Chapter 103.

“Val, we really should go.”

“Darling, it’s fine, I have time to spare. You can head back to our room by yourself. I have some things I want to talk about with our new neighbor in private.”

“What things?”

“Girl stuff obviously.”

I was terrified of what this so-called ‘girl stuff’ entailed. I never knew how scary the words, girl stuff could be until this instant. She couldn’t be planning to reveal Adele’s past or my relationship with her, could she?

“Relax, it’s not like anyone’s dying. Why do you look so pale all of a sudden? Are you not feeling well, Darling?”

Why does my boss enjoy messing around with me so much? Is it that entertaining?

“Yeah, sorry. I’m really not feeling too well right now. I’ll just return to my room for now. You two can do whatever you want.”

Just go claw at each other’s throats behind my back when I’m not looking or something. Besides, the more I try to interfere here, the more troublesome it will become, so I better just get as far away as I can from this scary battlefield while I still have these two legs attached to my body. The nightmare where Val was decapitated by Adele flashed through my mind at one point, but in the end, that wasn’t real. It was only a nightmare.

I parted ways with the two of them and entered my room in deep contemplation. Of course, I was a nervous wreck, and I couldn’t stop pacing back and forth. Why did Val take on such a big risk to be alone with Adele? Was she just trying to legitimately be a nice person and see if it was possible to get along with a reformed psychopath?

My heartbeat grew more elevated from the sheer nervousness brought on by the entire ordeal. It didn’t take long before I was unable to hold myself back. The walls in the building were fairly thin, so it wasn’t impossible for someone’s voice to be heard through them. I relocated to the closet in my room and dug around through the boxes a bit. I knew I had one lying around somewhere in all this junk. I never bothered to throw away after all. It was a stethoscope that belonged to my fourth ex, a memento of sorts to ensure I never forgot to never date another doctor in my lifetime.

After a few minutes scouring through all the junk, I found it and immediately placed it against the wall which divided our units.

“Do you have a crush on my boyfriend by any chance?”

Hah?! Val?! Are you messing with me right now?

“A crush?! No way! What are you talking about Val? How could I like a guy like him?”

Yeah. You go girl. Tell her. Ah. I feel pretty depressed for some reason.

“You don’t need to be shy. It’s just the two of us girls. There are no intrusive eavesdropping boys around to hear your true thoughts. Besides, you don’t really look like you dislike him that much despite what you say.”

Am I an open book to her? Is she actually aware I’m eavesdropping? No, the real question is, what the hell is she plotting now?

“Can I be honest with you even though you’re his girlfriend?”

“Of course, I won’t judge you if you have a crush on my boyfriend.”

“A little. Just a little, okay? It’s not to the point that I’d fight another woman for him or anything.”

What the hell? Did I ask you to have a crush on me? I know I said I got a little depressed just now, but I take it back! Please don’t make things more complicated than they need to be!

“Oh? Is that so? You don’t say.”

“Y-yeah.” The slight waver in her voice fully gave away her embarrassment and nervousness.

“Then what if I wasn’t his girlfriend? Would you pursue him then?”

“It depends on the situation. If it’s meant to be it will be. If not, then that’s fine as well.”

“So you wouldn’t be entirely against the idea then?”

“I wouldn’t say I would be against the idea.”

“I’m not his girlfriend.”

““...””

“Eh?! What? Wait, Val, what do you mean?”

“It’s exactly as I said, we’re not in that type of relationship.”

“But the kiss earlier.”

“Was just because of a bet we had. When you opened the door, I found your reaction cute, so I wanted to tease you a bit.”

“Are you being serious right now?”

“Of course I am. What reason do I have to lie?”

“I see.”

“To fall back on the bed looking so relieved after hearing that. You’re really too cute. It would be such a shame to let him have you.”

“Hya! V-V-Val?! W-What are you doing all of a sudden!”

Eh? What? What?! What?!

“As I said before, it would be a shame if some smelly guy came and plucked such a cutey.”

Was my boss a lesbian the entire time?!

No no no. This must be my imagination. There’s no way. Could it be she already informed Adele that I was secretly eavesdropping on their conversation and they plotted against me with this entire scenario? That would make a lot of sense if she wanted to play around with my fragile little heart.

I needed to visually confirm the events that were transpiring. Just hearing her words were not enough to confirm whether any of this was really happening on the other side of the wall.

But how could I possibly get a glimpse of that Shangri-La, the forbidden sacred grounds, beyond the wall that divided us? It was at that moment I noticed something I’d never seen before in my unit. It was a beam of majestic light hitting the back of the sofa against the same wall I had the stethoscope glued to. I’d never noticed it before because I never checked behind the sofa since I moved in. There was never any reason to do so either.

I was suspicious though, would I really be dumb enough to fall for such a blatantly obvious jump scare opportunity? Though, if I don’t act now while I still can, I’ll never know the truth. Wouldn’t I regret not knowing the truth when presented with such a golden opportunity?

Screech.

My thoughts were interrupted by the abrupt sound of something heavy being dragged across the ground. When I looked at the couch I discovered there was now a distinct line of dust revealed beside the couch. Just to be clear, I never touched the couch. Was it an act of god? Like hell it was. Was I being taunted? Perhaps. Would I really fall for such a blatant provocation? Yes, I surely would. Challenge accepted.

If you thought I was going to just naively let myself get startled by a jump scare, you had another thing coming.

Instead of moving the couch out of the way like any other normal person might have done, instead, I grabbed a roll of duct tape from the table in the room and commenced operation ‘hanging phone.’ I took one long strip and folded it together so the tape wouldn’t stick to the wall or back of the couch when trying to position it in line with the hole. I took another strip and taped the first piece to the back of my phone. Once my sophisticated anti-jump scare spying device was fully functional, I opened up the camera app on my phone and pressed the record button.