Exchange On the Train

It was 5:30 in the afternoon and the sun was perfectly warm on my skin. I was waiting for the train and smoking a cigarette.

“Hey, can I possibly get a cigarette from you?” A guy with dark sunglasses asked.

“Of course.”

I smiled and dug around in my bag.

“Thanks.”

He pulled a Bic out from his pocket and lit it.

“God, I’ve needed that all day,” he exhaled.

We chatted and established that he was headed home after a long shift at a restaurant a few blocks away. A woman threw toast at him that morning because her eggs were cooked wrong. I shared one of my own table waiting horror stories.

We chatted some more and established that I was on my way to the airport.

“Flying out?”

“Yup.”

I revealed no more information than necessary.

“Where are you going to?”

“New York.”

He told me that he has always wanted to go there, and that actually, his roommate had just gotten back from NYC.

When the train arrived we boarded and he sat across the aisle from me.

“So, when are you going to be back?”

“On Wednesday.”

“That’s a short trip.”

“Well, the friend that I’m going to visit has joint custody of his kids with his ex-wife, so we have to plan our trips around his parenting schedule,” I explained.

If he hadn’t been wearing sunglasses, I’m sure that I would have seen him wink.
“Ohh,” he said, “It’s that kind of trip. I see what you’ve got going on.”

I laughed and shrugged my shoulders. There ain’t no shame in my game. Besides, if he only knew the half of it…

A moment later he told me: “I was riding the train home from work last night and these swingers asked me to come home with them. I thought about it, but you know…”

“Were they cute?” I asked.

“She was, but I’m just not really into dudes.”

We were quiet for a minute.

“I don’t know. I mean, I guess, maybe sometime in the future,” he said.

“Well, if you ever get the chance again I would suggest you give it a try. It’s really a good time,” I said and smiled.

Surprisingly, our conversation trailed off after that. Suddenly he had several important text messages to send.

He got off a few stops later.

It wasn’t too much longer and I was at the airport, ready to board my plane.