Train Tracks

We make eye contact.

It’s a sunny day, brisk, the air creeping into my lungs like a puddle of water, a dragon’s breath of an exhale.

We make eye contact and it’s good. I haven’t noticed a stranger in months, and you have pretty hands. Neat, delicate ones that turn the page of your book. You’re reading- it looks incredibly dry, but the way the light slants across your body had me looking back, back, back to you. The landscape behind you blurs, stoic sticklike trees pointing towards the open expanse of blue sky.

We make eye contact and I furrow my brow. You’ve got plain, brown eyes. Not at all what I imagined. I adjust my headphones and turn towards my book, much more riveting and interesting than whatever it is in your hands.

I wonder if we’re getting off at the same stop. I wonder if you’re seeing family or a partner, or simply going to a specialist. You seem bright- maybe you’re here for a week at the university, had been invited as a guest lecturer. I bite my lip and look back out the window. Tuck a hair behind my ear and chance a glance back at you.

You’re looking again, but it’s behind me. Like I’m the person in front of the painting, you know the blonde that’s reading the placard but has no intention of letting go of prime real estate in front of Starry Night, not even though she knows she'll be in a hundred stranger’s iPhones across the globe.

You’re looking at the slip of ocean behind me, and I don’t blame you- it’s a beautiful, private fleeting thing. The tracks don't follow the ocean here, but for three glorious minutes, the unsettled waves of the coast reveal themselves.

You’re not married, which disappoints me. You must have some other vital character flaw for me to discover, heartbroken, years into our engagement. I’ve never been married either, but I pay that no mind. My skeletons are well-mapped friends in my closet.

Nobody’s watching me, and nobody sat next to me on this crowded train. You had the chance to, and it offends me you didn’t.

Better though, because I’d have liked you less if you did.

You look like all the people I’ve loved before. You hold yourself the same way. Quiet, careful. I look to you and I see the ways you could hurt me.

I look down. Turn the page in my book. The ocean behind me is covered by trees.