The Commute

The transit driver gets back onto the car carrying a leather, sand-colored briefcase in both hands and raises it high above his head. “Does this belong to anyone?”

Almost all the passengers in the lead car look up. A young red haired lady sitting in the seat ahead of me takes her earbuds out and looks quizzically at the passenger sitting next to her.

“What did he say?”

The man looks up from his reader. “I don’t know, something about the briefcase.”

The woman turns as he passes her. Our eyes meet.

“He’s asking if the bag belongs to anyone,” I say.

She shrugs, turns around and replaces her earbuds. The driver walks through the aisle, still holding the briefcase over his head. I can hear him ask the same question as he enters the second car.

The driver returns, carrying the bag like a football under his arm. He adjusts his Port Authority cap. He raises the bag high over his head again. “Last call.” No one even acknowledges him this time.

“Come on, already,” a teenage girl shouts.

The driver returns to his seat, places the briefcase at his feet, and puts the car in gear. My eyes follow his every action. That is a beautiful bag. I slouch in the hard pew-like seat and try to get a quick catnap before the rat race begins.

“Nice bag, huh?” The man sitting next to me interrupts my plan. He removes his glasses off. “I was shopping for bags online about two weeks ago. Saw one just like that, you know, the saddle bag look.”

“Yeah.” I nod, hoping he’ll take the hint.

“Yep. It cost almost twelve hundred dollars.” He replaces his glasses and returns his attention to the newspaper in his lap.

I turn my head. “I believe it.”

“Who would leave a beauty like that?” He picks up his newspaper. Our conversation is over.

I can see the bag clearly from where I sit. It even has locks on the two buckles. Who would leave a bag like that? I wonder what’s in it. Maybe it’s full of hundred dollar bills from a bank robbery. Nah. It’s probably stuffed with important documents. The person who lost it is probably going to get fired or hung out to dry. Or both. No, with a bag like that, she’s the boss. Maybe somebody’s carrying their lunch. Trying to look important. Nobody would forget an expensive briefcase like that one. The motion of the train brings me out of my thoughts. Everyone else has returned to their business. One fellow traveler opens his newspaper. The headline, in bold print, erases the grin on my face. Suicide Bomber claims the lives of fifteen in an Iraqi marketplace. I can read it from four seats away.

Wow, that’s crazy. People just going about their daily lives, and all of a sudden their world is ripped apart – dead. I take another look at the bag. It could be a bomb! I push that thought away. But it’s a stubborn and persistent demon. It could be--no one would just forget an expensive bag like that! The bag was heavy, you could tell by the way the driver held the thing. You couldn’t miss that. What if it is a bomb? I swallow hard.

The first terrorist bomb attack on an American public transportation system. I read last week about how the transportation systems and seaports are the most vulnerable spots in our security. This is crazy!

The tie around my neck is suddenly too tight; my lips are parched. I can smell the odor of my fear seeping through my new white shirt. My sound of my heart slamming against my ribs is like the ticking of an old clock in a room at night. All the other passengers are in their own world. It’s a bomb. At the next stop, I’m getting off this train. I’m going to stand right by the door.

"Next stop, First Avenue Station. First Avenue Station, Next stop," the automated voice announces.

First Avenue Station, the first station underground in the inbound direction. Underground, that’s a great place to set off a blast. Got to get off! Wait... wait, if I stand by the door I’ll be nearer the blast. Gotta get off before the train enters the tunnel.

Think!

I stand and pull my handkerchief from my back pocket to mop my forehead. My fingers do a tap dance on the cool metal handrail. The car approaches the tunnel to the entrance of the First Avenue Station.

Think, Alan! Think!

I pull the stop request wire violently.

"Stop Requested. Stop Requested,” the automated voice sounds out.

Everyone is oblivious to the danger. The train isn‘t slowing!

Perspiration showers down my face. An older man wearing a shabby, two-button polyester blend sports jacket opens his mouth to speak.

A monstrous roar drowns the man’s words; a blast so loud I grimace in pain. The shock wave somersaults me like crumpled newspaper. I crash into the lap of an older woman; my legs swing around and catch the side of her face. I can feel the crack of her neck. My eyes snap open.

Parts of arms and legs tumble through the car like ten pins. Screams are cut off in mid shriek.

Blood splatters paint the windows and walls of the car.

The world is black.

Then bright.

“Sir, sir? He’s conscious.”

The nameplate stitched on the navy blue shirt reads Acosta.

“Sir, I’m an EMT. Everything is just fine. We have managed to stabilize all your vitals. It’s nothing really serious. You had a minor panic attack.”

Written by: Charles Stone

Photograph by: Daniel Vidal

Chewing Gum

The cold rain fell in sheets of vellum paper—thin and transparent enough to see the shapes and colors of the life it was trying to protect. We ran, like ink on a page, dripping sweat and pain and ecstasy. She had just finished working and I had just finished watching. She said she was tired and wanted to go home. I wanted to be anywhere but home. Home reminded me of my wife.

The sun had long set and slow jazz spilled from the speakers of the End Street Depot as we waited. She cried. Or maybe it was the rain, I couldn’t be sure. I hugged her close, smelling her hair—a mixture of lemon, rosemary, and artificiality. I liked it.

The train pulled into the station, slowly coming to a halt a few feet away from where we stood beneath the overhang. We held newspapers over our heads and ran into the safety of barren seats and chewed gum left to die on the metallic floor of the nearly empty car. She sat next to a window, avoiding me. I sat across the aisle, staring at her from behind the steel pole that stretched between floor and ceiling. Her sleek black hair now soft with damp waves. Her red lipstick smeared across her face—and mine.

“It’s not enough for me,” she said, watching the blurred landscape as the train sped out of the station.

“I’m sorry,” I replied, not knowing what else to say. I could feel unfamiliar eyes staring me down from a few rows up.

It started as sex. No strings. An escape from my life. She stayed with me for the money, the gifts, the things she couldn’t have as a stripper. I was fine with that.

“I can’t give you more.”

She turned to face me, her freckled nose crinkling in frustration. She was fucking beautiful.

“It’s not enough,” she repeated.

I sat up, as though correct posture might make this conversation easier. I turned to face her, my legs blocking the aisle. I no longer cared about who heard us. “Elana, I don’t know what else you want from me. This was the deal. A good fuck and a nice new dress…nothing’s changed.”

“Everything has changed,” she said turning to face me, her eyes bloodshot. “I want--”

“I already told you—there’s nothing left to keep us apart. She’s gone!”

“I know what you said,” she snapped, turning back to the window.

I thought about the day I first met her. Stubb’s Hall. She lit up the stage with her black glittered heels and wicked smile. I thought about the slow burn of the whiskey as I watched her undress to the wail of the low saxophone behind her. I knew my wife would have killed me if she knew where I had been, but the whiskey had already convinced me that I didn’t care.

Sinking back into the hard seat, I let my hands fall helplessly to my sides. “I just need more time.”

“For what?” she yelled. “I’ve given you nothing but time!”

I told Elana I would leave my wife, but I didn’t mean it. In the same breath, I promised my wife that it was over, that I was through with Elana—she was just a toy, a plaything. Something to keep in my back pocket for the days I got bored—like chewing gum. She would ask why I got bored, but I never could seem to answer that question. The sicker she got, the more I clung to Elana—coming home with glitter stuck to my groin—and the less I tried to hide it.

“I just…I don’t know. It’s complicated. My God, she hasn’t been dead a month.”

The night my wife died, my heart broke. I buried it with her and I knew I would never get it back. I didn’t deserve it back. Fuck Cancer, I thought. Fuck me for being such an asshole.

The train jarred us both as it pulled into the next station. The rain kept a steady beat on the car’s metallic roof, falling harder. The soft shapes of the world outside now hid completely behind opaque sheets.

“You’ve had enough time, Shawn,” Elana said as she stood, steadying herself on the steel pole that stood between them. “I can’t wait another six months for you to decide what you want.”

I watched her tears fall in a stream of sparkling black. There was no mistaking them for rain this time. I shoved my hands in my pockets and made no attempt to go after her. The train jerked forward to the next station. I thought about my wife. Her innocent smile. The paper skin around her gray eyes. How I chewed her up and spat her out just like I did Elana. I hated myself.

The beckoning lights of Stubb’s Hall flashed pink through the window. I hadn’t realized that the rain had stopped, once again revealing the world around me. Bracing myself for the next station, I stood and took hold of the pole. The cold stung my hand. When the car had come to a complete standstill, I made my way to the exit. Apparently, this was where I got off. Stepping from the platform to the ground, I stopped as my foot caught on something. Inspecting the underside of my shoe, I couldn’t help but laugh. A wad of gum. Freshly chewed and strung along between the bottom of my foot and the hard metal floor.

Written by: Amber E. Box
Photograph by: Matthew Wiebe

Three of Swords

The window fogs beneath my breath; a blank slate. Here I write your name. Always your name. The upholstery is not unlike that of any other train: rough and stained and seeping with other people’s secrets. This gives me a nonsensical dose of hope, leaving the taste of lemons and honey behind.

Somewhere out there you might be sitting on a train, looking out the window, thinking about me too. Maybe you smile without opening your mouth, your lips the seal of an envelope. I loved to kiss words from you this way. But maybe there is another pair of lips performing this same kind of ventriloquist act and you let her, even though it was our thing.

Maybe you tell her about that movie and you both laugh and nod and she slips her legs around you and the train moves slow and rocks you back and forth. You are in love with her, and you kiss more words into her.

“Can I sit here?”

The voice comes from a twenty­-something who slides into the seat next to me. His eyebrows are thick and his lips are full, as if every part of him is filled up with youth. He looks younger than you ever did.

“Jess?” he asks. And I look, like maybe I’m responding to my own name.

“Grace,” I say. I’m not sure why the lie slips so easily from me, except that your name is still printed on the window.

“Where you headed?”

His question makes me remember why I hated having you as a travel companion. I just want to absorb the feeling of leaving, the abundance of possibilities out there in the world; quiet.

“The beach.”

“Bit cold for that,” he says, pointing to the snow beyond the train window. “Me, I just like to ride and write. No place in mind, no place to go. Just the ride,” he says. He pulls a leather notebook from his bag and scratches a few lines onto the page.

“What’re you writing?” I ask. I don’t tell him I’m a writer, that a similar journal hides in my purse. Because when I used to talk about writing, you never said anything. You just poured cream into your coffee and smiled while stirring everything up, like maybe you were looking at the entire galaxy instead of just a cup of coffee. Instead of looking at me.

“Notes, ideas, sentences. Whatever.”

I nod and retrace the letters of your name on the window. I hear the scratching again and know he’s taken himself back to the page. I close my eyes and pretend it is the sound of waves. I imagine you with your windows open, the way they always were back home. Maybe they wrap around your new house like the symbol for infinity, window after window; forever. Or maybe they are like an ampersand now, a broken reminder that nothing lasts, that there is always an and when it all ends.

“Infinity sign or ampersand?” I ask.

“Ampersand, always. Just look at it,” he says, sketching it out on the page. It looks beautiful, like a line embracing itself. “Self-­love,” he says.

“Oh.”

“No, not like that. Like it’s just you and, whoever, whatever you want, you know?”

“Yeah, I like that.”

“So where are you really going?” he asks, his pen holding place in the notebook. I stare at the cover, trying to find the words hidden within.

“Away.” This is the first true thing I tell him, even though I don’t know his name.

“Away happens to be my favorite.”

You never said anything that perfect. Maybe you are better with words now that I am gone. And maybe the phrases you give her blossom into beautiful sentiments because they have filled you with something new.

“I’ll just call you Away, then,” I say.

“It’s Shaw.”

I smile at the way he says his name, like it is the most precious thing he owns. “Mine’s Grayson,” I say, letting another truth pass over my lips.

“So, you hate your name?”

“Ah, no, actually. But—”

“No, wait, let me guess,” he says, turning in his seat so he faces me. From this angle his vintage-­style tee looks shabbier beneath his jacket; well­-loved. An image of a baby cherub peeks at me with eyes like his, round and grey. “You hate your dad? Or mom? Or your ex hated the name? Or you like to lie to strangers? Must be getting close,” he says.

“Are you speaking from experience?”

“Doesn’t everyone?”

He pulls out an iPod and hands me an earbud. We sit like that for too many miles, the landscape zipping by in a collage of greens: dill and meadow and sea mist and cabbage. They remind me of your eyes until I look back at Shaw. He mouths the words to the acoustic song that blares through the headphones.

“Indigo dawn,” he says out loud, no longer lip syncing.

Soon the song ends and he finds another and closes his eyes. I write Shaw’s name in stiff, sword-­like letters on the window before adding my own. I pull my journal from my bag and write indigo dawn and same sun, a partial lyric from the current song. I make them into a story and when I look up, Shaw is watching me write. And then he kisses me, and he tastes like cigarettes and gin.

When the train stops, Shaw grabs my hand, and leads me out into the station. He pulls a joint from his pocket and we smoke and kiss beneath the sign to Fairfield where no one can see us. He traces the back of my neck and I feel the word writer.

If you looked through that train window now, all you would see is a pair of empty seats and the remnants of names criss­-crossing the glass like constellations. And maybe that is the way it should be.

Written by: Kayla King
Photograph by: Samuel Zeller

Be Great

Taking the train home from the other side of town is like visiting a weird zoo—one where all the animals are different from you, and you shouldn’t look them in the eyes. There’s a tourist holding a pole and standing over me, looking like Willy Wonka wearing a Hawaiian print shirt. In the seat on my right, a man in a ratty coat reads Chapter 20: “Tentacles.” Sitting across the train car, two little girls in braids cut up, tickling one another. Then the older one leans over and licks the smaller one on the forehead. In front of me, there’s a woman carrying a purple orchid. A man reading a Spanish newspaper. A girl who interjects her rapid-fire Chinese with “I’m just sayin’.”

If I were in a praying mood, I’d pray we don’t get stuck in a tunnel.

When I switch trains at L’Enfant, I get back on my turf. Everything evens out, and it’s the strangers I always see. People I know, but don’t know. Tired people headed home from work. Sometimes a panhandler, but one who knows better than to ask here.

Walking back through the neighborhood, I find the boys playing ball.

“Z, come play!” Mike says.

“Nah, man, can’t.”

“Where’ve you been today?”

“School.”

“School?” Mike says, throwing the basketball at my chest. “The fuck?”

“I told you I was doing college,” I say.

“Z’s too good for us now,” Arthur laughs from over by the fence. “Come on, Mike. Leave him alone.”

I throw Arthur the ball. I expected this. I just hoped it wouldn’t happen on my first day. Up at the school, they said they could see I was different. How I pay attention to things. But I don’t need anybody telling me I’m special. My whole crew’s been getting that our whole lives, and look where it’s gotten most of us. Playing ball in the middle of a weekday. Doing nothing. Like they told us we were special just to keep us alive.

“I’ll be out later,” I say. “Got to check on my mom.”

I go in the house, making sure the door doesn’t slam behind me. She might be asleep.

“Baby, is that you?”

She’s awake. I can hear her oxygen tank making its puffing noise, like a big dog sniffing something every few seconds.

“It’s me.”

“How was school?” she calls from her bedroom.

“It was good, Mama. Everybody’s nice.”

“I’m so proud of you, baby.”

“I know. Did you eat yet?”

“I did. There’s some in the fridge for you.”

I heat up the leftovers, peas and rice, and turn the TV on. It’s the local news, and the ugly anchor with the shoulders like a linebacker is talking about the usual. Somebody’s missing. Somebody’s shot. Somebody’s crashed their car on the beltway, and there’s a massive pileup. I decide I’m not hungry and put my bowl back in the fridge.

I leave the news on and go back to Mama’s room. Her eyes are closed, but she opens them when I enter.

“You get enough to eat?”

“Yeah,” I lie.

“Tell me all about school, now. What classes did they give you?”

“English and computers. And introduction to criminal justice.”

“You’re going to be great, baby. You know that? You’re going to be great.”

“I’m going to try,” I say. “I’m going out. You good without me?”

“You go on. Tell Arthur I said he needs to go back to school, too.”

“I will.”

We play fast and hard. It’s August, still too hot to play with a shirt on, even at night. Mike tries to cheat every chance he gets, but I hurl myself around him, not meeting his eyes. My Jordans smack the cracked pavement. The game breaks down to nothing but sound—the huffs of our breath, the thunks of the ball on the backboard, the metallic rattle as it rolls through the hoop.

“Z thinks he’s a scholar, he doesn’t need ball,” Mike says.

“No team will take a dropout like you, Mike,” Arthur says. “You don’t need ball, either—you need the lotto.”

“Shut the fuck up,” Mike says, but he’s not mad. Mike may be bitter, but he’s not unhappy. He runs shit around here, and that means something. And his girlfriend’s about to have a baby. Even though Mama wouldn’t agree, I know Mike’s going to be a good dad. He cares when it matters.

“What’s it like over there in white-ville?” Mike asks, wiping the sweat from his forehead.

“Nice,” I say. “Shiny-ass buildings. Nobody getting caught smoking a j on kiddie playgrounds. Nobody like that around.”

“That was one time!” Mike yells. “What, you think I could’ve gone home like that? My grandmother would kill me if she caught me high.”

Arthur laughs so hard he doubles over. “Well, when you get sick of all that law-abiding bullshit, you know where to find us,” he chokes.

“I’ll remember that,” I say.

Arthur and I hit the corner store for beer, and he follows me back to the house.

“So you really like it at college?”

“Yeah,” I say. “It’s not like what you think. Everybody’s just like us. It’s just regular people. And they say they can help you find jobs.”

“Jobs. They could get me something better than Checkers?”

“Maybe.” I push open the door to the house. The TV is still on. The linebacker news anchor is gone, replaced by the bald guy who does the weather. Tomorrow: hot. The next day: hotter. The day after that: more of the same.

Arthur takes the beer to the kitchen, and I go to Mama’s room. The oxygen machine’s still making its noise.

“Mama,” I whisper. “You need anything?”

She doesn’t answer. Must be sleeping. But she’s more still than usual. I watch her stomach to see if it’s going up and down. It’s not.

I go closer to the bed and touch her arm.

“Mama, you okay?”

Arthur sticks his head around the doorframe.

“She asleep?”

I shake my head.

“She’s gone.”

“Shit, man.”

I call my aunt and the hospice nurse. Arthur sits with me while we wait for them, and I heat up the peas and rice, the last meal my mother will ever cook for me. I sit at the table and eat, each bite feeling more like food of the dead. Arthur starts on the beer and flips through my new computer book.

“I’m sorry, Z,” he says. “What are you going to do now?”

“I don’t know.”

Outside, I hear the hospice nurse pull up. Somewhere, kids are laughing and running down the street. Off a ways, a car’s backfiring. The whole neighborhood’s still alive.

Written by: Dot Dannenberg
Photograph by: Daniel Vidal