Ep. 1: Brick, Booze, and Bad Decisions
The Marmalade District always smelled like wet brick, old money, and regret — especially in the spring, when the snowmelt mixed with spilled beer and whatever mystery fluid was leaking from the alley behind the coffee shop. That was how Eli described it, anyway, standing on the creaky front porch of their Victorian rental with a mug of cold brew and exactly zero pants.
“Pants are a social construct,” Mateo said from inside, where he and his boyfriend Jonah were arguing loudly about whose turn it was to buy toilet paper.
“It was your turn last time,” Jonah shot back. “You bought artisanal olive-oil soap instead.”
“It was on sale.”
Behind them, Alex was sitting cross-legged on the living room floor, attempting to sage the house again despite repeated warnings from the lesbians that incense set off the smoke detector. Nora and Paige, who had been together since sophomore year at the U, watched from the couch like parents at a school play they didn’t approve of.
“This house does not need cleansing,” Paige said. “It needs structural reinforcement.”
“And emotional boundaries,” Nora added.
The household consisted of seven roommates, none of whom had intended to live with this many people, and all of whom secretly loved it. Eli, the unofficial narrator of the house, worked at a nonprofit by day and overshared by night. Mateo bartended downtown and flirted for sport. Jonah was finishing grad school and pretending he wasn’t terrified of adulthood. Alex claimed to be “between jobs,” which everyone knew meant “selling tarot readings on Instagram.”
Then there were Nora and Paige, the only stable couple in the house, which made them deeply suspicious.
The problem began when a manila envelope appeared taped to the front door.
Eli was the one who opened it. “Uh,” he said, scanning the page. “Guys?”
Mateo leaned over his shoulder. “If that’s another HOA complaint about noise, I swear…”
“It’s a notice,” Eli said slowly. “About the house.”
Nora stood up. “What kind of notice?”
“The kind,” Eli said, “that uses the phrase ‘change in ownership.’”
The room went silent.
Paige took the paper and read it twice. “The landlord sold the house.”
“What?” Jonah said. “He can’t do that. We just re-signed.”
Mateo grabbed his phone. “I’m calling him.”
Alex stopped saging. “Wait. Change in ownership can mean anything.”
Eli pointed to the bottom of the page. “There’s a meeting. Tomorrow night. With the new owner.”
Outside, a black SUV rolled slowly past the house, then stopped.
The driver’s window slid down.
And the man inside smiled like he already knew all of them.
