412B

412B.

I found the lease in a drawer

and the number came back whole.

The radiator that never worked right,

always too cold or too hot,

clanking at 3 AM like something

was dying inside the pipes.

The window. Single window

facing the brick wall of the building next door.

You could press your face to the glass

and see only red brick, only

the siding of someone else's wall.

I paid eight hundred dollars

for that room. For the privilege

of staring at brick. For the radiator's

middle-of-the-night complaints.

For the hallway that smelled like

other people's cooking, their lives

bleeding through the thin walls.

I lived there for two years.

I thought I was living.

Looking at the lease now,

the landlord's name is strange to me—

a man I called with complaints,

a voice on the phone

I was afraid of.

I don't remember his face.

I remember the radiator

more than I remember

most people from that time.

I remember the brick. The way

my face felt pressed against

cold glass, looking at nothing,

wanting to see something else,

and knowing I was paying

for the privilege of staying put.