No Strings Attached

Chapter 9

My thoughts were interrupted by a tremendous bang coming from the apartment above us. What the hell do they do up there to cause so much noise? I didn't think neighbors would be so obnoxious. For a moment, I stared up at the ceiling, as if I could see through the barrier between me and the disturbance if I tried hard enough. I jumped when something broke and a frightened yelp came from the apartment. I hope it's not an abusive family member, I thought sincerely. Alex had informed me enough about how awful abuse is, and I had since been completely against tolerating abusive partners or parents.

Dad came through the front door just then. "Did you hear that, too?" he called from the entry way.

"Yeah," I replied. "I'm in your room." As soon as the words left my mouth I realized that I still had the box out.

"What are you doing in there?" he asked.

My mind was always quick when it came to this. "The noise came from the room above yours," I lied. I put everything back before he could reach the bedroom and replaced the shoebox where I found it on the dresser.

When Dad came in, I was casually resting my arm on the wood and examining the ceiling like I was waiting for another sound.

"Well," he said from the door, "it looks like they've stopped making a racket. They need to get their act together or I'll be complaining to management."

My muscles tensed and I furrowed my eyebrows a little, a little angry. He couldn't just assume that they were being clumsy and careless. What if something was really wrong up there?

I left my dad's room wordlessly and went straight into mine to organize more things. I arranged them how I wanted and thought about what had just happened.

Altogether I sound like I really generally pissed off person, but I have my reasons. I know that people saw me crying in the bathroom, and assumed I was having friend problems, but I was just missing my mom. And when people knew my mom died, they would assume that I was a depressed bag of shit who cut herself. I did cut some, but no one saw. I vowed to Alex that I wouldn't anymore, so that I wouldn't get addicted like she did.

I don't make assumptions anymore. I always work out every way possible for something to be happening. And, sure, maybe that apartment really was just dropping things all over the place, but I refused to leave that as my conclusion unless I had my own evidence.

Half an hour later, I had everything that needed to be on my walls, well...on my walls. I had randomly placed my little trinkets on the shelves, but left one shelf for things my mom had given me. That one was closest to my bed, so she would always be near me when I slept. That sounds creepy. Allow me to rephrase that. Her unearthly presence would always watch over my sleeping body. Oh God, that's worse. But you get the idea.

The next day, at school we actually did productive things. We talked about neurotransmitters in Anatomy, information I have retained from all my other classes. Chemistry was another awkward encounter with my silent, but cute Asian lab partner. I didn't avoid Parker, but he acted weird around me after what had happened the day before. He apologized again, and I accepted it, but there was still something weird with him. I decided to sit next with Savanna and her group of friends, and it turns out a girl named Breana is in my Government class, and a boy named Harry is in my English class. They were all impressed with the classes I was taking this semester, and I was apparently the only senior in that group who stayed at the school past 1. What can I say? I love learning.

After school I repeated my ritual from the previous day: homework for like an hour and a half, and then instead of wandering, I read creepypasta on my phone with My Chemical Romance playing through my stereo. Most of those stories really aren't that scary, I just read them because I've already read every single one of the books we own at least twice.

I decided to give up on the pasta after reading just about the strangest My Little Pony story I've ever heard of. Before going to the kitchen, I turned up the music so I could hear it from in there, and then proceeded to pull together some sort of dinner.

I looked up a recipe with ingredients I didn't need to go to the store to prepare, and came up with chicken alfredo. Just as I was putting on the finishing touches, Dad came home.

"Tegan! I could hear your weird emo crap all the way from 4th Street!" he yelled.

"Oh, come on! You know you secretly love my music," I retorted, but ran to turn it off anyway. "I made pasta."

"You read my mind. I was craving Italian."

We sat down in our little dining room and talked about our days. Apparently, one of his co-workers has something out for him, and his papers were "mysteriously lost" right after he printed them out. "Coincidentally," the guy was the only one in the break room.

"I don't even know what I did to get on this fella's bad side!" he said.

After he mulled over what he could have possibly done, I told him about my chem lab partner. He really didn't seem like the type to be quiet, with his large frame and confident-looking face. But looks can be deceiving, I guess.

CRASH!

It came from upstairs again. "Alright, something really must be done about this," my dad said.

"Want me to go check up on them?" I offered, already pushing out my chair.

"Yeah, why don't you. I'll clean up the kitchen since you made dinner."

As I was leaving, someone screamed from the floor above. I broke into a run. I couldn't let this get any worse. Abuse or no abuse, I needed to see for myself that everything was okay.

I knocked on the door of apartment 4-C and anticipated who would open that door. I hoped no one was in pain, but I was also nervous that they would tell me to leave, but find someone in the background mouthing "help."

The door lock clicked, and slowly opened. I couldn't see the person's face though. "Yeah?" they asked.

"Umm...well, I've been hearing lots of clattering coming from this apartment lately. I live below you. I was just making sure everything was okay," I told the mystery dweller.

"Everything is fine here. Thank you." Why do I know this voice? They started closing the door.

I stopped them. "Wait, what's been happening up here? I have never heard so many dropped things in my life."

"It's nothing, really," he said. He had spoken enough that I could tell it was a young man's voice.

I stared at him for a moment. "Are you sure?"

"Yes," he replied.

From inside, a man called out, "Logan! Who's at the door?"

"Just a neighbor, Dad!" he replied.

"Wait," I said. "Logan? From Chemistry?"

He sighed. "Yeah."

I knew I recognized his voice from somewhere. "Are you positive you're okay up here?" I lowered my voice a little. "Are you hurt? Should I call someone?"

"What?" he asked. "N-no, it's not what you think. I'm fine, he's fine, we're all fine."

I was still skeptical. But I finally gave up. "Okay. See you tomorrow." I waved and walked off.

"You're Tegan. The brave girl with the blue hair who stood up to Carrie," he spit out before I was out of earshot.

Of course, I was a little taken aback by that. He called me brave. I spun around on my heel to face the door. He was standing outside the frame now, and I could see all of him. "Uh...yeah. That's me, I guess."

He looked at me, almost admiringly.

"And you're Logan. The boy with the dark clothes who never speaks in class," I told him.

He nodded shyly.

I grinned. "See you in class."