Monday, March 9, 2009
-m4w -28
You had a guitar. I had a blue hat. We exchanged glances and smiles on the subway platform. I pretended to read my New Yorker but I couldn't concentrate. You got on the Q and I stayed on to wait for the B. You were lovely.
You ride the train just like any other day, bemoaning the heat and the crowd and the loneliness as usual, when you allow your eyes to wander and suddenly there you find him - another soul trapped in this routine of public transports and crowds and complaining about it.
By some cosmic pull or just the natural ordinariness of the situation you find yourself seated next to him and in the few minutes that it takes from point A to wherever point B is, this is where the world revolves, with your 2 pm meeting a mere dot in the horizon and the tears you cried last night over locked up hurts that spill out when no one's there seeming like someone's else's memory.
What you have at the moment is this - a stranger who looks you in the eye for a second or two and presents you with the what ifs that you allow yourself to ask because you know the answer is too absurd it can't hurt you.
Meanwhile you dare not move or scoot closer because suddenly you are aware of everything that is you; bone, muscle, skin, fabric. Two, three layers between you and the fabric, skin, muscle, bone of this man seated beside you.
A cheesy ballad plays as if on cue, creating in your mind endless possibilities, the kind romantic movies are made of where no one knows what happens in between the chase and the hugs and the kisses.
Then it stops.
Point B has arrived and for the first time in what seems like an hour, you let out a deep breath, holding on to your bag and gathering along with it all the pieces of you that spilled on this train and on this man.
You stand up, walk a few steps, stop, glance. Not at the man and what he looks like, but at the man and his promise - you can allow yourself to feel and dream again. You step out of the train and you know you have arrived.
Wonderfully written piece! Whimsical and fun and I felt like I was on the train, too!
ReplyDeleteThis my favorite:
"for a second or two and presents you with the what ifs that you allow yourself to ask because you know the answer is too absurd it can't hurt you."
Guilty! Hahaha!