We Have to Go Now

6/16/07

The old man wore a pair of Vans that looked like an emo kid had donated them to the Salvation Army. At one time they must have been white with red checks, but now they appeared to have been spray-painted blue. Some of the red checks still showed through like pebbles at the bottom of a stream. His shorts were once blue jeans that had been cut at the knees, and his dirty hooded T-shirt was clearly an artifact from the early nineties.

He wandered around the train station wearing an absentminded grin that displayed his yellowed but surprisingly straight teeth. His blue emo shoes carried him slowly through the crowd as he held his hand out to the train commuters, asking them for change.

Nearby, a young man sat playing an acoustic guitar through an amplifier the size of a shoe box, while his friend stood beside him, singing Beatles songs with a twist of soul. A group of ten or so people had gathered around, listening and cheering. Occasionally one of them would drop a dollar into the bowl on the floor.

The old man in the cutoff shorts and spray-painted Vans bobbed his head to the music as he happily went about his business of collecting change. Most people shrugged him off, but a few reached into their pockets for handfuls of small coins. The old man gratefully accepted these with a cheery, “Thanks, friend!”

I sat on one of the rusty green benches, tapping my fingers along with the music, and watching the display board closely for my train. I waited there at the same time every day, and heard the same songs every time, but I never grew tired of them.

Beside me, an old woman sat clutching a floral purse to her lacy blouse. Her pale blue eyes darted around the room, temporarily settling on each stranger who passed by. She shuddered as the old beggar in the blue Vans approached her and politely asked for some spare change.

“I don’t carry change!” The old woman cried in a hoarse voice. Her wrinkled fingers grasped her purse tighter, jingling something that could only be the change she didn’t carry.

“Me either,” I interjected, before the old man could ask me.

“No worries, my friends,” he said, his wide smile showing off those strangely even yellow teeth.

The sound of scattered applause floated over as the singer broke into another song. The beggar clapped appreciatively. “The boy’s got a voice like an angel,” he said, his tired eyes still fixed on me and the old woman.

The woman made a tiny sound resembling the squeak of a rusty gate, then slowly rose to her feet. She moved toward the music with the speed of a caterpillar, one hand pressed firmly onto her back, the other still clutching her purse. Eventually she reached the bowl on the floor in front of the singer and his guitarist friend.

She carefully lifted her hand from her back and reached into her little floral handbag to produce three coins. I glanced at the beggar in the nineties throwback shirt, but he appeared unperturbed. He was still grinning and bobbing his head to the music.

The old woman slowly leaned over (obviously this took great effort), and dropped her three coins into the bowl. The guitarist looked up briefly and smiled at her over his dark sunglasses. She slowly walked away without smiling back.

More applause came as the song ended and the duo began to pack up their gear. A few members of the small audience called for more, but the singer raised his hands dismissively and said simply, “We have to go now.”

“We have to go now,” the old beggar repeated in a monotonous voice that still managed to sound somewhat cheery. He stared blankly after the musicians as they collected their bowl of money.

The old man’s crazy, I thought to myself. Probably Schizophrenic. These homeless people always are.

He appeared to momentarily wake from his trance and turned his bright, smiling face to me. “Good evening, friend,” he said with a little bow.

I tried to stifle the snickering laugh rising in my throat, but it forced its way out. The beggar didn’t seem to notice. He was walking away in the direction the old woman had gone. In fact, quite a few people seemed to be going the same way, including the singer and his accompanist. They were moving in a loose pack toward the entrance to the train platform.

At first I thought nothing of this. They were probably all taking the same train. Everyone there was trying to get out of the city. Still, curiosity beckoned and my eyes were drawn to them.

The old woman was out in front, taking careful, unsteady steps in her beige orthopedic sneakers. Putty, I thought, studying her footwear. That’s what you’d call that color. My gaze moved upward to the offending change-filled purse she still maintained a death grip on. She was holding onto it so tightly that her knuckles had turned white. It was her expression, however, that struck me as unusual. Her eyes were no longer darting back and forth, but focused steadily on something to the right of the escalator. I glanced at the spot but saw only a clear glass wall which looked out onto the platform.

I surveyed the crowd behind the old woman. They all shared the same focused stare, walking steadily forward in a group, like zombies after a kill. More people were getting up from benches and joining them, some of them muttering the same phrase the singer had spoken and the old man had repeated, “We have to go now.”

The clock on the display board now indicated that I had five minutes before my train arrived, so I rose from my bench to follow the others. My shoulder bumped a teenage boy carrying a skateboard. “’Scuse me,” I said.

The boy turned to face me and I was surprised to see that he was in the same trance-like state as the old woman and the beggar. His pupils were wide and his dark brown eyes seemed far away, as if he was staring at something on the other side of the world.

“We have to go now,” he mumbled through his retainer, without breaking his gaze. He walked off toward the old woman and the glass wall, dragging his skateboard carelessly on the floor behind him.

I gathered my things and hurried after the boy, passing dozens of deadpan faces with faraway eyes, all focused on that one spot on the glass wall. They moved slowly, like a funeral procession, clustering around the entrance to the platform.

I pushed my way to the front of the crowd with little resistance. The old woman was now inches away from the wall, staring out through the glass with a funny half smile on her face. She was still gripping her purse close to her chest.

A voice on the loudspeaker suddenly announced that my train would be arriving shortly. “Just a few more minutes,” I begged under my breath.

The old woman stepped closer to the glass, and as one of her putty-colored sneakers touched it, it actually began to move. It rippled like a lake when a stone skips across it. I jumped back and dropped my lunch bag, but I couldn’t move my arms to pick it back up. I was frozen in place.

I blinked my eyes a few times to make sure I wasn’t imaging what I was seeing. The old woman was still moving forward, and as she did, she was actually walking through the rippling glass wall. She moved her arms forward and her floral handbag disappeared behind the glass.

I shook my head and blinked a few more times. What I was seeing was impossible. Even if the old woman had walked through the glass, I should have been able to see her on the other side, but I couldn’t. I craned my neck to get a better angle but all I saw through the glass wall was the platform down below. No old lady; no floral purse.

When the old woman had walked completely through the glass wall and disappeared, the beggar stepped up behind her and began to do the same. He was grinning his cheery grin, bearing his straight yellow teeth.

Another announcement came over the loudspeaker. My train was arriving. Whatever was on the other side of that glass wall, it didn’t matter now. I had to get on that train and get home before I turned into a spaced out zombie like the rest of my fellow commuters.

I scooped my lunch bag up off the ground and made a run for the escalator. A strong, calloused hand grasped my arm, and I looked up to see the young man with the guitar beaming down at me. “We have to go now,” he said firmly. His singer friend stepped up behind him and echoed, “Yes, we have to go now.”

Through the glass I could see my train pulling up to the platform. “Exactly,” I said to the guitarist. “Have a nice trip.” I yanked my arm free and darted downstairs to the platform, just as the conductor was stepping onto my train. “Wait!” I called after him. He shook his head with an exasperated chuckle and moved aside so I could climb aboard.

As the doors closed and we pulled away, I looked up through the window at the glass wall that the old woman had disappeared into. The boy with the skateboard was walking up to it now. I could see his lips silently mouthing, “We have to go now.” He pressed his hand up against the wall and pushed it through, but it didn’t disappear as the old woman’s had. He took a step forward and I saw his leg dangle over the edge of the floor, high above the platform. He took another step and I watched him fall through the air, still smiling blankly, still holding his skateboard.

The train pulled out of the station and into a dark tunnel. I collapsed on an empty seat and took out my ticket.

“It’s the damnedest thing, isn’t it?” Came the conductor’s voice from behind me.

I turned and handed him my ticket. “What is?” I asked shakily, still trying to catch my breath.

“Those people jumping from the second floor. I called transit police, but there’s no way I was gonna stop this train. It’s five o’clock. We have to go now.”