FIRST APARTMENT

I quietly rolled the car down the driveway and into the street before pausing for one last look at my old bedroom window. It was a difficult decision to make. I lived here my entire life. But it’s time. Time for me to finally become independent. But still, it was hard. I love my parents. And I know they love me, but they are so overprotective. They make me feel like I’m incapable of making the smallest of decisions on my own.

They don’t feel like I’m ready to live in the big, bad city. They’re afraid I might get raped, robbed, or murdered. They kept reading me articles from the newspaper reporting the high incidents of drug addicts waiting on every corner of downtown Philadelphia who will rob you.

I assured them that I had been going to Tyler School of Art every day for the past two years and somehow survived without a bodyguard. I’ll be fine. My apartment is only a block away from school, and I can take the bus or the subway all around the city. And all my friends live a bus stop away.

I remind them that I will see them when they come by my apartment in a couple of days because they are coming to Philly to pick up my car and take it back home since it is too expensive to keep a car in the city.

As I pull out into the street, I see my parent’s faces pressed up against the kitchen window and waving frantically at me. I wave back with a big smile on my face. I see my mother wipe a tear from her cheek. That tearing rolling down her face almost makes me change my mind. I’ve never been able to bear seeing my mother cry. But this time, this time is different. I grit my teeth and wave again. And I don’t look back. I head towards the Ben Franklin Bridge and my future as a newly semi-independent adult.

After being stuck in the morning traffic jam for a good half hour, I cross the bridge and head towards my apartment, which is within walking distance of Tyler. It’s an old building, everything around it looks old. There are beautiful sections of Philadelphia, but this isn’t one of them. I manage to get a parking spot across the street from my new apartment, which is a miracle. Apparently, one of the overnight parkers just left as I drove into the lot. I see this as a good sign. Owning a car in the city is expensive. It makes more sense to take public transportation than pay through the nose to park your vehicle overnight. That’s why my car is going to be living at my parent’s house.

I will have to make several trips from my car to my apartment. I have all my clothes, and books, and art materials to bring inside. My parents helped furnish the place with stuff that they bought at yard sales and estate sales. They are good at finding bargains. They even got me dishes and silverware and kitchen stuff. When I arrive at the steps to my apartment, I see what appears to be a homeless guy sitting on the stoop. He moves to one side when he realizes I am going up the steps. I say,” hello. He asks do you have any spare money?” And I say, “Sorry, I’m a student and don’t have any extra money.” I unlock the door and head up the steps. I see a discarded needle on the top step. I’m so glad my parents didn’t come with me today, or they would have dragged me home.

By the time I arrive on the third floor, I’m out of breath. I promise to start exercising as soon as I get settled. I know at twenty years old, I shouldn’t be getting out of breath after only going up two flights of steps.

I have a little trouble unlocking the door as it’s an old building. And probably built at the turn of the century, and the door looks it. I finally jam the key in and manage to turn it. I have to pull the door closed with both hands. I shove all my stuff in with my foot since I had to put it down to unlock the door. The guy in the apartment next to me sticks his head out. His hair hangs down to his waist, and he has a beard almost as long. Oh, my mother is just going to go nuts when she sees him. The whites of his eyes are blood red. He looks like he hasn’t slept in ten years.

“Hey, welcome. My name’s Steven Corson. I work at night and sleep during the day, so I would appreciate it if you kept the noise down.

“Well, I’ll be at school during the day, but I can’t promise there won’t be any noise since my friends from Tyler School of Art will be visiting me because Tyler is right around the corner.”

He nods at me and says, “good luck. I hope you’ll like it here.” And he pulls his head back into his apartment and closes the door, and I hear him slide the deadlock in place. That reminds me that I need to do the same once I get all my stuff up here this morning. I think I’ll get an extra key made so one of my friends can hold it just in case I lock myself out or lose my key. I would get one made for my parents, but I don’t want to come home to find them sitting in my living room.

I made several trips from my car to the apartment, and when I made the final trip, I sat down on my new, old couch and took a deep breath. I say out loud, “this is the first day of the rest of my life.” And I smile. I look around my apartment. My parents came over one day and cleaned it from top to bottom. It will probably be a good month or two before I clean it again. And that’s me being optimistic.

I walk over to the kitchen if you can call it a kitchen. It has one counter with a refrigerator on one side, a hot plate and a toaster oven and a sink, no dishwasher. Oh, and a small cabinet under the counter for cleaning stuff. I look in the cupboards, and I see I have an old set of dishes, six glasses, and five used coffee cups. In the overhead, there’s cereal, dry potatoes, and some canned food. The fridge has milk, juice, butter, bread, cheese, and lunch meat, hot dogs and frozen hamburgers, and fudge bars in the freezer, which is my favorite dessert. I will have to thank my mom. As much as she gets on my nerves, she does more for me than anyone ever has.

I head toward the bathroom. It’s tiny, a standing shower, towel rack, sink, toilet, and a small cabinet under the sink with some cleaning products and paper towels. My mom left two sets of towels and washcloths. I go into the bedroom, and it looks even smaller than when I checked it out the first time because my parents brought my bedroom furniture over. Which include my single bed, dresser and side table, and a lamp. The living room has an old couch and my beanbag from my bedroom and my tv and computer. The closet is the biggest thing in the apartment, and hopefully, I will be able to fit all my art stuff and all my other junk. I will have to start looking for a chair for my bedroom on the street nearby. People in this area move in and out a lot. And often, they leave some of their furniture on the curb. I will have to keep my eyes open on my way to and from Tyler.

I spent the next few hours arranging things to my liking when I noticed that my stomach was growling. I stand next to the open door of the refrigerator to see if there is anything I want to eat. I was about to settle on a hamburger when I heard someone banging on the door, and then the banging got louder. I hear laughing. I two-time it to the door. Because the next thing I know, my neighbor will be complaining about the noise waking him up.

“OK, OK, I’m coming.” I unlock the door and pull it open, and what do you know? It’s three of my friends from Tyler holding a pizza box and a six-pack. “Come on in, but you have to keep it down cause the guy next door works at night, and he’s sleeping.”

They are laughing their heads off. They must have had some beer on the way over. I laugh at them. Then we are all laughing, and then I hear a banging on the wall from my neighbor, who doesn’t appreciate all the hilarity. I put my finger up to my lips. And then they start laughing again. “Come in, come in. Thanks for bringing the pizza. My stomach was growling, and I didn’t feel like eating a hamburger.”

They all start milling around the apartment. “Hey, this is great. We can crash here sometimes when we have a big project to do, and we have to stay up all night and work on it. And then we have to walk around the corner to school.” They all start clapping. The guy next door bangs on the wall again. They laugh. I laugh. The guy next door isn’t going to get any sleep today. Well, he must have been young once.

We decide to watch a movie on my computer. We settle on The Vast Of The Night, which is a scary- sci-fi movie. We start watching the movie and scarfing down the pizza, and guzzling the beer. We scream at all the scary parts and sometimes laugh hysterically. I’m laughing so hard that a piece of pizza shoots out of my mouth all the way across the room. And this brings on another round of hysterical laughter and banging on the wall.

After the movie, we decide to play Fortnite, and this is a game of elimination. The ideal ending is one character is left alive, and everyone else is murdered. We love this game and would play it all night if possible. In the middle of the game, my friend Jamie decides to get some more beer and snack food. When he returns, we start a new round of eating and drinking and laughing our heads off. My neighbor has given up on banging on the wall and has come to the door to complain in person.

He says, “Hey, I can’t get any sleep with all this racket. He looks furious, but when he sees that we are playing Fortnite, he says,’ excellent, can I join in? This is my favorite game.”

“Yeah, sure, and we just got more beer and snacks. Have a seat. “

And that, my friends, was the first night of the best three years of my life. And you only have one life. You should live it to the fullest. Whatever that means to you.”

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