Page 5 of The Chad Next Door
“Should…should we check out your rooms?” I say, eyes still riveted on the clashing colors and strange furniture designs. Why is everything orange and green? Why is that chair shaped so roundly? Why are the legs on the couch such thin pegs?
Zelda clears her throat, looking at me like this is all my fault. (It technically is, but we can fix this. Eventually.) “Do we get our own rooms? Or do we have to share?”
I made sure to get a three bedroom for that very reason, though I sort of wish I’d splurged for four bedrooms just so I could have a home office and try to find some kind of remote job. I don’t think I can work otherwise, though I should figure out the school situation soon. I’ve thought about homeschooling so they can have some more time to settle, but I don’t know the first thing about teaching. They’re already smarter than me as it is.
“You each get a room,” I confirm and warily lead the way down the narrow hall. I honestly have no idea which room is which, so I take a guess and point to the two doors that sit directly opposite each other. “You can pick who gets what.”
Immediately, they each take a door and shove them both open. In a weird synchrony that would make them look like twins if I didn’t know their birthdays, they spend two seconds looking at the rooms before crossing the hall and trading places, closing the doors behind them.
I guess they picked?
That leaves the last room for me, and a strange foreboding settles over me as I push the door open. My jaw drops. Not only is this roomnotfurnished, it’s also the tiniest room I’ve ever seen. Like, it will fit a bed and a dresser and nothing else. (That’s assuming I can find a place to buy those things in the first place.) I know for a fact that this house has a master bedroom, and I have a feeling that’s the room Zelda picked. Link would have gone for the room at the back, which probably looks out over the woods where he can watch the wildlife to his heart’s content and never interact with another human being.
This room is alsofreezing. I’m amazed the rest of the house hasn’t caught this utter chill. Tucking my arms around myself, I search for the source of the cold—like a hole in the ceiling or a missing wall—but I’ve only been in the room for two seconds when a chilling sound hits my ears. Something isrustlingin the closet. Straight up moving around. And that had better be a friendly ghost or I swear I’ll—
Something sleek and black darts from the closet and disappears through the massive hole in the broken window, and I scream louder than I’ve ever screamed in my life.
Chapter Three
Chad
Neighbors. I specifically came tothis house so I wouldn’t have neighbors because the only person within a mile radius is Hank, who basically never leaves his house except when he is completely and thoroughly blocked. I mean, who wouldn’t want to share a street with a hermited novelist? That’s the dream right there.
But no. Apparently, less than twenty-four hours after I settle in, someone decides they absolutely need to buy the rundown house that has sat vacant for over a year. Not just someone. A family. With one kid who isn’t even a little bit shy and another who has the subtle signs of being a troublemaker because he wouldn’t make eye contact with anyone. Their mother looks like she’s barely into adulthood herself and has all the signs of an overwhelmed teen mom. She wasn’t wearing a wedding ring, which probably makes her a single, overwhelmed teen mom, and the last thing I need is her realizing I have no need to leave the house so I’m available for babysitting or soothing her lonely heart or anything else she might be looking for.
I have no idea why a woman like her would come to a place like this, but I don’t like it. I left Sun City so I could leave complicated behind.
“You’d better keep your distance,” I tell Duke.
He lifts his head from where he’s lying on the back deck next to me, tail wagging slightly as he smiles at me. Sometimes I genuinely think he can understand me, and right now he seems to think that I’m joking about staying away from the neighbors.
I hit him with a hard stare. “I’m serious. The minute you go over there and say hi is the minute they think we can be friends. I’d rather pretend they don’t exist.”
He drops his head back down with a little sigh, disappointment all over his face. Maybe I’m being harsh.
I take a deep breath, enjoying this moment of silence since it might be my last. Those kids looked the same age as the twins were when our mom died, and Brooklyn and Houston were never quiet. I can only imagine those two will be the same, and this could be my only chance to enjoy a peaceful morning before it’s full of arguing children.
A scream pierces the air, and I jump, coffee spilling all over me. What in the… I look toward the neighbor’s house just as a large animal slips out of a back window, and panic sets in. Was that a badger? Duke is already on his feet, vibrating with anticipation, and I shout, “Go!” as I leap over the deck railing. He takes off after the animal. I head for the house.
The front door is thankfully unlocked, though I nearly bowl over the boy as he hustles into the front room looking white as a sheet. The girl is right behind him, more confused than afraid, which means the scream came from their mom. I rush past them to the very back room where it sounds like she’s straight up hysterical.
I find her huddled in a ball in the corner, her face in her arms as she shakes uncontrollably.
“Hey, are you okay?”
Her head snaps up, eyes wet with tears, and she sits there staring at me, completely frozen now. The hysteria in her eyes is clear as day, mixed with fear and maybe even horror.
I crouch down so I’m not looming over her. “Did it hurt you?” Reaching out, as if I haven’t made things worse by barging in here, I wait for her to say or do anything.
I don’t have to wait long. It all comes out in a snort followed by the most obnoxious laugh I’ve ever heard. She’s back to shaking, but not with sobs. Laughter. Enough of it that she’s crying again.
“Sorry,” she gets out in between guffaws—yes, guffaws. “It shouldn’t be funny. But it’s so funny!” She buries her face again as if that might contain her laughter. Then she gasps and looks up again. “Are the kids okay? Where are they?”
I glance behind me, finding both kids peering at us through the open door. Duke, for some reason, is right between them, his fur tangled up in their little hands. Guess he gave up on the badger chase pretty quickly. “They’re fine,” I mutter, feeling more foolish by the second. Why do I always do this? Why do I feel like I have to step in and save the day when I don’t even have the full story?
I clear my throat, standing again and moving to the window. It looks like a rock or something may have broken it, and there are bits of fur around the sharp edges. I wonder how long the badger has been sneaking in here. Based on the smell—or lack thereof—I hope it isn’t long. “You’ll have to get this window fixed if you want to keep him out,” I say, though that’s obvious. “I don’t know why a badger would be living at this kind of elevation, though.”
“Link says it was a wolverine.”
