Belle French had a problem. It wasn't a big problem like losing her job or her period being late or anything, but she was still pretty sure she was going to have to change her name and move to another state or something.
It had all started innocently enough, with a well-dressed silver fox on the bus. She'd always appreciated an older man in a suit, and this one was panty meltingly hot. She'd smiled like an idiot at him while trying to also pretend to keep reading her book so that he wouldn't think she was some kind of lunatic. People didn't smile to strangers on buses unless they were creepers or crazy, and she wasn't sure which she was but she definitely did not want hot bus guy to think she was.
He got off a few stops ahead of her, but it was enough to put her in a good mood all day at work as she shelved books in the library downtown and it was even a bit of a challenge not to whistle until she got out of the library. The sun was shining and birds were singing and she was in a good mood the whole way home. She swung by the corner store and got some popcorn, a bottle of wine, and a bag of mini candy bars. Wine and popcorn wasn't the most nutritious dinner, but she lived alone and she was feeling like indulging herself. Why not make it a perfect day? She popped open her candy and was chewing on a chocolate when she got to her building.
The doorman held the door open for her and she smiled in thanks.
"Party tonight, Miss French?" he asked, nodding at her bag full of junk food.
"Nope!" she replied. "It's all for me!"
He laughed and she realized the elevator door was closing and she ran towards it.
"Hold the door!" she called out, before popping her candy back into her mouth and hurrying towards the elevator. Thankfully, a hand reached out and stopped it from closing. It was going to be a great day.
"Thank you," she said around her candy as she stepped into the elevator and saw...oh hell. It was her silver fox from the bus and he was standing right there still looking totally perfect and she had a freaking chocolate bar melting in her mouth and a bag full of crap.
"You're welcome," he said, smiling a little and stepping to the side of the elevator as she reluctantly stepped into it. "What floor did you need?"
"Three," she mumbled around her candy, averting her eyes. Of fucking course he'd have a Scottish accent, right?
He was occasionally looking over at her with this weird smile on his face and she felt all the blood draining out of her face as she hurriedly finished her candy and tried not to stare at him creepily. He lived in her building. The hot guy lived in her building and she had a bag full of candy she was shoving into her face.
"Looks like a fun evening," he said wryly as the elevator climbed closer to her destination.
"Just um, an occasional thing," she said. "Had a good day."
"Sounds fun," he replied as the elevator doors opened to the third floor, thankfully sparing her more of the most awkward elevator ride she'd ever had. She mumbled something as she retreated to her apartment and exhaled as soon as she had the door locked behind her. What on Earth was she going to do? Hot guys were not supposed to live in your building, it just was not fair.
She was just about settled onto her sofa with her popcorn and wine and a horrible TV show on Netflix when she was interrupted by a loud rhythmic tapping coming from her ceiling. She was used to living in apartments, and it wasn't the first time she'd ever had an upstairs neighbor, after all. Still, something about the constant tap, tap, tap, tap moving around over her head was starting to drive her batty after only about forty-five minutes of listening to it over her show.
It was like Chinese water torture. Just a constantly, steady annoyance that was rapidly giving her a migraine. Finally, she couldn't take it anymore. Belle paused her show and quickly put on a pair of shoes and made her way to the elevator. She was on the third floor, clearly the noise was coming from her upstairs neighbor on the fourth floor, so she pushed the up button on the elevator and located the apartment immediately above hers and began banging on the door.
The tapping continued from inside the apartment and it was starting to feel like a personal offense at this point.
"Oh, come on," she called out. "What are you even doing in there?"
The door swung open and she felt her mouth go dry when she saw Perfectly Dressed Sexy Scottish Silver Fox Who She Now Realized Had a Cane standing there staring at her with annoyance on his face.
"Can I help you, miss?" he asked curtly.
"I'm your...I live downstairs," she said. "And there was a really loud tapping noise coming from up here."
"I have a cane," he said dully.
"I can see that," she replied, backing away slowly. "I'm so sorry. I'll just...go back downstairs. I'm sorry."
She wasn't proud of how fast she turned and ran, but boy was this a bad idea and by the time she was safely back in her apartment she was pretty sure she needed to just find a new place in another state and start over again.
Friday was girl's night, and Belle was in need of it.
"Just suck his dick," Ruby said after more shots than anybody could count. "That'll make him forget the whole thing."
"No no no," Ariel said. "You gotta play hard to get. Trust me, guys in suits want to chase you."
Belle stuck her tongue out at both of her friends.
"I'm pretty sure nobody wants to chase me," Belle replied. "For one thing, last time he saw me I had a candy bar shoved in my face."
"All the more reason to replace it with his penis," Ruby said, with neither one of her eyes actually focusing on Belle. "It'll make him forget the whole thing."
"I don't even know his name," Belle protested. "What'd'you want me to do? Just walk up to his apartment again and tell him to drop trou?"
"Yes!" Ruby and Ariel shouted in drunken unison.
From there, the night got blurrier but more fun and when the taxi dropped Belle off in front of her building she was swaying with a pleasant buzz until, suddenly, it wasn't so pleasant anymore. Her stomach clenched and roiled and she bolted for the bushes, praying nobody would stop to ask her why she was puking on the sidewalk or recognize her. She got half her wish, and when the excess liquor had been thoroughly purged from her system and she was ready to stumble back to her apartment she turned to find Mr. Perfect Fucking Suits Who Never Pukes In Bushes Outside His Building And Uses A Cane standing about six feet away and staring at her in concern.
She couldn't even be embarrassed as he trailed her to the elevator. Of course he'd turn up while she was that drunk and she should have guessed it before she even went out. That was exactly her sort of luck.
They rode the elevator in silence and she felt his judgmental eyes on her back as she stumbled back to her apartment. It was the perfect end to an awful week.
She laid low on Saturday, but by Sunday she was feeling safe to go jogging in the morning. It was Sunday. What were the odds he would possible be out before 7 am? Who got up that early on Sundays unless they were also going to be out doing something fairly athletic. Really, it was his own fault if he had to see her in yoga pants, a sports bra, and a ratty t-shirt. Sure, she had a tendency to turn bright red when she ran, but she felt a million times better by the time she got back into the building with her dignity still intact.
Really, if she'd just left it at that and gone upstairs it would have been a great day. Except, she hadn't checked the mail since Thursday and as long as she was downstairs and not in a rush she decided to risk a quick stop at the mail before she hit the elevator. So, of course, she just about walked right into the Fourth Floor Silver Fox Who Apparently Does Get Up Early On Sundays Just To Look Nice, That Bastard as she walked into the mail vestibule for the whole building.
"Good morning," he said too cheerfully for the occasion.
"Good morning," she returned as steadily as possible as she quickly retrieved her mail.
Next time she moved, she was going to find a place with a faster elevator so that maybe when she ran into sexy older men while sticky with sweat, bright red from exertion (and embarrassment), and probably smelling worse than she looked she wouldn't have to ride up to the third floor with them in a confined space.
God, what kind of cologne did he wear? It was amazing and she just wanted to roll around in him.
"Did you have a good run?" he asked.
"Yeah," she said, trying to focus intently on not creeping on him. "Thanks."
Thankfully, they reached her floor and she was able to escape with at least some of her dignity. Really, given their last few encounters, that one was almost painless. It just meant it was time to step up her game to prove to him she wasn't some sort of trash can made sentient and she would be home free.
The hot guy wasn't on her bus the next few days, even though Belle had intentionally worn her cutest outfits just in case. It was a damn shame to waste so many cute dresses on the general public, and she'd finally just about come to terms with the fact that he wasn't going to be on her bus again any time soon.
It was a miserable day, anyway and when it started raining around lunchtime she was pretty sure it was just time to call it quits and start over again the next day. Unfortunately, she still had hours left at work and by the time it was over the rain had stopped and now it was just gross and muddy everywhere. She carefully avoided the puddles on her way to the bus stop, and the bus was leaving already before she got to her stop.
Belle watched the bus helplessly as it pulled away. She could still get the next one, but it would delay her another fifteen minutes. She grumbled and continued on to the bus stop angrily. She just had time to fling her purse onto the bench and sit when a car sped past splashing her from head to toe in filthy puddle water.
She shrieked and looked down. Her dress was splattered and she could even feel the dirty water dripping down her face and in her hair. She quickly rubbed the water from her lips and off her eyebrows. She had to look absolutely disgusting, and by the time the next bus came by she hadn't dried off to any significant degree. It was already an awful day, but of course there was Mr. Perfect-Suit-and-Scottish-Accent-Silver-Fox standing there holding one of the handles and staring at her openly as she boarded the bus with her cheeks burning in embarrassment and her dirty dress clinging to her. She was going to cry.
Thankfully he didn't try to speak to her during the ride to the apartment, or even acknowledge that he knew her. She didn't even know what she'd do if he did. This was the third time she had seen this guy and she'd stared at him like a crazy person, shoved her face full of candy, and now looked like she had been frolicking through rain puddles on her free time.
The bus pulled to a stop near the apartment, and she stormed off before he could disembark and stalked off in the direction of their building. She just wanted to take a hot bath and forget any of this had ever happened. She was waiting for the elevator when he came and stood next to her. She wiped her cheeks – which was likely going to smear her mascara (which had to have already run down her face anyway) – and refused to look over at him and his perfectly dry suit. God, his shoes weren't even wet. How did he even do that?
It was a shit day all around.
"Three, right?" he said once they'd entered the elevator and she nodded in response.
They watched the little lights dinging their way up to her floor where she disembarked without a word and locked herself in her apartment and drew a bath. A glance in the bathroom mirror confirmed her suspicions – she looked absolutely hideous. Her makeup had run down her face and her hair had grit from the street in it. And her dress had gone damn near translucent where it clung to her torso. Tomorrow had to be better, didn't it?
A movie and some self care had gone a long way to repairing her fractured ego. Hot Scottish guy had at least seen one of her nice bras through her wet dress, and it had to be pretty obvious what had happened to her. He couldn't think she usually walked around looking like she rolled in the gutters after a storm, at least. And now she knew which bus he took home so her odds of being able to look attractive in front of him had gone up substantially.
She wasn't even sure why she cared, except that it just seemed abominably unfair that every time she saw him he looked so put together and she looked like a bridge troll.
Belle was painting her toenails on the sofa and watching trashy TV when someone knocked on the door. She briefly considered pretending not to be home on account of her hair being in curlers and the Korean sheet mask she was wearing with a dragon face drawn on it. But her regular mail guy was older than her dad and had a pretty good sense of humor. Plus she was pretty sure what he was bringing and she didn't want to have to pick her package up with the doorman.
"Just a minute!" she called out, scrambling to pause her show and get to the door.
She swung the door open and immediately slammed it back in Hot Scottish Silver Fox's face. Mother fucker. The door knocked again and she pulled off her stupid Korean dragon face and started ripping curlers out of her hair as fast as she could before she swung the door back open and hoped she looked like a normal not at all crazy person.
"What can I do for you?" she said as normally as she possibly could considering she was wearing a bathrobe and not a whole lot else and standing in front of her secret neighbor crush.
"You um...missed a curler," he said apologetically and she reached up and felt around her head until she found the offending one and pulled it out, hoping the horror she felt didn't show on her face. "I got a package for you. I think someone put the address in wrong."
She looked down at the box he was holding and felt her stomach drop to her feet.
"You didn't look at the return address, did you?" she asked weakly.
"Not on purpose," he replied. "But it was kind of...right there next to yours."
She whimpered and took the box containing a vibrator from him. She could have killed Ruby for talking her into buying from a place called Sinful Sensations but it had been a pretty good looking toy and the box was supposed to be 'discreetly packaged.' There was really nothing left to do but cry at that point.
"Oh, God, what's wrong?" he asked as she sobbed onto her vibrator. "I thought you'd be...happy to get it?"
She just sobbed harder at that and he pulled a handkerchief out of an inner pocket of his suit jacket and offered it to her. Belle took it reluctantly and rubbed her eyes as she tried to get herself under control. It was monogrammed – of course it would be monogrammed.
"Better now?" he asked her kindly and she nodded. "Now, what's wrong?"
"You look so good," she blurted out. "And I was wearing a dragon face mask and curlers."
"It was an adorable face mask," he said comfortingly. "And your skin did look amazing. It's a little red now, but very...soft looking."
"Thank you," she said, feeling a little better in spite of herself. "But every time I see you I look like I just got dragged through a cornfield."
"No you don't," he said. "Apparently you need to get your eyes checked if you think I look good and you don't."
"Today I was coated in dirty ditch water," she said. "And you always look impeccable."
"I knew I should have offered you my coat," he muttered. "Would it make you feel better if I admitted I spent the entire bus ride trying not to look at your bra, though?"
"A little," she admitted. "It's a nice bra."
"From what I saw it certainly is," he replied.
"What about the other day when I was all sweaty?" she asked him. "I was bright red and disgusting from jogging."
"And wearing yoga pants," he said. "I honestly can say I was not looking at your face the entire time we were in the elevator."
She burst out laughing at that, strangely relieved he didn't seem to remember any of her horrible humiliations.
"I'm sorry I complained about your noise," she said weakly. "I was an idiot."
"It's no matter," he replied. "It's hardly the first time someone's complained about the noise. I probably should have gotten something on the first floor."
"It's not really that bad," she said. "I've gotten used to it. It's kind of soothing to hear somebody else there when I'm alone."
She smiled at him and he smiled back and suddenly everything seemed a lot better.
"Do you wanna come in?" she asked. "I can put on real clothes."
"I have a better idea," he said. "It's not very late. Would you like to get a drink?"
"Are you sure you want to see me get a drink?"
"Well I've already seen the result," he said. "Might as well see what comes first."
"I'd like that," she said. "Give me fifteen minutes to get ready?"
"I can wait," he replied. "I am very much looking forward to seeing you at your best."
"I'm Belle, by the way," she said, offering him her hand. "Belle French."
"Robert Gold," he replied, shaking her hand gently. "Nice to meet you."