Author's Note: Hey guys i kno its been a while since we updated, but her is your chapter now! we really need more reviews! the good the bad the ugly, we just need them becuase that is what motivates us to write if 50 peope read it, and only 10 people review it makes us sad. so in short please reveiw and make us happy: ) anyway here is the chapter
Chapter 3: The Neighbors
The bell sang out, cutting the teacher off in mid-sentence. She looked up at the PA system, annoyed, then turned back to the class that was already scrambling to leave.
"Ok, don't forget the reading from the text book tonight, and I want that essay by Friday."
It had been a long first day. My first class had started at 8am then I had an hour break before my next four classes. Finally at 3pm they were over for the day.
I made my way through the bustling crowd, walking quickly to get to my apartment before Jen so I could get the newly hooked up computer first. It was about the only thing we had set up so far. Move in day was today for us because Jen had just gotten back yesterday, the day right before school started. I had set up the computer, refrigerator, a couple of plates and glasses, and a sleeping bag; the rest of the apartment was empty. When I turned onto my street I immediately reached into my bag and grabbed my pepper spray and my key. It may not have been very far from the campus, but it was one of the most dangerous streets around.
"Jen?" I called out, locking the five locks behind me. No answer. Sighing with relief, I walked over to the kitchen section of the apartment, opened a cupboard and grabbed a glass.
I was just placing the glass beneath the tap when I noticed a glass already sitting in the sink. It had a slimy red coating on the inside that looked like someone had been trying to wash it out, but hadn't quite finished. Jen must have gotten back early, had a drink than half-heartedly rinsed it out, leaving it for me to take care of. It was just like Jen. I'd known Jen was a messy person, but I had hoped she would take a little more care with her won apartment. But I guess it was too much to ask. I grumbled as I picked up the empty glass to finish rinsing it out. That was when I noticed that the glass was chipped and there was a huge sharp end at the lip.
Suddenly the door burst open. I jumped, causing me to slice open my palm on the sharp edge. Immediately blood began to flow out of the huge gash.
"Oh Damn that hurts!"
Jen came bounding over to me, "Oh My Gosh!" she seized my hand. "Are you Ok"
"Yeah, I'm fine, I just…" I started to get a little woozy, and then I noticed the figure standing in front of my sleeping bag. It was right there, only 20 feet away, but at the same time, it wasn't there. It was almost like a mist with a form. It twisted and moved but it stayed still at the same time. He just stood there. The same guy I'd been seeing for almost two months now. His eyes seem to be glowing, and anger twisted his beautiful face.
"Dee, are you listening to me?"
"What?"
"I said we need to clean this up, but we don't have anything here, let's go ask the neighbors."
Jen practically dragged me out of the room and when I looked back, he was still there, staring. Then the door closed and he was gone.
Jen started pulling me towards the apartment across the hall.
"No Jen," I pleaded, "Not there." She continued dragging me foreword.
"Diana, I don't care if he harassed you. Inside every man is the need to be a hero. He'll just lend us some Band-Aids and we'll be on our way." She said. There was definitely some flaws in her reasoning, and I was just about to voice those when the door swung open. Instead of the scantily clad man I had met before, there was another. He had midnight black hair and a blue tee shirt that was stretched tight across his chest. He had a thick novel in his hand and when he glanced up at us, I saw that he also had the bluest eyes I had ever seen.
"Hello," he greeted.
"OK, I don't want any funny business, my roommate just sliced her hand and we need some disinfectant," commanded Jen. My face turned beet red.
Perplexed his gaze landed on my bleeding hand. "What happened?" he asked, taking my hand in his and leading us inside. "Here, sit," he pulled up a kitchen chair and went into the next room. I glanced at Jen.
"He was the one who harassed you right?" She questioned. I shook my head. "Oops." He walked back into the room, carrying a small bag. He took a seat next to me and pulled out a bottle of disinfectant, some cotton swabs and a white gauze bandage.
"Don't worry; I'm a med student at the U. You're in good hands," He smiled, dabbing at the blood on my hand.
"Thank you," I said.
"Not a problem. Just be happy it was me and not my roommate Jared. Lets just say he's not as accommodating," he finished wrapping my hand, giving it a light tap.
"Well actually, I did kind of run into him the other day," I admitted looking at the floor.
"Oh, so you're the new neighbor with the nice assets." He chuckled.
"Apparently."
"I'm sorry about him, he's a real jerk, but he was the only one with reasonable prices for renting," he said, "My name's Scott by the way."
"Diana," I replied, Jen nudged my arm, "and this is my roommate and best friend Jen," I had almost forgotten about her.
"Nice to meet you both," he said smiling at each of us in turn.
"Well Deedee, we should get going. Today's move in day remember?" She pulled me out of my chair.
"Do you guys need any help?" Scott questioned, "You shouldn't be doing any heavy lifting with that hand of yours."
"Really," I said, "We'll be fine. We don't have that much stuff."
"Actually, we could use a strong man to help us with the T.V. and armoire," countered Jen, giving me a meaningful look.
"Sure, let me just go turn off the computer and T.V. Your apartment is across the hall right?"
"Yup," replied Jen, dragging me back out the door. There seemed to be a lot of dragging Diana around lately. As soon as our apartment door was closed, she let go of my hand and started fussing with my hair, pulling and tucking stray tendrils.
"Jen what's going on?" You know we could have lifted that T.V. by ourselves." I said, getting annoyed with all the tugging she was doing on my baby-fine hair.
"Didn't you see the way he was looking at you? And when he touched your hand, Deedee, he's definitely interested," Jen said, still poking and prodding at me.
"Who?" I asked.
"SCOTT!" she yelled.
"Shh, don't be so loudghvm-" I got a mouthful of artificial strawberries as she applied lip gloss. "Jen, won't it be a little obvious if he comes back and suddenly I look amazing?" I reasoned.
"You're right!" She exclaimed and started pulling out my hair making it messy again. I raised a hand to wipe off the strawberry lip gloss.
"NO," she caught my hand," The lip gloss stays" we both heard the knock at the same time.
Jen giggled slightly as she went to the door and opened it. "Thanks for agreeing to help us with this Scott; it's really nice of you. Come on in."
He stood in the doorway studying the room then slowly stepped inside, "Wow, this is a lot nicer than all the other apartments. I wouldn't have expected something like this here."
"Thank you," Jen said glancing in my direction.
"Right, well, I guess we should get started then shouldn't we?" I said heading towards the door.
Jen grabbed my arm, "Oh crap, Dee, I forgot about that thing!"
"What thing?" I asked, confused.
"That THING, the really important thing that I forgot," she looked at me meaningfully. "I'm really sorry Scott, but I really have to go get it. I'll be back later; you two just start bringing things in and get as much done as possible."
I watched in horror as she waved goodbye, winking obviously at me, and left closing the door behind her; leaving me in a room full of silence.
"Well this is the stuff." Scott and I looked down at the piles of boxes wedged together into the trunk of my family's car.
"You got all of that to fit into one car?"
"Um…Yeah, my mom helped us out a bit, and she's really good at puzzles."
He looked at me from the corner of his eye.
"Yes," I said, "My mother's a geek."
"Sure, whatever," he shrugged and picked up the first box.
It took a total of three hours. We had to grab a box, walk up two flights of stairs, unlock the room, put the stuff where it needed to be, lock the door again, go down the stairs, unlock the car and do I all over again. By the time we were finished, we had five stubbed toes, one scraped knee from me falling down the stairs, one gash up Scott's arm, his finger smashed in the car door; and my head bruised from bumping it on a table.
About ten minutes before we finished, Jen came speeding back in her junk car with an ice cream.
"So did you get that thing?" Scott asked.
"The what? Oh! Yeah that, No. I guess my mom threw it out."
"Sure she did," I said, rolling my eyes. She glared at me. "Hey you guys have worked so hard, lets go take a break and get some drinks!" she looked between us, Scott shrugged.
So we headed back up to the apartment where Jen commanded both of us to sit while she got the drinks. She came back with three cups and a bottle. After pouring liberal amounts of the red liquid into each cup, she handed them to us and settled back into her chair as Scott and I were forced to sit together on the couch. The couch was really more of an oversized armchair and two full grown adults really weren't made to sit in it, but we made do; which actually meant that I was practically on top of him.
"So do you two like living here?" Scott asked casually.
"Sure."
"It's our first place to ourselves. I don't think we could hate it if we tried," Jen elaborated. "Do you like it here?'
Scott sat back, shifting his legs underneath mine, and thought for a moment, "It's not really that I like it, but more like…It's convenient, cheap, good size, close to school, close to home and close to work. I don't think I could have found anything better."
"It's kind of the same for us too," I said, "It's not exactly my dream house, but its just right for two college students, and the place kind of grows on you."
"To tell you the truth, I'm surprised you like it and that its in such good condition."
"Why do you say that?" Jen asked.
"Well they say this place is haunted." My head snaped up.
"Haunted?" Laughed Jen, "You have got to be kidding me."
"No really! They say that everyone that has rented this place left after a week. Every one of them came out saying they saw things, heard things. There's even a ruler that someone was killed here. All their blood was drained from their body. Their face and neck were mangled and even some of the body was missing; it was torn apart so bad," he shivered.
"Did any of these people say what they saw here?"
He looked at me quizzically, "I think I remember someone saying that they saw a man."
"What did he look like? Did he have red eyes," I struggled to keep my voice steady.
Scott sat there, his eyes wide, "How do you know about the eyes?"
I squirmed uncomfortable, "It's nothing, I've just…"
Have you seen him?" He grabbed my hand, "Have you seen the red-eyed man?"
Suddenly the sound of gagging and sputtering made us turn around. Jen was in the chair leaning over, clutching her throat. A red liquid was dripping from her lips onto the floor as her shoulders heaved with the effort of expelling it from her mouth.
I started screaming as Scott jumped up and grabbed her. "Oh my God! Oh my God! Jen!" I watched as Jen threw up all over the floor, dropping her glass.
"What was that drink?!" Scott demanded.
I grabbed the bottle and my eyes flew open. It was all in French. I quickly recognized it as one of the bottles I had emptied and thrown out on my first day here. How had it gotten here?
"Mary mother of God, its blood!" I looked over at Scott who was kneeling next to Jen. He held up the glass Jen had handed him, filled with the thick red liquid.
Later, as Jen was taking a nap on the couch, Scott and I poured the vile liquid down the sink and flipped on the garbage disposal. Scott took the now empty wine bottles out to the dump himself, not trusting the garbage men. When he returned he asked me about them.
"They were in the refrigerator. I threw them away when I started cleaning," I answered.
"And you're sure you threw them away?" He asked in a tone that was not condescending.
"Positive," I answered.
"Well I'm not sure what's going on here, but I don't like it." He said as he gathered his tools and jacket.
"Thank you so much for everything, really," I said truly grateful for his presence.
"Diana, I know I just met you today, but if anything happens, I'm just across the hall and I'll give you my number so you can call. In fact, why don't you call me before you go to bed tonight so I know nothing's happened." He stepped out the door, "Be safe Diana," the door closed behind him.
Author's Note: haha, the famous "be safe" line! REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW! Oh and let us know if there are errors pretty please!
