First Apartment, Chicago

“First apartment. Logan Square, third floor walk-up. The rooms echo because you own nothing. A mattress on the floor, a lamp, a coffee maker — the holy trinity. Your own keys. You lock and unlock the door three times because you can. The radiator clanks to life and you have no idea if that's normal. El train rattling the windows every twelve minutes. You sit on the floor eating pad thai from a container and the city sounds come in and you think: this is mine. All of this is mine.”