Suga considered himself a patient and understanding person. After all, one had to be when they were a school teacher. But even the strongest soldiers had their limit and Suga’s new upstairs neighbor was testing his.
At first he hoped it was just general noise of them moving in, but that assumption ended when it continued well past two weeks. Suga persevered, though, and he put up with it all for over a month: the incessant chatter, TV turned up much too high, music blaring at all hours of the day. He tried to drown it out with music played through his headphones (because he was mindful of his own neighbors), and at night he shoved his head under his pillow to muffle the noise.
There was no peace, and some days Suga really really needed the world to be so silent that he forgot he was existing in it.
Some days, Suga didn’t want to think about what he would have to put up with or guess what time it would stop.
He thought about knocking on their door—maybe leaving a note—but then his neighbor would know his face, and what if they weren’t nice? No, it seemed safer to Suga to hide in his apartment and suffer in silence. Until one fateful Friday afternoon when he couldn’t take it anymore.
His day prior to coming home was already nearing the top of his ten-worst-days-ever list. Vomit over his slacks from a kid who had gotten sick, Suga trudged into his apartment. There was silence at first, and a glimmer of hope warmed Suga up. He prepared himself a bath, grabbed a book, lit a few candles…
Then came the music, and the shuffle of multiple pairs of feet.
Suga snapped, but he didn’t yell at them. Instead, he stormed to his room, opened his laptop, and changed his WiFi name. He didn’t check it again until an hour later when he was getting out of the bath.
Apt 609, you’re loud as fuck!
Apt??? Say it to my face, coward
Infuriating. Who were they to get angry at him when it was them making all the noise? This wasn’t over by a long shot, and Suga was determined to have the last word. So, he logged back in to change his wifi name again.
Every clack of his keyboard echoed throughout his apartment, embodying his anger. If anyone else has been there, they would have commented on it. Hell, Suga was pretty sure that his next door neighbor could hear him typing. Especially when he started hitting the same letter over and over again until he noticed the red: 0/32.
Suga was going to have to be a little more creative to say all he wanted in such a limited space.
UWouldntHearMeOverUrCrapMusic
Crap?WtfUAMusicSnobOrSomething
Rude. Suga liked lots of music, but what his neighbor listened to could only be described as screeches and clanks. If there was any musicality within it, it was indiscernible to Suga. In fact, Suga was certain that anyone (except his neighbor) would agree with him, and he was determined to make that known.
No, I just have ears
GetRidOfThose&MyNoiseWontBotherU
Absolutely annoying. For three years, Suga had never had any problem with his neighbors. Sure, there were occasional times when someone was a bit loud, but it never lasted more than a day or two. It was the typical living in an apartment building woes, nothing more and nothing less.
But this neighbor… This neighbor did things just to be obnoxious. Which included them starting to blast their music. It wasn’t their usual, and the act felt purposeful. So he opened his laptop to send a message only to find one waiting for him.
How about this for music choice?
Suga decided not to reply. Instead, he changed his WiFi back to the random string that blended in with all the rest. To get the last word, he was going to say nothing. He grinned to himself, thinking about how much it will drive his neighbor insane to not know what Suga thought of the new music—which was much improved.
Makki hung his keys on the small hook. Leaving his shoes by the door, he entered his apartment to find his friends all on his couch, surrounding his laptop.
“You would think you all would be the unemployed ones, not me,” Makki said as he set down the take-out.
He left them for a moment to grab a few bowls and napkins, and when he returned, they all smiled at him. Not the smiles that said they were happy to be there. No, these were shit-eating grins. The kind that said they had done something, and Makki was the one who would be paying the price.
“Okay, what did you do?”
They flipped his laptop around.
Baby come back! ( づ￣ ³￣ )づ
Who are you calling baby?
“That doesn’t sound like me at all. I would never beg,” Makki said, eyes on Oikawa. The handiwork was clearly his, but his response was just to shrug, unconcerned with what he had done.
It had been just under a week since his neighbor last communicated via their WiFi display names. The day it happened Matsukawa had been with him, and he sent the whole thing into the group chat. So when Oikawa came over earlier that day—bringing Iwaizumi with him while they were both on vacation—he was very interested to hear if things had developed more.
Then came his disappointment when Makki’s answer was nothing, leading Oikawa to take matters into his own hands.
“Makki’s right,” Matsukawa said and grabbed the laptop and started typing away. Not long after, he showed them all the screen.
You my darling. I miss you!
Makki sighed and snatched his laptop away from his friends; they had lost the privileges to change his WiFi name. He took it to the kitchen as he went to fetch them some drinks, logging in one more time to change the name again.
He put it all to the back of his mind after that, and they enjoyed their dinner together. Oikawa went on about how he was certain the mystery neighbor had to be attractive, and Matsukawa backed him up, saying there were very few unattractive people in the apartment complex. Iwaizumi had nothing to add, but that had more to do with the food in front of them.
Eventually their conversation naturally shifted, and by the time Oikawa was helping him clean up, Makki had forgotten he was waiting for the reply. His current thoughts were on putting away the food, making popcorn, and forcing someone else to decide what movie they watched.
Until Oikawa squawked, and Makki pulled out his phone to check the nearby WiFi names.
Apt???AreYouThere?CanYouHearMe?
No, I got my ears removed…
Makki was too late to keep Oikawa from replying. He hit enter right before Makki reached him.
Wait what????!!!! (* O *)
“Would you stop? My neighbor is going to think I am dramatic,” Makki said. He took his laptop back, ordering Oikawa to finish making the popcorn.
Although he didn’t believe that his neighbor would take such drastic measures, a part of him thought of the ‘what if.’ He hadn’t heard from them until today, despite not doing anything to quiet his routine. Though, a more likely scenario was that they left their apartment for some days or got ear plugs. Or that they were ignoring Makki on purpose.
His curiosity won. He was desperate to know.
You are lying right?
They watched the first movie, and Makki made sure to keep the volume up. It didn’t need to be that loud, but he wanted to get his neighbor to crack.
With still no reply, Makki has to try again.
Apt??? Please tell me ur lying!
“You know, if you want your neighbor to respond, you have to do something that will make them more annoyed than usual,” Matsukawa told him as he waved his phone, noting how he knew Makki had been changing his WiFi name.
“And what would you suggest?”
“Got a bag of marbles? Or I guess dumping all your silverware onto the floor would suffice.”
“That would only annoy the person underneath me, and I would be left to clean it up, try again.” Makki shook his head and rolled his eyes.
“Iwaizumi, do you still know how to tap dance?” Matsukawa asked, grinning wildly.
Iwaizumi shrugged, “Not really.”
That didn’t stop them. Once Oikawa thought it would be a fun idea, he was already pulling Iwaizumi off the couch to teach them the few moves he remembered. The steps were quickly forgotten and it just became them smacking the feet against Makki’s kitchen floor. Of course, it didn’t make even close to the right sound, so Makki and Matsukawa taped spoons to their feet, which turned to be more slippery than they expected (in addition to it hurting the soles of their feet).
They fell flat on their asses laughing. Makki had forgotten why they were doing any of this until Oikawa brought his phone up to Makki’s face and excitedly shouted, “They replied!”
Suga had had enough. There was only so much he could ignore. He knew his upstairs neighbor wanted to get a rise out of him, and he wanted to say he could resist giving them that satisfaction. After all, he felt like he was winning. They kept changing their WiFi name, desperate for him to reply.
But, it was their desperation for him to reply that brought him to the current predicament—them stomping around their kitchen.
There were only two choices. Wait for his neighbor to tire or cave and reply. His stubbornness wanted to do the first, but he knew they would go all night and just pick it back up in the morning. So Suga was stuck with the latter.
He grabbed his laptop, not even thinking about how his answer would give away his location until he saw the neighbor reply.
WTF RU teaching a tap class 609?
IKnewIt!UCanStillHearMe…509??
Shit. There went the bit of anonymity that this mode of communication had given him. They were going to be meeting, which would either end with them laughing or with Suga getting his ass kicked.
It was best to keep up his front. He wasn’t afraid of his neighbor, and he wasn’t afraid to play with fire. At this point it seemed like he had nothing to lose. Besides, from what he has been able to figure out, his neighbor didn’t seem like a bad guy. He never heard any arguments or fights; it was just obnoxious noise.
Suga dared them to come check.
Fuck around and find out
Challenge accepted _へ__(‾◡◝ )
Not five minutes later, there came a knock on Suga’s apartment door.
He walked quietly, avoiding the spots on his floor that he knew creaked. Since his neighbor could be scary or creepy, Suga wanted the option to pretend that 509 was incorrect. Careful not to touch the door, he peered through the peephole.
His neighbor was not ugly at all. Actually, Suga stopped breathing for a second as his heart skipped a beat when he saw the pink hair. There had been a fair amount of new faces the past couple of months with people moving in and out, so it had not crossed his mind that the one guy he had been dying to accidentally bump into would be the same person who had been tormenting him.
Suga straightened his clothes and took a deep breath before he unlocked and opened the door.
“May I help you?” he asked, keeping his voice cool. He kept a hand on the door, ready to slam it shut if need be.
Their eyes met, and the man paused. Full stop. Mouth a little open. He looked at Suga without saying a thing. Despite the butterflies he felt, Suga knew he had the upper hand. He was in control.
“Apartment 609, I assume,” Suga smiled.
The man nodded. “Makki.”
“Huh?”
“Makki. You can call me Makki,” he stammered.
His grin widened. “Well, Makki, do you think you could be a bit quieter now that you know who you’re torturing with all that racket?”
Suga lifted himself on his tip-toes and was leaning forward in his door frame. It took everything he had not to blush, especially as his heart raced. Yet, his confidence renewed as Makki blushed the same shade as his hair.
“Yeah. My apologies. My friends are dumbasses. We’ll be quieter from now on, I’ll make sure of it.”
“Lovely!” Suga chirped. He wanted to ask Makki out, but he thought he was going to break at any moment. The words caught in his throat, switching at the last second. “I’ll see you around then?”
“Yeah, you will…uh…”
“Suga.”
“Cool. Yeah— Suga, Suga, Suga,” Makki muttered to himself before coming back to Earth. “See you around, Suga.” He tripped as he turned to walk away.
Suga laughed and closed his door. He stayed with his ear against it, listening until he heard Makki’s footsteps echo down the hall. Then he slid down against the cool surface to the floor.
After a few minutes of replaying everything in his head, Suga checked the WiFi to find a message waiting for him. Makki might have acted flustered outside the door, but behind the safety of his own door, he was back to the cocky, annoying neighbor self—that he now found endearing.
Friday 7pm. You. Me. Dinner.
Suga smiled at the message. He would reply to it later. For now, though, he would let Makki sweat a little.