J.B.B.

“How can you love someone like that?”

You looked at your recently made friend, Gina, from work, thinking whether to invest your time in all the possibly great explanations or to stick to the shorter version of it.

“Because loving is far easier to deal with than hate. Hate makes you feel bad.”

You scrunched your nose as both of you walked past the poster of the Frankenstein remake as Gina rolled her eyes at you.

“You do know that’s not true, right? Commitment sucks babe. It sucks real hard.”

You giggled as her curls bounced so gracefully even as she moved her head in colourful disgust.

“I don’t know, man. I’ve never really found anyone ‘relationship-worthy’ yet.”

“Really?” She sounded surprised, “How many people have you dated?”

You shrugged your shoulders and raised your hands in approximate gestures, “uhh…two.”

Gina stopped in the middle of the street and looked at you, her head tilted in question.

“Girl, what is a beautiful woman like you doing in your free time if not making out with someone?”

“Hanging out with a crazy friend,” you responded nonchalantly, breaking into a smile on seeing Gina’s surprise turn into her signature smug face.

“Alright you cocky angel. Looks like I’ll have to play your wingwoman. I’ll be taking details on Monday. Bye babe.”

You waved as she crossed the road and skipped towards her home while you walked straight ahead.

You turned towards your street, bumping into a wall. “Oof!” Or so you thought.

You tried to find a footing as your legs retrieved from the huge structure standing right in the middle of the sidewalk. And of course, you failed miserably, landing on the hard tiles with a sad groan while your groceries spilled everywhere.

“Apologies, ma'am.”

A man at least six feet tall, with a built that could put all Greek Gods to shame, kneeled before you, bringing forward his right hand for you to sit up and began collecting the scattered plums and putting into your paper bag quickly. You were not able to get a good look at his face covered under a cap. But you did not miss his sharp jaw or his long brown hair playing near his neck. You would’ve never stopped looking at him had he not turned his clear ocean eyes back at you.

“Sorry, I uhh didn’t see where I was going,” you apologised, too embarrased to look at him, and moved towards the bread loaf lying beside you. You picked up the loaf to find what looked like a journal. It didn’t have anything written over it, just tiny initials on the botom corner and inside of the cover page- J.B.B.

You turned around to find your groceries neatly standing in the paper bag with no sign of the human form of the Alps.

You turned again to look around the corner. No one. No sign of even the shadow of a man. Just a lingering scent of his, letting you know that you hadn’t dreamt it. Putting the journal in your bag with the thought of returning it to its owner, you started walking to your destination, with a really interesting incident to overthink about for the day.

Your neighborhood didn’t have much to speak about except the different hues of white on every apartment and an abandoned building right opposite the one you had begun calling home.

The rent was cheap, thanks to the abandoned heap of bricks in front of your apartment-that for some people was too much to look at- and the facilities were good. You’d found a job of an assistant manager at a local bookshop that was, for you, unusually large and filled with content you’d never even heard about. Gina worked in the maintenance section for the 'limited copies’ and 'local history’ area and your curiosity had been the reason you two had met and bonded over your love for all the pages that smelled old and dusty.

Your apartment was small- the door taking you straight into the hallway with a couch and TV that was at one foot distance from the kitchen, that stood opposite your bedroom- but you’d made it pretty cozy for yourself.

You went straight into your routine once you were home. Keeping your belongings on 'the chair’ in the bedroom, you opened the bathroom door while putting on a playlist according to your mood- randomizing when you felt daring- and came out of your clothes to get under the shower. Today the mood list was sensual and the water pressure was strong. You liked it cold, sometimes lukewarm when the cold European winter made you miss home. The shower would be followed by making dinner and snacks- the latter being the supper for cats and kittens that would visit you or the ones that had inhabited the building opposite yours. Their company was the best. They loved anything and everything you brought for them and they ate it till there was nothing left or they experienced food coma. You wanted to keep a cat but your apartment was too small-according to you- and you’d rather they have their freedom than be cooped up in a small space for the entirety of their life.

You picked up the basket full of mildly roasted bread smothered in butter and all the Tupperware containing milk and your dinner along with a small mat and made your way to your little friends.

“Aah! No wonder they’ve been crying so loudly. They must have smelled the delicious bread.”

“I still don’t know how they do that Mr Kline. It’s like an inbuilt clock that tells them exactly when I’m home.”

“They do, actually. But for them it’s less of a biological clock and more of a 'Y/N has come home-let’s party’ clock upon hearing your arrival.”

Mr. Kline was the handy serviceman of the building. Even though he was a reputed professor of world history at the local college, he preferred to be simply known as the building’s caretaker. You hadn’t understood why a man as wise as him would chose to work for a building he practically owned with his husband and not be standing in a lecture hall somewhere talking about all the knowledge he had gathered in half a century. His well-kept golden brown hair and his soft personality towards the people he liked made him look younger than he was, never giving away the sass and the wisdom that was kept at the edge of his tongue for the ones who thought they knew it all. He’d been the one to recommend you for the job at the library and you made sure to thank him this wonderful man with whatever little unpopular knowledge you could share with him about your birthplace.

You shared a greeting with him as you left the building and crossed the street towards the unkept one.

The building, like any other in this town, was quite sturdy. It still had wallpapers over the corridors and stairs from the previous owners. Almost everything was intact- the stairs, the apartment doors, nearly all the windows, even some punk rock poster wall in one apartment. Some walls had been grafitti-ed on with memes and uplifting messages, others had weird symbols drawn on them. Some walls had been taken down on various floors for whatever had been the plans for this place before they were dropped. So, yeah, nearly everything was intact. The only thing that you knew was not, was the heating.

You climbed up to the second floor and turned to the apartment space to your left. The places where the walls and door were supposed to be, had been taken down on both sides. It was nearly an open space except for the bedrooms and bathrooms. Turning on the working lightbulb in the apartment space you announced your presence.

“Hey my little furballs!”

You were met by half a dozen of meows and tails standing straight up in the air on seeing you. The cats and kittens, cuddled into each other over the heating pad Kline had put up for them, got up and came over to you, rubbing themselves with your legs and purring.

One of them, with black fur that shined blue under the lights like a clear night sky, stood up on his two feet and looked you with his big green eyes before meowing loudly.

“Yes, Panther, I’ve got your buttered toasties. Come on, Nina. You too, Sakura.”

Everyone looked at you with the same curiosity as you put down their share of milk and bread in a line.

You watched them eat and drink with such excitement in your heart as you opened your dinner and sat down on your mat.

You were about to dig into your vegetables when you heard a tiny creak from the wooden floors. You turned around to look at the dark space opposite to where you and your furballs were. The apartment next door was only lit by the glow of street lights from the sidewalk outside. Only silence clad the darkness there. You were about to go back to your dinner when a reflection in the window of that apartment caught the corner of your eyes.

You turned back but there was nothing there.

Alright, Y/N, you thought to yourself, you’ve been coming here for quite some time now and nothing like this has happened before. So there is definitely someone or something here.

You stood up, your hand slowly moving to your back as you took careful steps towards the space next door. Moving your grey T-shirt up, you felt the cold metal side on your fingers before they found the wooden handle and took out the knife. The cats were too busy in their food to notice you enter the space next door.

The floor creaked as you moved in. This apartment was covered in yellow wallpaper everywhere with patterns of what looked like green coloured plants. The kitchen counters had gathered dust everywhere except one tiny spot at the side that faced you. You positioned yourself and hovered the edge of your right palm over it, finding the similarity in the imprint on the dust.

Someone was here. And they had been watching you. And the only places where they could have disappeared to were the cold outside through the sealed windows or behind the bathroom and bedroom wall.

Everything rational inside you told you to get out of here. And like any person outside a horror movie, you heard your reasonable brain and slowly backed away from the who or the what you could not see.

“The building looks empty boss.”

You heard voices, moving around below you.

“Go look upstairs. I don’t want the body to be found before at least a month.”

Fear eroded your senses for five seconds. Just as the sixth came, you gathered yourself and removed your shoes- thanking whatever force made you buy these no laces loafer looking things- and went across the space to turn off the lights. You could hear footsteps approach the floor below you.

“This one’s empty t-oh look, there’s a punk rock wall here!”

The cats looked at you in confusion as you frantically looked around for a place to hide before turning back to the only wall standing there staring at you.

“Fuck,” cursed under your breath.

“Okay, okay, I’ll check upstairs but I’m telling ya I want something like that in my room too.”

Oh screw it, you thought, running on your toes towards the door standing in the wall with your hand tightly gripping your knife, I’d rather be scared by a ghost than end up in a body bag.

Quietly opening the door, your entered inside the room and closed the door cautiously just as the footsteps announced themselves on the floor.

“What the hell? Where the walls at?”

You jumped at hoarse voice reverberating throughout never letting your eyes leave where you came from as you moved away from the door.

“Well, I’ll be damned. Look, boss, there are little furries purrin’ over here.”

Oh no! The cats!

Oh no your tupperware you idiot, your brain shouted, so much for being cautious.

A pair of footsteps thumped up the stairs making you move further back into the room and wanting to dissolve in the wall behind you. And that’s when you noticed the wall closet.

“John, there’s food here,” a deep voice hissed.

“Yeah the cats gettin’ hungry.”

“You thick bamboo of a head! There’s plastic everywhere. Look! It’s warm. Someone’s here,” the cold voice declared.

It didn’t take you more than ten seconds to open the closet and climb inside.

You had your shoes huddled close to your chest with one hand while the other had the knife at ready.

“Check that fucking room, John!”

You tried to steady your wavering breath, inching away from the closet door that had tiny slits letting in the already filtered light coming from the window. Your back came in contact with the wall in a single step. The space was smaller than you’d thought. The curses grew louder as reluctant heavy footsteps came near the bedroom’s door.

Suddenly your senses noticed a vague familiarity around you. Like a blink-and-miss memory. Your mind walking away from the danger lurking outside and entering this dark square space, noticing a scent. A familiar scent. The one you’d come in contact with this morning. The wall behind you getting warmer in your back.

Chilling electricity passed throughout your body at the realisation as your defense system took over and tried to turn around, only to me stopped by a pair of strong, ripped arms wrapping themselves around your mouth and your hand that held the knife.

“Shh shh shhh.” You heard a familiar voice whisper in your ear before both of you heard the door click open.

“Yello’. Is there anybody there?”

You froze at the creepy voice that called out from the entrance of the room.

“It’s okay I won’t hurt you. I promise,” the man behind you persuaded, “I can’t say anything about the men outside.”

Your arms ached at the position it was being held at but you did not want to move it for letting the shady men outside know about your presence. And as much as the claustrophobic space was killing you besides a complete stranger, you didn’t let go of your knife.

The stranger’s breathing was frustratingly normal as his chest rose and fell behind you so languidly. His heartbeat too never showed any signs of panic whatsoever.

“I’m taking away my hands now, okay?” Came a pleading whisper of a question.

You nodded just as a tear fell off from your cheeks onto the back of his palm. His body remained motionless behind you, never feeling the urge to move away from you, if there was space to move away, that is.

“I’m sorry,” he muttered under his breath as he loosened his grip around your mouth calculatingly, his fingers grazing your lips as they moved away. The other hand, gloved, just left your arms as if it wasn’t putting any effort in keeping you from stabbing him.

“Hey boss!”

The loud voice made you jump, making the man behind you grab your waist gently as he whispered, “Move behind me.”

You shook your head, turning your knife, making it graze along the skin on your wrist while your thumb rested on the top of the handle.

You had one way of getting out of here and you were not compromising it.

You could have sworn you felt his breath get stuck in his lungs in surprise at your choice.

“What?” The 'boss’ entered the room as well.

“I think we can dump the body here. The cats can eat 'em up and no one gon’s ta know.”

The tensed air inside the entire room went silent for a moment as three humans questioned the sanity of the fourth one.

“Keep talking like that and I’ll bury you too, John. Now come with me to the basement. No one’s going to go there anytime soon. Faster John! We are not getting paid by the hour by that Russian!”

The footsteps receded downwards and you waited for a moment to let go of your breath and move towards the closet door when the arms still wrapped around you stopped you.

“No, they’re still here.”

The whisper now turned into a mumble, allowing you to hear his actual voice.

Nearly five minutes passed when the warm body towering from behind you finally shifted, letting go of your waist.

“Okay they’re gon-ghh”

You drove the knife through his thigh and dash out of there, nearly breaking the closet door off the hinges, never looking back at the door, the cats, the tupperware, stopping only when you had climbed up two storeys, opened your apartment door and bolted all latches.

Your breathless state and the nausea caught up as the rush receded, making you fall down on to the ground.

It took a while for you to collect your thoughts as you got up and stared outside the window overlooking the building you’d just run out from. The same windows that had lit up the dark space stared right at you, sitting in silence until you saw a shadow move.

The vibration of your phone forced out a small scream. By the time you turned back, the shadow had disappeared.

“Hello?” You tried to smoothen out the tremble in your voice.

“Hey Y/N, quick question- beer or whiskey?”

“Huh?”

“Pick one.”

You looked back at the window.

“Uhh…Whiskey.”

“Nice! Netflix or Local Cable?”

“Uhh…I don’t… Gina can we do this tomorrow?”

“…”

“Hello?”

“Are you with someone right now?”

A cold pain ran through your heart as your eyes went back to the building, searching for shadows.

“N-no.”

“It’s okay, darling. We’ll catch up tomorrow.”

“Yeah.”

It took you a while to finally look away from the building and draw up all the curtains in your house and double check all the windows.

Turning off all the lights, you picked up a knife from the kitchen and took to your bedroom, planting it under your mattress- just in case- before allowing your body to melt down into the sheets, smacking your head in frustration at the fact that this was not what you had planned to overthink about while going to bed, knowing full well you weren’t going to sleep that night as well anyway.

What you did not know was that the world’s deadliest assassin had seen you cross the street to enter the leftover of an apartment building with your hands full while searching for his journal. He’d followed you inside from the backdoor and had curiously but cautiously seen you from the shadows as you mingled with a bunch of stray cats.

He’d tried to move closer to get a good look of this smile you had on your face when the floor gave away his presence, making him turn around the corner and into the room.

He’d expected you to give up on searching the source of the noise like any rational human being who knew fear would but he’d seen the pair of scruffy men enter the building from the window, with a huge suspicious duffel bag that he was too familiar with. He was about to warn you when he felt your light footsteps approach the door, making him retrieve into the closet.

Standing still as you searched around for a place to hide had been difficult for him. He could see the fear in your eyes as you hugged your shoes close to your chest while the knife was kept away from your body like someone who knew how to use it but only for defense.

What had been more difficult was the wave of panic that seared through him as he saw you open the closet door and stand right in front of him, your heated body touching his. The familiar slight scent of sweet oranges filled his nostrils as your hair brushed his stubble. He could feel himself relax as his senses started taking your presence in.

He had seen you go stiff for a moment and he knew. Without wasting any time, his reflexes took over, wrapping his arms around you.

He had felt your tear on his hand, wanting to apologise as many times as he could once you two were out of this mess.

He had felt your heavy breaths waiting to get out of the closet. How he wished to help you calm down.

And as soon as the threat had passed, he had wished to apologise and ask for his property back before you stabbed him in his thigh and ran away.

For a flash of a second his anger had known no bounds. But something changed. Just as he saw you standing in the building opposite him, looking out in his direction, his anger broke, giving way to something new.

He took out the knife from his leg and sat down beside the cats, who looked at him with pure judgement in their eyes.

“Mwerr,” Panther said angrily while Sakura meowed in question.

You had left quite a deep cut in him. He estimated it may take the entire night to heal and had slumped down into your mat.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered into the air around him.

He felt the pain.

He felt your knife in his hand.

He felt a smile creep onto his face after ages.

“Brave gal.”

The alarm made your sleep deprived head pound in frustration. You got up and welcomed the warm morning sun rays until last night’s incident crept back into the bed with you.

Pushing it away, you moved up and to the door to go and tell Kline that you wanted to get your door locks changed.

As you opened it, you were welcomed by all your Tupperware, now clean and neatly stacked up at your doorstep with a note.

I apologise for yesterday. Here’s your property. I hope I can have mine back. I’ll wait in the City Park for you.

-J.B.B.