Despite planning to do several things this Sunday, a day he had looked forward to since the week had started, the morning sun failing to blare through his window like it normally did showed him that the elements had other plans. He had always kept his curtain open; for one, he liked being able to put the AC on at night (when the curtain was down it became an obstacle for the air to move through) and two, he loved the feeling of going to bed whenever he was able and wake up whenever nature desired him to. It wasn’t a question of interrupting internal customs, but rather a feeling of waking up when the world saw fit. He examined his phone—a habitual first action that he was always ashamed of performing—and saw that it was one in the afternoon. The beginning of his day, which was supposed to be filled with a detox run around the neighborhood, a breakfast consisting of an egg white platter and an exotic fruit bowl was now ruined and his hope of making it to midtown in time for Central Park’s inaugural park wide mediation was dashed. Normally he would take a shower to clear his mind, but he could hear down the hall that his roommate was already occupying the space. Sometimes he thought of what factors there were in a person’s life that determined the songs they would sing in the shower. Everyone knew that your voice sounded the best when the water was running and the sound reverberated off the walls like you were actually someone that could produce that great of noise. A select few weren’t so lucky, but again, it had to be this person’s select shower playlist. Dixie Chicks? Kenny Chesney? Toby Keith? Slayer? Megadeath? Korn?! Country music was one thing. Three country artists in a row was another. But the transition from country to heavy metal?! That was like taking everything that was wrong in the world and mashing it together to create one big shit sandwich. Some southern twangs were sexy—this one wasn’t. Some people screaming simply hurt the ears—not destroy the eardrums all together.
OK. So this house is telling me something. This day is telling me something. I need to get out of here, he thought. Let’s see what the outside world has in store for me. After grabbing some sunflower seeds and a pack of lemons, he was on his way out the door. The elevator read “Out of Service—Check back next year” and the man blinked to get the crust out of his eyes, which had to have been the obstruction causing him not read the sign correctly. Except he looked at the sign again after blinking and saw that it now read “This used to be elevator—It’s 2017—Just Fucking Walk.” Who the hell did this super think he was? He would bet his life that he had taken the elevator just last night, when he came home drunk from a party in Canarsie.” Now that he noticed it, the sign didn’t look like it was plastered on any type of elevator. It was just white walls. He couldn’t possibly have been the only one who was disappointed to find out his apartment no longer offered the services of an elevator. After all, he knew there were a lot of old folks that lived on some of the upper levels. How were they supposed to go up and down? Even he needed the elevator for going down the stairs. He had a couple of knee surgeries a few years ago; walking down was still a struggle. He slowly descended the first flight to see that there was another sign on the 5th floor, “Using your body sets you free.” The next floor—“I just spoke to the inventor of the elevator and told him he was the one to blame for obesity.” The third floor—“I did you a favor—now you don’t need to be scared of dying in an elevator.” The second—“You can practically see the floor from here.” And the ground floor read, “If you can struggle to pay my rent you can struggle to climb those steps.” Jesus Christ, this landlord sounded like a Nazi. He made a mental note to himself to look at new places somewhere else when he returned later in the day. His legs were already feeling taxed after doing the dirty work of walking down so many floors. He even thought he might have felt himself limping.
When he exited his complex he was surprised to find that there were no cars on the street and it was clear he wasn’t the only person who noticed. “FUCK!” he said. Looking down the block he could see that there were herds of families also standing like he was with a similar screwed up face at the total absence of street vehicles. Someone shouted, “CONO!” Someone else shouted, “PUTAIN!” An elderly woman yelled, “CAZZO!” A baby screamed “BEHEN CHOD!” He wondered if everyone else went through the same process as he did. Finding out their elevators didn’t work, having to walk down all the steps, only to find out there next dependable means of transportation was missing as well. The street certainly looked different. It was certainly more open and several kids were playing in the street, getting wet to the unlocked fire hydrants on one end and playing a mean game of stickball on the other. Now that he took the time to fully look, there wasn’t a car in sight. There wasn’t a stoplight on his corner like there once was and there weren’t any cars as far as his eyes could see. The streets, which used to be filled with the loud shrill honk of horns was a landscape of children laughing, crying, and shouting. You know…it wasn’t so bad.
A strange day, he thought. The manner in which he woke up, the elevator, the complete elimination of automobiles; a strange day, indeed. On his way to the subway he saw that the main street corner had also changed entirely. For one, it was clear that cars were no longer in the picture. This main street, “St. Nicholas” looked like a human metropolis. Yesterday there were stands solely on the side of the street, but now his neighborhood looked like a Moroccan Medina, a huge bazaar of fruit stands, clothing vendors, furniture artisans, and perfume confectioners. At this point he wondered if there was even a subway at all. He slipped and slid, ducked and dodged the newfound human traffic that was on par with the automobile traffic he once knew. He breathed a great sigh of relief when, after a couple of blocks. he discovered that there was still the subway station that there was before…except, to his dismay, the station was closed because 1 trains weren’t running between 242nd St. and 137th. He should have known. Well, at least there was an A train nearby. On the corner of 181 and Ft. Washington, he entered the station in the hope of finally getting his day started and checking off a couple of the things he had on his list. Upon first glance, he didn’t notice anything different about the station. Out of nowhere he was bumped from behind by a couple of masked hooligans, who jumped over the turnstiles, while being pursued by a couple of cops who had guns in their left hands, simultaneously clutching a couple glazed Dunkin Donuts in their right, and wearing what appeared to be pig noses. Wait. Wait, what? They weren’t wearing pig noses. They had pig noses. And pig tails! Not the hair style, either. Literally, each one of them, had pig tails. The only reason he was around long enough to notice was right after the masked men fled the scene, the cops found that they weren’t athletic enough to jump over the turnstiles. Oh, they tried, but after fifteen seconds, they quit and buckled over, exhausted. He stared at the two cops, or pigs, or whatever they were, and slowly swiped his subway card to get through to the other side, all the while staring at the cops with an incredulous look like, “You guys can’t even carry a train pass?” before braking their gaze and heading to the downtown side below. Steps. Steps had indeed replaced the famously tall escalators that used to stand where he stood. He thought of reporting his landlord and super to the authorities. This was now a public matter and his knees ached to think of all the steps below. But he managed.
The A train came within minutes. If there was any doubt that something in the world was terribly wrong, the man now had all the evidence he needed. He watched the cars pass by. Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh. There was no one in the train to be seen. He couldn’t help, but shake his head. The doors opened, he hesitated, and then entered and was welcomed with the familiar breeze of a blue line car. He sat down. The seat was cold to the touch.
“The next stop on this train will be—.”
An arm stopped the doors from closing just in time to let a woman with frizzy brown hair, caramel skin, bright green eyes, a nose ring, a crop top, navy blue capris, and converse sneakers in the train. She stopped to sit right across from him.
“The next stop on this train will be…”
He said, “Where do you wanna go?”
and she replied, “After what I’ve seen the past 30 minutes…anywhere.”
“Thank you for boarding the Anywhere Express. The next stop on this train will be Anywhere.”
He looked at her and she looked at him.
Please stand clear of the closing doors.