I started to develop feelings for my building superintendent

I still think about the night before I left Los Angeles—the way Matt and I finally stopped pretending we were just friends and how his pit bull, Jesus, fell asleep on the edge of the bed while we held each other, fully clothed, knowing our time was up. It wasn’t a great ending. There were no fireworks, no cinematic announcements. Just outside the city there is quiet silence and two people trying to make one night last forever.

I met Matt years ago, when I first moved to Los Angeles and the city seemed to crush me. I had been looking for an apartment for months, a process that had turned into a series of minor insults. Landlords’ smiles would fade the moment they saw my brown face. The nicer apartments—those with working showers or refrigerators—were always “rent only.” The ones I could really get were dark, smelly or uncomfortable.

I was beginning to think I had made a mistake in leaving New York. Then my friend Shannon sent me a Craigslist listing that—miraculously—seemed normal. “Hollywood / Little Armenia,” she read. “Centrally located. Two blocks from 101.” The fare was not outrageous. The pictures didn’t scare me. I pulled out my Thomas guide, found my way to Lexington Avenue and walked there with more hope than I care to admit.

The building exceeded my expectations. It was white, mid-century, with castle-like touches that gave it character. The street was alive with Armenian markets and mom-and-pop bakeries. For the first time since arriving in LA, I could see myself living in a place that felt like a community.

Then Matt appeared.

He had long, clean hair, red hair, with warm brown eyes that you immediately felt attracted to him. “You’re here about the apartment?” he asked. I prepared myself to break the routine. Instead, he smiled and said, “Let me show you around.”

He was the caretaker of the building, but it felt too small a word for him. He was also a documentary filmmaker who had studied at UCLA, was fluent in three languages ​​and had an easy charisma that drew people to him. His dog, Jesus, a black and white pit bull, followed him everywhere, tail wagging like a punctuation mark.

The apartment itself was not perfect, but it was a palace compared to what I had been through. It was a studio with a large kitchen and lots of natural sunlight. I signed the lease that week. Shannon warned me, only half-jokingly, “Don’t fall for your building super.” I promised I wouldn’t.

This commitment lasted about two weeks.

The first night I got in, I realized my bedroom window was broken—not just broken, but open enough to make me feel unsafe. I knocked on Matt’s door, probably faster than I intended. I’ve been through too much crap to expect much. But he listened patiently, raised his head and made it right the next day. That small act—his professionalism, his consistency—disarmed me. It was the first time in months that someone in this town felt like they cared about me.

We both smoked at the time. The building had a small courtyard where residents would gather, and before long, Matt and I started running into each other there. The meeting turned into a conversation about film, queerness, art and the strange loneliness of a transplant in a city chasing dreams. He told me about Costa Rica, where he grew up, and about how he loved Los Angeles and resented it for its contradictions. I told him about New York, how it shaped me and why I was leaving.

Our relationship slowly deepened, punctuated by cigarettes and laughter, and those long, lingering silences when neither of us wanted to say goodnight.

By the time the holidays rolled around, I stopped pretending that I wasn’t looking forward to seeing him. As a thank you for all his help that first year, I bought him two bottles of Gray Goose: lemon and orange flavors because I noticed he liked lemon. He invited me to help them drink on New Year’s Eve.

We spent the night talking about everything and nothing: music, travel, passion. Midnight came. Embrace us. And in that long, long hug, I felt the spark that we’d been staring at. But we left, careful not to cross the boundary that had been quietly sanctified between us.

For years, we danced around it. We would share a beer, a cigarette, a late night conversation and then retreat to our corners. I respected his professionalism; He respected my place. But beneath all this restraint something was undeniably alive.

Then came the crash. A driver T-boned my Volvo on the way home from work on the E! Network, and I was left with two herniated cervical discs and a dire warning from my doctor: one wrong move, and I could be paralyzed. I decided to go back to New York to recover.

The night before I left, Matt came over to say goodbye. We knew this was our last chance to stop the show.

“I love you,” he said with a smile.

“I love you too,” I told him.

We finally kissed, with the tenderness born of years of self-restraint. But we don’t take it anymore. We just lay there, spooning each other, while silence can save us.

After I moved east, we kept in touch for a while, then broke up. He eventually married a Frenchman and moved to Europe to make a film. I stayed in New York and wrote my stories.

Sometimes I think about that broken window—the one he fixed the day after my first night in the building—and how it set the tone for everything that followed. Love doesn’t always announce itself with drama. Sometimes it is in the silent repair of something broken, small acts of care that create something profound.

Matt taught me this. He made a city that once felt hostile finally feel like home. And even now, years later, when I think of Los Angeles, I don’t think of rejection or struggle. I think about him.

The author is a freelance writer. He lives in New York City and works on monuments. He is also on Instagram: @thebohemiandork.

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