(An experiment in First Person and in Romance since it's not a genre I normally write in. Sorry I had to split it in two rather than three because I was only allowed to post two times for Review Day!)
Windows - Part 1 of 2
I slowly slogged up the countless flights of steps in the Victorian tenement block I called home, swaying slightly and grasping onto the hand rail.
It had been a good night, well…maybe just a decent night.
New Years Eve was a big to do these days and I’d, half willingly, allowed my mates to pull me out for a night on the town.
There was booze; there were girls, noise, and people, lots of people. Eventually my mind had grown foggy, my body tired and I split off from the group and made my way home.
They’d protested, jeering at me for being a lightweight and a spoilsport but I’d had enough. My comfy bed seemed much more appealing than drinking myself sick and ending up cuddling a lamppost in the freezing cold. Maybe I was getting old or perhaps I just preferred sleep.
As I came to the front door I fumbled my keys out of my jeans pocket, dropped them once or twice on the floor and then eventually aiming deliberately, in only the way the drunken can, pushed the key into its allotted slot and staggered into my flat.
Flipping the lights on, I dumped bag, coat and keys in a heap in the hallway, wobbled into the bedroom, reached my bed and collapsed onto my back with a loud sigh.
Home sweet home.
I lay there for a time, my eyes closed, unwilling to move as I listened to the quiet.
Then came an odd noise that seemed out of place compared to the usual buzz of the fridge or cawing of seagulls that didn’t understand the city wasn’t in fact the sea. It was a sort of sniffling sound, and as I concentrated on it I noticed a slight whimper. It sounded like someone crying, someone crying outside my bedroom window.
Reluctantly I rolled onto my stomach, frowning, and listened harder. I don’t know what I expected to hear but the crying just continued.
Curiosity overcame my unwilling limbs and I pushed myself off the bed, wandering over to the window and pulling it open.
I ducked my head out, determined to identify the source of the sound…and I did.
There, sitting by the open living room window of a flat in the block next to mine, was a girl. Her blue eyes were puffed up and watery, her brown hair a mess, and a scrunched up tissue was clutched tightly in her hand as she sobbed.
I knew I should look away, return to my post-night out come down and forget all about this but I just couldn’t look away from her.
Even in her pain and distress I found her beautiful. She must’ve been about the same age as me, early twenties, slim build, petite, appealing.
She chose that moment to look up at me, her eyes locking with mine and I froze, not knowing what to do.
Shit, shit, shit.
“I…uh…sorry, I was just…I mean I heard…sorry.” I began to hastily retreat but her voice stopped me.
“Wait.”
Reluctantly I leaned out the window again, knowing my face was a cross between horror and embarrassment. There was no way she hadn’t seen me gawking at her for no apparent reason. A strange guy staring at a woman in her flat…not creepy at all.
Guiltily I watched her as she considered me, her blue eyes taking me in.
“Have you ever…” she started but trailed off almost immediately.
“Have I ever what?” I found myself asking.
“Nevermind,” she dismissed the question with a wave.
“No, go on, ask. I don’t mind.” Now that she was talking I wanted her to keep talking. The awkwardness of before seemed to have vanished.
She sighed but gave in. “Have you ever been in love?”
The question took me by surprise. It wasn’t at all what I’d been expecting.
“I…” I started, then paused to consider, wanting to answer it properly. “I thought I was once,” I answered honestly.
She smiled weakly at me. “I know that feeling.”
As she said it her eyes looked sad again, the pain creeping onto her delicate features and I found myself desperately wanting to make her laugh, to smile at least. Just something so that she could find escape from that pain.
“Yeah…but then I realised I couldn’t date myself.”
Her eyes flicked to me and when she saw me grinning at her, her face broke into a smile and she chuckled softly.
I feigned sadness. “It broke my heart.”
“I bet,” she smirked.
“You don’t know the woes!” I cried dramatically.
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When I was at home in the evenings, watching television and whiling away the hours, I often found my eyes wandering to the window, hoping that I would catch a glimpse of him as he shuffled about his bedroom.
Sometimes I wished that I’d look over and he would just be there, leaning out his window like he was that night and we could talk again.
It was ludicrous. I didn’t know anything about this guy and here I was, pining after him. All I knew was that when I’d been at my lowest on that New Year’s Eve he was there, making me laugh. He never once asked me to explain what had happened, never prodded me to find out or left a trail of hints that he wanted to know. He just talked with me and smiled.
I wanted to see him again and that scared me. I’d just gotten out of one hellish relationship and here I was tangling myself up with thoughts of another guy.
No…it wasn’t like that. I didn’t want to date him; I didn’t want to date anyone at the moment. I just wanted to talk with him. That’s all.
During my own rambling thoughts I had found myself sitting by the living room window, cup of tea in hand, cardigan pulled about me, gazing out across the void between our two flats.
His curtains were drawn as usual. I inwardly sighed.
Then with a fluttering motion the curtains were open and he was stood there in jeans and a t-shirt, his brown eyes looking straight at me.
Oh god, oh god.
He smiled at me and pulled the sash window up, leaning out.
Putting my cup of tea down on a small table next to me, I followed his lead, ducking my head out.
“Morning,” he said, leaning his chin on an open palm.
“Hi…”
I didn’t know what to say to him. The last time I’d seen him I’d been bawling my eyes out over some shitty, now ex, boyfriend. That wasn’t exactly the best of first impressions.
“Come here often?”
I rolled my eyes at him and he laughed. His smile was the kind that lit up his whole face and I found it endearing.
“So I didn’t get to introduce myself the other night. I’m…”
“No wait!” My hand shot up, stopping him before he could reveal his name.
He looked at me quizzically and he was right to do so. He was going to think I was mad.
“Let’s…let’s not do the name thing.”
“Oh yeah, sure. Because names make it far too easy to identify each other and we wouldn’t want that.” He smirked.
I laughed despite myself and then smothered it quickly, remembering I had a serious point behind this.
“It’s just that…” Oh god, how to explain this. How to explain that I didn’t need any complications in my life? That it would be nice to have a relationship, a friendship, that was just simple, that was just two people talking and laughing. Would he think me strange?
I should just be honest. The way he was with me that night. I owed him at least that much.
He waited patiently for me to continue and I took a deep breath, plunging on. “If you didn’t notice from our last erm…encounter…my relationships have a knack of going south. And I was thinking that…perhaps it would be nice if we could just talk, like no strings attached. Just us, here, at our windows and nothing else.”
He didn’t say anything for a while; just shifted from leaning against his right palm to leaning against his left and I wondered if I had completely freaked him out.
Then he said, “So, no names?”
Relief washed over me. “Yeah and…maybe we should only ever talk at our windows?”
“Right.”
“And no specific details about our lives?” I ventured further.
“Hmm…” he shifted and got up, disappearing from the window and I thought I had lost him that I had gone too far.But he soon reappeared holding a notepad and pen, crouching down and ready to write. “So Rule One was no names, right?” He grinned.
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I think I definitely found her too interesting. When there was a pause at work during the day my mind would be on her, the girl at the window. I thought about what she was doing now, if she was bored at work too, if she was thinking about me and then I had to shake myself.
No strings attached. That’s what I’d agreed to. Even if I had wanted to object or thought it was odd. Whatever shit she’d been through on New Years had been enough to rattle her trust in people and I didn’t want to be the one to completely destroy it.
Now I was sat at home, remote in hand, flipping through the channels on TV in a sleepy daze, not really paying attention to what was flashing across the screen in front of me, my mind was elsewhere.
When I was at home all I could think about doing was going to the window to see if she was in, if she was around, if she would be sat at her window waiting for me but I stopped myself. I didn’t want to freak her out. Being a creeper at the window wasn’t going to get her to trust me and I wanted to keep talking.
Fuuuuck!
I chucked the remote down on the sofa beside me and ran a hand over my face and through my hair, annoyed by my circling thoughts. I’d only spoken to this girl a couple of times but somehow she’d gotten in my head. This wasn’t me. This wasn’t what I did. Yeah…I was interested in women but mostly just a passing interest, a moment in time, heck even just the physical. It wasn’t like I was a bad guy; at least I didn’t think so. Just…I’d never met anyone I wanted to get to know beyond a mutual appreciation of good looks.
Pulling myself from the sofa, irritated, I shuffled down the hall towards the kitchen to get a drink. As I passed by the open door of my bedroom, movement in the corner of my eye caught my attention and I glanced through the empty room to the window.
She was there. I could see through into her living room. She was dancing. Music drifted to me, some upbeat pop song that had me smiling as she moved along to the beat with such freedom.
I turned towards the window, leaning against the doorframe and watched as she pranced around the room in her pyjamas, all cares in the world removed from her shoulders in that moment. Her face was alive, her lips moving along to the words of the song, her eyes bright with exertion and joy.
As I watched her, I felt my chest tighten and a weird fluttering sensation attack my stomach. I shifted my position in the doorway, uncomfortable with what my body was telling me. I tried to ignore it. I already knew it was too late though. My mind already knew I was lost to her.
I sighed and pushed away from the door. This couldn’t be good.
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I ducked my head back inside the window and chose another pebble from the potted plant next to me. Snatching it up in my hand, I leant out again, took aim, and threw. The small stone met the glass with a resounding tap and bounced off, falling to the floor far below.
Nothing still. God this guy must sleep like the dead. I’d been throwing the small pebbles for at least five minutes now. The sky was slowly lightening and I began to worry I’d miss this chance entirely.
Maybe he wasn’t in. That was logical. Perhaps he was on holiday, or over at a friend’s house after a night out, or with a girl. That thought made my stomach sink and I aggressively snatched up another pebble and threw it as hard as I could.
The tap it made was louder this time and I saw a warm light flicker on behind the curtains. He was at home. I felt a thrill go up my spine and then hated myself for it.
I watched as the curtains shifted aside and he was there, in the window, looking decidedly sleepy. His brown hair was tousled, his eyes half closed like the very thought of being awake hurt him. He rested his head against the glass of the window and his eyes met mine. The corner of his mouth tugged up in a smile. My heart began to beat faster and I tried to push away the feeling, not wanting to outwardly show the flutter I was feeling at his mere presence.
He shifted to pull the window open and I felt my eyes watching the thin cotton of his top move over muscle and wondered what it might be like to touch him.
I looked away. This wasn’t a good route for my mind to be going down, not only was it slightly pervy but it also scared me.
A soft groan made me look back at him. He’d sat down on the floor by his window and folded his arms in front of himself on the ledge. He leant his head on them and looked as though he could quite happily fall asleep again at any moment.
I laughed slightly at how pathetic he looked. “Wow, you’re really not a morning person.”
He looked at me accusingly but I could tell he wasn’t really annoyed. “5am on a Saturday is not morning,” he mumbled.
There was silence for a moment as I witnessed him becoming gradually more aware of everything. He yawned widely and rubbed his face then stared at me. “So…are you going to tell me why you were throwing stones at my window or am I meant to guess?”
I realised I’d gotten so distracted with watching him that I’d forgotten the whole point of this. Shaking myself, I leant further forward. “I wanted to share something with you.”
He perked up at this. “Does this something involve your name?”
I smirked at him. “Nice try.”
“Worth a shot.” His eyes observed me carefully and I suddenly became self-conscious, pulling my cardigan tighter around my body. It was almost like I felt the material might shield me from him, that if there remained something between me and him then he wouldn’t be able to see right through me.
A beam of sunlight hit my face, warming my skin and I looked away from him and back to the sky. A deep red was starting to peep above the rooftops of the tenement blocks bordering our small patch of grass. The sun’s rays licked out across the pre-dawn expanse of blue, warming the world as it woke to another day and a delighted smile spread across my face.
“That…” I started, slightly breathless, “…is what I wanted to show you.”
There was a pause as I took in the display of mother nature in front of me and then his voice broke the silence, gentle and in awe.
“It’s beautiful,” he murmured, hesitating slightly before he said, “So are you.”
A jolt ran through my body at the surprise compliment and I turned my head towards him. His eyes were on me rather than the sunrise and he smiled gently at me.
I felt my voice catch in my throat, searching for a response and eventually all I managed was a choked, “What?”
He shifted uncomfortably under my gaze, fingers finding their way to his hair and running through it but he kept smiling. “I think you’re beautiful.”
“I…I…” I didn’t know what to say to him. A part of me felt so pleased but it was quickly smothered by fear, like I was already getting in too deep and that maybe he was already too attached.
He must’ve noticed how I’d stalled and slipped into silence because the next thing he said was, “Where the hell did you get stones from anyway?”
My eyes became focused on him again after blurring with thought. A grin was painted widely on his face and I couldn’t help but chuckle a touch. It was amazing how he could make you feel at ease with just a smile. But even though he’d deflected me and I was willing to go along with it, I still couldn’t help feel something unwanted brewing in the back of my mind.
Hey my friend! Review time here! Okay! Shut up when you say you're no goood! Gahhhh! Why can't I write like you????? 
This storyyy is absolutely amazing!!!! Seriously! I loved the plot! It was a super cute and I can't wait to read part two! Amazing job becki! Ummm.. to review grammar... I didn't notice anything wrong.... ermmm... Great job! I look forward to read more of your writing soon! Love ya girl!
~Your friend, Skyler <3
Becki!
Gaah what an adorable conceit. I love love the idea of this kind of relationship, because there are so many times relationships just pop up like this under the oddest of circumstances. Plus, the banter. THE BANTER. I could rave forever about the banter. xD But I won't, so onto the review!
Even in her pain and distress I found her beautiful. She must’ve been about the same age as me, early twenties, slim build, petite, appealing.
“Yeah…but then I realised I couldn’t date myself.”
Her eyes flicked to me and when she saw me grinning at her, her face broke into a smile and she chuckled softly.
It had been nearly a month since I’d talked to him through the window and for some reason I couldn’t stop thinking about him.
Hey Becky! Iggy here to deliver a flamin' review. ^^
The first couple paragraphs, right before he meet the girl, seem rather dull and lifeless to me, but maybe that's just because the guy want having any fun at that party. Once he gets chatting with the girl, I start smiling, because the playful banter is sudden and generally appropriate at the time, the sweet guy trying to make the girl laugh without prodding her for information. I like it this far!
Fuuuuck!
I hope this makes one of my most pressing worries clear:
Haha, the number of times you use "window", especially in that short passage, is very worrying. I understand it's a big part of the story, but see if you can't find a way to fix it. Using other words? Not mentioning the window at all? It might still be clear to just say the girl he was talking with, right? We know who the story is about.
Now, about the characters. Maybe I'm skeptical, and maybe that makes me not part of your target audience, but I don't understand why these kids are so suddenly into each other. I mean the novelty of the idea is great, and I get why they'd think about it all the time: cause it's a way they never met anyone before and that automatically makes them special to each other. But I don't think anybody would feel comfortable throwing rocks at someone else's window. The way I'm imagining it, I think they'd have to kinda get together before hand, whether they were ready or not, just out of viewing proper social etiquette. What if someone walked by and thought they were crazy? They'd probably try to avoid a situation like that, wouldn't they? By inviting her up? I mean 20-somethings aren't worried about hanging in each other's houses. I get that maybe the second time they wouldn't, but this rock thing -- that's what I don't believe. Especially in regards to a stranger and a sunset. Wouldn't this girl be a little more self-conscious? "Let me wake up this guy I barely know to show him a sunset"? Or what's her thought process about that idea?
Anyways, I am still off to part two, because I do like to hear what happens in relationships. hehehe.
PM me if you have any questions or comments about my review, please!
Bex! So, I’m using you to figure out (well, attempt anyway) how to review prose, since I have no idea.
Whoa, ok. I had no idea the first bit was narrated by a guy. That said, I’m not getting real differentiation between your two narrators, and that’s ended up more confusing than anything.
I’m sure this is in part because you’ve posted this in two parts, but I’m torn in calling this romance – at least in the current definition of romantic fiction. Now, this doesn’t read how I would expect a romance to read. However, my general frame of reference falls into two categories: stories that happen to have a healthy dose of romance, or the free trash I find on Amazon. The problem is that you’re falling somewhere between these two ends, which is fine by itself, but when you throw that in with a narrative that jumps between two narrators who in theory should be very different, but aren’t reading as such, the reader has to work to understand who is speaking, rather than dealing with the content. With that, however, I also haven’t yet read the second part, so where the latter issue could be addressed in the second part, I’m not sure how the narrative side will play out. Well, that or I’m just obtuse, which is also possible 
Ok, that all aside. D’aaaaw! I love the first scene. It’s like a bizarre meet-cute, and just yes. I really like Stella’s point about the windows and all that jazz – definitely not what I would have read into it (I went into the “uh, this is a bit odd,” territory first), but as a mirror, it makes narrative sense. And… cheesy pickup line <3
Now, to go see where this setup is heading!
Becki! Omg this is adorable! I really love the idea, I love how everything is done through the windows like it's their private little space that nobody else can get into.
One thing I really liked was how you didn't name either of them, they're just the guy and the girl and I think that's really nice. There's a lot of anonymity, there's not much background here, no friends, no parents, no whatever. That's nice.
A couple of things that got to me a little bit- I feel like there's a little bit too much internal monologue. Don't get me wrong, it's nice monologue. But like, the girl's first perspective? The first few paragraphs are just too "trapped in my own head la-di-dah". It's nice seeing their thought processes as they fall in love, but I think it'd also be nicer to see a little bit more of the falling. Because we read romance for the cute moments, right?! We don't really care how people feel (okay no we do but it is mainly for the cute moments). And I feel like they were a little bit lacking. So I guess- though clearly you have two characters who get stuck in their own heads a lot- that it'd be nice to have a bit more outside of their heads shown to us.
That last scene is so cute... I love it.
One thing that I didn't mind not being here but that I think would be really cool in a totally "deep and profound" way that is so not me is playing with the imagery of the windows- the separation, how they only see glimpses of each other's lives, stuff like that. I think that'd be really fun!
But overall I really liked this... Off to read Part 2!
Hope I helped, drop me a note if you need anything!
-Stella x
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