Lisa had always thought there was something lovely about big, croweded houses, the kind where there were several kids to a room, and back staircases that might have been servants’ quarters, and passageways in the basement that might have been stops on the underground railroad. And armchairs where grandparents sat, and breakfast nooks, and thin walls, and older sisters looking for a quiet place to read. She knew they must exist, these houses, but had never actually seen one.

Even better than noisy kids and visiting relatives, she thought, would be that same house but inhabited by groups of friends, people in their twenties who needed cheap living and social stimulation for their creative pursuits. Of course, the house would fall into inevitable disrepair, and probably smell more like smoke and beer and cats than brownies, but that would be part of the charm. She also knew these houses existed, like neo communes, and thought she would very much like to live in one. Where does one find such a house?






Harlow had bought her place, a brick two-story with an attic near Wicker Park, when the economy took a nosedive and she was feeling decisive. She was sick of feeling transient, and sick of writing a letter or number after her street name, sick of not having memories in the floorboards. She wanted a home.

The first person to come live with her was Thaddeus, of course. As he began staying over more and more frequently, he began paying less and less rent to his own landlord, and as far as Harlow knew he eventually just phased out of his lease like a train losing steam. And then his things were in her living room, and enormous oak desk, several trunks full of sport coats, and books. Every room except the bathroom by October resembled a library of sorts, the hallways, the pantry, the staircase, even, a disheveled, shelfless library. There was the occasional overheard conversation peppered with words like ‘ecumenical’ and ‘small claims court,’ followed by a gravelly snort in his disarming British voice, but other than that, there was no discussion about his becoming a resident. He simply did.

Faith came next. Faith, Harlow’s old roommate from DePaul, a skinny Filipino nanny by day who was choreographing an opera at a theatre nearby. Faith’s transition was likewise smooth, as in tacit; she began staying over on winter nights when the drive to Beverly was too snowy to travel. Her studio was in Lincoln Square, near Harlow’s house, so by April, without any notice, it became official; her things were in the second bedroom, and rent checks began appearing on the counter, made our for wildly varying amounts of money, on the tenth or so of every month. Around now every day in the house was an adventure in rendezvous, for Harlow especially, who kept rather normal hours. Thaddeus was home for days at a time in between classes, alternately brooding, writing, and hosting stone-faced reading circles with his lit students, who drank a lot of tea and sometimes left roaches on Harlow’s homemade coasters; Faith had various boyfriends from the theatre who made liberal use of the kitchen as well as her bedroom, often bringing along their own friends and boyfriends too. And then there was Jessi, dark, angular Jessi, the painter; it was odd, Harlow thought, of all her friends, Jessi was the least stable, and yet the most reluctant to move in without asking. The only time Harlow ever knew for sure where Jessi was sleeping was when she was dating Joel. When that ended—however that ended—Harlow did something that for once she didn’t lord over her: she made Thaddeus move his desk and reading circles to the dining room, dragged a mothy futon down from the attic, and invited Jessi to stay.

So anyway, there was only one official tenant at this lovely brick house near Wicker Park, but the post office, and countless other twentysomethings in and around the Chicago area knew that at any given time there were several. Harlow met more people while cooking breakfast in her own kitchen than she ever did at any bar. And she realized, when she saw the first rent check from Jessi that spring, made out for an amount of money she wasn’t sure her friend had, she knew that that was what she needed in a home.