Sing It

Living in an apartment building isn’t that bad most of the time. However, some buildings are better than others…and, more importantly, some buildings have thicker walls than others. The building that Kellin has just moved into for college purposes is kind of shitty, and therefore, the walls are very, very thin.

Above him, he hears parties every weekend while he’s trying to study. Below him, he hears a large dog barking occasionally. On one side of his place, he hears his neighbors having some really weird-sounding sex. And on the other side? Well…

“All these lights, they can’t blind me,” his neighbor, Alex, sings at eight in the morning, presumably in the shower. “With your love, nobody can drag me down…”

In reality, this guy is probably the least disruptive of all his neighbors, but it’s still kind of annoying to hear him singing random pop songs at inconvenient times. He’s actually not that bad of a singer, but as a light sleeper, Kellin’s not too keen on always being woken up early by Alex’s one-man concert. Then again, if he isn’t awoken by the singing, he’ll definitely be awoken by the dog barking or the couple that seems to have sex around the clock. At least Alex’s singing isn’t terrible.

One morning while Kellin himself is in the shower, he hears Alex’s voice from what sounds like the other side of the wall—the layouts of the apartments are often switched, meaning that the apartment next to Kellin’s has the same layout, except that everything on the right side of the place is on the left side, and vice versa. Alex’s bathroom must be somewhere close on the other side. Wherever he is, he’s definitely singing right now.

Kellin recognizes the song after a few moments: “Alejandro” by Lady Gaga. Alex is doing fairly well at it so far, and there’s something oddly attractive about the way he sings, “You know that I love you, boy, hot like Mexico….” Kellin can remember meeting this guy before, though he can’t really recall specifics about what he looks like; Kellin just knows that he’s a young dude—around Kellin’s age—named Alex who happens to live next door to him. And now Kellin knows that he also likes singing mainstream radio hits.

When Alex gets to the chorus, Kellin can’t help himself. Without giving himself time to talk himself out of it, he sings loudly, “Don’t call my name, don’t call my name, Alejandro…”

Alex stops for a few moments, as if trying to figure out where the voice came from, so Kellin continues: “I’m not your babe, I’m not your babe—”

“Fernando,” Alex jumps in, the two of them singing at the same time now, through the thin walls of the apartment building.

Kellin doesn’t question it; he just keeps going, unintentionally singing a duet with his neighbor whom he’s only actually met, like, once. When they’ve finished the whole song, Kellin laughs incredulously and yells, “Great job!”

A few seconds later, he hears Alex yelling back: “You, too! We should do that again sometime!”

“It’s a date,” Kellin agrees, and then he shuts the shower water off, humming “Alejandro” as he gets dressed. It ends up stuck in his head for most of the day, but he doesn’t really mind.

—

They don’t exactly discuss it, but from then on, it just becomes their thing. Nearly every morning, Kellin and Alex get in the shower at around the same time. One of them starts singing a catchy, popular song, and the other jumps in to help sing it. They go from Fall Out Boy to One Direction with no hesitation, and Kellin has never considered himself a huge fan of mainstream music, but considering that he knows pretty much every single word to every song they’ve sung so far, he’s starting to reconsider that thought. Alex’s voice is pretty good and quite versatile, but Kellin’s is still higher, so he finds pleasure in taunting Alex by singing Ariana Grande as loudly and obnoxiously as possible while Alex shouts from the other side, “I can’t sing that high, dude!”

“Just sing in a lower octave!” Kellin shouts back in the middle of his “One Last Time” rendition.

“No way!” Alex replies. “Go hard or go home!”

Kellin’s not sure if he’d call this a friendship, considering that they never happen to see each other outside of their apartments and the only conversations they ever have are yelled through the wall, but it’s definitely something. (It definitely doesn’t help that Kellin sometimes ends up thinking about the fact that he and Alex are both naked at the same time. Yikes.)

A couple weeks after the beginning of their morning duets, Kellin is leaving his apartment one afternoon, closing the door behind him, when he turns and sees a familiar-looking (and extremely attractive) guy walking down the hallway toward him, humming something to himself. Kellin recognizes the voice immediately, and that’s what makes him realize that this is Alex, and holy shit, he’s just as hot as his voice.

When Alex gets closer and notices Kellin staring at him, he stops in his tracks, the two of them making eye contact. “Um,” Alex says slowly. “Hi. Neighbor. Kellin, right?”

Kellin nods. “Yep,” he says, wincing when his voice cracks a little. “And you’re Alex?”

“Mm-hmm,” Alex replies, and then a small, mischievous grin crosses his lips. “But, uh, you can call me Alejandro.”

Kellin can’t stop himself from smiling back at him, his heart fluttering a little because honestly, this guy has got him under his spell. “Nice one,” he says, biting his lip and looking Alex up and down. He couldn’t be more obvious if he tried.

“You know,” he continues, “I was going to go out and get some groceries, but I think that can wait.”

Alex stares at him for a few more seconds before turning to the door of his own apartment, right next to Kellin’s, unlocking it quickly and motioning for Kellin to follow him. “Get in here, you little shit,” he says. “Let’s see how high your voice can go.”