Amanda,
A cramped New York apartment, one of the smallest places he, a recent implant from Florida, has lived in. But coming from rat-infested dorms and an Alphabet City dig where the floors peeled up, this place with its hardwood floors and exposed brick is the nicest I’ve lived in, at least in New York City. Having known each other through friends for five years, we find it easy to chuckle together. Every night at nine p.m. his girlfriend calls, and he talks with her in hopes of retaining the every-day, every-minute relationship that they sustained in Florida. He’s learning that a phone conversation doesn’t take the place of a hug, a kiss, or sex.
I sit in front of the TV while he’s on the phone, drowning myself in other peoples’ stories, in hopes of forgetting my own. I can’t listen to music—after a while it sounds like an unconscious voice befriending my thoughts. Climbing out of our living room window looks like a suicide attempt, but I’m just aiming to sit on our makeshift balcony tattered with pigeon feathers and cigarette butts; it’s a far cry from my roommate’s Gainesville balcony which was decorated with proper patio furniture.
We’re each other’s only source of comfort in this city. For him, it’s homesickness, being in an unfamiliar space with strange people and knowing only me. For me, it’s a matter of being sick of home, not knowing I would have to start life over in the city that I had been so intimate with during my undergraduate years. I’m dealing with receipts, hanging folders, Post-It notes and paperclips. Resumés, thank-you notes, and cover letters. Fax machines, e-mails, and phone calls. Interviews. Tailored clothing. Networking. Business cards. I used to discuss the nuances of Marquez, gossip about the relationship between Sartre and Beauvoir, wax eloquent about the various literary, artistic, and cinematic forms of Postmodernism. Now I worry about things like careers and nice apartments–I talk about how to build my credit, how to manage my budget, how I max out my accounts every month just to pay rent. I thought college would guarantee a cushy transition into the work world, that people would fall over their feet to hire me. Instead I’m a freshman, lost again in the city that I thought had prepared me for adulthood.
Amanda ““ Age 23 ““ NYC
From 400 Words, Issue 1
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