It was Charlene who noticed. When I came home from work, she reported that new neighbors might be moving into apartment 2B across the way. Our bedroom window looks down into theirs, you see. She said the man was older, silvery hair and a trim beard. The woman might have been college age. Maybe his daughter, she thought. I looked out at their window into the empty bedroom. “I don’t see anything,” I told Charlene.

Two days later, Charlene called me at work. “It’s the new neighbors,” she said. “They’re painting the bedroom. A nice soft blue. Robin’s egg. They’re just about finished. The woman isn’t wearing a top. Probably so she won’t get splatters on her shirt. She has really nice tits. I bet you wish I had tits like hers.”

“You have lovely tits,” I said. “I love your tits.” I don’t think I’d ever heard Charlene use the word “tits” before. “If I were there I’d—”

“Oh my goodness!” Charlene exclaimed.

“What?”

“The man just painted the woman’s back. He ran his roller right down. And now he’s pulling down her pants. He’s going to paint her butt. No. Ha ha, she swiped her roller right across his face. Ha ha, serves him right. Now he’s got a blue nose.”

After it was quiet for a time, I asked Charlene what they were doing.

“They left,” she said. “Probably taking a shower. I think I need a shower too.”

When I got home, I looked out the window at the neighbors’ freshly painted bedroom. “They did a nice job,” I said. I lifted Charlene’s blouse and fastened my lips to her right nipple. “Oh, sweetie, sweetie, sweetie,” she purred as I sucked.

After dinner I said, “Maybe we should paint our rooms too. Maybe the new neighbors would offer to help.”

Charlene said she didn’t think they’d actually moved in yet.

A week later at lunchtime Charlene called me at work again to tell me the neighbors had been moving cartons from a rental truck into their new apartment. “Nothing in the bedroom, though, and then the truck drove away.”

“Seems like a long process,” I said.

“Yes, but then they came back. The man was hanging this painting on the wall of the bedroom. The painting was a soft blue, much like the wall.”

“Robin’s egg,” I commented.

“Right. The painting was of a girl lying in a blue field and a bunch bunnies cavorted about her in what I have to say was an erotic way. But the painting was hanging cockeyed. The woman went to the wall and straightened it.”

“Then what happened?”

“Nothing. They left.”

At home I went right to the window. One of our kitchen chairs was in front of the window, and I sat. Charlene sat on my lap. I unsnapped the button of Charlene’s pants. I tugged down the zipper. I moved my hand inside. “Oh, honey,” she moaned. I touched her while we watched the painting.

I called Charlene the next day to find out if there was anything new at apartment 2B.

“As a matter of fact, there is,” she said.

“They’ve moved in?”

“Not exactly,” she said, “but a furniture delivery truck came by and two guys put a bed in the bedroom. The headboard sits right under the bunny picture. It’s a nice looking bed. And then about twenty minutes later the girl came by. And she made up the bed. Pillows and sheets and a nice blue summer-weight blanket.”