I wrote this essay about roommates for the current issue of the beautiful interiors magazine, Apartamento. The photos are of me in mi apartamento, taken by Sandy Kim.
When I moved to New York in the summer of 2010 I didn’t have any friends. I couldn’t afford my own apartment, so I made the novice mistake of moving in with a random stranger I met on Craigslist. You hear horror stories about Craigslist roommates–OCD, junkies, money scammers, rapists–but still, I thought, How bad could it be?
Mike was in his mid thirties with a big beer belly, permanent armpit stains, and the general attitude and appearance of a someone who hasn’t gotten a blow-job in over a decade. He would burp and fart so loud that it would wake me from my sleep almost every night. To add to his cliched ‘bad roommate’ persona, he was a hoarder. Every available space of the apartment was crammed with dusty knickknacks, books with titles like Why We Get Fat, light-up Santa Clause statues that no longer lit up–the list goes on. The weirdest thing, though, was that for the most part Mike refused to speak to me, instead choosing to communicate solely through passive aggressive notes he would write in washable marker on the bathroom mirror. Things like, “DID SOMEONE USE MY COMB!?” (And by “someone” I assume he meant me, as we were the only two people living in the house.) I became so terrified of the awkwardness of running into him in the hallway that if I knew he was home, instead of going to the bathroom, I would pee into a plastic cup and throw it out the window. I only ever saw him clean once; I came home late one night to find him on all fours, manically scrubbed the bathtub with bleach. I was convinced he’d killed someone.
That apartment only cost me $420 a month–that’s pretty insane, even for Bushwick–but still, it wasn’t worth it. I needed to get out. So when my friend Amelia split up with her girlfriend and offered to let me live in a section of her living room for a small portion of the rent, I gladly accepted. Sure, I wouldn’t have a “real” room, and instead of actual walls my living space would be defined by sheets slung over a makeshift clothes rail, but still, it would be better than peeing out the window.
It’s a unique form of intimacy that arises, living so closely with someone like we do. In New York, unless you’re loaded, you generally have to resign to living in a glorified shoebox. Having a roommate becomes like being in a relationship, except without the fucking.
Because of the open-plan layout of our house, there is essentially zero privacy. When I’m in my bed and Amelia is in hers, we can hear each other breathing. We hear every phone call the other makes–the lies we tell our moms, the excuses we make to our bosses. When Amelia has sex, I can literally hear the sound of her fingers entering her lover’s vagina. Last night, I heard the girl in her bed whisper, “You fuck me better than my husband.” I miss nothing. And Amelia, in turn, has been witness to the many times I’ve screamed and cried and came and puked. We split the price of toilet paper, we pull clumps of each other’s hair out of the drain, we make salads, we share boxes of tampons. Once, when the guy I was sleeping with refused to go down on me (he claimed that my vagina at the time tasted “potent” and that the smell of my cunt “put him off”), Amelia offered to lick my fingers after they’d been inside me to judge how mine compared to the plethora of vaginas she’d previously sampled. “How thoughtful!,” I replied. Really, what more could you ask of a roommate than that?
This pretty much is the story of my life. Living with a friend is weird, intense but is something special, and I’m almost scared now to going back to live alone. Ps: the two photos are fantastic! xx
This post fills me with nothing but pure unadulterated excitement for moving down into a shoe box in London and licking vagina juice off my best friends fingers.
Also those photos are amazing, why do you get to be skinny with big boobs? Want to trade for my tiny tits and massive hips? (They’ll come in so handy for childbirth, literally those fuckers will just slide out.)
:) I moved to NYC last September without knowing anyone and ended up with an amazing roommate in williamsburg for $450/month! but we could never form such a bond (a dude) :/ consider yourself the luckiest..also, kudos to you for sticking it out… i’m sure it was hard at first and look at you now! <3 xo
DID SOMEONE USE MY COMB?!?!
Awesome photos! My favorite roommate hung out with dodgy Francophones who would offer visitors handfuls of Ecstasy from a cookie jar.
oh Karley you are so entertaining <3
You’re so endearingly honest. As much as I love the fetish posts, it’s the cute ones like these I cherish the most. You’re the best blog on the internet. I laugh when people think otherwise :)
Omg, I love this
Old school slutever, i like it. The second pic is very nice, but vertically stretched. Kisses from Milan
hey what would a holden caulfield session of checkers cost a fellow bushwickian? I don’t drink piss yet.
PLEASE, I live in Williamsburg :) So you want to pay me to play checkers with you?
I had a sex dream about you the other night. It was so hot! You were a real good domme :)
You look so hot in that first picture! Gotdamn!
It’s a good post.
i miss posts like this!! most of your stuff now is all fetish stuff and things from magazines. i mean the writing is good etc but i started liking your blog because of your posts that made regular life seem kind of bizarre and interesting. i liked how it was just kind of “young people living life”. that stuff was entertaining as well as relateable.
what about whats his face, the other dude you lived with? with the crystals! he was the best
Bunny? He’s in London still!
nah the young little hippie, i think he/she means that one.
Why does your face look super pale and your legs look super tan in that last photo? Is that stockings or strange lighting?
I miss my roommates especially one of them. When we used to go out and we did not get a guy to bring home. We would have great coitus with each other. I used to love the taste and smell of her pussy. Good times.!
omg the original lala is a MAN, baby
Is this the same apt. that you live in now- the one with the chalkboard in the kitchen?
Yeah the chalkboard apt is the same as the curtain apt. Still live behind a curtain. #glamorous
the New York apartment culture is fascinating. i think you really have to love people to thrive in it. NY is a city of people lovers.
I actually did that whole pee-in-a-cup move a few times at my old house. Never worth it.
Is this the apartment you also used for the dream lover vid?
This post makes me appreciate life even more. Thanks to you! xx
Karley, will you write (or have you written) a piece on the varied vagina (they’re all so different!) and which ones people like and why?
my roommate drank too much and I fucked too much. practically speaking, this meant that I complained about listening to her drunkenly puking while I was having sex, and she complained about listening to my disgusting dirty-talking while she was busy drunkenly puking. we no longer live together.
also, “you fuck me better than my husband” is something I always secretly wanted a woman to say to me.
You told me the rent was $500 a month! You owe me $80! x
Hahahahaha. True! I swindled you! :)