All Aboard

After grabbing a can of Red Bull and a newspaper, I walked out to the platform to await my train. The night air felt cool against my skin as I walked towards an empty bench. The platform was mostly empty, just a few college-age kids sitting beside a pile of musical equipment - instruments, amps, mic stands - the guys pretending they were Bruce Lee, poorly-executed kicks and punches being thrown at one another, and the girls laughing and giggling and talking into cell phones.

I was never that young, I thought, even when I was their age.

I placed my newpaper and can on the bench and sat down beside them, sliding up the sleeve of my leather jacket so I could look at my watch. The face read 9:06, and the train to Los Angeles wasn't due to arrive until 9:30, though it's almost always late, like clockwork. I figured I had about an hour to kill.

I slid the Red Bull into the left pocket of my jacket, saving it for later. Once I got to L.A., I was sure I'd need a boost. I shook open the paper and scanned the headlines: Terror, Economy, Terror, Health Care, Tax Cuts, Terror. Didn't anything good happen in the world anymore?

"Dude, someone lost their Visine!"

Glancing up from the paper, I noticed two of the college kids standing at the edge of the platform, pointing.

"I'll get it," a third called out, setting down his guitar case and hurrying over to his friends. He jumped down between the rails and bent over. His friends helped him back onto the platform and he held his prize aloft, a little tube of Visine, those eyedrops that the teacher from "Ferris Bueller" used to shill for in those commercials.

I shook my head and turned back to the sports page. My team, the St. Louis Cardinals, had a ten game division lead heading into the weekend. Another couple months of playing like that and we'll have another World Series to celebrate.

Something moved in the corner of my eye and my head jerked to the right. I saw three people settling into a bench further down the platform, two women, probably mid-forties, prototypical "soccer moms" in their Softer Side of Sears finery, and a younger girl, maybe sixteen or seventeen, wearing a heavy, black coat and jeans, with dirty sneakers, which once may have been white. Her legs were stretched out as she lounged on the bench. The two women were babbling back and forth about Uncle Paddy's liver disease, "a shame, really," and little Johnny's report card, "his teacher said he might be gifted."

But the girl simply sat there, huddled between the other two, hunched over and unmoving, though she appeared to be favoring her right arm. She just stared straight ahead with her head bowed, like a puppy who's been yelled at for shitting on the carpet.

As the women prattled on, the one closest to me would wave her arms in the air to illustrate her point, and I'd catch quick glimpses at the girl. She had unkempt reddish-brown hair, cut just above her shoulders, and was wearing a big, heavy coat. She just sat there and the women's voices floated above her head, and she looked utterly miserable.

"Dude, go long!" One of the college kids called out, and I turned back to see one of them, a guy with long, blonde hair, wearing a Chargers jersey, motioning down the platform, holding the tube of Visine in his hand. One of his friends, a kid with dark hair, wearing shorts and sandals, started jogging towards me, his head cocked over his shoulder.

The blonde guy reared his arm back and let the Visine fly. I watched it arc end-over-end, wobbling through the air. I followed its path as it soared over my head and I knew the blonde had thrown it too hard. His buddy was barely past my bench. I glanced past him and saw the two women still sitting there, talking, oblivious to the UFO heading their way. I winced as I realized where the Visine was going to land.

"Ow!" The woman farthest from me yelled out as the projectile fell out of the sky and landed, pointy-end first, in her eye. Her hands, which appeared to have been showing the proper technique to twirl pasta on a fork, flew to her face. A string of obscenities I hadn't heard since my military days spewed forth from her mouth and the other woman whipped her head around and glared at the college kids, who had run back to their group of friends, barely trying to restrain themselves from laughing.

Standing up, the injured woman said "Don't move from this spot, young lady, you hear me?" and the girl nodded her head almost imperceptibly. The two women stalked off in search of a restroom, leaving me an unobstructed view of the girl.

I must have spaced out, my mind wandering while my eyes stayed transfixed on the girl, because, suddenly, she was looking at me. I hadn't even noticed her moving. I couldn't turn my head away, having been caught, so we sat there looking at each other.

She was older than I initially thought. Nineteen or twenty, now that I had gotten a better look at her face. She had pale skin and bright, green eyes, and it was her eyes that made me think twice about her age. There was something in there, something far older than her youthful appearance would suggest. Below her right eye, I thought I noticed a bit of discoloration, like a bruise that's nearly healed.

I wanted to look away. She was making me uncomfortable under her unblinking gaze, but I was frozen. My mind flashed with a thousand thoughts all at once, Who is she? Who are those two women? Who hit her? Did she run away from home?

Her eyes stayed locked on mine until I heard the inane babbling returning, the two women walking back onto the platform, one with a bag of ice over one eye. The young girl snapped her head forward, looking exactly as she did before she women left. The sudden movement broke her spell over me and I was able to return my eyes to the newspaper in my lap, but my thoughts stayed with her.

The rumble of the approaching train rattled me back to the business at hand. I glanced at my watch again: 9:34. On time for once, I thought as I stood and risked another glance at the girl, trying to make eye contact one last time. I didn't know why, but it seemed important. Her head was still down and the two women chirped away. Not their train, I mused.

I walked towards the train as it slowed to a halt, and I felt the warm air rush out as the door slid open. I turned back once more, wanting to see her eyes. She was looking right at me, her twin emerald eyes shone with a wetness that hadn't been there before. I opened my mouth, but no sound escaped my lips. What could I have said?

I slowly turned my head back to the waiting train compartment and climbed aboard, fighting the urge to rush over to the bench and knock the two women aside, and ask the girl what happened to her. It was none of my concern, and yet, as I felt her eyes boring into me, I knew she needed help.

A loud cry erupted from the platform, and I spun around in time to see the woman with the ice bag fall to the platform, cubes spinning this way and that. The girl had pushed off the injured woman, launching herself towards the train. The other woman was taken completely off-guard and she could only sit there and watch, her mouth agape, as her charge moved faster than I would have given her credit for.

The doors began to slide shut and I actually prayed a short pray that the girl would make it aboard. She nearly slipped on a piece of ice, but kept her balance and managed to barely squeeze through the doors of the car behind mine. The train whistle blew and we slowly pulled away from the station. The two women could only sit and watch, but before we were out of sight, I thought I saw one reach into her purse and pull out a cell phone. She frantically dialed a long string of digits and began screaming into the phone and that's all I saw.

I turned towards the doors separating the two cars and I could see the girl through the small window. She was sitting on the floor of the car, breathing heavily, with her eyes still trained on mine. Taking a deep breath, I walked towards the door and pulled it open. I entered the other car just as the lights went out, and all I could see, floating in the blackness around me, were those two green eyes.

"Thank you," she whispered in the dark.