He most likely lives in a shared apartment, a short walk from the edge of the hip part of a town. He probably shares this apartment with some interesting people; some street-finds decorate their space, and they wear sweaters in the wintertime because heat is expensive. He works a low-paying job with interesting people he likes, and they have interesting conversations. But eventually he’ll get a different job.

Judging from the way he holds his right hand in this photo, his name is Ryan. There is lint in his right rear pocket.

He knows some interesting people, and is aware of more interesting people—or just imagines they exist—and hopes to meet them. And hopes that when he does meet that they will like him. This is evident from the creases in the top of his left front pocket.

When he’s alone, he reads long old novels that he doesn’t tell anyone about. He keeps them a secret, since he is worried it might make him seem pretentious. The most recent book he read was by Dickens. The front pages fell out, because he kept curling the book over so he could hold it with one hand; the pages fell out just as he reached for a chipped Arizona Loves You mug full of coffee on his bookcase. He was half-way through the third paragraph on page 537 at the time. To judge from the day-old moustache on his upper lip, the coffee was most likely luke-warm.

He probably found a penny on the ground at 12:03 today. It was heads-up. He took that as a good sign. After putting his groceries away, he walked out of his kitchen, and then out of his apartment, and towards the hip part of town. Thinking today he’d meet someone very interesting.

This afternoon.

Tim Devin