I was born in the cold, and the cold was my first memory. Silk-thin fur clung to my skin, damp and pearly, and I peered out at the world. From the opening of a wooden tree knot abruptly interrupted with a fence I could smell a bittersweet rotting of moss, sense the beating of midnight September rains, hear shrill humming streetlights. My siblings and I shuffled away to rest behind Mother near the back of our nest. It was cold outside.

Some time passed, I'm not sure how long, but Mother stopped coming home. The hail came down heavy and we never ate well. Occasionally I ducked under the fence to make away with scraps: kibble, walnuts, compost, a dead bird; and I always ate it on the spot if I could. The other rats wanted me to share. One night, the grass froze solid, and we grappled to fit into our old nest. One of my brothers couldn't squeeze his way in, clinging to tree bark as we warmed ourselves inside, and felt his tail grow limp. He nudged me with a wet nose, desperate, but the air stung us and I didn't move. He bit me until I couldn't hold my place.

I opened my eyes again on the ground and felt a fleeting warmth. Blood on my front leg melted the frost immediately below me, and if it hurt much, my limbs were much too numb to register the pain. I needed shelter, or at the very least, a soft place to die. In a daze I slithered along the underside of the old fence, avoiding a little dampness, and traveled farther than I had normally dared. On my left, I knew there was a fat old cat that watched his house at night. On my right, a raccoon nest. I took my chances with the cat.

He was sleeping now, and I ducked underneath wooden planks to rest. But something smelled unusual by the back of the deck, and I figured I wasn't for the world much longer in this weather anyways. I made my way through rot and dust until I found what I'd looked for - the stone foundation had minuscule cracks. A warm draft escaped them, and without another thought, I slid inside. The heat hit me immediately, and I knew I'd found my new home.

For months i hid myself blissfully in an antique piano. I ate rich table scraps, slept soundly, lived in decadence, with another rat who'd lived there since summer. We were companions in every way. After a while, though, we heard banging from outside the walls. I ran out under the piano and heard a scream, and things started to change. My friend stopped showing up. I snuck down into the crawlspace, looking for him, and found a delicious slice of cheese enticing me. I'd bring it to share with him once he came back. But before I could take it, something heavy snapped down on my neck with a crack, and the last thing I felt was my body going cold.

When I was eight years old, my family moved into a little green house on a busy street. Our landlady used to live there alone with her three dogs, one of which she left buried in the yard when it died, and tiny paintings of them decorated tiles in the kitchen. Thirteen steps led up to our front door. Having no real need for privacy, when she remodeled the house, she gave it curiously few walls. The day we moved into our little empty house, built in 1901, with lead exterior paint, and rats in the basement, and only really bathroom doors, I was absolutely spellbound. My entire life up until then occupied a single-story apartment room in student housing. A little green house with a staircase felt like a cathedral.

We filled the empty space pretty fast. I guess we started to get bigger, and our knees bumped at the dinner table. I still sleep with my little brother and sister, who have both tripled in size since we first came, and still grow taller. My potted plants can barely fit in the kitchen. But our laughter and closeness always made a small home seem plenty wide enough, even when my aunt moved in, making us a family of six. Up until nearly a year ago, I don't think I ever even noticed the space was close.

And then we had to buy desks.

Suddenly, after spending nearly every single day indoors, my own bedroom felt claustrophobic. Every word echoed across the house, inescapable, each conversation winding its way into my head. Forks scraping on plates tore my ears. I heard everything, and felt everything, trapped in a world much too small. We barely found room for children's desks. We still don't know where to put a Christmas tree.

But as few doors as we had, we missed out on a lot of what was in front of us. My mom told me how surprised she was when we went to pick up my meds, how she had no idea. I laughed at her back then. And then I had the same reaction when she had to get hers. Over time, we'd built up walls of our own, and only just realized how lonely we really were. Sometimes, closeness is a blessing. Microwave dinner tastes better at a tiny table. I never miss a joke, no matter where it's made.

I still live in a little green house, by a busy street, with thirteen front steps. It doesn't feel big anymore. But for us it's become just the right size.