The other day I was stopped in the lobby of my apartment block by my female neighbor.
She had gone gym crazy and wanted to tell me about it. Could I tell, she asked?
She was pretty toned, I said.
Feel my biceps, she said. So I did.
Harder, she said. I obliged.
We were just about to part when she asked me if I wanted to get a beer some time.
Then she looked a bit awkward and shy for having said it. So I said sure.
I said it partly to ease her discomfort and partly because I really wouldn’t have minded having sex with her.
The first problem was that we were still in lockdown and no bars were open.
She quickly realized this and added “as soon as we can”.
I had the distinct impression that if I had asked her to come and have a beer with me in my flat right there and then she would have done so. And maybe much more.
But I held fire.
The girl next door
It isn’t the first time she’s stopped to talk to me and my radar had already started to register her presence months earlier.
She’s around 40 and in very good shape, though not the type I really go for.
But here’s the second problem. She doesn’t just live in my block, she is my very next door neighbor. I hear her on the phone to her mother through paper thin, poorly,-constructed Mediterranean walls. That means she can hear me.
Worse still when I sit on my balcony – something I’ve been doing a lot of during lockdown – I can see straight into her balcony – and vice versa.
The third problem is that our conversations don’t really flow. There are awkward silences. There isn’t what you would call chemistry.
Ungentlemanly behaviour
So I’m not really interested in having anything serious with her.
If that’s the case but I’m still considering going for a beer with her you probably guessed that my intentions are not the most gentlemanly.
Although I’m not interested in going out with her, I would be interested in having sex with her.
This was especially true after several weeks of lockdown.
But… and it’s a big but, I had the distinct impression that whilst it might be very easy to get into something with her, getting out of it might be alot harder.
No exit
In normal circumstances, if we have sex with someone and they want something more, any hurt feelings and unpleasant consequences of that gulf in desires are far away and easy to overlook.
In this case, if I invited her over and we ended up having sex I would have to live directly with the consequences of that decision at very close quarters.
I started to have visions of bringing another date round and cooking one of my special date-seducing exotic meals, whispering sexy words to her on my candlelit balcony… only to see my neighbour looking daggers at me from five feet away.
Looking daggers at me, or even worse, interrupting the conversation at her leisure. After all she’s my neighbor. I can’t exactly put an injunction on her going onto her balcony and talking.
I didn’t want to turn down an easy opportunity to get laid but I was in a quandary.
Seeking advice
I messaged a friend who we will call “The Player”.
The Player sleeps with a great deal of women, who he also needs to keep happy so that they do not harm him by being indiscreet.
His first piece of advice was to make sure, if I did go to bed with her, that I stressed to her that I was not looking for anything serious.
That way she couldn’t claim she had been misled.
“What you don’t do is sit her down and look her in the eye while having a drink and tell her you’re only interested in having sex with her. That would be an extremely dumb move.”
So what do I do?
“You wait until she’s so turned on that you’re literally about to stick your dick in her wet pussy. That’s when you tell her that you’re not looking for anything serious. She’s so ready to get fucked that she just says ‘yeah yeah whatever’.”
Playing at home
Thematingmaze.com does not endorse The Player’s advice in this case as meeting the highest standards of ethics. But I do recognize that it has a certain logic to it.
But of course there’s another angle to all of this and I was keen to get The Player’s advice on that.
Would he hold back from having sex with her due to logistical considerations, ie the fact that she lives slap bang on the other side of a semi-transparent fence which according to building regulations cannot be altered?
That’s a difficult one, I would definitely think about that for a while, he said.
Neighborhood Watch
As it happened, my neighbor appeared on the other side of that fence just as I was sitting soaking up the sun the next day. And the next. And the day after that.
She had realized that at a certain time of day I would usually be out there having a cup of coffee.
And as there was no physical boundary between us it was extremely easy for her to find out what I was up to.
She started coming out at the same time as if by coincidence and striking up a conversation.
The first time she saw me she gave me her phone number.
The second time she asked me if I’d like to go for a walk with her.
I smiled and with a heavy heart said I was busy.
She asked me if I could make it in a couple of days. Sorry I said, it’s a busy time.
After that she stopped coming out.
Taking the advice to heart
In conclusion, it was The Player’s advice that it had sealed it.
The thing is that the Player has a way higher tolerance for risk than I do.
If he thought twice about having casual sex with a neighbor because it was more potential trouble than it was worth, then I was certainly going to steer clear.
It’s not that I would never sleep with a neighbor.
It’s rather that the possible fallout of doing so in such close quarters had come home to me.
At this very moment in time, ie during lockdown, I wasn’t seeing anyone else but that was literally only due to the fact that I was practically under house arrest.
It could change as soon as lockdown was lifted and in reality it did.
In the end there wasn’t enough chemistry to justify the risk.
By Max
