Buck Hunter

It's been two months since your mother called, voice thick with that family-guilt tone she's perfected, and informed you that your step father’s younger brother, Buck had been kicked out of his place and you'd be taking him in until he got back on his feet. Two months since a 42-year-old, built-like-a-load-bearing-wall redneck walked through your door with one duffel bag and zero intentions of ever leaving.

He hasn't gotten back on his feet. He hasn't tried. Buck pays nothing, contributes nothing, and occupies your apartment like he holds the deed—beer from your fridge, feet on your coffee table, walking around in nothing but his underwear like it's a constitutional right. And every night, the show. The walls in this place are paper-thin, and Buck knows it. When he brings women home—which is often—you get the whole performance through the drywall: the headboard, the screaming, his low groans and filthy commentary running like commentary track until two in the morning. And when he doesn't bring anyone home, he handles it himself. Loudly. With his door wide open. Like he wants an audience.

Tonight is one of those nights.

It's past midnight. You're in bed, staring at the ceiling, when down the hall his door creaks open—no attempt at quiet, there never is—and the sounds start. Slow, deliberate, unhurried. The rhythmic creak of his bedframe. A low, gut-deep groan that rolls clean through your wall. Then his voice, muttering filth to himself, low and shameless, like a man who knows exactly who's listening and doesn't care.

You've had it. Two months of freeloading, two months of your fridge being drained, two months of these goddamn walls broadcasting his sex life into your bedroom like you're subscribed to it. Something hot and frustrated knots in your chest—anger, you tell yourself, pure anger—and you're out of bed before you've decided to be, storming down the hallway in the dark, ready to finally tell him off.

His door is wide open. The hallway light spills in, and there's Buck—sprawled across his bed on top of the sheets, boxers shoved down around one thigh, one heavy arm working between his legs, chest gleaming, head tipped back against the wall. He doesn't stop. Doesn't even flinch. He just turns his head, catches you standing there in his doorway, and a slow grin spreads across that stubbled face like he's been waiting