# ID A Short Story For Me... **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [March 23, 2009, 10:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/id-a-short-story-for-me/490519 "2009-03-23T22:59:39Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Elvis\_Chimney](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/50afbb/32.png) [@Elvis\_Chimney](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elvis_Chimney)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2009, 10:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/id-a-short-story-for-me/490519/1 "2009-03-23T22:59:39Z")
So, I remember some time ago reading a short story (or thinking about it, it might even have been a short film). It was about a man who finds himself homeless and takes to living in another person’s house without them knowing - moving around when they’re not there and hiding in the attic when they are. This continues for some time until he discovers that there are a number of other people who have been doing the same thing, and that they’ve all been living in the house together without him realising. Does this sound familiar to anyone? (I may not have remembered all the details correctly). There’s a voice in the back of my head that says it was a Neil Gaiman story (might be to do with the combination of creepy/funny) but I don’t have any of his books to hand to check. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2009, 11:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/id-a-short-story-for-me/490519/2 "2009-03-23T23:16:35Z")
_All Summer in a Day_ …oops, sorry, force of habit. ---
**Author:** ![Amp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Amp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amp)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2009, 11:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/id-a-short-story-for-me/490519/3 "2009-03-23T23:42:21Z")
The only thing I can think of is a story called _The Occupant_. But that’s about a woman living in someone else’s house thinking it is her own. ---
**Author:** ![Ronald\_C.Semone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/cc9497/32.png) [@Ronald\_C.Semone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ronald_C.Semone)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2009, 12:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/id-a-short-story-for-me/490519/4 "2009-03-24T00:04:56Z")
There is also John Collier’s classic short story, \*Evening Primrose \*, about a man who goes to live in a department store and gradually finds out that there is a whole society living there after hours. ---
**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2009, 12:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/id-a-short-story-for-me/490519/5 "2009-03-24T00:32:58Z")
Not your story but a real tale of adventure. [The apartment at the mall](http://shenews.projo.com/2007/10/apartment-at-th.html) > [@](#): > > PROVIDENCE — Eight artists snuck into the depths of Providence Place mall and built a secret studio apartment in which they stayed, on and off, for nearly four years until mall security finally caught their leader last week … ---
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2009, 12:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/id-a-short-story-for-me/490519/6 "2009-03-24T00:46:05Z")
> [@Ronald\_C.Semone](#): > > There is also John Collier’s classic short story, Evening Primrose , about a man who goes to live in a department store and gradually finds out that there is a whole society living there after hours. They used that story in the old radio show _Escape!_. And I think I may have seen it on an episode of _The Twilight Zone_. Or maybe the radio actors did such an excellent job that I manufactured a memory of having seen it on television. ---
**Author:** ![Uncle\_Brother\_Walker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/f08c70/32.png) [@Uncle\_Brother\_Walker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Uncle_Brother_Walker)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2009, 4:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/id-a-short-story-for-me/490519/7 "2009-03-24T04:56:52Z")
I have always remembered this while growing up as a sort of urban legend where some creepy peeping-tom kind of guy lived in between the walls of a very well-to-do home in California. \*While the family lived there. \* He would peep on them while they slept and sneak out during the day when they were at work/school. Seems they had some sort of unique architecture that included crawlspaces between rooms and would connect to the attic. Never figured out if it was true or not, but it was a good creepy story.