Oh ... Yes ... Like that ... You are the best ...

They were at it again.

Ever since that young man had moved in next door, these sounds had frequently invaded my room.

It wasn't just that they were so loud, it was that once they began, they were sure to keep me up for half the night.

I hammered on the wall, hoping they would quieten down.

If anything, the noises only got louder.

I could feel myself getting angry. I was on the warpath.

I stormed outside and hammered on his door.

But I was not prepared for what I saw once it opened.

I shouldn't be privy to this, I thought.

After witnessing this, how can I be allowed to live?

"Sweetie, how's the house Mommy found for you? Do you like it?"

After graduating from university, my mom had bought me a house to live in.

The living room was split into two levels, which I really liked, but the wall was paper thin.

I could hear my neighbor's nighttime activities as clearly as if they were coming from my own TV.

I frequently worked late into the night trying to keep up with my busy job. By the time I got home, I was already exhausted. The last thing I needed was more disturbance.

Noise was something I couldn't bear.

"Open up. I'm here to check the meter."

I knocked on his door while using a voice modifier app on my phone to sound like a middle-aged man.

Hearing him come to answer, I fled.

There was a brief moment of quiet, but it didn't last long until the noises began once more.

Perhaps he was a satyriasis...

Noise pollution was a bugbear of mine. After a hard day at work, home was supposed to be my sanctuary from stress—my quiet place.

"Gasman, open up."

I tried his door again, hoping that this time it would have a lasting effect.

He opened the door immediately, clearly annoyed.

Peering out through the peephole in my door, I finally had the chance to take in this maniac who was keeping me awake with my own eyes.

He was dressed far more formally than I was expecting. Perhaps making the right impression when opening the front door was important to him ...

He had an elegant demeanor and gold-rimmed glasses.

As soon as he closed the door, the noises began again.

He obviously wasted no time picking up where he left off.

Judging by the sounds, he must have been quite skilled.

I rarely saw him leave his house.

Maybe I should quit my job and set up a stall on his doorstep selling "protection", I thought.

I doubt I'd need any other customers.

I couldn't help but admire this satyriasis. Most people might feel embarrassed by having their neighbor turn up in the night to ask them to quiet down, but he didn't let it stop him one bit.

My only remaining option was to call my mom and vent.

"The house is fine Mommy, but my neighbor's a satyriasis."

There was confused silence from the other end of the line. "Your neighbor's a what, sweetie?"

"He's like a rabbit. I can hear him going at it from dusk till dawn. My nerves are shredded. If you don't believe me, come listen for yourself."

I made sure to sound despondent. In truth, I'd been wanting to redecorate for a while and this seemed like the perfect excuse.

My mom's voice was full of worry. "I saw him a few times when I was buying the house. I would never have guessed he was a sex fiend. Maybe you should reconsider that nice man Steven tried to set you up with. He seems like a good match and if all goes well you can move in with him."

My mom and dad were divorced but after remarrying, my mom wouldn't stop going on about the wonders of marriage.

She seemed to have conveniently forgotten all the violence she suffered at the hands of my biological father.

Although even I had to admit, she'd done a good job choosing my stepdad.

"No thanks. As far as I'm concerned, there aren't any good men on this planet."

I could hear Steven, my stepdad, choke down a cough nearby.

Maybe I paid too much attention to social media, but I'd read enough horror stories, coupled with my own experiences, to put me off men for life.

"Then you should try soundproofing the house. Or I could come around and have a word with him about it?"

She sounded so sincere.

"Mommy, you can't just knock on his door and 'have a word with him' about his noisy sex life. I think you need to have the house redecorated."

What was she planning on doing? Turning up on his doorstep and telling him to practice abstinence?

Or maybe she was just going to tell him to keep it down?

No matter how I thought about it, it was awkward.

Though, that's not to say it wasn't possible.

The next day, I watched the note stuck to the ornamental flowers next to the door of my building. It read, "Suppress Your Desires."

I smiled.

The decorators my mother had hired turned up later that day. Luckily, I just so happened to be going away on business.

I begged them to work through the night. I told them it was urgent and paid them extra to do it.

After all the trouble Mr. Satyriasis had caused me, it was the least I could do in return.

...

I stared in shock.

Why was Mr. Satyriasis sitting at the head of the meeting room table?

It turned out that he was the voice actor my animation studio was hoping to work with.

This all seemed like way too much of a coincidence.

Fortunately, having hidden the second I heard him come to the door the night before, he had no way to recognize me. Otherwise, we would probably have had to find someone else.

"Hello, I'm Brook Sierra."

It was clear he was a voice actor; even when saying hello, the quality of his voice shone through.

Brook Sierra was one of the most famous voice actors in the country. Yet he was well-known for never making public appearances.

There were those who speculated that this was because he was hideously ugly.

If such people could have sat beside me in that meeting room, they'd have certainly had to change their minds.

If he had been prone to making public appearances, such was his presence that he would certainly have risen to even greater prominence, and there would be no chance for a company such as ours to work with him.

I could see now why his girlfriend never demanded he sleep. If it were me, I don't think I'd ever get bored of his attention either.

He wasn't just easy on the eyes and ears either, his attitude and demeanor seemed easy-going and amiable.

After all, there weren't many professionals who were willing to put up with my company's unusual list of demands.

I felt like my manager had sent me here as a joke, just to watch me fail, but Brook signed the agreement I offered him after barely even reading it.

A 30-70 split, the final payment to be paid only once viewership hits a certain target, no fixed production schedule.

He agreed to it all without so much as a word.

Negotiations like these were the stuff of dreams.

I could hardly believe my luck as I returned to my offices with the signed contract in hand.

How was such an esteemed voice actor happy to accept such ridiculous conditions?

I felt like I should do something to thank him.

After all, it was rare that I got the chance to see my manager so annoyed and so disbelieving.

He looked very unhappy to be handing responsibility for the follow-up work to me.

The studio had put out word that whoever managed to seal the deal on this cooperation would be put up for promotion.

Trevor, my manager, had his own protégé who he wanted to succeed. That's why the conditions in the agreement he'd given me were so unfavorable.

Who could have known that despite being set up to fail, I'd end up coming back with a signed contract?

And his own little lapdog wouldn't even have the chance to run back to Brook with a sweetened deal.

Trevor wasn't happy, but I was. I was looking forward to a raise.

All thanks to Brook Sierra.

From this day forth, I thought, I don't care how long you go. In fact, I'll happily resupply you if you run out of anything you need.

I'll give your girlfriend sports massages and keep her stocked with vitamin C. Anything to stop illness or injury from putting her out of action.

But when I returned home, there was a six-foot lump huddled up on the floor outside my building.

Its eyes were red from crying.

Among the ornamental flowers by the door, the note saying "Suppress Your Desires" now seemed especially prominent.

Had his girlfriend left him?

Seeing me return—the lump—Brook, stood up and fled upstairs to the communal rooftop area of our building.

He wouldn't jump off, would he? It couldn't be that serious.

She's only a girl. I could go find her for you and help smooth things over, I thought.

...

It was quite windy on the rooftop and he was tall and slender. He couldn't have weighed much.

I wondered how strong of a gust it would take to blow him over the edge.

I shuddered to think, imagining my beautiful promotion being blown away like that.

"Excuse me, Mr. Sierra. Could we have a chat?"

He was looking around him, furtively, as though trying to find the best place to jump from.

When he heard my voice, he immediately turned to look in my direction, staring as though he had seen a ghost.

His expression surprised me. I turned my head to look behind me, but there was no one there.

I couldn't help but think of a ghost story I'd recently read.

Surely, he wasn't possessed by some malevolent spirit?

My confused expression seemed to be making him more afraid.

Could it be that his overindulgences had twisted his mind and now he had his eyes set on me?

Why else would he stand there staring silently for so long?

Maybe I should run now, I thought, just in case.

Just as we were staring at each other, a snow-white cat appeared, as if from nowhere.

It walked towards us, gracefully.

Upon seeing the cat, Brook knelt down.

I wasn't sure what was going on.

For some reason, I knelt down too.

Brook picked up the cat and started crying.

I didn't know what to say.

I figured he hadn't spoken because his voice was so hoarse from crying.

But when he finally did speak, it made me want to tear up our agreement.

After all this trouble, thinking he was going to throw himself off the roof, he was just upset because his cat had gotten out and he couldn't find it.

He asked me, his voice faint and raspy, "What are you doing here?"

I scratched my head. "I live in this building. We must be neighbors."

Seeing that he was in no danger of doing anything stupid, I decided to leave. It would have been awkward to stay when he was like this.

So, I said my goodbyes and left.

...

My mom's decorators had worked their magic quickly. In a little over a week, they'd managed to soundproof the entire house.

I worked in the gaming department of the animation studio. My main role was writing the dialog and plot for one of our more popular characters.

Now that Brook Sierra was on board, we sent out our first wave of promos for this character.

But the feedback wasn't as positive as we'd hoped.

The biggest story that everyone was talking about was claims that the character represented by my scripts was plagiarized.

I sat in my house, feeling a little dizzy from the redecorating fumes.

I didn't understand how anyone could accuse me of plagiarism.

There was a knock at the door.

I opened it to find Brook standing there, holding his cat.

I figured he'd seen the news already, too.

I invited him in.

As expected, the first words out of his mouth were: "Have you seen the rumors about your scripts?"

"I have. I promise you there's no truth to them. I didn't plagiarize anything."

"I believe you. Have you tried calling the studio to find out what's happening?"

I had tried, but no one was picking up the phones.

It was bad enough that they hadn't called me first, but the fact they weren't even answering my calls ...

I waved my hands, helplessly.

In this industry, being suspected of plagiarism was hardly rare.

But considering how much these rumors were blowing up, the fact that the company hadn't done anything about it yet was unusual.

Brook's cat was looking around my living room, lackadaisically.

Suddenly, it stretched out its legs and struggled free.

Free to roam as it pleased, the cat wandered the floorboards, gracefully.

Brook was still looking at me, a serious look on his face.

I discovered that here, in my own sanctuary, I was the most nervous one present.

"What do you plan to do?"

I wasn't sure how to respond. There was no way for me to prove my innocence. After all, by this stage, nothing anyone could produce was entirely new anyway.

I could be sure that I hadn't copied anyone else's work, but if there happened to be coincidental similarities ...

Well, there wasn't much that I could do about it.

I shook my head, helplessly.

Brook's voice was hoarse. "You're new to this industry, am I right?"

"You are. I've only recently started."

He went on, seemingly not holding out much hope.

"Do you have a record of your edits?"

"Of course."

I fetched my laptop and handed it to him. He opened my scripts and started checking through my editing history.

"Did you send this to anyone else?"

"I sent some of this to a company I interviewed for before."

"They probably used it without your permission. I'll get in touch with PR for you."

I was suddenly filled with admiration for him.

I was so relieved that I didn't even mind that his cat had knocked all of the fragile collectibles from my desk onto the floor.

I looked from the broken pieces lying on the floor to the cat, feigning innocence, among the carnage, and finally to the mortified expression on its owner's face.