Well, I Love That Dirty Water. Oh Boston, You're My Home...
MediaNews Group/Boston Herald via Getty Images. Getty Images.I followed the realtor up a narrow, dimly lit staircase to the second floor. Once we were standing in the small hallway, she opened the door directly in front of us and said, "This is the bathroom. You'll be sharing it with the employees who work for the realty company…"
I stepped inside, and there was an old cast iron tub with an ugly shower curtain on the right. Next to it was a free-standing pedestal sink with a mirrored built-in medicine cabinet behind it. Next to the outside wall was a white two-piece toilet with a partially rusted chrome 90-degree pipe connecting the tank to the bowl. It had a faded, open-front black seat, the kind you find in a commercial building.
The floor had small black and white tiles placed diagonally, and there was one tall double-hung window with wide, painted woodwork that was heavily chipped and a cheap, faded shade. And under it, a big ass steam radiator. The light was coming from a simple round yellowed fixture mounted high on the 10-foot ceiling that had no more than a 60-watt bulb, which I hoped would provide enough light to shave.
Once the realtor provided me with what she felt was ample time to look at the bathroom, she started pulling the door closed even before I made my decision to walk out. I made it through the door just in the nick of time.
Next to the bathroom and perpendicular to it was another door. She fumbled with the key and opened it. The studio apartment had the same high ceilings as the bathroom. In the back, there was a walkout bay with three double-hung windows and another big ass steam radiator under the middle one. On the side of the room opposite the entry was an extraordinary working marble fireplace I was told not to use. The entire floor was marble, too. There was a kitchenette on the front wall that had a small stove, mini-refrigerator, and a stainless steel bar sink. It was all partially hidden behind a small breakfast bar with a white marbleized Formica top.
587 Beacon St., built in 1899…
Photo provided courtesy of Zillow
It was all quite magnificent, eloquent, and expensive looking, especially for a college student trying to find an inexpensive place to live in Boston, and given how I had stumbled onto it, a lucky find. One question remained. How much?
When I asked, she responded matter-of-factly, "Two hundred dollars a month with a first and last month due upon signing a one-year lease…"
There wasn't a whole lot to think about. I didn't hesitate. I told her I'd take it.
Shit! It was two doors down from Al Capone's Pizza, a block from Store 24, and two popular nightclubs in Kenmore Square, Katy's and Lucifer's, close enough to Fenway Park to hear the crowd cheer and only a mile away from my girlfriend's dorm at 102 Beacon. I hit the fucking jackpot!
My cousin Mark had just graduated from MIT, and when he heard I was considering going back to school and living in Boston, he called and asked me if I wanted his bartending job at Father's Fore in Cambridge. I called him immediately and told him I did.
My girlfriend's parents let me park my Cuda next to their screen porch, under the pine trees beside their house in Sharon.
The search was over. I was finally returning to my birthplace. I had found an affordable studio apartment in a brownstone in the heart of the best college town in the USA, Boston. Life was so fucking good!
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To be continued…
*All characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental…