I never slept for more than an hour at a time and all I could think about was hopping on the train. The Long Island line would rattle, roll and bump me into Manhattan where I would have to get out at Penn Station and get to Grand Central Station where I could pick up a Metro-North train to Fairfield. It would take me a few hours to get home and I decided not to walk across 34th Street and over to Park Avenue and just take the subway. I would take the first train on the New Haven line.
George was still asleep.
The house was as silent as deep space so I crept my way to the bathroom to brush my teeth.
The door was cracked so I pushed it open. Sitting on the toilet was Barbara with a magazine.
She looked at me and said, “Good morning.”
I covered my eyes and retreated almost knocking over an end table. George was stretching his arms above a yawn as I returned.
“Isn’t it too early for you?” he said.
“Usually, but I wanted to get into the city early,” I replied.
He yawned again like a drowsy lion and said, “Cool, I’ll be ready soon. You can take a shower if you want.”
I had to come clean of what I witnessed.
“George, I walked in on your sister in the bathroom, sorry.”
“Man don’t be. Be thankful you weren’t blinded. Don’t worry about it, she doesn’t,” he said.
Light peeked through the blinds.
“All right.”
“Go take a shower. I can smell the beer from here,” George said.
Barbara went back to bed and I got ready. George was true to his word because he was ready and roaring to go after ripping clothes out of his closet.
The Suburban tore off to the train station. George spun the knob and blasted Mudhoney as we sped down the straight streets. When we got there and had ten minutes until arrival. He tore away leaving me alone in Long Island.
The train blew its horn twice before it pulled up two minutes late. Mesmerized, I watched the island’s suburbs pass away into the linear concrete confusion. The ride went fast. At the next to final stop, the train could hold no more passengers. Disembarkation in Penn Station was a half-frozen tube of toothpaste expelling its contents.
The air was hard and tasted like a burnt piece of wood coated in diesel. I popped out onto the streets for a moment and looked at Madison Square Garden, hadn’t been there since a Ranger’s game a year ago. I descended once again and the subway crammed with drowsy people took me north to Grand Central Station. With one foot inside, I had to dodge businessmen and tourists in the echoing chamber, and made my way to the central information desk. The famous clock above that I had seen but never looked sat as the base of the open space above. After checking the tracks and times on the boards, I found my train and purchased a ticket.
Exhaustion possessed me as I lumbered with my overstuffed bags and bumped into every object in my path. Fast walking men with newspapers under their arms avoided me.
The chaos was sweet.
Hobbling down the flight of granite stairs to the lower tracks, I reached the platform where the Metro-North train waited with open doors. The rancid garbage and dead rat scent dusted my clothes like putrid snow flurries. The hot breeze off the tracks and train didn’t help matters. The nylon handles of my bags imprinted on my hand.
The old workhorse commuter train’s tarnished aluminum doors opened on time as the sickly yellow lights inside coughed. The sticky floors gripped to my shoes. The cabin smelled of beer and perfume. I passed the seats near the doors that faced each other and slid across the first red and blue three-seater that was unoccupied. Not many people were on the train yet. The fake leather seats trapped heat and made my butt sweat.
Below an advertisement for Cats near the doors, a drunk man in a tuxedo sat faced the rest of the car as he swayed in his boozy wind. One eye floated and the other flared as he turned his stupor upon me. I stared out the window to the platform smeared with gaunt brown light. A burp broke the background noise of fans and the scent of gin wafted by my nose. The train filled up.
I hoped I wouldn’t have to give up a seat but eventually did. A lady in a dark gray suit, who smelled like lilacs and wool sat down, smiled, said nothing but tipped her sunglasses as she gave Drunky a look over. The sound of fumes vented as the door contracted. A metallic announced proclaimed our destinations. The train rocked back and forth in the tunnels like a paint mixer until it reached the light of the day. We finally got up to speed after 125th street.
The lady said, Good bye” as she got off in Cos Cob and there would be another twenty-five minutes or so until I reached home. I looked across the aisle at the countryside through the window that was just visible over two middle-aged men reading the Times.
There were only two more stops until mine so I got up and went to the sliding doors. I rested against the plastic shield that separated the cabin from the exit. Not one puff of serene smoke in two hours and I was craving one to the point of salivation. Ads for cigarettes stared at me at every station.
The crackling of the power cables above bleached out the roar of the tracks below.
As I lifted my head to see the Saugatuck River in Westport, the aluminum exterior reflected sharp light off the waterways as we crossed the bridge. I couldn’t help but be reminded of my smaller days when I took the train from the semi-sylvan suburbs to the stone streets and shiny steel skyscrapers of the city. The mechanized electrified trolleys transported and transposed people to places new or routine everyday. The sentiment was vanquished as the train shrieked to a stop.
I was home.
It was morning.
My house was a few miles away so I would take a cab. Conveniently the Cab Company was located at the train station. The taste of frost flew on the air with a hint of salt. It was deep autumn on the Connecticut shore. I craved pizza and decided to check out the old grounds.
At Wessex, there were two pizza places to choose from and both were franchises. I wanted the real thing with real garlic and down a block was Sophia’s. The quaint pizza place with red checkered tablecloths I grew up on called to me. My bags swung as pendulums as the hard soles of my boots clacked on the raised sidewalk. The chime rang as I pushed open the door. Heat and the smell of caramelized onions escaped.
At the counter the Greek, as we locals called him, tugged on his moustache as the little old lady Sophia stood in the back, hair covered by a black scarf, flipping onions in a pan. I paid. The paper plate he handed me dripped cheese off the edges as the steaming slice pushed the smell of garlic up my nose. Drool dripped as I scooted my way to the window and gazed upon the traffic of US route 1, the Post Road.
I tossed the plate in the tin bin at the door and pulled my barn coat out of my bag and walked back to the train station. The sound of I-95 rolled in the distance as the onshore winds picked up.
In my brief absence, the Cab Company purchased a new fleet of cars. The old cabs I took before passing my driver’s test smelled of cigars and rotten mushrooms. Most of them struggled to start. A young driver wearing a backwards Yankees cap told me he would take me and asked me to follow him. I backseat of his cab had the new car smell.
The traffic was light downtown and soon we breached the residential zone. Through my cracked window, the air became jagged with salt and the distinct odor of low tide swirled into the back seat. This was a smell I had become oblivious to from living by the beaches most of my life. Now I had to readjust to the overpowering smell of detritus, Hydrogen Sulfite gas, the farts of the seaside.
We turned left down Sturges Avenue lined by spruce and ancient oaks. Each side held handsome houses and bold lawns. Sand gathered in dry puddles along the storm drains in the beach enclave. At the end of this road was Reef beach and a Frisbee throw down was Pine beach, my private beach.
We pulled on to Pine Beach Road, the road I lived on since I was eight, where you couldn’t build a house over three stories. The cab came to a gradual halt and we
pulled up to the knobby oak in my front yard. I got out and paid the driver and tipped well. He did not help with my bags.
There was no car in the driveway.
The garage, a smaller version of the ancient colonial house, was shut so I assumed no one was home like I planned. I had hoped maybe Hunter might be there but it was unlikely. The brass key was under the ceramic frog I put under the juniper bushes when I was ten. A depression on the underside held the key off the ground. I went around the back of the house and tossed my bags on the back porch next to the three season room. For a second I forgot which of the two keyholes to use since one was dead. The doorknob lifted and I gave a steady spin. The white door creaked and the loose panes of glass rattled as it slammed back into the groove.
The laces of my boots would not let go so easily but I finally flipped them off. I placed them under the mudroom’s bench that led to the laundry room.
Nothing had changed.
Nothing had moved.
Nothing was dirty.
The copper pipes clanged and the floor vents rumbled as hot air rolled past me like fog. A hidden hangover jumped out and yelled Boo. I needed to sleep. The hardwood stairs to the second floor bowed under my feet. The glass doorknob turned with a click and I saw that my sleigh bed was made. A stack of towels sat near the headboard. The room was clean and uncluttered as my easel leaned against the wall near the window that faced the street. My book shelves were straight and the Persian rug in was bright. The red dots appeared and covered the bed.