This Seat is Taken

Mr. Nobody had made his decision. He stood without hesitation, bracing himself against the rocking of the train by holding the overhead luggage rail. The train jerked as if rolling along unmaintained tracks in some third world country, as if protesting his decision and begging him to get back into his seat. Mr. Nobody had had enough.

His thought had always been to walk forward towards the café car, and jump from there, so he took the strange black ticket stub the conductor had given him and made his way, if clumsily, towards the front exit, when the heads of the two children peeked over their seat backs and looked at him.

Shit. He didn’t want them to watch. Where had they come from? Earlier they had a new game going where they counted things they saw passing outside the train window. It was nice to see them playing together again. The older one’s interest in the younger one had waned as he approached his tweens. It pained Mr. Nobody that the girl had to suffer his pre-teen aloofness. She missed her brother.

Mr. Nobody thought they were gone. It was hours since they were last in their seats. The entire carriage had emptied, in fact, making his decision easier. He’d had the entire car to himself. Now here they were, chins resting on forearms, watching him keenly.

He smiled at them; they smiled back, watching, waiting to see what he would do. He was about to move on, resting on the false assumption that they were just kids and didn’t know anything that was happening, when it occurred to him that it wasn’t true, kids know more than we think, we just tell ourselves that so that the shame we feel having failed them isn’t overwhelming. But what if for once I just told them the truth, he thought? I have a lifelong habit of hiding myself which effectively is the same as lying to them, isn’t it? Why not now? Isn’t this a good time? Before I get off this Hell Train?

Mr. Nobody grunted, clenched his fist, then said aloud, “Okay I will!” He moved a few seats closer to the kids and looked at them, really looked at them as he hadn’t in some time. Their faces were open and smooth, curious, innocent, but in no way dumb or possessing minds too limited to process adult issues.

“Both of you kids look just beautiful to me,” Mr. Nobody began. “I want to tell you something. Being an adult is complicated, but it actually shouldn’t be. We try to protect you kids from so much. I think that may be a mistake. I mean, we don’t want to traumatize you, but how am I to know which will be more traumatic, telling you something frightening or not telling you something uncomfortable when deep down you already know, and now I’m just making the world seem even more frightening, because the one person you believe you should be able to count on can’t come clean when you most need it. Am I making any sense?”

“I don’t understand all of it,” said the girl, but enough.

“You’re making plenty of sense,” said the boy. “It’s okay.”

“I want to tell you the truth. I feel like nobody tells anybody the truth. Actually, kids do a pretty good job.” Mr. Nobody smiled at the boy and said, “I recall the time when you were about 5 years old, we were waiting for the bus and a man came along who only had one leg. You know what you said? And you said it kinda loud, too. You said, ‘How come that guy only has one leg?’ A valid question. If I had seen hundreds of people in my life with two legs and one day I spotted a guy with only one leg, I’d wonder, too. I regret to this day that I shushed you. I’m sorry I shushed you. He only had one leg. I don’t know why. That’s how it goes for some people.

“We shouldn’t judge one another so much. That’s all I know. That man with one leg, we ought to cut him some slack. I never wanted you to have a bad impression of me. I wanted to look strong for you, so all these years I’ve acted strong. What if it would have been stronger to show you my weaknesses instead?

“This isn’t about you, kids. I just, I feel like I boarded the wrong train many, many years ago and once it pulled out of the station it got harder and harder to get off, to change directions. All the incentives seemed to be for going one way. Nobody wants you to change course. Nobody wants you to suddenly say,’ Hey, I’m different now, this isn’t for me.’ Do you understand?”

“Sorta.”

“Kinda.”

“It may sound on the surface, like I am saying I don’t love or want you, but that is not true. In fact, I love and wanted you more than I knew. Maybe to a fault. Because I forgot about me. Does that make any sense?”

“I just want you to be happy,” the girl said.

The boy looked to his sister, then at Mr. Nobody, and agreed.

Mr. Nobody nodded. This was as good as he would get. He would have to accept this as sufficient.

“The truth is that there is no truth. No ONE truth anyway. It is all truth, or part truth or half-truth or true for me but not for you or for…” Mr. Nobody’s attention was caught by a vaguely familiar looking woman who was now seated in the seat besides his. “.. or for others. You think you have a truth but it is made up of a billion smaller truths that all join together to form what we go through life believing is THE truth until you hit a point like this where you realize it isn’t true and for a moment, because what you thought was true no longer seems true and that TRUTH in CAPS was made up of a billion smaller truths you get where I am now and it all seems to fall down because all the little truths that the big TRUTH was made from, how can they be true? How can you know? And if they aren’t then what have I been doing all these years?”

Mr. Nobody laughed. This is the other thing that is so difficult about living. When you’re a parent, you can’t get anything out right.

“I’ll see you soon,” he told them in a soft voice. “Go back to your game.”

Then he turned and moved towards the exit doors behind him, and had to pause again, because now other passengers had returned to their seats, including the elderly woman he hadn’t been kind to. Now he couldn’t go that direction either, but he had to, so he boldly went straight towards her, kneeled, and began to apologize.

Mr. Nobody put his knee to the worn carpet, noticing the black sheen of filthy old gum smashed into it. Touching the filth made him feel better, as if he were making a fine sacrifice of himself to prove his sincerity to the old lady.

“I regret what I said to you before,” he began. “I’m having a bad day. A very strange day, very confusing like, maybe such that I’ve cracked up just a little.”

The elderly woman extended her hand to Mr. Nobody, who clasped it. He felt her age in her skin, the bones.

“You try too hard,” the elderly lady said. “Just don’t be such a dick. Don’t wait till you’re my age to figure it out. All this shit you think is so important, it isn’t.”

Mr. Nobody pulled back.

“Surprise, old bags like me, we’ve already done it all. You think you know everything. I let you act like a jackass earlier because I can. You’ll get there too in time. I you want. You have to do it. You can’t just watch YouTube. You have to do it.”

Mr. Nobody laughed. He did not let go of the elderly woman’s hand for a time. He just stood there looking into her eyes, laughing, his eyes wet with tears.

Finally, he said, “Thank you for accepting my apology,” he said.

He stood and went through the rear exit. He felt the eyes of the children on him as he pulled the door and hesitated but forced himself not to look. He had to ignore them if he was going to make it.

Mr. Nobody opened the door and exited the car, stepping into the connecting platforms. The air was loud and hairdryer hot. The noise and the lopsided wobbling jostled of the joined cars felt doubly harsh up close, outside of the insulated, air-conditioned interior.

There was a clear shot off. That’s what mattered. Mr. Nobody need only to jump as far away from the train as possible. Bracing himself, he leaned out a little, feeling the hot wind, when he heard a voice behind him.

“Hey.”

Mr. Nobody’s body clinched. His body knew the voice well. He worked hard at it. He worked very hard not to react, to meet her gaze, to meet her wherever she was, and not react. How, even here, on the train of his own making, did his wife find him?

“You’re getting off?”

There wasn’t a trace of anger or judgement in her voice. Mr. Nobody looked closely at his wife.

“We made good partners,” she said. “We couldn’t see it. Now I can. Can you? I hated you for a long time. That’s on me. I never hated you. I hated the part of me that you forced me to look at.”

He nodded again. He knew it was true for him too. Still the anger clung to him.

“I know what you mean. I still have anger. I feel it clinging to me. I try to brush it off and then I stop. It’s like a want the anger.”

She turned to the window because the kids had come. They pressed their faces against the glass, mashing their noses and lips, fogging up the glass.

“God knows what’s on that window.”

“Good for their immune system?”

“Sure.”

“Why are they here? I don’t want them to see this.”

“Well, you must on some level, because here they are. This is your train, not mine. Not that any of this can be untangled.” She laughed.

“What’s so funny?

“It was a lot, wasn’t it? Marriage?”

“It was. It is.”

“We love you,” the kids shout, wave.

“That better?”

He nods.

“You haven’t failed. Everybody is fine. You’ll see once you’re off the train.”

“Why are you like this now? Where is all this coming from?”

She shrugged.

“You never used to shrug like that. It’s funny. I like it.”

“Meet the new me.”

“I like the new you.”

“Thank you. So do I. I’ll leave you to your business,” she said. She slid the door open, gathered the kids and was gone.

9 HOURS EARLIER.

“Tickets! Tickets please.”

Mr. Nobody woke slowly. He rubbed something sharp from the corners of each eye. Smacked his mouth. Jesus, he thought.

The conductor stopped at his seat. Mr. Nobody patted his shirt, then checked his pants pockets.

“I don’t think I have a… I may have lost my ticket,” Mr. Nobody said.

The conductor nodded. Mr. Nobody might even swear that the conductor gave him a look, as if he wished to communicate something he couldn’t say out loud.

“Okay,” the conductor said, the produced a black stub which he slipped into a groove above Mr. Nobody’s seat.

Mr. Nobody’s heart began to race, and he worried that another panic attack was coming on and he didn’t want to grapple with it on a train. What’s more, he suddenly realized he had to take a terrible piss. Mr. Nobody took three deep breaths as he had been taught, holding them, squeezing them out from deep within his diaphragm. Usually that was sufficient.

Now he stood and went into the bathroom, hatched the door, and braced himself against the narrow wall with his shoulder. The tiny window was open and fresh outside air flowed into the otherwise urine smelling compartment. The train clackety-clacked and the horn blared, and the bells of a road crossing sounded, and the blue water sloshed in the metal toilet that nobody in their right mind would ever sit directly upon. Zipping up it dawned on him he was dressed in his weekend clothes, jeans, sneakers, a polo shirt. Not terribly original but neither was Mr. Nobody.

Why am I on a train, he thought? Am I drunk? Why am I wearing my weekend clothes? No, I’m not drunk; too bad.

Heading back to his seat, he paused to survey his situation, scanning the car for clues to his situation.

His car was sparsely populated with strangers. He paused to regard the black stub the conductor had given him. Nobody else had a black stub. He held it between his fingers and sat down. Then he stood again, to check the overhead for any luggage he may have brought.

Nothing.

Mr. Nobody sat again, then grasped for his wallet. Good. He had his wallet. He worked more on his breathing, assuming in time, soon he hoped, things would settle down, and he would begin to remember.

He moved to the window seat and looked out and saw the impossible. Amish Country? He looked around the train to confirm just what sort of train he was riding. It was a Metro-North train, really only a commuter train, not Amtrack, not one that left what was considered, at least in economic terms, the ‘greater metropolitan area.’

The train’s great horn split the quiet country air and signals at the crossing rang out. Mr. Nobody watched the passing landscape closely. One car at the crossing. Picturesque barns, immense expanses of crops green and lush, corn taller than his teenage boy. There were bearded men leading horses, women in a headdress or scarf Mr. Nobody recognized as Amish but didn’t know the proper name of. Chickens scratched at Amish dirt. Mr. Nobody marveled at how these people had boarded a different train. They farmed and maintained what seemed a simple life if there was such a thing. What was it, Mr. Nobody tried to remember: they didn’t use engines? Or electricity? That didn’t strike him as the least bit simple.

Of course, they wouldn’t have cell phones.

Wait a minute, he thought, how could I? Mr. Nobody only now recalled that he had a phone. He thought perhaps if he could just reach someone from his life on the phone, he would… well it might be easier to relax into whatever was happening to him.

He took it from his pocket and habitually began to dial his wife, then promptly stopped. New information flooded his mind. She had something to do with him being on a train. He had done something that hurt her; she asked him to leave for a while.

That’s right, he remembered, happy to recall at first, then sad to recall what there was to recall.

“Find some other place to sleep for now,” she had said.

Because of his text “affair.” With the woman in his office. The entire memory returned to Mr. Nobody, including his resistance to the idea that “texting” and “affair” could meaningfully be linked.

Never mind that for now, when he looked back at his phone, wanting very badly to reach someone from his real life at home, to ground himself, he noticed there were only two bars. He looked out the window again: it was impossible that he was on this train and that this train was barreling through ever more corn fields.

His ten-year-old daughter was the next logical person to contact. Mr. Nobody couldn’t remember her number. Two bars went to one, flickering back and forth between one and two. He found her in his contacts and pressed call.

“Hi, daddy.”

“Hi, darling. How are you?”

A train crossed the opposite direction and it startled Mr. Nobody.

“Daddy?”

“Yes, honey. Can you hear me?”

“Daddy, call me back I can’t hear you.”

“Okay, honey. Just a moment.”

“Daddy? Daddy? That was Daddy, but I couldn’t hear him.”

Mr. Nobody heard that. Surely his daughter said that to her mother. ‘To her mother.’

That was a phrase he’d heard divorcees use but never had used himself but now and then caught himself using lately as if trying it on for size, though by accident, which made him wonder who was running his life, for it all felt of late like some dam in his subconscious had burst beyond containment and things he didn’t know were there and perhaps would like to push back in were flowing out without cease and now he had to deal with them because as they flowed out they went public for all to see and of course it was commented on at times and at those times he had no choice but to deal with them

Mr. Nobody put the phone down. The phone was trying to tell him that they remained connected, but they were so disconnected even the so-called ‘smart phone’ was whipped.

The battery was now so low, the phone was urging Mr. Nobody to plug it in. Mr. Nobody smiled. Or laughed.

“You have an ego, too. A built-in self-preservation device. Just like me. Alas, I have no charger little phone. So, we’re both effed, okay? And if you know why, please tell me, because I do not know. I understand nothing in this moment. And I’m getting a little miffed.”

Mr. Nobody stood and looked around the car, then announced rather loudly, and with no small frustration, “I’m getting a little miffed here! Why is there nobody else on this train? Why am I on this train? Where are we going? And to what end!”

Mr. Nobody’s phone vibrated. He jumped. He looked at the caller I.D. This was his son calling.

“Hi, dad.”

“Hey buddy! What’s up? How are you?”

“Fine. Triya’s phone had a bad signal. You called.”

“I did. I called. I am, uh, well at this precise moment I don’t know where I am. But I am definitely somewhere.”

“That’s good. It sounds like you’re on a train.”

“I am. Hey, I forgot my charger and my battery is almost dead, so if I…”

Mr. Nobody’s phone made that dreadful sound they make when the battery gives up the ghost in the middle of a phone call. He looked at the screen and watched it power off, the little spiraling last spec of life it had to offer, swirling uselessly.

A moment later, he thought he felt his phone resurrected though no phone he knew of was accompanied by hunger pangs. When was the last time I ate, Mr. Nobody wondered? Not that that mattered; hunger was hunger. The growl of biology. At least I know I’m not dreaming: Who ever felt hungry in a dream? Hungry for food anyway.

Now the commuter train was winding through a glorious rocky mountain pass. Mr. Nobody recognized the images as being from a documentary he’d seen years ago. Ever since, he’d wanted to come to this place.

He sat watching for a long time. Rocky crags. Brilliant glacier peaks. Unlikely mountain goats, sentinels watching over the train grinding through the steep pass.

It dawned on Mr. Nobody that he was being presented with the contents of his own mind. Of course, he couldn’t get a signal: he was in fantasyland! Mr. Nobody was grateful to be alone now, for surely these were part of the unkempt flood of his broken subconscious spilling across the earth, his imagination, hopes, longings, and dreams.

This is my train.

“I see what’s happening here. You’re showing me my whole life. I’m dead? Is that it?” His stomach growled. “No, that’s not it. I can’t possibly be dead. Not if I’m hungry.”

More and more fantasies come. They become downright unruly.It all gets to be too much. Mr. Nobody goes numb to it. He leans his forehead against the glass. Notices a smudge from the oil on his skin. When that becomes just as interesting as riding the Siberian rail through his own mind, he knows he needs a rest. But first, food.

Mr. Nobody rubbed his face and stood up and walked two cars forward into the café car.

“Hello? Anybody here? You open? No? Okay then, you’ve left me no choice.”

Mr. Nobody went behind the bar and helped himself to whatever he could find, which wasn’t much. Well, there was plenty of not much, Lay’s chips. Overly buttered pretzels. Sodas.

Mr. Nobody eyeballed the beer and wine but thought better of it. In the end he took two bags of potato chips and a Coke.

He punched the open-door button. The car is full of people again.

“Hello everybody. Wonderful to see you. I have an announcement to make.”

He turned to the children who now smiled up expectantly at him.

“Where are YOUR tickets,” he says to them and winks.

“We don’t have a ticket.”

“Then I’m afraid I must give YOU a ticket. You are under arrest and cannot leave this train until you have paid.”

They roll their eyes at him. He smiles and leaves. The return to their game.

“May I sit here,” said Mr. Nobody. “I’ve got snacks.”

“I’m sorry, Mister. This seat is taken. My parents told me not to talk to strangers.”

“Oh, okay.”

“As I was saying, I have an announcement to make! I know that none of you is real. You’re all me. I’ve put you here. So, sorry about that.”

“Is that why I feel so apathetic and spiritless, Mr. Whoever-you-Are?”

“I’m sorry, you have something to say? Are you blaming me for feeling apathetic?”

“Maybe even PUH-thetic.”

“Listen here you old bag!”

“Don’t you talk to ME like that!”

“Why not? Aren’t you me?”

“Yes. I’m that last little part of you that you’d sure as hell better protect because I don’t take shit, you hear me?”

“Hey, what are you, some buried memory I can’t deal with? May I sit down? Please?”

“No. This seat is taken.”

“By your handbag? That’ not very kind. Is that how I am? Where’s your ticket?”

“Here you go!” She reached into her pocket, unrolled her hand, and flipped him the bird. “It’s my special granny ticket. I hope you discover why I’m here.”

She stood up and walked away, through the doors, disappearing several cars back.

“Ok great. Walk away.” Mr. Nobody turned to the other passengers. He hadn’t noticed them before but never mind, this was all beyond him. “This won’t be popular but hear me out. The suicide rate for men my age.. I’m in the highest bracket for suicide. White men in the so-called prime of their career. And why do you think that is? Do you know what camp for kids’ costs? Piano lessons? Braces? Ipads? Disney channel? Insurance? I want the old ladies to have it easy. Don’t get me wrong. But Jesus. What about me? You think I’m here right now because I’m doing well? Huh? Maybe I could use a discount! I could you some help too you know?

Mr. Nobody sat down feeling spent; nothing happened for a long time. Perhaps Mr. Nobody had fallen asleep, nothing had boundaries any longer.

It occured to him that when you die and your life is shown to you, you’ve become ONE so it’s easy enough to KNOW all at once, the way God probably does. But when it happens when you aren’t dead its tough. The brain can’t process that much at once.

They say that if you want to tire out a dog, teach it tricks. Using his brain will tire him far faster than chasing a stick for hours. What’s that say about biology and human evolution? Perhaps we weren’t meant to think so much.

It was in this mentally threadbare state that Mr. Nobody heard an announcement over the P.A. There hadn’t been an announcement in so long he forgot they were a thing.

The PA cracked to life, a woman’s throat clears

When the PA crackles to life. A throat clears. A familiar voice comes over.

“This flight will be included if you sign up today” and such it was as he wakes from a doze.

“Flight? This isn’t a flight!” He states aloud. “Oh, God, here we go again.”

Mr. Nobody heard the door clank open and shut behind him. He lifted himself high enough in his seat to turn and see the woman.

Sure enough, it was her, dressed in a purple flight attendants costume.

“Ah, good. Well, you look great.”

“You know I used to be a real flight attendant.”

“I remember, yes.”

“Why are you on my train? Hawking credit cards?”

“That’s not what this is. Here.” She handed him a brochure which he took reluctantly. “’Ten signs you’re having a midlife crisis!’” he read.

He turned back to the flight attendant slash lover in her purple getup.

“There’s even a red sports car on the cover. With a woman in the passenger seat. Is that you, too?”

“However you like it.”

“I’m not a red sportscar guy. Isn’t this midlife crisis thing a little cliché?”

“No, it is a perfectly valid expression of a personality reaching an identity crisis following years of surrendering personal wishes, dreams, and desires. The tipping point of martyrdom and love. The brochure does a fairly good job covering it all. The girlfriend is cliché but valid. The sportscar, too. It’s both an embarrassment and a natural wish of the boy the man has killed for years.”

“I see. That sounds pretty deep. Am I really that deep?”

“What do you think?”

Mr. Nobody shrugged.

“Well, thank you. I will have a look.”

“You’re so very charming.”

“Ah, thank you. Did I script that?” She looked across the carriage then apparently comfortable that nobody was watching, which was true because nobody was there, she bent down and kissed him on the lips. “Yes,” she whispered, her breath warm, of another land, a place that felt like a country he might like to visit someday, then perhaps stay on for a month or three.

Mr. Nobody watched her move away from him and exit the car. He realized he felt aroused. All the confusion and fatigued he’d felt had disappeared. Mr. Nobody stood and tried to follow her into the next car but found the door was locked. He slapped palm against the glass, but it was no good. By now she had vanished.

Mr. Nobody realized he was still clutching the brochure, which was thicker than he recalled it being when she handed it to him. He held it up, lifting it, studying its heft. He realized quickly that in the same way his dreams had insided-out and unspooled across the landscape for him to behold, now, too, had they gone into this brochure, this other form of himself.

Mr. Nobody hurled the book across the car.

“Fuck you!” Mr. Nobody yelled at nobody in particular. He began to pace back and forth. The A/C was failing. “If my book is expanding, and the train isn’t stopping, then there’s nothing to fear. And just because the train won’t stop, doesn’t mean I can’t disembark!” Mr. Nobody yelled again. “That’s enough!” He thought he might be yelling at the faceless source of intelligence that had created all that he was experiencing. “You hear me? I’ve had enough! I’m getting off this fucking train.” When he felt the sensation of an echo. He felt his own voice yelling at himself, and suddenly it all felt absurd. Mr. Nobody realized that he himself was absurd.

He stood balancing, surfing between the cars, feeling the extreme heat, seeing that now he is in the desert and recalling a time he fell in love with the desert when as a little boy his father took okay.

“Fine!” he cried out. “I admit it. I love this stupid fucking train. Fuck you for making it so difficult. And fuck you if I’m getting off it. I know my name! I know what this is all for. I know it doesn’t matter if I know. I’m innocent.”

Just then he saw the conductor come back into the car where he’d been sitting. Mr. Nobody went back inside. The kids were back. He wife was there, alone. The woman from his office was chatting with the conductor. “I found my ticket!” Mr. Nobody yelled. He looked at the elderly lady. He flipped her the bird and smiled. She laughed and flicked him off in return.

“This is my fucking train,” he yelled. “Shove your ticket up your ass! I AM my ticket.”