Two years ago
Kelly practically kicked the front door open, struggling with an armful of paper grocery bags. "Rey!" she cried out. "Come help, I'm going to lose the bread!"
Rey bounced to her feet and ran from her room, snatching the loaf that slipped from Kelly's fingers just before it hit the ground.
"Ew, sourdough?" Rey wrinkled her nose, judgingly.
Kelly huffed. "Um, a little help please?" She walked right into her roommate, forcing a load into Rey's arms.
"Ooh, and you got fancy cheese," Rey exclaimed, spying a butcher paper-wrapped wedge in one of her bags.
"Don't you dare," Kelly threatened. "I need that cheese."
Rey plopped her burden on the counter and began sorting through the groceries to help put them all away. "And you got the fresh artisanal ravioli? I didn't even know you liked artichoke. What happened to Chef Boyardee?"
"Ha-ha." Kelly grabbed the pasta from Rey's hand and tossed it into the fridge. "Can't a girl treat herself to something nice for once in a while?"
"Well, we don't get paid till next week and you usually shop then, so you're up to something," Rey declared. She popped a purple grape in her mouth and spat the sliver of a seed out in Kelly's direction.
"Get your paws off those, they're organic and cost like, seven dollars a pound!"
Rey practically choked on the grape skin. "Seven dollars? For pre-wine?" Her hands cupped her mouth in sudden shock. "Oh, my god, Kelly, are you pregnant?!" A crumpled-up paper bag to the head was all the answer Rey needed.
"I have someone coming over, okay? And I expect you all will be on your best behavior!"
"It's not the sisters you have to worry about." Rey referred to the pair of sisters who rented out the apartment's largest bedroom. The two were quiet, conservative, and often kept to themselves but sometimes would let loose with Kelly, Rey, and a bottle of sweet wine on the weekend. Despite their differences, Rey was hugely jealous of their relationship, as she had never the joy of siblings, or much of a family for that matter. Kelly was all she really had.
"I know. I didn't want to be an ass and just call you out specifically," Kelly smirked. "Help me clean up, will you?"
The two spent an hour tidying and cleaning the kitchen and living room, even bravely attacking the bathroom to scrub it from the filth that is inevitable when four women are forced to share a small space. When it passed a mediocre muster for cleanliness, the two friends flopped on the couch to share a quick beer.
"So, how'd you meet this guy?" Rey asked, idly flipping through the TV channels. She wished she had someone to warm her bed that night.
"He came into the restaurant. Left me a nice tip and his number," Kelly smiled. "He works as a bartender at The Palm. He's cute."
"Bartender, huh?" Rey sipped at her beer and wondered when was the last time she had hooked up with a boyfriend or a girlfriend or a one-night stand. She never had received a phone number as a tip.
Kelly's phone chirped and she snatched it from the coffee table, eager. Her cheeks flushed as she read a text message and hurriedly finished off her beer. "He's on his way, he'll be here soon, shoo!"
"Save some leftovers for me," Rey demanded, grabbing a couple more beers before reluctantly retreating to her room.
She was happy Kelly finally had someone in her life that made her excited. The last boyfriend her bubbly, blonde friend had was a total creep and an unapologetic racist. Kelly let that relationship live well past its expiration date and Rey hated how his negative tendencies seemed to rub off on Kelly. A bartender at one of the most elite Southern California restaurants? That was already a step above the unemployed dirtbag who stole Kelly's tips from her piggy bank.
Rey twisted open another beer and flopped onto her bed, its springs groaning and squeaking with every movement. The window was open a bit and the sound of the constant and impatient traffic filtered through, an endless stream of whooshing, honking, and squealing that hardly quieted even when she closed it. She studied a crack in the drywall of the wall opposite of her, noticing it had grown bigger since the last earthquake.
She couldn't help but exhale a dramatic sigh. Her apartment sucked, her job sucked, having no family sucked, and the whole living paycheck-to-paycheck thing also sucked. This situation wasn't pure loneliness or total poverty, but oftentimes, it felt like it. She wondered how different her life would have been if her aunt hadn't died, or her parents for that matter. Would she still be living in Vacaville? Would she be roasting in the even more strenuous heat of Phoenix? Maybe she would have grown up happier. Maybe she would have had a puppy. Would she have had a sister or brother? She tried to picture the sound of their voices, all three of them, and realized she couldn't truly recall them.
She didn't even realize she had finished the beer until she put the bottle to her lips and nothing came out. She popped open her other beer and wished she had grabbed more. She wasn't about to escape her cave and be forced to interact with a stranger. And she could hear him now, the new potential boyfriend, a deep and rich voice that carried lushly through the walls. Then, there was Kelly's coquettish tone, giggling in response to something he had said.
Rey flicked her hand in the air and her light switch flipped down. The room darkened considerably, with the moon and street lights casting their shadows. Rey listened to the ambient noise of the hypnotizing traffic and didn't realize she had dozed off until she was woken up by a pained grunt.
She shot upright, her heart pounding, thinking Kelly was in trouble. But Rey quickly realized it was not a grunt of pain or distress but of pleasure. Just on the other side of the thin wall, Kelly and her new beau were getting aggressively acquainted in Kelly's bed.
Rey slowly laid back down, afraid the squeaking of her own mattress would alarm them. She settled under the covers, resting her warming beer on her nightstand, and curled up, trying desperately to ignore the sounds. She felt like a voyeur, an intruder if she listened to them, but it was so hard not to.
Rey had wanted to tell Kelly she could hear practically everything and wanted to request Kelly to move her bed to the other side of her room, but Rey had gotten so used to the sounds when Kelly and her shitty ex were having make-up sex sessions, she didn't really want to say anything. And so much time had passed, it would seem so awkward, so she never did.
And tonight, she was grateful she hadn't. The man's sounds and voice were so close, it was almost like he was in the room with her. How Rey craved the closeness and the attentiveness of a lover. If she closed her eyes, she may be able to pretend he was in there instead.
"Oh, yes, fuck me like that!" Kelly cried out. There was a thud, then a grunt, rhythmic and hard. Rey imagined Kelly with her golden hair, fanned out on her pillow like a halo, gloriously pinned under the taut and chiseled frame of her mysterious lover. Rey imagined his arms were sinewy, their little muscle fibers twitching as he held himself up, bracing himself as he thrust himself fiercely inward, the curvature of his sculpted ass glistening and Kelly's tits bouncing up and down in sync. Kelly liked being fucked hard.
Rey's hand found its way to her own nipple, teasing and twisting it gently. But this man was a rough lover, so Rey twisted it harder and realized that felt even better when she could hear his moaning. Was that a bead of sweat dripping from his forehead? Kelly was probably reaching up, gripping his back with her fingernails as his pace quickened. Little crescent moons surely appeared on his skin.
Another hand found its way under her jeans and under her panties. Rey choked down her own moan as the others echoed from the other side of the wall, and she arched two fingers to stroke down and up, down and up, her lips warm and plump and hungry for the touch. She fondled her breast, stroking her hard, dark nipple with her thumb and she squeezed her ass tight, pressing up against her other fingers. She thought of Kelly's partner fucking her, sliding his thick cock between her own thighs, in and out, in and out, her wetness coating his shaft, and then he'd fuck her even harder, so hard that their hips would crash together and her head would hit the wall from the force.
"Oh, sorry—" came a sharp and urgent whisper.
"Don't stop," she moaned.
Rey rubbed faster and flexed her ass tighter. Her nipple was sore and she screwed it harder. Her legs began to tingle and she felt herself climbing toward climax, but no, not yet, too soon, so she let off a bit, just a bit to tease herself, and she chewed on her bottom lip to keep from moaning and tried to withhold that orgasm just a bit more, but fuck, it was just so hard to resist. The neighboring thrusting and grunting grew frenetic and—
"I'm gonna come," she gasped. "Hard, hard, fuck me harder!"
A loud noise hit the wall. He was bracing himself, his other hand gripping her hair. She raked her fingers on his chest.
Rey quickened her pace, her pulse pounding as he pounded Kelly, and her wrist was cramping but she didn't want to stop and she climbed and climbed and then it came, she came, so did he and she, and Rey dived from the peak into a warm, comforting pool of delicious feelings and bodily aftershocks. She rolled to her side to bury her face in her pillow, still whipping her fingers away at her cunt, smothering her panting and groaning, and her body twitched and the waves of pure ecstasy washed from head to toe and she didn't stop rubbing until her fingers cramped and she grew limp and gasped to catch her breath.
"That.. was incredible," Kelly gasped.
###
A slamming cabinet woke Rey. Her room was full of daylight and her head was fuzzy.
"No more IPAs," she grunted at the beer bottles on her night stand. She rolled out of bed and grabbed her jeans that had fallen to the floor during the night and pulled them on then twisted her hair into a sloppy bun. She went out into the kitchen where a mess of the prior night's dinner rested in cold, soapy water in the sink and Kelly and her new beau were laughing over coffee at the dining room table.
"—and that's how we met. I still think it's funny how she was so nervous to tell me her name the first time!" Kelly was finishing a story, her hands wrapped around a steaming mug.
"'Morning," Rey harrumphed. She was not a morning person. She beelined for the mug caddy and poured herself a cup of coffee.
"Is this the infamous Rey I've heard so much about?" a sonorous voice inquired.
Rey squinted to focus on the man sitting at the table and nearly dropped the coffee pitcher. Sitting across from Kelly and only a few feet away from Rey was an averagely handsome, thickly-built, tall, redhead and Rey recognized him immediately.
Dom.
A glimmer of faint recognition flittered across his freckly face. He quirked his head to the side and his fiery curls jostled. He looked at Rey intently for a moment, reaching far into vague memories, grasping for some reason why Rey looked so familiar.
Rey smiled politely and poured herself some coffee. She dropped her other hand out of sight and concentrated briefly, wafting her fingers in the air. For a split second, she received a train of his memories that whooshed by her third eye, and with a quick push of the force, she muddied them.
"This is she," Kelly smiled.
Rey filled her mug to the brim. "I am she." She mirrored Kelly's smile but she was shaking inside.
"Funny," Dom murmured. "I swear, you look so familiar, but I can't put my finger on it!"
"Hmm," Rey chuckled, sipping her coffee. She wanted to fling the hot mug at the stupid ginger's face but resisted. "Well, pardon me, but I need to get ready for work."
"Nice to meet you, Rey," Dom said with a nod of his head. His face didn't have any of that surly childishness that he had once before, so many years ago.
"Nice to meet you, too, Dom," Rey lied.
Kelly let out a surprised laugh and cast a wary glance at Dom. "Rey, how'd you know his name?!"
Rey froze for a moment. Dom looked at her again, and she could sense he was trying to scrub the film from those memories she had quickly tried to dirty.
"Oh, well, er," Rey babbled. "I, uh, I didn't want to say anything but—" She looked around dramatically to make sure the sisters couldn't hear her. "I could kinda hear you screaming his name last night, Kelly."
"Oh!" Kelly turned as pink as her mug. "I'm sorry about that, Rey!" She exchanged a chuckle with Dom. "Maybe I should move my bed to the other side of the room."
"Oh, no," Rey said, almost too quickly. "I mean, those walls are so thin, it doesn't matter. I'll just find some ear plugs. You just give me a head's up when you're having company." Rey flashed another convincing smile at her friend and excused herself to go shower.
She resisted slamming the door shut and cranked the heat in the shower until it was almost scalding. The hot water pounded her back and she squeezed her eyes tightly as the memories from childhood came flooding back. That snarky, asshole, redheaded little asshole kid laughed and pointed and mocked her and now he was fucking her best friend. It wasn't until Rey opened her eyes that she suddenly realized she was plunged into darkness, the sound of the broken light bulbs crashing on the counter.