Yeah, this one's a little short, but it's to clear up a few things that Anthony didn't know about her, and to add another detail that's going to come up a bit more later in the story.
Yeah, so, I'm pretty lucky that Natalia didn't come after me with a gun after we left the restaurant. I don't think I could run faster than a bullet. But that's not the point. The main point is what happened the following morning. I don't want to be all melodramatic about this and all, but holy shit.
So I get up for my job at around 6:30 (before just about everyone on my floor) and I'm gone 15 minutes later. Usually it's all quiet around this time, because there's nobody else insane enough to sign up for a job that requires you to wake up at the crack of dawn. Well, besides me.
So I was brewing a cup of coffee, (I hate having to wait in lines. I'm not a patient person at all. Being a cop has let me get to any place I want in a matter of seconds, except the front of the line at Starbucks. But I digress to the max) when I heard a really weird noise. It sounded like a snoring sort of groan thing, but I couldn't be sure. It sort of reminded me of the sound I was caught making on tape when I had to sleep on a couch at my Great-Aunt Rita's house. She's not malicious or anything. She's actually quite lovely. Luckily I got rid of the tape. But again, I digress. Whatever was making the noise was now growing increasingly louder. I stopped fooling around with my tie, tip toed over to the wall that separated me from the noise coming from the room next to me. I pressed my ear cautiously against the wall, and took a listen. I heard groaning, moaning, but it all sounded like they were being made by someone who was in serious pain. I contemplated going over there and knocking on their door to see who would answer. Mind you, I knew nothing about the person living next door to me. I knew they left the house multiple times throughout the day. Some days they'd stay confined to the apartment all day, other days they'd be in and out and in and out. Yet I could never catch a glimpse of them. And they were never up at 6:30. I figured they must live alone. Suddenly, I heard a telephone pierce the air with it's shrill ringing. Which is really really annoying to hear in the morning. That was followed with what sort of sounded like the person waking up, but it also sounded like they had fallen to the floor somehow. Finally, the whole thing started to creep me out, so I shrugged it off, continued messing around with my tie, gave up on it, poured my coffee into a cup, and headed for the door.
I have no idea how me and Natalia ended up opening our doors at the same time, and how we both came to face each other simultaneously, but we did. It's hard to say who was more shocked. I'd say she was more shocked, because I was less shocked, and more terrified. I still suspected she wanted to kill me. Almost a second later, she was smiling and greeting me with a scary amount of decorum. God, she's amazing.
"Aha! Anthony!"
"Whoa. What a shocker."
"I'll say."
"How is it that we've been living next to each other for 2 years-“
“Uh, six.”
“But I’ve only been here for 2. I did my training as a cop here, but I’d always drive back home to New Jersey.”
“Oh. Lucky. My parents were always fighting, so I took up NYU’s four yearscholarship offer-“
“You were always a smart one.”
“Thank you. So I took up that. But then in my third year, I was offered to do some modeling for a department store, and that’s when I decided I wanted to become a model.”
“You juggled all that and still graduated with a Master’s...are you like a robot or something?”
“You think it was all smooth sailing? I was in horrible shape; my first year was terrible because all the agents thought I was “too fat.””
“Yeesh. So how’d you get in shape?”
“Well, finally I was offered to do some more modeling, and that’s when Griffin came along and decided to help me out. Then we hired Richard to help me get back into shape, and the rest is history. Oh my God, I’ve been talking about myself way too much! And you look like you have somewhere to go!” She bit her lip and looked embarrassed.
“Oh no, it’s no problem. We’ll take a stroll done Memory Lane another time.”
“Oh ok. Bye Anthony!” She turned and walked the opposite way of me, disappearing out of sight faster than I could realize she was leaving.
Well, what were the odds?
Where did she have to go anyway this early in morning anyway?
YOU ARE READING
I Think I Knew That Model
HumorNatalia has come a long way from her geeky, loser teenage years, and now her dream to move to Manhattan and become a model and is a reality. While the lifestyle in is far from glamorous, she's finally happy with herself, and what her life has to of...
