Men of the Metro
Late afternoon, in upper Northwest bound for the city
The man sitting across from me would not stop pawing at his girlfriend. I was sitting in the seats that have their backs to the wall facing into the center of the car, while they were in the last row of the seats facing toward the back, so short of closing my eyes there was nothing I could really do to get them out of my peripheral vision. Like someone humming a tuneless song just loud enough to be overheard, like someone drumming his fingers on the table or fiddling with a napkin - you pop that gum one more time - !* It made it all the more awkward that the object of these semi-repetitive, mindless attentions was a fellow human being. He squeezed one leg, squeezed the other, twiddled her fingers, patted her shoulder, rubbed her knee, while she stared into the middle distance as blankly as any commuter who was not suffering the attentions of an overzealous swain. At least I assumed that was what he was, by their clothing and appearance the pair could have also been a coach and a player on a girls’ field sports team in late high school or college. I shut my eyes and tried to sleep; when I woke up three stations later he was still at it, squeeze, rub, pat, stroke. Is this what the attached have to put up with? I’m all for physical affection, but if I were the girl I would have socked him in the face.
Early night, midcity, traveling east
I boarded the train to find one corner full of white high-schoolers in white clothes. They were talking and laughing and showing off for each other with an urgency and enthusiasm I’ve only ever really seen among humans.** The girls were fleshy and blunt-limbed, with round children’s faces, the boys were taller than they’d ever been before and were playing it for all it was worth. They must have just been coming from a play or a school or sporting event, no group of more than eight all wears all white by chance. Most of the boys were puffing their chests at the girls, but one boy, on the seat, was reading ‘The New Yorker” at a girl. It was absolutely charming; he was showing off exactly as all of the rest of them were, but he was doing so by demonstrating his difference. He had an air of insouciant arrogance and a curvy, almost feminine face, and was exactly the type that my fourteen-year-old self admired. As I took my seat the orangish, unnaturally flat tone of his skin showed that he was wearing makeup. “Yeah,” he was saying to the girl beside him, looking up from his magazine with an air of “Well… since it’s you…”. “Yeah, I don’t want to miss the speech tonight.”
Late night, northeast, leaving the station
I passed a man who seemed to be some years my senior and was a good foot and a half taller than me. I noticed the difference in height because he was crumpled, not slouched exactly, but battered and stooped and collapsed in on himself, walking like walking hurt him and navigating like he couldn’t see exactly where he was going. If I were walking like that, all I would want in the world would be for someone to come up to me, drape my arm over their shoulders, and tell me that we were going home. Everything was going to be all right. I don’t know whether he was drunk, or, drugged, or ill, but no one came for him, and he staggered through the gate after me, and I never saw him again.
*I’ll freely acknowledge that when it comes to physical demonstrations of nervous tics, or simply of the need to be doing something with my hands, I am a great offender. But at least I paw my knitting, not other people.
** There’s a certain ceremoniousness to display, even among chickens; it’s usually just a few doing it at once and it’s very much a dialogue. Not so among teenagers, they are mostly just expanding and hoping someone notices.
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