'Milk' by Carrie Etter

I slid under the duvet, closed my eyes, and almost at once opened them again: above me, the young couple had begun arguing. I knew her name—Janey, a wisp of a young woman with large dark eyes and a messy, new-colour-every-week bob—well, I’d seen it a mousey brown, electric blue, and neon orange in the few months they’d been living here. I’m sure at some point I’d been told his name, but could only remember his scowl.

They were shouting in turns. He hadn’t paid some bill, and she was a fucking nag. I reached for the foam earplugs on the nightstand and heard a crash and her scream.

I sat up and yelled, “You okay up there?” Faint sobs. Glass being swept. Footsteps. Speech, but the volume too low for me to discern words.

I laid back, listening, and eventually drifted into sleep. As the next day was Saturday, I spent the morning reading and drinking milky coffee, and around eleven, a knock sounded on my door. I regretted not having put on any makeup yet, but figured it was the postman, who’d seen me au natural a few times before.

It was the young man from upstairs, tall, with scruffy dark hair and a freshly bruised purple, swollen eye. “Um, I’m Michael, from the apartment above? I was hoping I could borrow some milk.”

For a minute I just stared, trying to fit the image before me with what I’d imagined last night. “Come in.”