The Living begins with the narrator, Shy, standing alone on the Honeymoon Deck of a Paradise cruise ship. Shy is a Mexican American teenager from Otay Mesa, San Diego, a town “right down there by the border” (3). He has taken a summer job with the cruise line, and although he finds the work to be menial, the money is “game-changing good” (1). He hopes to help his mother financially, buy himself “some new gear and a pair of kicks” (1), and be able to afford to take a girl out on an expensive dinner date. Paradise cruise ships are the height of luxury, meaning almost every passenger is extremely wealthy.

As part of his job as a “Towel Boy at the Lido Deck pool by day” and “Water Boy at night” (1), Shy has become accustomed to catering to rich, arrogant passengers; one such man approaches him, and Shy describes him as “middle-aged and balding, dressed in a suit two sizes too small” (2). The man, who introduces himself as David Williamson, is visibly uncomfortable and starts talking to Shy about his life as the “top scientist in my field” and “cofounder of my own business” (2).