the volume up loud, but it doesn’t quite manage to drown out the sound of Bradley’s voice or his bubbly laughter. When I heat up a frozen dinner in the microwave, I stand at the sink and tell myself I’m not watching him through the window, I’m not

But there are no curtains next door yet and I can stare straight into the living room, where Bradley’s stretched out on a couch with one arm flung dramatically over his eyes, the light from a floor lamp casting his skin into bronze. His chest and arms and legs look so smooth, sculpted like a work of art, and I can see the thick bones of his hips, the slightly rounded abdomen beneath his belly button where his trunks hang down too far to be decent. I don’t realize I’m staring until the microwave beeps and startles me. As if he hears it, Bradley stirs and calls out, “Rudy? I’m hungry.”