if you call me (h. intak)
synopsis | intak lives next door and won't stop teasing you about the love notes you've been receiving for the last few weeks.
details | neighbor!intak x gender neutral!reader, neighbor au, fluff, mutual pining, cheesy flirting, reader is oblivious, lowercase intentional, no use of y/n
word count | 1.3k
love notes | this is kind of short bc im kinda sorta in the middle of writing 3 different research papers 🩵 inspiration struck tho
part 1 | part 2
you could see it from the end of the hallway, always a different color and gently fluttering in the artifical breeze from the apartment complex's air conditioning. for the last few weeks, you never knew whether or not you'd come home to a new message on your door. usually, they were scribbled on colorful sticky notes in smooth black ink, and the contrast made them impossible to ignore.
well, the contrast and the messages themselves.
you probably should have been creeped out, but they were actually kind of sweet. "you look pret-tea today," one had read, scrawled on sticky purple paper under a doodle of a tea bag. you once slammed your door closed after a particularly frustrating day. the next morning, you had found doodle of a rooster on an orange square: "just chicken in on you."
and now, as you approached your apartment, you could see a glint of baby blue flittering against the dark wood of your door. there was no pattern to follow. you could find three in one day, or you could go three days without one at all. if nothing else, this "secret admirer" kept you on your toes.
you fished into your bag, rummaging through seemingly everything you had ever owned to find your keys. your keychain jingled as you turned the key in the lock, the sound of metal on metal signaling to everyone on the floor that you were finally home. and before you could even turn the knob, the door to the apartment next to yours swung open.
like clockwork, intak leaned candidly on the chiseled wooden post of the doorframe. his black zip-up made him appear even more casual as he looked down the hallway, over your head, and at the floor, all with his lips pursed and brows furrowed in faux contemplation.
"oh, hi," intak's eyes finally landed on yours, which were visibly unimpressed by his routine performance. he was usually out here when you got home, seeking the latest scoop on your note situation. he glanced at the imaginary watch on his wrist, "you're, uh, twenty minutes later than usual. I almost thought you'd moved."
you tried not to give into his antics too much, but it was more difficult than you thought. he was undeniably charming, maybe too charming for his own good, and he had been kind enough when you first moved in to show you which staircase was the least life-threatening.
"you don't have to wait for me to get home, you know," you crossed your arms, matching his relaxed stance on your own doorframe, "you can literally just step outside and read it. its on the door."
"yeah," intak sucked his teeth, weighing his options, "but then its just weird. i'd be lurking around outside your door."
you furrowed your brows at him, partly amused but mainly curious, "and waiting until i get home to come outside and lurk is somehow less weird?"
intak opened his mouth to speak, but he immediately closed it, rubbing his jaw with his hand as he pressed his lips into a thin, defeated line. "okay i see how that would be," he paused a beat, sighing deeply, "weird."
"do you just, like, watch through the peephole for an hour?" you taunted him. the corner of your mouth pulled up into a smirk as you watched him grow increasingly defensive.
"how i know is not the point, although you do have very recognizable footsteps," intak waved his hands around as if to swipe away the current conversation, "can you just tell me what it says? i mean, first one in four days- it better be good."
you rolled your eyes at him, pushing off your doorframe to face the door itself. the blue note was stuck haphazardly at eye level, a bit crooked, and was curling up on the edges from having been pulled off a stack. you reached out and smoothed the bottom edge until it was flat against the wood grain of the door. your fingers pinned it in place as your eyes scanned the dark ink.
you felt intak's eyes burning into the side of your face as you started to read it. this one was different. "its, um," you lifted the note off the door, bringing it closer, "its a phone number."
intak leapt from his place in his own doorway and craned his neck to peer over your shoulder. "that's bold," he said, "there's not even a drawing on it."
honestly, you didn't hear a word from his mouth. you were suddenly hyper aware of how close he was, how broad his shoulders were, how the heat from his body contrasted with the harsh stream of air surging from the ac unit. your interactions had never breached a three foot distance. and you'd never been close enough to smell the sweet, woodsy cologne melted into his skin.
all at once, your mouth went dry and your knees grew weak and your palms became damp. you'd never felt this way about him before. he was just your annoying neighbor who played his music too loud after 10 pm. he slept through his alarm every morning, the buzzing of his phone and the blaring alert tone seeping through your walls again and again as he snoozed it. why even set an alarm if he was gonna sleep three extra hours?
"are you okay?" intak asked. his tone was sincere, and you realized you'd never heard him speak normally, delicately. it was always banter, always teasing.
"yeah," you breathed, crumbling the note up in your hand and stepping forward, leaving more space between the two of you. "yeah, sorry. it just got... too real, i think."
"oh," intak breathed, as he took one big stride back to his own doorway, "yeah, agreed. that was suuuuper weird to do."
out of the corner of your eye, you thought you saw a frown. you thought you saw his big, brown eyes cast to the suspiciously stained carpet. you thought you saw him wipe his own palms down the thighs of his jeans.
you finally turned the knob on your door, the note still crumbled and tucked between the metal and your hand. you felt something crack somewhere deep within you, something wistful. you wouldn't miss the notes, assuming that writing their phone number was the final piece of the puzzle your admirer had been assembling. they were just paper. yes, the doodle were cute, and, yes, the messages were sweet. but you wouldn't miss them.
maybe you'd miss something else.
intak pushed open his own door, too. you watched him force his lips into a small smile as he locked eyes with you. "have a great night," he said, "if you want."
"you, too, intak," you laughed, "if you want."
but as you stepped inside your apartment and pushed the door closed behind you, something compelled you. something small and blue, scribbled with black ink. you held out your hand and opened the note back up. you could still make out the number through the hundreds of fold lines.
you flipped the paper over, and doodled on the back was an ice cube with a scribbled out attempt at a message. all you could make out was,
"if you call me."
what happened next was not your own doing. you were simply possessed by someone more confident, someone with way less to lose, as you pulled out your phone and punched in the numbers. one moment your finger was hovering over the green call button, and the next, you were hearing the dialtone.
and to your surprise, right as the droning signal began to thrum in your ear, you heard a ringtone. you put your phone down at your side, and you heard the phone ringing in the apartment next to yours.
you heard intak's phone, ringing.
