Sometimes the neighbors smoked cigarettes in their bathroom, and the smoke traveled down the vent, seeping into Isabel a’s bathroom and making the air hazy.

They hung mirrors on the wal s to make the apartment seem bigger, and put up bright yel ow curtains to distract from the grayness. They put up a fake wal to make Mary’s bedroom, a slim rectangle that held her bed and desk and not much else. The wal was thin and Isabel a could hear when Mary sneezed or turned a page. Mary was always shut up in her room working, which drove Isabel a crazy.

“What are you doing?” she’d ask through the wal .

“Studying,” Mary always replied.

“Again?” Isabel a would ask. Mary would sigh.

“Yep. Again.”

After the first month, Mary started to go to the library more. “I’m too easily distracted,” she told Isabel a. It was quieter in the apartment with Mary gone so much, but Isabel a never real y felt lonely. And if she did, she’d go to the bathroom and listen to her neighbors chat, breathing in their smoke and laughing along with them as they said things like “Y’al knew he was a bump on a log” and “Back that train up!”

Isabel a got a job as an assistant, working for two high-level executives at a mailing-list company. She wasn’t sure what they did exactly, but she did know that they cal ed her their “executive assistant” and that her main job every morning was to get Bil a corn muffin with raspberry jel y and to get Sharon a chocolate chip muffin. Bil asked for his muffin, and Sharon did not. This was part of the game. Each morning, when Isabel a placed the muffin on Sharon’s desk, she said, “Oh, I shouldn’t!” but she stil ate it. “I was just getting Bil ’s muffin and I thought maybe you’d want one?” Isabel a would say in response. As long as she did this, they seemed happy.

Isabel a’s days and weeks fel into a routine, but she always felt like there was something else she should be doing, something better that was waiting for her. Sometimes on Saturday afternoons, she and Mary went to the park across the street and ate hot dogs in the sun. Mary always brought her textbooks with her, and took notes and read. Isabel a just stared at people.

“This is the first fal that I haven’t gone to school,” Isabel a said to her once.

“Mmm-hmmm,” Mary said. She turned a page and uncapped a highlighter.

“Maybe that’s why I feel so weird al the time,” Isabel a said.

“Maybe,” Mary said. She fil ed the whole page with yel ow smudges and Isabel a was jealous of her. She didn’t want to go to law school, but Mary had purpose and assignments and for that Isabel a envied her. Al Isabel a had was two bosses who just wanted muffins. And sometimes jel y.

Their friends from col ege, Kristi and Abby, lived in the same building as they did. Kristi was the one who’d recommended it to them. “You have to live in a doorman building,” she’d said to Isabel a, as though it was something everyone already knew. “It’s not safe otherwise.” Sometimes Isabel a went out with them, but they exhausted her. Kristi and Abby always wanted to get dressed up and go out for sushi or go to a party where you had to have your name on a list to get in. They both worked in PR and al they talked about was events and RSVPs, which Kristi pronounced “Risvips” for some reason. “I can get you on the list,” Kristi would often say to Isabel a. Isabel a didn’t want a list. She just wanted to get a drink.

Sometimes, if she was lucky, Isabel a could convince Mary to go out. They usual y just went to Gamekeepers, the bar right down the street.

“Come on,” Isabel a would say. “It’s so close! We can be there in two minutes and have a drink and be home in an hour.” She always hoped, of course, that once they got there Mary would stay out later, but getting her out was the first step.

Gamekeepers was a brightly lit bar, with neon signs on the wal s and a black-and-white tiled floor. In the back room, there was a whole wal of bookshelves crammed ful of every board game ever made. The first night that Isabel a and Mary went there, they stood in front of the wal and stared at al of the games. The bar had al of the big hits—Scrabble, Trivial Pursuit, Monopoly—and some older games too, like Operation, Boggle, Life, and Sorry!

“Whoa,” Mary said, as they stared at the shelves. “This is crazy.” Al around them, people were playing games on long wooden tables, rol ing dice and slapping cards.

“Oh my God,” Isabel a said. She pul ed a box off the shelf. “Look, they have Pig Mania. I can’t believe it.”

“What is that?” Mary asked. She looked at the box.

“It’s this game, from the seventies, I think. You rol pig dice and get scores for different things.”

“Weird,” Mary said.

“The seventies were weird,” Isabel a said. “Come on, let’s play.”

They rol ed the pigs, but Isabel a could tel that Mary wasn’t into it. Two guys came over to join them, which was encouraging at first, but then they started snorting and squealing when the pigs rol ed into any position that looked dirty. “I got Makin’ Bacon!” Isabel a screamed, and they just snorted louder. One of them was so drunk that he kept swaying and bumping into the table, causing their drinks to spil and the pigs to topple.

“I think we should go,” Mary said. She stared at one of the snorters. “I have to get up early to study anyway.”

“Fine,” Isabel a said. She surrendered the pigs to the boys so that they could rol them alone.

“You’re leaving?” the drunk one said. He closed his eyes and Isabel a wondered if he had fal en asleep, and then he opened them and repeated his question. “You’re leaving?”

“Yeah,” Isabel a said. Mary was waiting for her by the door. “I have a lot of things to do tomorrow,” she said. “Just a real y busy day.”

Isabel a met a boy named Ben and went on a date. She wanted something to fil her empty weekend days when Mary was studying and Kristi and Abby did things that Isabel a had no interest in, like going to the gym or shopping in SoHo. Isabel a went to the gym with them once, and Kristi wore earrings and a necklace while she ran on the treadmil , which bothered Isabel a so much that she couldn’t ever bring herself to go back again.

“I’ve never been on a date before,” Isabel a said to Mary as she got ready that night.

“You’ve been on plenty of dates,” Mary said.

“No,” Isabel a said. “I’ve been out to eat with boys who were my boyfriend, but that’s not dating. That’s just paral el eating.”

Mary looked up from her books and tilted her head. “Paral el eating,” she said. “Huh. Sometimes I think you should have been a lawyer.”

Isabel a and Ben starting spending a lot of time together, but he never real y wanted to do anything. He was fine sitting on the couch in their apartment. “Maybe we should go out?” Isabel a would suggest. “To a museum or the zoo or something?” Ben just laughed at her and patted her knee.