She came home from dinner later than expected. Closer to midnight than she wanted it to be, meaning morning would come just that much sooner. She flicked a switch lighting up the whole living room. Shoes were kicked off in the corner with all the other shoes that seemed to make their home there. She headed into the kitchen taking just a second to hit a button to start the music, bypassing the television. Some soft rock station was playing a song by an old boy band who promised to love you forever. By this time all the good parts of the late night chat fests were over anyway and some celebrity was blathering about the importance of their latest project. Nobody would remember it six months or even six days from now. Besides she had a better idea for something to watch.
She took a trendy health enhanced water from the fridge and put it on the counter. It was too cold to drink right now. One of these days she’d figure out how to get the right temp, too bad the manual was long gone. On her way to the bedroom, her phone chirped. Looking down at the display she sighed. A concerned friend wanting to know if she made it home alright. She answered the text with a smiley face and turned it off. It was too late to give any more attention to that right now.
In the bedroom she switched out the fun clothes for the comfy clothes and returned to the living room. She turned the light off plunging the room into near darkness. She grabbed the water, walked to the window and opened the curtain. The only light came from the street and a few select residents who were still awake at this time. This was the show she wanted to see.
Her friends didn’t understand why she bought this apartment. It wasn’t in the best neighborhood but certainly not the worst. It wasn’t really convenient to downtown but it was in a decent spot for the train. No, it was the window seat and the big picture window. It took her back to a place with sweet memories and she had to live here. Discovering all the late night activities of her neighbors was just an unexpected benefit and became the perfect spot to relax before sleeping.
Tonight was a fairly active night. The office building off to the right had three rooms brightly lit. A cleaning crew was sitting in the breakroom eating leftover food. One lady on the fifth floor was actually working. Sadly, it probably wouldn’t mean a thing and her boss would take the credit for all her hard work. He also possibly told her that his wife didn’t love him and was going to leave her soon. Dream on, dear. He’s a liar.
Now floor three, window seven was much more interesting. He was a late night regular. Family pictures covered his wall, though it was too far to really see them but it was probably the All American family living the All American dream. Yeah, working late again, if by working you mean online poker. From the looks of it, it wasn’t a good night. The bottle of whiskey wasn’t helping either. Keep trying, hopefully your luck will improve before you lose it all.
Moving on to the residential buildings also proved to be interesting. The young man one floor down and directly across was furthering his health education by watching naughty videos and just barely avoided being caught by a parent. Just a momentary shadow in a sliver of light then the room was dark. A few minutes later a glow came from the window again.
Three floors above a couple dozed off on the couch, leaving just the family dog to watch the end of some movie. Too bad, he couldn’t tell them how it ended. This was a usual night for them. In an hour or so one would wake and stumble to the bedroom, not even noticing if the other followed.
Their neighbors two doors over weren’t sleeping in their bedroom either. Tonight was Game Night and it looked like some combination of vampire and super heroes. Most of the action was taking place away from the window. Yeah, it’s better that way. Besides that wasn’t the point of this voyeurism. There was just something about catching a glimpse of someone’s life when they didn’t think they were being watched.
Something caught her eye on the street. The last bus of the evening was nearly cut off by a taxi. Both had late night passengers. Ahh, more late night regulars. A young lady talking on her phone exited the taxi not even noticing the young man getting off the bus who was watching her. Perhaps he was just too shy to say anything to her. She probably wouldn’t have heard him anyway, the phone was always up to her ear. Or maybe she did notice him getting home from work and used the phone for security. Who knew what would happen if they just gave each other a chance?
A siren jolted her awake, not even realizing her eyes had closed. A police car was flying down the street. Some emergency needed attention but it wasn’t on this block. By now all the windows were dark and the only thing on the street was a garbage truck slowly moving along.
As she stood and pulled the curtain closed she caught what could’ve been a movement in another window. Was it possible she wasn’t the only one taking part in a little late night people watching? Just before the curtain closed off the window to the outside completely she gave a little wave of acknowledgement to her unseen watcher or maybe it was just to her own reflection. In a few minutes it wouldn’t matter because sleep would be occupying her until it was time to start the day over again and the night would bring on another show.
