"You can live rent free for two years in this city, you just have to know how."

I met this guy a few weeks ago, Brian I think his name was. He came to my apartment with a few of my roommates' friends, and it was pretty clear from the start he was just a tag-along, some guy, some anonymous random. He reeked of booze, was dirty, dishelved, wild-eyed. His curly brown hair clung limply to his head, and he wore a ratty Hawaiian shirt and smudged white sneakers. At first I was wary. Why is he in my apartment? Who the fuck is this guy? The living room quickly filled with conversation and it soon became clear that I was stuck with Brian. I could either engage or retreat to the warm confines of my room.

Quickly, I made the decision to chat with this outwardly unappealing person. C'mon, pussy, I thought. You want to be a journalist so bad, well now's your chance. You want to be Joseph Mitchell, well, you're not going to be by not talking to strangers. I bit my lip, and engaged.

"Hey, so-"

Turns out that was all I needed to say. Brian launches into the story of his life with barely any prodding. I love people like this. They're like human rollercoasters. All you have to do is strap yourself in.

So, it turns out Brian is a squatter. Presently, he's trying to find out a way to avoid being evicted from a Park Slope apartment in which he's living. "I don't pay rent," he says. "I never have." He's full of pointed, confrontational little phrases like this. "You can live rent free for two years in this city, you just have to know how," he says. I ask him what I think are poignant journalistic queries. How often do you have to move? "About every six months or so." Wow, so your life must be pretty portable. "Yeah, it is." He shows me his book, of which he has around ten copies in a bag. It's called "Codename: President," and each copy has a different collage-style cover that he designed. "They're $20 each," he says, raising an eyebrow. I nod uncommittingly. I don't have $20.

Brian says he's currently fighting eviction the only way he can: turning the tables on the landlord by trying to shine a spotlight on all the health code violations in the building. "I'm trying to drag it along for as long as I can," he says. But you'll eventually get kicked out, right? He doesn't answer this, instead launching into how he's trying to recruit his neighbors in his crusade, unsuccessfully. They apparently enjoy having a roof over their heads.

He hands me a flier for an art show where he's showing some of his stuff - I don't ask what his "stuff" is. I'm starting to get the feeling this guy's a phony. The flier says the gallery show is sponsored by Corona Beer. I begin to wonder if this Brian fellow is as authentic as I had him pegged, or if he's just some drunken lazy art kid, of which New York never appears to be in short supply. It's only later that my roommates warn me, "He's a junky. He's worthless." Hmmm. Perhaps.

So I admit I was a little caught up in the quasi-romantic (I assumed) life of a squatter. Bucking the system, refusing to conform, claiming ownership simply by occupying space. It's the ultimate "fuck you" to a system drunk on capitalism. The Prestes Maia in Sao Paulo. The Au in Frankfurt. The C-Squat in the Lower East Side. All of these places existed outside the box, off the grid, in a place not on a map although it may technically be on a map, in a time not on a clock cause the clock is broken. Squatting is commonly wrapped up with punk and anarchism, both of which have been sterlized and crippled by years of aggressive co-option. According to Reclaim the Streets, a squat group based out of Berlin, it's all about taking back public space from the enclosed private arena.

Maybe Brian was just some worthless junky. Some drunk. Some idiot artist too stupid to make a buck and afford his own place. But there is something to be said for his approach. Rent free for two years? In New York City? My god, if such a thing were true . . .