The walls in this house are paper thin. I hear everything my roommates do to each other. And I can’t stop listening.
I moved into a cheap room in a Portland share house because I was broke and desperate. Jace is a bartender with a sleeve tattoo and zero concept of personal space. Nico is six-three of moving-company muscle who barely speaks and never smiles. They’ve been roommates for two years, and whatever they are to each other, they’re not quiet about it.
Every night, through the plaster wall inches from my pillow, I hear them. I should put my headphones in. I should roll over and go to sleep. Instead I lie there in the dark, hard and breathing wrong, timing my hand to the rhythm of their bedframe.
Then I come home early and their door is open. I see everything the wall was hiding. And Nico looks right at me.
I can’t afford to move out, but I’m not sure I want to anymore.
