The Neighbor [The Complete Collection] by Abby Weeks Page A

growing more careless of her, more reckless. She’d wanted to move to Sunny Oaks to breathe new life into the marriage but it was as if, with her being farther away from Troy, he felt he could think of her even less than before. He’d never stayed out this late before. She wondered briefly if maybe he’d been in an accident. He might have tried to drive home drunk and crashed. She put aside that thought. If there’d been an accident she’d be contacted. The more realistic option was that he was asleep with Suzy somewhere, too drunk to even realize that he wasn’t in his own bed at home.
    She looked out the window across the way at the neighbor’s house. Henry Walden, she said to herself quietly. She walked up to the glass.
Look at me
, she thought.
Please, look at me
. She didn’t know what she was doing but she felt so alone and she just needed to know that someone in the world, even if it was just her eccentric neighbor next door, was thinking about her.
    She went to the light switch and turned on the lights. Then she went back to the window and peered out across the darkness.
Please look at me
, she thought.
    The light in Henry’s room came on! He was there, standing by his window in the same clothes he’d been wearing earlier at the grocery store.
    Had he been waiting by the window all this time?

V
    J ANEY STAYED WHERE SHE WAS and looked across at Henry. He stood, motionless, looking back at her. He almost could have been a statue, or a mannequin. In fact, if she didn’t know who he was or why he was standing there she might have thought he wasn’t real. She held up her hand in greeting and he responded, holding up his hand. The way he did it made her picture someone standing on a pier, watching a loved one leaving on a ship for a very long journey. There was something so sad about the man.
    She felt strange at having learned so much about him. She’d read the salient points of his entire life and knew more about him than she knew about some members of her own family. At least, she felt she knew him. It made her wonder who was the bigger voyeur, him or her? He’d watched her get naked and play with a dildo, but she knew the most intimate details of his life.
    She decided she was going to take her clothes off. She didn’t care that it was improper. Her husband still wasn’t home and she wanted
someone
to appreciate her beauty. She slipped out of her sweats and pulled her hair out of the ponytail it had been in since the day before. It felt good to be naked. It felt even better to be naked in front of Henry. She could almost feel his eyes on her bare skin. She closed her eyes and breathed out a long sigh and tried to concentrate on the fact that he was looking at her naked body. She tried to feel the connection with him, as if the effect of his gaze on her skin could in some way comfort her for what Ben was doing.
    It was different to being touched. She knew that. She loved being touched by men, at least she’d loved being touched by Ben until he began cheating on her. This was different. There was no direct stimulation. No one was actually touching her breasts or her vagina with their hands or mouth. There was no penis for her to focus her concentration on. But it was still good. It was still a genuine connection that she was making with this man across the way, and it wasn’t cheating on Ben. At least, it wasn’t
quite
cheating.
    The thrill of being watched was a thrill of anticipation. It was as if she knew it would lead to something more physical eventually, and that was enough for the time being. Knowing it was almost as good as having it happen to her immediately. It was the pleasure of a good tease.
    The only thing about a tease though, is that it leaves you wanting more. She didn’t want to have sex with Henry. Not yet. She was still too committed to Ben and her marriage and to the goals that they shared. Even if he was willing to throw it all away for a brief fling with a secretary, that