I'm at work now, but I'm happy to share later. There was a Kazakh family (new immigrants), a Syrian guy (there for medical school), a "stripper" with a large butt implant (on paper, but really she was a prostitute; not judging), an Italian guy (graphic design exchange student), and more. Usually every few months there would be a new flatmate.

All to say the apartment was definitely illegal, but I was young and couldn't afford much.

I'm wondering if I should make a few separate posts about these, but for now let me tell you about the stripper/prostitute; we'll call her Ana.

I'll begin by describing this apartment. When you opened the front door you saw a long wood floor hallway. Every door was on the right. First there was a bedroom, then the bathroom, another bedroom, then the kitchen, another bedroom, and my room was at the end. No living room whatsoever.

When Ana was moving in she only had a few pieces of luggage. I invited her to my room to get to know her, offering to make her some tea. She accepted and while she's telling me how she works at a strip club near midtown she's eyeing up my room. Pretty quickly she notices one of my windows has a fire escape; the window facing the front of the building. It's spring so the window is open. To her that was an invitation. She climbed out and started yelling down at the passersby while twerking. At this point I got a good look at her body; I mean it's not like I didn't notice she was curvy before, but now I could clearly see the butt implants. I started to put two and two together. After wrangling her back inside, I diplomatically moved us to the kitchen.

Later that week, early one morning, I heard screaming down the hall, but an unfamiliar man's voice. Apparently she brought a "client from the strip club" home. Guess he wanted a little extra that morning without having paid. Ana pepper sprayed him as he retreated into the hall, and the first person to run out to the commotion was the French girl. She got pepper sprayed inadvertently. The guy quickly left, the girls got into an argument, and me and the rest of the residents stayed in our rooms until it became dead quiet. Ana was gone next month.

I want more story time