5

He knew he could not outrun the subway. That didn’t mean that he wasn’t going to try. He had gone to bed at four that morning, after staring at the text for so long he had to go into his sister’s bathroom and steal her eye drops. 

​

not working. sorry.

 

did you mean to send this message to your manager?

 

no.

​

He didn’t respond. His father always said that the internet was ‘ripe’ for misunderstandings and his father was always right, except when he wasn’t. Instead, he set an alarm for the mid-afternoon. He’d be awake by noon, at the time when he knew she was going into the city. He wasn’t able to get back to sleep for at least two hours, unable to stop himself from creating a list of reasons for her text in his head.

 

1. She was kidnapped. This was the only way for her to tell him without arousing suspicion.(What if she was in some rando’s basement right now, and he was lying under his Looney Tunes duvet, doing nothing?)

2. Last week, when they had watched The Lion King, he’d mentioned that Scar was his bisexual awakening. That could have been a deal-breaker. Not the bisexual thing—she already knew that. The Scar thing. (She’d laughed, though. He loved her laugh.)

3. She’d found someone better. This was most likely. (Someone who could answer her questions, who wouldn’t let her down.)

​

Last Friday, they had gotten milkshakes and drove down to the water to watch the geese from the safety of his car. He’d caught her sneaking glances at him. When he’d asked her what was wrong, she had shook her head. 

 

“Would you rather drown or be burned alive?” She’d tilted her head, waited for his response. 

 

“Drown, I guess.” Sometimes she asked questions he didn’t know how to answer. He had never really thought of it before. “‘Cause at least you wouldn’t feel your skin burning. I think I’d rather my last conscious thought be fear than pain.”

 

“Aren’t they the same thing, when it comes down to it?” She shrugged. “You know, the first time I ever heard about someone attempting suicide, it was a guy on the radio talking about how he lit himself on fire. I was like seven, my mom turned the volume down right after that so I didn’t hear the whole thing, but it still seems like overkill to me. If I was that desperate, I’d fill my pockets with rocks and walk into Lake Ontario.” 

 

“You would? Is this something you think about a lot?” 

 

“No,” she’d said. “No, not really. Sorry, I didn’t mean to get all intense.”

 

“I don’t mind. You can tell me anything you want.”

 

“Oh. Thank you.” She’d looked away then, out at the horizon. “Can you take me home now?”

 

He nearly tripped over the turnstile as he sprinted into the subway station, his worn-down high tops skidding on the tile floor. He’d parked his car in the nearest parking lot in the worst show of parking since his driver’s test, a barely passable attempt at symmetry. He didn’t care. There were other things to worry about. Namely: the almost empty subway he was about to miss. If she wasn’t on this one, she’d have been on the one before it–which meant that he’d have the whole ride into the city to decide what sort of grand gesture he could make once she went on break at work. 

​

He took the steps two at a time, moving as fast as he could without falling the rest of the way down. In front of him, the train sat, lonely. Across the station, a train to Vaughan arrived and departed, no acknowledgement of its companion on the parallel track. I wonder if I should have gotten off, joined a much larger group of people going back the way I had come. It would have turned out differently, surely. It was not as though I had anywhere to be. Still, something kept me tethered to my seat. I cannot explain the feeling—but if you’ve felt it, you will understand—of knowing you should be getting off the subway but watching your stop pass instead, unable to move from your spot. I did not get off at Finch West, though I likely should have. Instead, I watched a young man slide through the doors as they closed. 

 

For the first time, the girl with the smudged mascara looked away from the window, towards the doors. Something flashed in her dark brown eyes when she saw him—apprehension or excitement, maybe both. Before he could return her stare, she snapped her head back to the window, staring resolutely out at the darkness. 

In and out. In and out. In and…His attempt to catch his breath was thwarted by a movement out of the corner of his eye, the unique mahogany of her hair, the way each of her motions were always so grounded. In what, he couldn’t say. In something. 

 

He understood that her presence on the train left him with several options. 

 

1. He could ignore her. Play it cool, stride down the hallway like he hadn’t noticed her at all. (This was the sensible option.)

2. He could make his grand gesture now. Sure, he hadn’t figured out the gesture yet. So what? He could still do it. It could still work. (This required more thinking than he had the strength for, as he was still trying to catch his breath.)

3. He could sit down next to her and pretend like everything was fine. His sister frequently chided him for his inability to take things at face value. You don’t always have to make things more than they are, she’d told him. Sometimes things just happen because they happen and all you can do is accept it. (She was sixteen, why did she have things figured out? Why didn’t he?)

​

In the end, with as much self-control as he could muster, he sat down beside her—shoulder to shoulder—and stared straight ahead, as if he had chosen this seat out of necessity, as if the train itself wasn’t almost completely empty. 

 

If he had been looking at anyone other than her, he would have seen the two highschoolers turn to each other. 

 

‘He’s hot,’ mouthed Four. 

 

Three rolled her eyes. ‘He’s sweaty,’ she mouthed back.

 

Four snorted, scooting nearer to her. Side by side, their knees occasionally brushed. Neither of them moved away. Five caught a glimpse of them from across the car. He hated the act of it, the sight of such closeness. The intimacy of friends who had known each other a long time—wrapping their arms around each other’s shoulders, the way neither pulled away from their casual touch. Jealousy spread like a forest fire, burning a hole in Five’s chest. He had never done that, why did he not take advantage of that closeness when he had it? When he was still someone worth loving? When was the last time someone had looked at him and moved closer rather than moved away?