A Night Sky

I can read minds. I can. You do not believe me? Well then, I will show you. See the young woman stepping on? She has her eye on the young man in the blue hat over there, the one reading his paper. He has not noticed her yet. She has decided to take the available seat next to him. Oh, but it just was taken. So, she will stand in front of him then, holding the bar above their heads instead. She has decided to let herself lurch ahead just a bit once the train jolts to a start, letting their knees touch only a brush. He will look up and she will catch his eyes and hold them captive the way she knows how to do. Watch. There, it worked. He is caught and he stands, offering her his seat. Conversation ensues, exactly as she had planned.

She is not the only one. See the woman sitting across from us. She is not asleep, he is only resting, but still she is dreaming. You can see her eyelids fluttering. Track the bulge of her eyeballs moving to and fro behind the thick coat of blue eye shadow. Her fake lashes tremble sporadically, sifting blue residue onto her cheeks.

This is what she is dreaming:
In her head is a pond, iced over, frozen solid, concealed within a thick forest of evergreens, a winter wonderland. The entire landscape is made up in shades of blue, everything is glittering with ice and snow. Three people are in this dream. A man and woman; star crossed lovers, dancing on the ice, and a pair eyes within the forest watching them. Two of the people are her. She is the woman dancing on the ice and the eyes watching. She is falling deeper into the dream, teetering on the brink sleep. See how her heavy chin falls into itself, doubling until there is no jawline, only a mass of neck, a dimple and then lips.

The woman dancing on the ice is a person whom she has never been. She has been overweight since she was a little child. The woman gliding on the ice is slender as a rose and just as statuesque. Ah, a pirouette. She spins, looking toward the sky with one arm swept gracefully behind her and the other raised high toward the heavens. Her hand positioned as if she were accepting the hand of God. She spins with such fluidity, like a silk ribbon caught in an updraft. So fast, her form begins to resemble that of a tulip. The handsome lover encircles her, protecting his flower. At length, he grows lonely and wraps his arm around her waist, pulling her out of spin and into him. They stare into each other’s eyes, they kiss passionately. Look, outside she is smiling. From her view behind the ice bejeweled branches she watches through tears, both sad that it is not her that is being loved and elated that it is.

Now, releasing each other from their embrace, they glide side by side. With one swift scoop, he lifts her high above his head. She soars, splicing through the winter air. He is supporting her by just one flattened palm at her midsection. He will not let her fall. He loves her. She trusts him. She feels the cold air rushing at her. Look down at her arm, she has goosepimples. The she that is watching from behind the trees cannot take the beautiful scene for much longer. Look, a tear. She will wake up now. She has let herself float too far into her daydream. She brushes away the tear.
This is her stop, so she must go.

Another then. The man at my left, standing at the door across from us. He is very handsome, is he not? Yes, very handsome indeed. Tall, relaxed, rugged. Our eyes are not the only ones on the train directed at him and he knows this. He wears an expensive coat, long, black cashmere, leather gloves and a scarf hanging stylishly from around his neck. He has a charming smile on his face. His shirt collar is unbuttoned so that you can see his sculpted pillar of a neck flare out into his collarbone. A very nice neck, a neck that demands to be touched.

This man is on his way home. He is very anxious to get there. At home he has two women. Both are young, barely twenty, fair skinned, blonde, between 5'4 and 5'7 with small breast and small feet. One is in bound and gagged in a trunk three feet long and two feet wide. She has laid there in ten hour intervals for a week and a half straight. The other is in a crawlspace above the top of the master bedroom closet. She is dead. When he gets home he will rape them both, the dead one too. The dead one first. He is leaving tomorrow. He is bored and restless and must move onto the next town. The girl who is alive now will not be by ten AM tomorrow morning.

Let us get off here. Yes, I know this is not our stop. We can catch the next train but it is best not be to be in too close of a proximity to someone like this.

What do you mean, stop him? What can I do? I know no more than what I see in his head. No address, no names, nothing. Would you like to follow him and become his next victim? I saw a number and it was 16. Would you like to become number 17? Life is good and life is bad. I can only observe. I cannot interfere. Do not be so sad. Forget what I said about him. What do I know? It could have been all his imagination anyway. I am wrong sometimes.

Here, here is a happy one. See the old man by stairs leaning on his cane? Aged and withered with a long white beard and hair sticking out of everywhere; nose, ears, warts. Everywhere but on the top of his head. You want to know what he is thinking of right now? Flying. That crookety old body of his soaring between skyscrapers, tap dancing off lamppost, paddling himself through the air with his cane in an invisible airborne canoe. Silly thing. Yes, laugh. It is funny. Although he is old, he is just as young as you in heart.

The train has been delayed. We can walk if you’d like. I think we only have a couple of blocks to go and it is not so cold out. Come, let us walk.

Aah! Fresh air! The beautiful sky so black and clear you can almost see the earths reflection in it. This right here above our heads is the answer to the trick of my trade. The human mind is a night sky infinitely spliced by beam after beam of thought at the speed of light, an infinite grid of illuminating manifestations. When I stand in a crowd it is not the chattering cacophony of a congregation of birds in a tree that I hear. The human minds manufactures and processes thought in such high volume and at such a rate of speed that a crowd of people is the deafening thunder of a hundred thousand waterfalls. A gale force rush of daydreams, of wishes, of chants of the days tasks, of corporate rigmarole, of wails and weeping, of angry shouts and screams, of music. Oh, the music I hear! Violins, flutes and pianos. Operas, symphonies and jazz! Lots of jazz. You will always know when the music in their head is jazz by the shoes that are tapping their imaginary bass drum or snare.

What? Do not tell me you are tired already. An old woman like me, wearing you out? Come on, we only have a couple of blocks to go.

See across the street, the café? In the corner table, the redheaded young woman looking out of the window? She is waiting for her lover. She is thinking of him right now. See the discreet smile on her face? She is deaf. Her lover is a pianist. After they make love, she lays naked on his concert grand curled up like a kitten with her cheek pressed against the laminated wood. She lays quiet as he plays for her, feeling the vibrations amble through her body. If she were made to choose, she would not know which she preferred making love to the most, the man or his piano.

Oh, you want to pick one now? Okay, go ahead, be my guest. Who? Which one?
Her, with the orange scarf? Okay. She is thinking about death, a death which is imminent, hers. She has cancer. It will not be too long now. Yes, she is aware of this otherwise, I could not know, now could I?

This is what is in her head:

She is sitting on a bench by a pond in a park. She is alone. She sits patiently with her hands folded in her lap. She is blindfolded. Suddenly, the bench on which she sits lifts into the air steadily as if supported by a crane. She floats at head level making her way from the pond, out of the park and into the main street of town. Little by little, people are opening their windows and looking through the doors at her floating down their street. They all recognize her as someone they know and love and run out to meet her. People stream out from everywhere, hoards of people cheering and shouting. She is a celebrity. They reach up to touch her hand. Although she is blindfolded she greets everyone back, laughing, feeling for them, identifying every person in the crowd by sound orby the touch. She knows them all. They are her friends, they are her family. The seat gains in speed but the crowd runs faster, anxious to stay as close as possible to her until they no longer can keep up.

An older couple, a man and a woman, appear through the hoard. The crowd splits letting them up to the front with a series of happy pats on the back and cheered encouragement. The couple catch up to the bench, waving her down, shouting her name. The female of the couple strongly resembles a matured and aged version of the dying woman. They run up to the suspended seat. You can tell from the way that the young woman’s head perks when she hears the voices of the older couple calling her name that these people hold a special position. Her brow furrows and her mouth crumples into a cry as she follows their voices, feeling around for their hands reaching out to hers, clasping onto to them. They hold the back of her hands against their cheeks and kiss them. She reaches down kissing their hands back. When they no longer can keep up, they let go but hold onto each other, summoning all of their aging might to keep up with her.

Next, the crowd splits again, this time letting through a young adult male with a baby. The seat gains in speed and height but her young husband runs at full speed, until he is at the head of the crowd, the only person still able to keep up. He catches up to her and lifts their infant child over his head up to its mothers hands for a last touch. Her outstreached hands search for and at last find her infant child. With trembling fingers she delicately outlines the child’s face, shoulders and arms all the way to its small palm, tracing its tiny fingers. When her young husband can no longer keep his speed with the child raised high, he lowers the baby and grabs hold of her hand, laying it against his face, against his mouth kissing it passionately. She lifts again. She leans all the way over the side of the bench and gives his head one last loving stroke around his face and through his hair, and she is out of reach.

The crowd still runs underneath her calling out Goodbyes and Good lucks, I love you’s and We’ll see you soons. No one is sad. Everyone is happy and cheering her name, even her family. If anyone is crying, they cry only out of happiness. This her death. She will not be afraid when it comes.


Here we are. Home sweet home. Thank you, young man, I can carry the rest from here. You are as chivalrous as they come. I would offer what little I have for your kindness but I can already see that you will not accept it. A far cry from what you had in mind intentionally. I wouldn’t of had much to take anyway. Yes, I knew. I read minds, I told you. A changed young man from here on out now, aren’t you? I bet. Either way, you are a good soul. That was what I saw when I first looked at you, a withered plant with healthy roots. No, there is no need to apologize. What have you done? Nothing. You walked an old lady home, carrying her groceries. There is no crime against being a gentleman. I trust you. You are good. If I did not see good in you I would not have asked you for help. Now off with you, go home to your family. I am sure your mother is worried sick. I will not forget your kindness and I can see already that you will not soon forget me. Thank you and goodbye.