“We were pretty shocked that it happened,” Justin admits.

Part of the reason it happened at all, Justin and Kirshner agree, was that Justin had already proven himself when he undertook to revitalize the Quincy House Grille two years ago.

“Justin is a very imaginative guy who has a lot of ideas—some of them good—about what we could do in Quincy House,” Kirshner says.

When Justin took over management of the Grille in the fall of his junior year, he revamped the menu to include smoothies, breakfast food and fresh-baked cookies. With a surround-sound speaker system, burger-joint style booths and live student performances, the Grille—with Justin at its helm—became a popular hang-out.

All the roommates have been involved in the Grille, either as employees or as sounding boards for Justin’s ideas.

“One of the things that made the Grille really fun to do was having my friends involved,” Justin says.

The Hot Tub on the Balcony

For Anthony, the way they all lobbied for the door is typical of their style—they take an idea, no matter how outlandish, and follow it through.

It’s a style that nearly got them in trouble earlier this year, when they decided that their balcony would be perfect for a hot tub.

As they begin to tell the hot tub story, the voices boom into laughter. “Oh, that’s classic,” one shouts.

When the group decided to get the tub this October, Justin researched the options and they made the purchase—contributing $80 each—from a Leverett House resident who kept the illicit luxury in his room.

But as they began to brainstorm a list of rules for the tub, the roommates faced a fundamental disagreement between those who believed the hot tub should be for their use only, and those who believed the tub should be advertised and shared.

Soon after the purchase, Chris had a group of friends over. They woke up some of the neighbors, and the roommates feared that the secret was out.

The next day, Chris says, his inbox was flooded with angry e-mails from roommates reprimanding him for breaking the hot tub ground rules. They immediately held a heated room meeting.

As the roommates tell the story now, months later, a few of them laugh about the intensity of Aaron and Justin’s reactions.