Atlanta Apartment Hunting
Jamie Iredell


toured me through strange-sounding byways: Cheshire Bridge, Bells Ferry, Moore's Mill Roads. Everything sounded old, just as it was—antebellum, and cotton mill-studded. Finally a studio on Monroe—familiar, though still a forgotten President—emerged from the Creative Loafing. The landlord's voice was Southern-gay—all drawl and lilt. His eyes were shaped like rail-flattened pennies, and just as brown, like a mouse's fur. He was equally opportunistic and uncaring about the humans who inhabited his buildings. The apartment was swathed in pecan trees and pools of standing water gurgled with mosquito larvae, their little wormy bodies waving to me. Inside the room was cave-like, for all the shade the pecans tossed, and the lack of windows. For six years I hermitized myself in there, until I met Sarah, and we moved into a place filled with light. When it came time to leave, Wayne, the landlord, said I could have extra time to pack and clean. He returned my deposit in full, minus these extra days.




The last part of Jamie Iredell's novel in chapbooks (Before I Moved to Nevada) has just come out from PG and can be read here. The other parts are When I Moved to Atlanta (Paper Hero Press) and When I Moved to Nevada (The Greying Ghost Press).

To link to this story directly: http://wigleaf.com/200904hunting.htm

Read JI's "Roadtrip" from the archive.

Detail of photo on main page courtesy of rbatina.







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