I Came Back For You!

I had flown into Montreal on Friday, with the thought that I would enjoy a relaxing weekend in the city instead of spending my Sunday on the road rubbing elbows with other travelers. Then on Monday, after a couple days of local fun, I would attend a meeting scheduled with the bank’s Executive Director of HR, Madame Duclos. As it was a recurring event on the second Monday of each month, traveling to Montreal was a regular experience for me.

When in town, I always stayed at the Hotel St. Paul, and had a routine of taking the metro to the office. Today I wouldn’t have had a choice anyway because there was a taxi driver strike ongoing in the city and getting an Uber was nearly impossible. So I hopped on the train at the McGill station and my associate, Darron, who flew in late last night, would be getting on at the next stop, which was closer to his preferred hotel. I shot him a text when I boarded letting him know which car I was riding in so we could meet up on the train. Despite the ongoing strike, the crowd on the metro was relatively light, so locating me would be easy for him.

“Holy shit, dude! You look like hell! What happened this weekend?” Darron walked onto the train car speaking loudly enough for everyone in the station to hear.

“Shhhhh.” I peeked up at him, squinting my eyes like the sun was shining directly into my face. Now with his southern drawl ringing in my head I ask him, “Please sit down and act like a normal human.”

Darron takes the seat next to me, turns, and continues to press the issue, “Seriously, Henry. What happened? You look like a bag of shit. Well, a bigger bag of shit than normal,” he jokes as he continues to laugh at his own wittiness. “Should we cancel our meeting with Kim?”

I power through my pain, shake my head no, and tell him, “Part of it is a hangover, and I’ll explain the rest of what happened when we get to the next stop. It’s easier to show you.” Darron gives me an inquisitive look, shrugs his shoulders, and decides that’s good enough for now.

As the train approaches the next stop, Saint Laurent station, and slows to a stop, I get Darron’s attention and point to a wall across the station platform with a large print for Vogue Magazine. It stretched half the length of the train, stood around 40’ tall, and featured a model whose face is currently sought after by everyone in the fashion industry—Ilana Hansen. She was wearing a dress from one of the industry’s hottest designers, and the print was there as a tribute to the fashion industry in Montreal. It was an imposing and iconic sight that always caught my attention when I rode through Saint Laurent, and even Darron had commented on how hot she was the few times he had been on the train with me.

“Holy fuck, did you get mugged over there by the hot chick billboard?” Darron explodes with disbelief. “Here at the station? No way! Man, I used to like coming up here but this city is going to shit! Oh wait...fuck...Henry are you okay? Did they catch the guy?” He continues on, but the initial excitement of his presumption that I was robbed faded with each following question. “It was a guy who mugged you, right?” Darron asks in a normal tone, yet dripping with sarcasm.

“I’m not talking about something that happened at this station. Or the picture. But the model…Ilana,” I quietly say.

“Wait a minute!” Darron stands up and begins to become very animated. “You got mugged by Ilana Hansen? The hot girl on that huge advertisement? Holy shit, I always thought you were a pussy, but come on, she’s probably half your size.” Darron laughs, “How fucking old and feeble are you?” He continues, completely unaware of the other passengers staring at him who have started listening to our conversation.

I have a nice laugh, despite not feeling up to par, look at him, and answer. “No dumbass, I met her this weekend at Mont Royal Park while I was at the Bohemian Festival. I had been enjoying the music, having drinks, and our paths crossed.” Thinking that this explanation would calm him down and move us on to a different topic, it actually had the opposite effect and he started pressing me for more details. Not only that, more people on the train had seemingly moved closer and became very attentive to our conversation.

“If you think that I’m going to believe that you hooked up with a hot model who’s half your age and way out of your league, you are fucking crazy. She’s an 11 and you are like...a solid 6 on your best day. Let’s keep it real, my man,” Darron says, still speaking as though I’m not hungover, but instead hearing impaired.

“No, I’m not feeding you a line of shit and nothing happened with her.” I say to him with hopes that the topic had run its course with him and everyone else listening, but then I made the mistake of saying, “Well, nothing much really.”

Like a hungry dog who just bit down on a bone, Darron wasn’t letting go. “Dude, we have three more stops until we have to get off this train. I want to hear the details.” Even worse, more people riding the train with us had seemed to become interested in the tales of my weekend. It must have been a welcome change from their normally bland commute.

“Shit,” I sighed as I came to the realization that I wasn’t getting out of this easily and decided to tell him what happened.

“So yesterday, I had been drinking heavily most of the day and started gravitating toward the park when I heard the music playing in the distance. I learned that the Bohemian Festival was going on and decided to check it out. The moment I got in I could see it was the type of crazy hippie shit you see at Burning Man or Coachella on YouTube. Those festivals you hear about but never experienced in person. The place was filled with young people wearing far too little clothing. Some were in crazy costumes and everyone but me were adorned in glow stick jewelry, fluorescent face paint, or both. People were openly smoking pot and the smell was overwhelming. On stage was a Doors cover band called Light My Fire, playing their set and everyone looked to be having a good time. At this point I’m just into my drink, walking around, taking in all of the sights, and that’s when I see her.”

I pause and lean back in the seat as the train comes to a halt arriving at the next stop. The doors open and there is an exchange of passengers on and off. Then the doors close and the train starts moving again.

“Well, what happens then?” Darron asks as he eagerly anticipates the juicy part of my story is about to begin and he can vicariously relive the experience.

I hear, “Don’t stop now, Henry.” I turn and find myself looking at this guy in a hardhat with ‘Nick’ written in permanent marker across the front. He was carrying a lunch pail, had a reflective vest over top of his clothing, and had gotten on the train back at the McGill station with me. I guess we were friends now. Just past him I see more people throughout the car looking in my direction with begging eyes hoping to coax me into continuing. “Fuck! What have I gotten myself into?”

I take a deep breath, recompose, and continue a little louder so the rest of the car could hear clearly. “Ilana is in front of me dressed in sandals, a pair of cut off jean shorts, and a loose t-shirt that had been tied into a knot on the front. She was tall and slim, her hair had been braided on the sides by her temples, and the rest of it fell across her back. On top of her head was a crown of daisies and she wore a necklace made of glow sticks looped twice around her neck. It was a simple outfit but she was absolutely stunning.”

I continued. “She was dancing with a friend and they were both moving perfectly to the rhythm of the music. Her friend was a beautiful light brown–skinned girl with brown curly hair teased out like a light afro, a tattoo on her upper arm, and wore an outfit of shorts and a t-shirt similar to Ilana’s. She may have been half-black, possibly Hispanic, but she was very handsy on Ilana when they were close, and the pair of them were mesmerizing. Finally, just behind those two was some douchebag of a guy with his hair pulled into a man bun, sporting a wife beater shirt and too much gold jewelry, and wearing Adidas tracksuit pants. You know the type, a complete pussy who looked like a pseudo Russian gangster and stood out even more than I did in this crowd. Think of the young guy from Breaking Bad if he had long hair and was European, and then you would have a complete picture of this loser.”

To my right I hear a woman’s voice ask, “What’s a wife beater shirt?” A rumble goes through the car and I hear the same question being repeated among other passengers. Fucking Canadians! I turn to answer this gray-haired middle-aged woman in a rain jacket and scarf who asked the question. She looked like someone who would be trading recipes while sitting at a discount hair salon with her friends rather than intently listening to my story on the metro.

“It’s one of those white, tight-fitting tank tops that you find guys in trailer parks wearing,” I answer. The response I get is a lot of nodding from this impromptu audience and I hear a number of, “Ahhhhs,” throughout the car.

“Anyway,” I continue, “he is staring me down and mean-mugging me because he realizes that Ilana had made eye contact with me. By this time, though, she had her arms extended toward me, waving me over like someone in a Hula dance trying to draw me closer. He is pissed and it’s written all over his face. As I take a few steps closer, she moves away from her friend and starts dancing toward me,keeping her eyes locked with mine. By this time, all of the alcohol I had been drinking really starts to kick in. I’m starting to move with the music, and I step in close and start gyrating next to her. As we’re dancing, she faces me, puts her arms around my neck and starts moving closer and closer until she is right up against me. I’m enjoying this completely, but in the meantime I can still see this sack of shit hovering over her shoulder, and he is glaring at me. He mouths ‘Fuck You, you old mother fucker,’ and I just smile at him. Right after he finishes saying that to me, Ilana keeps one hand around my neck but turns to him, holds her hand out, and says something to him. I couldn’t hear what she said because she was facing away from me and the music was deafening. Anyway, he looks at me, smiles, and yells ‘I’ve got you covered, grandpa’ before handing her a pill. She proceeds to put it in her mouth, turns to me, cups my face with both hands, and gives me an incredibly sensual kiss. In doing so, she transfers this pill into my mouth. Since I’m living in the moment, I take a swig from my drink and down it. Ilana and I keep dancing together but after a couple more songs she tells me not to go anywhere, and that she will be back. Ilana grabs her friend’s hand and they both disappear into the crowd. Trailing a few steps behind them is this dirtbag who keeps looking back and smirking at me.”

Again the train slows and stops, no one exits, but a few new people board. The doors close, and the train begins moving to the next stop. Darron says, “You have reeled me in, but let’s start landing this fucking airplane because we are getting off at the next station.” This sentiment is echoed in the car by others who have now become invested in my story.

“Well, I’m waiting on her and just bopping along to the music. I don’t know how much time passes but I feel like the alcohol is starting to have a serious effect on me and I start feeling faint. At the time I thought it might also have been this pill I swallowed, and started debating whether that was a smart choice. Then I black out and the next thing I remember is waking up in the grass where I was dancing. I was laying on my back but now had a couple of medics attending to me and a crowd standing around pointing and laughing. I was trying to figure out what was so funny and then I looked down and I saw that I was pitching a tent.”

“What do you mean by pitching a tent?” I heard from one of the passengers.

“It seems that guy had given Ilana a boner pill and that is what she slipped into my mouth,” I say in the general direction of where the question came from. There is still some murmuring and questioning going back and forth among the passengers. Meanwhile, Darron is biting his lip and turning red trying to hold his laughter. “I was given a Viagra pill and was laying there with a huge erection!” I blurt out to my gathered audience in frustration.

Laughter explodes within the car and I feel the train start to slow down for my stop. Darron and I stand up, receive some light applause, and even more laughs, as we move closer to the doors. Jesus, I can’t wait to fly the fuck out of this town later this afternoon, I start thinking to myself.

At our stop, both Darron and I step out of the train car and onto the metro platform. In doing so, I pass someone boarding the train whose familiarity catches my eye. As the doors close, I turn to see Ilana through the glass, standing on the train, holding on to an overhead strap, and returning my stare. She blows me a kiss and I see her mouth the words, “I came back for you,” before the train takes off. As I stand there watching the train move down the tunnel, I hear Darron repeatedly stammer, “No way…no fucking way!”