caution, the doors are closing

I am often trying to make eye contact with strangers on the train.  These transient folk, sealed shut in their transport pods, eyes fixed on glowing screens, are nearly impossible to connect with.  I try to make eye contact with them, because it’s fun, and because the payoff is high: a fleeting understanding between animals.  Wild beasts recognize one another through momentary stares.  Though we herd ourselves, we are wild; we crave eye contact.  Every few seconds I raise my gaze and assume my most yearning facial expression – the space between my brows creases, corners of my mouth turn up slightly – and scan rows of seats for a partner.  Most strangers refuse to acknowledge my gaze, though I know from the twitch of their lashes that they see me; they simply tuck their chins tighter into their chests and shift their hips away from me.

Look at me!  Acknowledge my existence! You humans, you drones, you bitter drooping savages, show me the life that flickers within – just a pinprick, a droplet of blood smeared on crumpled tissue will do.  Just a smile reflected in a dark window will do.

The two loneliest places in the city are crowded bars and commuter trains. The former is true because you can’t hear what the fuck anyone is saying and if you did hear what she were saying, it would be so steeped in flirtatious snark as to be devoid of meaning.  Empty words as precursors to empty sex.  (Note: I love both of these empty acts because I myself am empty inside.  Vacuums beget vacuums.  But that is for another essay.)  Commuter trains, though, generate a special tone of loneliness.  The tone is barely audible – merely a whimper, like the peeps of a hearing test – but with incredible sustain.  Here, we are inert bodies.  Here, we are scattered planets who’ve lost their surplus gravity, only rationed enough to hold ourselves together.  The seats of the train are microcosms of life – stay within your designated area, do not allow your luggage to encroach on the space of another, turn your eyeballs inward, and never ever divert them outwards.

Look at the window, you creatures of habit.  Watch as existence blurs at eighty miles per hour.  See the crimson smear of struck passengers on the rusted tracks ahead. Imagine yourself nothing more than a red concrete streak, and then remember that you have words and thoughts.  Now share those, please, with me.

There are so many beautiful beings around me.  I see them; I see the cogs ticking, see their jaws clenching and relaxing; I see their lashes sag towards their laptops and point up towards the gray ceiling.   Say hello.  Touch my arm.  There is a girl.  There is the girl I see every day.  I smile at her on the platform while we wait for the train.  She smiles back and adjusts whatever skirt she is wearing that day.  She wears skirts every day.  On her feet she wears shiny-soft leather boots with cowboy heels, the kind that slope towards the toe.  She smiles back at me.  Our eyes dart from one eyeball to the other, to our lips, to our brows, to the movement of our chins.   We hold hands in our minds, I think.  Then the clanging bell rings, the engine approaches through a whorl of ancient newspapers, and the fragile thread snaps.  We look at our laces, enter the train, and find our seats.  My thread still reaches for her.  I see only her boots three seats down from me.  I taste the cherry color like cola in my mouth. I feel the leather in my hands, malleable; I feel hints of her toes through the leather.  I feel her feet in my hands and wonder what kind of face she might make if I traced her arches.  Reality crumbles for an instant on my tongue.

Mountain View.  Mountain View station.  Now approaching… Mountain View Station.

I reassemble myself and check to see if the girl, that beautiful girl with whom I’ve never spoken, shows any sign of what has just happened between us.  But no – she is too busy slipping a bundle of books into her tote.  She stands up and walks down the aisle.  I walk behind her.  I am already compiling To Do lists for work, when I notice her left boot as she steps onto the platform.  Her heel quivers ever so slightly. I feel her smile through the back of her head.  We are still holding hands.

Someone mutters How to be a Complete Wreck in Five Easy Steps.

Photo by Alex Simand

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Alex is a Creative Writing MFA student at Antioch Universtiy Los Angeles and a Canadian expat living in San Francisco.  He writes nonfiction, fiction, and poetry.  He sometimes shares his musings and meanderings on his blog.