George's Home on Camphor Tree Lane, somewhere in California

George's home is "a tightly planned little house" comprised of only the necessities (12). The staircase is narrow and steep, and one must bend one's head "even if, like George," they are "only five eight" (12). The living room "is dark and low-ceilinged, with bookshelves all along the wall opposite the windows" (16). There is a small kitchen and a smaller bathroom, and all this smallness and lowness seems protective; the narrator admits that because there is hardly enough room to move, there should equally be hardly enough room to feel lonely. Yet this is untrue: after the death of his partner, Jim, George does feel lonely, almost missing the way the two would squeeze past each other on the narrow stares, or shave in front of the same bathroom mirror. In many ways, therefore, the house may be regarded as a metaphor...