A stranger lives the same life as you, for a moment

24 Nov, 2025

Three seconds

It's late afternoon and you're walking home alone in a big city. The road before you unfolds a perfect view of the supermoon hanging just over the horizon. The moon really is bigger than normal, you think to yourself, no wonder they call it a supermoon. You walk by a pizza shop just as a woman pulls the pizza guy outside and points at the sky. His eyes widen as he replies directly to the thought in your head, "holy shit, it is big!"

Three minutes

You find yourself keeled over on the floor of the 7 train, nearly passing out from exhaustion after circumnavigating Manhattan on foot. Your boyfriend is by your side, freaking out a bit and doing his best to take care of you. People quickly clear out the bench for the two of you, and the older man next to you offers some water and advice. "Take deep breaths and put your head between your knees." He turns to your boyfriend, "what did she have?" He says matter-of-factly that you just walked a long distance and hadn't had any food in the three hours after the walk. The concerned stranger insisted, "no really, what did she have?"

Three months

Your internship starts like any other, a painfully early wakeup, a chaotic commute, a few wrong turns, and finally a room full of fellow students. A young employee flips through too many orientation slides before you're off to the races. All of you brilliant interns start meeting up for lunch every day. You rattle off stories about your teams and interrupt each other with the impatience of five-year-olds. In a week it's like you've known each other your whole lives. You don't even consider eating lunch with your team because this is your family now.

You talk about everything and nothing in particular, all of the time. Maybe you're a little impressionable too, you haven't quite grown out of peer pressure. The other intern on your team is vegan, so you go vegan too. A week later you're joking with him about your insecurity of not knowing whether you actually smell bad all the time. He solemnly interjects, "actually, I've been meaning to talk to you about this... your farts smell awful... it's hard for me to focus at my desk sometimes." The joke goes over your head, you're mortified, you're so sorry, you tell him, it's all the beans, and he ribs you the rest of the bus ride home for being so gullible.

The term flies by. You hug and wish each other well on that last day. Maybe you'll bump into each other in the halls and say hi. You'll meet even more people at the next internship, and the one after that. By the time you've graduated, you only remember them as collectives and impressions: the edgy ones, the kind ones, the corporate bots, the frat boys.

Three years

As you're hauling your boxes into your new third-floor walk-up, you run into the only other tenants on your floor, a guy and a girl, nice young couple with a dog. They introduce themselves warmly. They're both friendly and seem content to not be friends. (Nice!¹) You see them often enough, but not that often. Usually it's a quick wave as you're heading to the office and they're getting back from walking their dog. Every now and then you hear someone following your footsteps down the street from the subway station, check over your shoulder, and oh thank God it's just your neighbour. "Hey, good to see you." "You too, have a good night." When it pours outside, your dripping umbrellas share a spot in the hall.

You share a lot more than you ever let on. The walls aren't that thin, but the late night fights still bleed through. As the exterminator's poison starts kicking in, you wonder about all the roaches that came from down the hall and took refuge behind your door instead. Sometimes you let your friends on the roof, stomping all over your neighbour's side, and sometimes you feel the thud-thud-thud over your head too.

One day you see a stroller appear outside their door. You'd never noticed if she was pregnant and you don't hear any baby crying, but the stroller remains. Maybe it's for the dog, but that seems a little odd. You ponder the possibility of a tragedy and you feel sorry. Then you start noticing dogs in strollers everywhere and wonder why you hadn't seen it before.

Another time the guy runs into you and your boyfriend coming back from the gym. He asks a lot of questions. "What's your routine like? You guys train together? How many times do you go in a week?" Turns out, he is in fact a trainer! He offers to train you and you exchange contact info. You never take him up on the offer. No hard feelings, he's as pleasant as ever.

Finally you move out and start giving all your furniture away. Nobody wants the couch. Could your beloved neighbours save you from a backbreaking haul down the stairs? They're interested at first but it's too big for their space. You always thought you had the same apartment layout, but apparently not. They ask you where you're moving to. "Oh, Toronto, very nice. Good luck with your move." That's the end of that.