Rich, Pretty Rich

-Pretty Rich-
by ali shaw

The woman living opposite me was sexy. A friend saw her, and described
her as sex on legs. But there was only one of her. She had a body that
The Daily Star was unworthy of. She was a phenomenal tempest of
pheromones. Men used to stop casually in the road between our houses,
and fiddle with their shoe laces or check that they had something in
their satchel, all the while glancing up at the window of her front
room. Often they would come in gangs, eyes wide, breath heavy, because
she would never disappoint. She was always there, often in just her
underwear, or a tiny bath towel wrapped just over her nipples and her
hips. Sometimes she would dance and pretend that nobody could see her.
On some occasions she strip-danced. One man offered me four million for
the use of my sitting room for a week, because it gave such an
excellent view. I refused on principal. I loathed her. I was sick of
her from the moment I moved in.

I spent my days with the curtains closed, and inspected the tarmac
whenever I walked in the street, only lifting my eyes to avoid the
clusters of other men who gawped in awe. It became a personal mission,
to never see an inch of that girl's body for as long as I lived.

One day she almost caught me. The phone rang at night, and the receiver
went dead as soon as I picked up. Half-conscious, I lifted a flap of
the curtain to see if the sun was close to rising outside, and if there
was time enough to plunge back into sleep. There she was, stood stark
naked, pressed against her window, her tongue beckoning to me. I tugged
the curtain back over the glass, panicked, rushed to the shed in my
night clothes and came back with a hammer and nails, to bind the cloth
to the wall so that I wouldn't be tempted to lift the veil again and
behold her incredible curves. I wept when I had finished. I was in a
state of extreme arousal, and it seemed such an impossible task for any
one man, to avoid the enchanting body of the lady who lived opposite. I
was sick until there was nothing left to heave out of my stomach, but
somehow I held out. I thought I might move house, but that would mean
that I had succumbed.

The torture continued, sluggishly inching through the days. I was fired
because I wasn't working, I was battling my infatuation. I was at grips
with a bestial lust, fighting over my very will itself. I developed
little diversions, delved deeply into porn, but none of those
so-called, 'beauties,' could match up to the thoughts that continually
returned to me, the compelling, the tugging urge to take one lengthy,
dribbling look at Her.

I researched the lives of the monks, the flagellants who battered
themselves to purge the sins of the flesh. I put the hammer and nails
to use on my toes and I prayed ceaselessly, I scrubbed at my face with
sandpaper and read and reread the Ten Commandments while hacking at my
shins with a trowel.

And, eventually, I won. I overcame on one drizzling morning; woke,
yawned, stretched, tugged the curtain free of its nails, and admired
the wondrous subtleties in the tones of the rain clouds. I knew she was
there, I knew she was jiggling and prancing and leaping about in
desperation, wobbling her wares this way and that. Yet I felt no need
to look, in fact, I detested even the thought of switching my glance to
her. I watched the sky for a quarter of an hour, until it stopped
raining, and then I went and poured myself a bowl of corn flakes. I was
in the best mood that I had seen for years, and I even considered going
for an early-morning jog. Then there was a knock at the door.
Leisurely, I upped, taking my coffee with me, and walked into the hall.
I opened up with a smile on my face. Men were there. All manner of men,
uniformed for various trades, or in casual dress. They seized me, and
dragged me away. My coffee cup fell, and lay in many pieces on the
doorstep where it had shattered.