Roomies

Ugh. Crushes are the worst, but in hindsight a crush from afar seems so much easier than this. I should stick to making up stories in my head and watching from a distance like a reasonable creeper. Now I’ve broken the fourth wall and if he’s as friendly as his eyes tell me he is, he may notice me when I drop money in his case the next time, and I will be forced to interact smoothly or run in the opposite direction. I may be middle-of-the-pack when my mouth is closed, but as soon as I start talking to men, Lulu calls me Appalland, for how appallingly unappealing I become. Obviously, she’s not wrong. And now I’m sweating under my pink wool coat, my face is melting, and I’m hit with an almost uncontrollable urge to hike my tights up to my armpits because they have slowly crept down beneath my skirt and are starting to feel like form-fitting harem pants.

I should really go for it and just shimmy them up my waist, because other than one comatose gentleman sleeping on a nearby bench, it’s just me and Calvin down here, and he’s not paying attention to me anymore.

But then the sleeping gentleman rises, zombielike, and takes one shuffling step toward me. Subway stations are awful when they’re empty like this. They’re caves for the leches, the harassers, the flashers. It isn’t that late—not even midnight on a Monday—but I’ve clearly just missed a train.

I move to my left, farther down the platform, and pull out my phone to look busy. Alas, I should know that drunk and persistent men are often not swayed by the industrious presence of an iPhone, and the zombie comes closer.

I don’t know if it’s the tiny spike of fear in my chest or a draft passing through the station, but I’m hit with the cloying, briny smell of mucus; the sour rot of spilled soda sitting for months at the bottom of a trash bin.

He lifts a hand, pointing. “You have my phone.”

Turning, I give him a wide berth as I circle back toward the stairs and Calvin. My thumb hovers over Robert’s phone number.

He follows. “You. Come here. You have my phone.”

Without bothering to look up, I say as calmly as possible, “Get the hell away from me.”

I push Robert’s name and hold the phone to my ear. It rings hollowly, one ring for every five of my pounding heartbeats.

Calvin’s music swells, aggressively now. Does he not see this person following me around the station? I have the absurd thought that it really is remarkable how deeply he gets in the zone while playing.

The man starts this shuffling, lurching run in my direction and the notes tearing out of Calvin’s guitar become a soundtrack for the lunatic chasing me down the platform. My tights keep me from running with any amount of speed or grace, but his clunky run speeds up, turns more fluid with confidence.

Through the phone, I hear the tinny sound of Robert answering. “Hey, Buttercup.”

“Holy crap, Robert. I’m at the—”

The man reaches out, his hand wrapping around the sleeve of my coat, jerking my phone away from my ear.

“Robert!”

“Holls?” Robert yells. “Honey, where are you?”

I grapple, trying to hold on because I have the sickening sense that I’m off balance. Dread sends a cold, sobering rush along my skin: the man is not helping me stay upright—he’s shoving me.

In the distance, I hear a deep shout: “Hey!”

My phone skitters along the concrete. “Holland?”

It happens so fast—and I guess things like this always happen fast; if they happened slowly I’d like to think I’d do something, anything—but one second I’m on the nubby yellow warning line, and the next I’m falling onto the tracks.

two

I’ve never been inside an ambulance before, and it’s just as mortifying to snort awake in front of two sober professionals as I’d imagine it would be. A female paramedic with a permanent furrow etched into her forehead stares down at me, expression severe. Monitors beep. When I look around, my head becomes a rocket ship, counting down to some manner of combustive event. My arm is sore—no, not just sore, screaming. A glance down tells me it’s already restrained in a sling.

With the distant roar of an oncoming train, I remember being pushed onto the tracks.

Someone pushed me onto the subway tracks!

My heart begins doing a chaotic version of kung fu in my chest and the panicked tempo is echoed by the various machines surrounding me. I sit up, struggling against the monumental wave of nausea, and croak, “Did you catch him?”

“Whoa, whoa.” With concern in her eyes, the paramedic—her name tag reads ROSSI—gently urges me back down. “You’re okay.” She nods at me with confidence. “You’re okay.”

And then she presses a card into my hand.

National Suicide Prevention Lifeline

1-800-273-8255

I flip it over, wondering if the other side says,

Who to call when a drunk dude pushes you onto the tracks

Unfortunately, it does not.

I look back up at her, feeling my face heat in indignation. “I didn’t jump.”

Rossi nods. “It’s okay, Ms. Bakker.” She misreads my mystified expression and adds, “We got your name from your purse, which we recovered just off the platform.”

“He didn’t take my purse?”

She presses her lips into a frown and I look around for backup. There are actually two paramedics here—the other is a scruffy Paramedic of the Month calendar-model type who is diligently charting something from where he stands just outside the ambulance. His name tag reads GONZALES. Beyond, a cop car is parked at the curb, and a pair of officers chat amiably near the open driver’s-side door. I can’t help but feel this isn’t the smoothest way to intervene in a potential suicide situation: I’ve just pig-snorted, my skirt is awkwardly bunched near my hips, the crotch of my tights is somewhere south of the equator, and my shirt is unbuttoned to make room for the adhesive cardiac monitors. A suicidal individual might suffer a touch of humiliation here.

Scooching my skirt down with as much grace as I can manage, I repeat, “I didn’t jump.”

Gonzales looks up from his paperwork and leans against the ambulance door. “We found you there, sweetie.”

I screw my eyes closed, growling at his condescension. This still doesn’t add up. “Two paramedics just happened to be wandering through the subway right after I fell onto the tracks?”

He gives me a tiny flicker of a smile. “Anonymous caller. Said there was someone on the tracks. Didn’t mention anyone pushing her. Nine times out of ten it’s an attempt.”

Anonymous caller.

CALVIN.

I see movement just outside the ambulance, at the curb. It’s dark out, but it’s definitely him, holy shit, and I see him just as he stands. Calvin meets my eyes for the briefest pulse before startling and jerking his face away. Without another look back, he turns to walk down Eighth Avenue.

“Hey!” I point. “Wait. Talk to him.”

Gonzales and Rossi slowly turn.

Rossi makes no move to stand, and I stab my finger forward again. “That guy.”

“He pushed you?” Gonzales asks.

“No, I think he’s the one who called.”

Rossi shakes her head; her wince is less sympathetic, more pitying. “That guy walked up after we arrived on scene, said he didn’t know anything.”

“He lied.” I struggle to sit up farther. “Calvin!”

He doesn’t stop. If anything, he speeds up, ducking behind a taxicab before jogging across the street.