❀ Auslly one shot ❁

Knock three times/Auslly

Writing Prompt: Knock Three Times. Write a romance story about two people who live in abutting apartments and are madly in love with each other, but have never actually met each other face to face.

I imagine them to be around twenty in this story.

Knock Three Times

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"Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind,

And therefore is winged Cupid painted blind."

-- William Shakespeare, A Midsummer Night's Dream, 1595.

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Austin awoke drowsily, stretching out his toned arms as his eyes fluttered open. He began to smile as he remembered it was Friday, and more importantly, his first day off from doing studio work in months.

He lazily dragged himself to the bathroom, chuckling to himself about the blonde bed-head that stared back at him in the mirror. Turning on the water, he prepared to have a nice long, hot shower.

Getting out of his pyjamas and stepping into the shower, he let out a high pitched squeal when the water hit his body, feeling the stone cold droplets and starting to shiver.

Looking at the faucet, he made sure it said hot and that it was turned most of the way up. Austin dropped the detachable shower head when the cold sent a shock down his spine, and immediately winced when it clanged with the shower floor.

He groaned loudly and wrapped a towel around himself, walking determinedly towards his bedroom, where he knew his wall joined with the girl from next door.

Austin hit it loudly and frantically.

"Dawson!" he called, voice raised. "This is the third time in two weeks that you've run off all the hot water!"

"It's rude to knock on the wall." Was the dismissive but firm reply.

"You know we share a hot water tank, just..." he trailed off, not knowing what to say. "Just don't let it happen again, alright?"

"Sorry, Moon." The girl from next door called back, not sounding sorry in the slightest. He could imagine her smirking face on the other side of the wall.

Except he couldn't.

Somehow, even though they'd had numerous through-the-wall conversations, he'd never actually seen her face and had no idea what she looked like; what she was like or what she did for a living, or anything about her for that matter.

It was strange, but somehow Austin managed to take a small comfort from it.

He shook his head with a small, reluctant smile and turned on the immersion, planning to wait for the water to heat up.

Ally ran a hand down her curly, ombré hair with a sigh. She was sure that Moon from next door would be home soon, and no doubt start playing loud music the way he sometimes did late on a Saturday night.

Not that she didn't like partying. Well. She liked to go clubbing, where you didn't know anyone and it was dark and the drinks were better. Parties to her felt like forced fun with people you didn't particularly like.

Anyway, sidetracking.

She didn't mind his parties normally, but for the past few weeks she'd been snowed under at her job, and any peace and quiet she could get would be a big help, honestly.

Her dad had gone to New York to expand their musical instrument business, Sonic Boom, by advertising that people could record their own songs for a fee. Therefore, she'd had to offer this at the Sonic Boom she was stuck managing in Miami. Plus, her dad was terrible at taxes and anything number related, leaving her to do all the hard work and number crunching for both shops.