Trapped in the Dark With My Enemy

The first time I saw him, he was moving a hideous velvet couch into 7B, and it was blocking my door to 7A.

“Watch the paint,” I’d said, my voice tight, as one of the burly movers scraped the armrest against the pristine eggshell of the hallway wall. My hallway wall.

A man emerged from behind the monstrosity, wiping his forehead with the back of his hand. He had dark, messy hair that looked like he’d been running his fingers through it, and his gray t-shirt was damp with sweat. His eyes, a startling shade of blue-green like sea glass, found mine. “Sorry about that,” he said, not sounding sorry at all. He flashed a grin that was all white teeth and effortless charm. “New neighbor, I take it?”

“Apparently,” I said, folding my arms. “I’m Elara. I live here.” I gestured unnecessarily to my door.

“Milo,” he said, and instead of offering a hand, he shoved them in the pockets of his worn jeans. “Looks like we’re gonna be seeing a lot of each other.”

That was the understatement of the century. For the next three weeks, Milo of 7B became the soundtrack to my carefully curated, meticulously quiet life. His music was a thumping bass line that seeped through the wall at 11 PM on a Tuesday. His laughter, loud and infectious, echoed in the hallway with his equally loud friends. He left his running shoes, caked with mud, right outside his door. He burned toast with alarming regularity, setting off the building’s sensitive smoke alarms at least twice.

And he was, infuriatingly, beautiful. It was a physical ache, a low-grade annoyance in my gut every time I saw him. He’d emerge from the stairwell, breathless from a run, his skin flushed and his t-shirt clinging to a chest that was clearly more than decorative. Or I’d catch him in the elevator, smelling of soap and something earthy, like sandalwood, his stupidly long lashes casting shadows on his cheeks. He’d always offer that same easy grin. “Hey, Elara. How’s the war?”

Because I’d made my displeasure known. A politely worded note about “quiet hours after 10 PM.” A complaint to the building manager about the “persistent olfactory nuisance” of athletic footwear in a common area. I’d even, in a moment of peak pettiness, slid a coupon for a local smoke alarm battery store under his door.

He’d taped the coupon to his door with a post-it that read, “Thanks, Mom! - Milo.”

I hated him.

Which is why, on that fateful Thursday evening, when the elevator doors slid open to reveal him already inside, leaning against the back wall, I felt my entire body tense. I’d just finished a grueling twelve-hour shift at the architectural firm, my feet were screaming, and all I wanted was my quiet apartment, a glass of pinot noir, and the sweet silence of my own company. The presentation hadn’t gone well. My design for a new library annex had been called “soulless” and “overly controlled” by a partner, his words picking neatly at the lock of a fear I kept buried: that my need for order was stifling, that it built beautiful, empty boxes.

“Evening,” Milo said, his voice a low rumble in the small space.

I gave a curt nod, stepping in and pressing the button for 7. The doors closed, sealing us in. The elevator was a relic, a charming but slow bronze box with a mirrored back wall. I stared straight ahead at the polished doors, acutely aware of his reflection behind me. He was watching me, a faint, unreadable smile on his lips. He wore a dark henley that stretched across his shoulders, and he’d rolled the sleeves up to his elbows, revealing forearms dusted with fine dark hair. I could smell him again—that clean, woodsy scent, underscored by something uniquely male.

“Long day?” he asked.

“The longest,” I said, my voice clipped.

“You always look so… intense when you come home. Like you’re carrying the weight of the world’s blueprints on those shoulders.”

I shot a glare at his reflection. “Some of us have serious jobs.”

He chuckled. “And some of us have jobs that don’t require us to frown at elevators. I teach music, for the record. To teenagers. That’s serious.”

A music teacher. Of course. That explained the late-night jam sessions. I was about to retort when the elevator gave a violent shudder. A horrible grinding noise screeched from above us, and the lights flickered once, twice, and then died with a final, decisive pop.

We were plunged into absolute, suffocating blackness.

A small, involuntary sound escaped my throat—a gasp of pure shock. The elevator car jerked to a halt, the sensation of motion replaced by a terrifying, static suspension.

“Whoa,” Milo said, his voice suddenly close in the dark.

Panic, cold and slick, shot through my veins. I am not claustrophobic. I tell myself this as a mantra. But the complete absence of light, the sudden silence broken only by our breathing, the sheer impossibility of escape… it pressed in on me from all sides. My carefully managed world had just shrunk to a three-by-five-foot box of pure chaos.

“Okay,” Milo said, his tone shifting into something calm, practical. “Okay, don’t panic. It’s just a power outage. The backup generator should kick in.”

“Should?” My voice was too high.

I heard him move, his shoes scuffing on the floor. A moment later, the pale blue glow of a smartphone screen illuminated his face from below, casting eerie shadows. He looked focused, not scared. He tapped the screen, then held the phone up. The feeble light did little to push back the dark, but it was something. I could see the worry lines etched around his eyes now.

“No signal,” he said. “But there’s an emergency phone.” He shuffled toward the control panel, his shoulder brushing against mine in the cramped space. A jolt, electric and unwelcome, shot through me at the contact. He found the small, recessed handle and pulled open the panel. He lifted the old-fashioned red handset, listened for a moment, then pressed a button.

“Hello? Yeah, we’re stuck in elevator… what? Seven? I think between six and seven.” He paused, listening. His jaw tightened. “You’re kidding. How long?” Another pause. “Great. Just great. Thanks.” He hung up with more force than necessary.

“What?” I demanded, my heart hammering against my ribs.

He turned to me, the phone light making his sea-glass eyes look almost supernatural. “The power’s out for the whole block. A transformer blew or something. Backup generator’s fried. They’ve called the fire department, but with the storm…” He gestured vaguely, and for the first time, I registered the distant rumble of thunder I’d been ignoring. “They said it could be a couple of hours. Maybe more.”

“Hours?” The word came out as a whisper. “In here?”

“Afraid so.” He sank down to sit on the floor, his back against the mirrored wall, and stretched his long legs out. “Might as well get comfortable, Elara.”

Comfortable. In a metal tomb with my nemesis. I remained standing, frozen, my arms wrapped tightly around myself.

“You’re not going to sit?” he asked after a moment of tense silence.

“I’m fine.”

“Suit yourself. But your feet are probably killing you. I can hear you shifting your weight from here.”

I hated that he was right. Hated that he noticed. With a sigh of defeat that was mostly for my own benefit, I slowly slid down the opposite wall, mirroring his posture. The cold from the floor seeped through my tailored trousers. The phone light between us created a small, intimate pool of illumination. I could see the dust motes dancing in the beam, the scuff marks on his boots.

“So,” he said. “Trapped in the dark with your least favorite person. This must be your personal hell.”

“It’s ranking pretty high,” I admitted, and to my surprise, a weak laugh bubbled out of me. It sounded slightly hysterical.

He smiled, a genuine one that reached his eyes, making crinkles appear at the corners. “Look on the bright side. At least I don’t have my guitar.”

“Is there a bright side to being entombed?”

“We’re not entombed. We’re… temporarily inconvenienced. And now we can finally have that conversation you’ve been avoiding.”

“What conversation?”

“The one where you admit you don’t actually hate me. You just hate that you’re attracted to me.”

The air vanished from the elevator. All of it. I stared at him, my mouth agape. “I—what? That is the most arrogant, ridiculous—”

“Is it?” He tilted his head, the light catching the stubble along his jaw. “You watch me, Elara. Every time we pass in the hall. You give me that frosty glare, but your eyes… they drop. They take a little tour. And you always flush, just here.” He pointed to the hollow of his own throat.

I felt the heat bloom on my chest and neck, betraying me utterly. “You’re imagining things.”

“Am I?” His voice dropped, losing its teasing edge, becoming something softer, more dangerous. “I notice things, too. The click of your heels in the morning. So precise. The light under your door, late. I’ve caught your scent in the hall… rain, lilies.” He leaned forward slightly, the movement causing his knee to almost touch mine. He hesitated, as if searching for words. “It’s not… it’s not just watching. It’s that you’re so… contained. It makes me want to know what happens when you’re not.”

The confession, fragmented and raw, didn’t hang in the air—it seeped into the cracks of my resolve. My carefully constructed wall of animosity developed a catastrophic fault line. All this time, I’d thought my secret was safe, that my annoyance was a perfect cover for the inconvenient, humming attraction I felt every time he was near. And he’d seen through it. Not with a poetic monologue, but with simple, observant truths.

“I hate your loud music,” I said, but my voice lacked its usual venom.

“I know. I’ll use headphones after ten. Promise.”

“And your shoes are a biohazard.”

“I’ll keep them inside.”

“You burn toast.”

“I’m a terrible cook. I’ll buy a toaster oven with an automatic shut-off.” He was smiling again, but it was different. Softer. “See? Compromise.”

Another roll of thunder echoed, closer this time. The elevator car felt even smaller, the walls closer. The pool of light from his phone seemed to shrink, drawing us into its center.

“Why did you tape the coupon to your door?” I asked quietly.

“To annoy you,” he said simply. “Because when you’re annoyed, you get this little line right between your eyebrows.” He reached out, and before I could flinch, his thumb brushed gently over the spot. The touch was a brand. My breath hitched. “And I like knowing I can affect you. Even if it’s negative attention. It’s better than the nothing you give everyone else.”

His thumb didn’t move away. It traced a slow, feather-light path down the bridge of my nose, then over to my cheekbone. I should have slapped his hand away. I should have delivered a scathing retort. Instead, I sat perfectly still, my blood singing in my veins, every nerve ending focused on that single point of contact.

My mind was a riot of conflict. This was insanity. He was chaos personified, the human embodiment of everything I’d spent years building walls against. Letting him in, even this much, felt like a personal failure. The partner’s words echoed: soulless, overly controlled. Was my control just fear in a tailored suit? Here in the dark, with the world and its judgments suspended, that fear felt heavy and pointless. His touch was an anchor in the formless dark, a sensation so vivid it overrode every cautious protocol.

I realized I was trembling, a fine vibration in my hands where they rested in my lap. I held my breath, as if the slightest exhale would be a surrender. But my body was leaning into his touch of its own volition, my head tilting just so to feel the rough pad of his thumb against my jawline. The decision wasn’t a conscious one. It was a dam breaking after a long, slow leak. The fight drained out of me, not with a whimper, but with a rush of heat that left me dizzy.

“This is a terrible idea,” I whispered, my eyes locked on his in the dim light. The words were my last, feeble stand.

“The worst,” he agreed, his voice a husky murmur. “We’re stuck in here for who knows how long. We have nothing but time and poor decisions.”

His hand slid from my cheek to cup the back of my neck. His skin was warm, his touch surprisingly sure. He was giving me time, space to pull away. Every rational cell in my body screamed for me to do just that. But a deeper, older, more insistent part had already chosen. It was the part that was tired of blueprints and empty boxes, the part that craved the messy, unpredictable symphony he seemed to live.

“Milo,” I breathed. It wasn’t a warning anymore. It was a release.

He answered by closing the distance between us. Not with a sudden lunge, but with a slow, inevitable drift, like two planets whose orbits have finally intersected. His lips met mine.

And the world didn’t end. The elevator didn’t plummet. The kiss was not a conquest or a battle. It was a discovery. His mouth was soft but insistent, tasting faintly of coffee and mint. The scruff of his beard was a delicious abrasion against my skin. A low groan vibrated from his chest into mine as I responded, my own lips parting, my hand coming up to fist in the soft fabric of his henley. I pulled him closer.

The phone clattered to the floor, forgotten, plunging us back into near darkness. But it didn’t matter. We were a universe of sensation. His tongue swept into my mouth, and I met it with my own, the kiss deepening from exploration to something hungry, years of suppressed tension igniting at once. My other hand found his hair, as soft and thick as I’d imagined, and I wound my fingers through it, earning another, deeper groan from him.

He broke the kiss, his forehead resting against mine, our breaths coming in ragged, shared gusts. “Tell me to stop,” he whispered, his lips brushing mine with each word.

“No.”

It was all the permission he needed. His hands slid down from my neck, over my shoulders, mapping the shape of me through my silk blouse. His touch was everywhere, burning through the layers of fabric and professionalism. He found the hem of my blouse and slipped his hands beneath it, his palms hot and slightly rough against the skin of my waist. I arched into the touch, a shudder running through me.

“You’re so fucking beautiful,” he muttered against my throat, his mouth following the frantic pulse there. “So smart and sharp and… God, the way you look at me like you want to dissect me.”

“Maybe I do,” I gasped as his teeth grazed my collarbone. In the dark, with his body against mine, the need to understand him felt primal. Who are you under all this noise? I thought, the words lost in a sigh.

He chuckled, the sound dark and thrilling. “Have at it, then.”

In one smooth, shockingly strong motion, he shifted us, turning so my back was against the wall, his body caging me in. The cold, riveted metal was a stark contrast to the heat radiating from him. He kissed me again, deeper, more consuming, while his hands worked at the buttons of my blouse. My own fingers were clumsy as they pulled his henley up and over his head. I needed to feel him. The phone light from the floor cast upward shadows, illuminating the hard planes of his chest, the dip of his stomach. He was all lean muscle and warm skin. I splayed my hands across his pectorals, feeling his heart hammering against my palm. So fast, I thought, for someone who seems so casual about everything.

“Your turn,” he said, his voice thick. He finished with the buttons and pushed my blouse open, then made quick work of the front clasp of my bra. The air in the elevator, once stale, felt cool and shocking on my bared skin. His gaze dropped, and his breath caught. “Jesus, Elara.”

He didn’t just look. He worshiped. He bent his head, and his mouth closed over my breast, his tongue circling my nipple before drawing it deep. A cry tore from my throat, the sound echoing in the small space, raw and wanton. I clutched at his shoulders, my nails digging in. The sensation was overwhelming—the contrast of his hot mouth, the scratch of his beard, the sheer illicit thrill of what we were doing, here, now. In the echoing silence between rumbles of thunder, the wet sound of his mouth on my skin was obscenely loud, and a fresh wave of heat washed through me. This is real. This is happening.

His hand slid down over my stomach, over the waistband of my trousers, and cupped me through the fabric. I bucked against his palm, a moan escaping me. The thin layer of silk was suddenly an unbearable barrier.

“Please,” I heard myself beg, a word I never used. It felt like handing him a key to a room I’d kept locked even from myself.

He understood. His fingers made quick work of the button and zipper, and he pushed my trousers and underwear down my hips just enough. His touch, when it came, was direct, seeking. He found me wet, desperately ready for him. A ragged sound of approval came from his throat as he stroked me, his fingers learning my rhythm, circling the sensitive core of my pleasure until I was panting, my head thrown back against the wall.

“Milo… I can’t… if you keep doing that…”

“What?” he murmured, kissing my shoulder. “What will happen?”

“I’ll come. And I want… I want you.” The admission felt like a greater vulnerability than being naked. I want you. Not just release, but him.

He stilled his hand, but the pressure remained, tantalizing. “Are you sure? Here? Now?”

I opened my eyes. In the faint, ghostly light, I could see the tension in his face, the desire warring with a last shred of decency. I reached for the waistband of his jeans, fumbling with the button. “I have never been more sure of a terrible decision in my life.” And I make decisions for a living.

That broke him. He helped me, shoving his jeans and boxer briefs down just enough to free himself. He was hard, thick, and the sight of him in the dim light sent a fresh wave of liquid heat through me. He reached into his discarded jeans pocket and, miraculously, produced a small foil packet. I raised an eyebrow.

“A music teacher is always prepared for a field trip,” he said with a wry, breathless grin.

I took it from him and tore it open with my teeth, my eyes never leaving his. I sheathed him slowly, my fingers trembling, and his eyes fluttered closed for a second, a muscle ticking in his jaw. “Elara,” he whispered, just my name, but it sounded like a confession of its own.

When I was done, he didn’t hesitate. He hooked his hands under my thighs and lifted me, pressing my back fully against the cool elevator wall. I wrapped my legs around his waist, the new position making me feel utterly exposed, utterly claimed. He guided himself to me, the blunt head of him nudging against my entrance.

“Look at me,” he commanded, his voice guttural.

I did. Our eyes locked as he pushed inside, slowly, inexorably, filling me in one long, stunning stroke. A gasp was torn from both of us simultaneously. The fit was perfect, an ache of fullness that bordered on pain before blossoming into pure, shocking pleasure. He held there, buried to the hilt, his forehead against mine, both of us trembling with the intensity of the connection. In that suspended moment, there was no enemy, no neighbor. There was just this shocking, perfect alignment. This is what it feels like not to be alone, a voice whispered in my mind, terrifying and beautiful.

“Elara,” he whispered, my name a prayer in the dark.

Then he began to move.

It was not the frantic, desperate coupling I might have expected. It was deep, measured, relentless. Each thrust was a deliberate claiming, each withdrawal an agony of loss before the next exquisite penetration. The angle was perfect, hitting a spot inside me that made stars burst behind my eyelids. The only sounds were our ragged breathing, the soft, wet slide of our bodies joining, the occasional creak of the elevator car as it absorbed our motion. “You feel…” he grunted, his voice strained with effort, “…incredible. So tight.” The raw praise, so different from his usual teasing, undid me further.

I clung to him, my arms around his neck, my mouth seeking his in hungry, biting kisses. I was wound so tight, the coil of pleasure building with every rock of his hips. The roughness of the riveted wall against my back, the smell of our sweat and his sandalwood scent mingling with the faint, metallic odor of the elevator shaft, the sheer wrongness of it all—it fused into the most potent aphrodisiac I’d ever known. “Don’t stop,” I breathed against his lips, the words a plea. “Please, don’t stop.”

“I’m close,” I choked out, the words barely recognizable.

“Me too,” he gritted out, his pace increasing slightly, his thrusts becoming harder, more urgent. “Come with me. Let me feel you.”

His hand slipped between our bodies, his thumb finding that sensitive bundle of nerves again, and he pressed, circling in time with his thrusts. It was too much. The orgasm broke over me like a wave, violent and all-consuming. My body clenched around him, a series of rhythmic, pulsing contractions that ripped a sob from my throat. He groaned, a deep, shattered sound, and drove into me one last, final time, his own release shuddering through him. I felt the heat of it even through the barrier, the force of his pleasure echoing mine. As the tremors subsided, he buried his face in my neck, his breath hot and ragged. “Holy hell,” he murmured, the awe in his voice mirroring the feeling expanding in my own chest.

For a long moment, we stayed like that, fused together, panting against each other’s skin in the dark. Slowly, gently, he lowered my legs, but kept me pinned against the wall, his body a warm, heavy shelter. He nuzzled into the crook of my neck, his breath hot on my damp skin.

Outside, I became aware of the storm again. The rain was hitting the building now, a steady drumming sound. But inside our bronze cage, there was only the sound of our slowing heartbeats.

Reality, cold and unwelcome, began to seep back in. What had we done? My blouse was open, my trousers around my thighs. My professional armor was in tatters on the elevator floor, both literally and figuratively. He was my neighbor. My loud, messy, infuriating neighbor. And I had just had the most intense, transformative sex of my life with him against a wall. The clarity was brutal. This changed everything, and nothing. We still had to live next door to each other. The shoes, the music, the burned toast—those facts hadn’t vanished. Had I just traded a cold war for a devastatingly complicated peace?

As if reading my thoughts, he slowly pulled away. He disposed of the condom discreetly in a small trash bin by the panel I hadn’t even noticed. Then he picked up his henley and handed it to me. “Here. It’s… less rumpled.”

I took it, wordlessly, and slipped it on. It was enormous on me, drowning me in his scent. He pulled his jeans back up, then helped me, with a surprising tenderness, to step out of my trousers and straighten my underwear. He handed me my own clothes, and I dressed silently in the dark, my fingers fumbling. My silk blouse felt like a lie now.

Once we were both more or less decent, he retrieved his phone and sat back down, patting the space beside him. After a moment’s hesitation, I joined him. We sat shoulder to shoulder, the light from the phone our only companion.

“So,” he said after a long silence. His voice was hoarse.

“So,” I echoed.

“That was…”

“A mistake?” I supplied, though the word tasted like ash.

He turned his head to look at me. In the pale light, his expression was serious, stripped of all its usual easy charm. “It didn’t feel like a mistake. It felt… inevitable.”

“Inevitable is just another word for complicated.”

He reached over and took my hand, lacing his fingers through mine. His palm was warm, his grip firm. “I like complicated. I teach middle school band. I live for complicated.”

A laugh, shaky and surprised, escaped me. I leaned my head against his shoulder. “What happens when the lights come back on?”

He kissed the top of my head. “We go to our separate apartments. And tomorrow, I knock on your door. And I ask you, very politely, if you’d like to have dinner with me. Somewhere with terrible lighting and no risk of power outages.”

“And if I say no?” I asked, the doubt creeping in. This felt like a bubble, a pressure chamber. What if, back in the fluorescent light of the real world, we defaulted to type? What if my need for order slammed the door on this beautiful, terrifying mess?

“Then I’ll ask you again the next day. And the next. I’m very persistent. And now I know you don’t actually hate me. That’s a game-changer.” He paused, his thumb stroking my knuckles. “But Elara… the music, the mess… that’s not going away. I’m not a project you can fix. I’m just… me.”

His words hit a nerve, the same one the partner had struck. Soulless. Overly controlled. Was that what I wanted? To fix him? To organize his chaos into one of my neat blueprints? The thought sickened me. “I don’t want to fix you,” I said, the realization dawning as I spoke. “I think… I might be afraid you’ll break me.” It was the most honest thing I’d said all night.

In the dim light, I saw his smile, gentle and understanding. “Maybe we could just… not break each other. Maybe we could just be a new, weird kind of noise.”

I squeezed his hand. The panic from earlier was gone, replaced by a strange, buzzing warmth. The darkness didn’t feel oppressive anymore. It felt private, like a secret we now shared.

We sat like that for what felt like both an eternity and a heartbeat. We talked. Really talked. I learned about his failed garage band, his passion for teaching kids who thought saxophones were uncool, and the reason for the chaos: his childhood in a military family, moving every two years, where noise and mess were the only things that ever felt like home. He learned about my immigrant parents, their sacrifices, the pressure to build a stable, impressive life as their reward—a pressure that had calcified into a need for control so absolute it sometimes choked me. The animosity melted away, revealing the fascinating, flawed people underneath—the ones we’d been too stubborn and too scared to see.

Then, with a hum and a series of clicks, the elevator lights flickered back to life. The car gave a gentle lurch and began, slowly, to ascend.

We sprang apart as if electrocuted, scrambling to our feet. The sudden, harsh fluorescence was blinding, exposing everything. My swollen lips, his tousled hair, the general air of dishevelment that clung to us. We didn’t look at each other. The real world was reasserting itself with brutal efficiency.

The elevator dinged, and the doors slid open on the seventh floor. The familiar beige hallway, with its ugly floral carpet, had never looked so mundane, so judgmental.

We stepped out. He went to his door, 7B. I went to mine, 7A. I fumbled for my keys, my hands unsteady. The silence between us now was different—charged, fragile, full of everything we’d said and done. I could feel him hovering, a question mark in the space behind me.

“Elara,” he said, just as I pushed my door open.

I turned. He was leaning against his doorframe, looking exactly like the chaotic, beautiful problem he was. But his eyes were soft, and in them, I saw a reflection of my own uncertainty. This wasn’t a neat ending. It was a fraught beginning.

“Tomorrow,” he said. It wasn’t a demand or a sure promise. It was a hope, offered like a tentative chord.

I held his gaze for a long moment. The old urge to retreat, to lock my door and restore perfect, silent order, was a powerful tide. But beneath it was a newer, stronger current—the memory of his touch, the echo of his confession in the dark, the terrifying thrill of having been truly seen. I gave a single, slow nod, my own silent leap of faith. “Tomorrow.”

I slipped inside my quiet, orderly apartment and closed the door. I leaned against it, listening. I heard his door open and shut. Then, silence.

But it was a different kind of silence. It wasn’t empty anymore. It was full of promise, and the echo of his touch, and the terrifying, thrilling knowledge that the walls between us had well and truly crumbled. The war was over. Outside, I heard the faint, unmistakable sound of him humming a tune through the wall—a little off-key, completely spontaneous. A smile touched my lips. Something far more complicated, infinitely more beautiful, and undoubtedly messier, had just begun.