Train Encounter: Part 1
He was just waiting to take the train again. Waiting on a platform that would be momentarily crowded, but he had room to breath, for now. People are always later to the station on Tuesdays. They’re waiting like him to take the 7/35 cattle car to or from work. Looking at the digital display hanging from the ceiling of the station every couple of minutes and then getting lost in the newspaper or magazine or people watching. Just one more way to count the wasted minutes. Another way to feel a little less. No one would talk to each other and it was for the best. That’s what Al thought. And that’s what Al thought they all thought too.
At first he didn’t notice her waiting on the platform and she didn’t really stand out. It was when Al sat back on the bench and turned his head to the left that she came into his line of sight. He figured she must be in school and that’s where she’s going. She didn’t have a uniform on but she was wearing a backpack.
“Maybe she’s in college,” he thought. “probably an intern. Maybe this is her first day”.
Honk Honk
Two (unheeded warning) blasts from the train interrupted his attention and when he turned back around to look at her a rush of bodies had obscured her. All those people ready gasping at too little air so everyone uncomfortably fits into the train.
He quickly jumped up from the bench and frantically searched for the yellow sweater that caught his eye. She stood out and wouldn’t be that hard to find again.
He began to jockey for his place in the train, his place next to her. He wanted to get closer to her even if not close enough to talk. Looking at her would be plenty. He began to fantasize talking to her. Quickly he got upset. Al didn’t know what to say to her. It had been twelve years since he had struck up a conversation with a woman he found attractive. Twelve long and mostly loveless years of marriage. He began to wonder what he would talk about, if he could even talk about anything that would keep this yellow sweater interested. But he had to get close enough to see her. Maybe he’d get lucky and by chance find himself next to her. Maybe close enough to smell the kind of shampoo she uses. But he didn’t want to leave this up to chance. The crowd swelled forward. It was too late.
“Maybe I can catch her when it’s her stop. She’s probably coming back to this stop. Yeah this is her stop. She looks like a Melanie.” Now he just started making up situations where she would laugh or positively respond to anything he said. In his head she seemed genuinely interested in any observation he would make about the other riders or the neighborhoods they passed. It was all so perfect and smooth in his head. All he needed was to see her again to confirm she was real. And once he saw her that would make all the feelings he associated with her real too. It was perfect. It was what he needed.
Over the intercom system the conductor announced Al’s stop but no sight of her anywhere. The crowd had thinned and so did his optimism for seeing her again. “She must be in the other car. But maybe she’s short and I wont get a good look. Maybe she isn’t real. No. No!” he insisted to himself. “I saw her and the others saw her and I know she was there. Her sweater was too bright yellow not to be real. I know she was there. She’ll be back again.”
Al settled his worries, collected himself and departed the train. This was the last part of his march. The walk from the train station to his house. The last time in his day he considered himself a free man. When he got home he knew the routine would wear him into a stupid binge. He just wanted some kind of escape. But this walk home was quicker than usual. He couldn’t stop thinking about the yellow sweater. How it hugged her chest so snuggly. She had nice breasts, anyone could tell that. Big but not too big. Probably a C-cup he thought. Her hair wasn’t anything remarkable, but it made the rest of her features stand out even more. Her delicate white skin that probably burned quickly in the summer. The high cheek bones supporting doe eyes that could melt any heart and her nose that was just slightly upturned. Her skirt that was hemmed just over her kneecaps revealed legs you see in swimsuit/pin-up magazines. Yeah, she had a real nice tight body he thought.
And just as he noticed the erection growing in his pants Al was at his front door. He maneuvered his overcoat and brief-case to shield any embarrassment and shame from his wife who just wouldn’t understand.
Intersection
What’s that racket/
He didn’t answer. All they heard was a clatter of smashed blacktop and reverse warning honks from city trucks. She turned over to shut the window.
What are they doing/ Talking into the pillow.
Putting up that new traffic light Sal… remember we saw the signs roped on the trees up and down the block last night.
Still into the pillow- I have such a headache. Can’t they start later/
Doug figured to let her get more rest and examine the situation more closely for himself. <I wonder if they’ll put up a new crosswalk button. Na, that’d be too much and the light wouldn’t change quickly enough but it would still be nice, make it look nice. And maybe have those ones with the countdown numbers in them, so you don’t haveta guess if it’s still flashing.>
There was never enough traffic to warrant a button. It only made people feel good about waiting. <I wouldn’t want one anyway. All those people pushing the same button again and again. What if they just sneezed into their hand or were bleeding. I hope one doesn’t go up and infest the corner. It’s a nice neighborhood. They should know better than to mix up our little family and all the other families here. We tried so hard to make this a nice place and now it kinda is except that all the people who moved in are jerks behind the wheel and now because of us it isn’t safe for our kids to play outside without a traffic light that they don’t need but we do. They responsible ones> He chuckles out-loud but Sally is again fast asleep in the other corner where the bed is doing its best to deliver her from the commotion outside. <need to be looked after. we are the people bringing more people into the world and this is what we do to them. Tell them to be afraid of strangers, but their friends and families are the real danger to them. We never tell them the real danger, we don’t tell them about ourselves.>
From the third story window he could see a crew of five utility workers in orange mesh safety vest. They had blocked off both flows of traffic and created the Barnes Dance everywhere should have but only a few cities have and only then a few spots in the cities have. But it didn’t matter here. It was a windy day and maybe too windy to be woking in cherry pickers and with jack-hammers. But they were gonna get thru it today cause that’s what the sign said and that’s what they were gonna do. Debris floating around or not, extension arm swaying or not, it had to be erected. Doug looks over to his sleeping Sally and then back to the intersection.
<This is the crew who would have gone out with chainsaws and bulldozers to go clear a forest, but there aren’t any more forests left to clear. So these guys get up as high as tree limbs and start making things that look like trees even though there aren’t enough trees anymore to go foresting them. At least it’ll keep the kids safe. >
Every eight or nine minutes or so the team of street workers have to stop and there is less sound in the air. It is never silent. The wind is still howling and he can’t open the corner window without getting a coating of street grime on the window sill and anything within a foot radius.
He leaves the scene and does a familiar routine to begin the day. The shower spray and grinding of the electric razor drown out all of the outside commotion but only in the sanctuary of the bath. He knows he has to leave the bathroom and the apartment and cross the intersection. the subway is two blocks from the room. Two blocks from his third story asylum and outlook.
