spent my first night in the MIT student center, where the security guards left me alone, probably mistaking me for the sort of sleep-deprived overachiever I had once been. In the nights that followed, I slept on couches, in alleys, and once, on the rooftop of the Harvard English Department. It was a warm night, but a lonely place. I can’t even remember if there were sounds or raindrops or distant chatter from the nearby cafe; I am guessing there were not, but in any case, my own echoing emptiness would have drowned it out. I learned quickly that there’s an intrinsically desolate feeling to
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