The Man on the Subway

I rode the subway to and from school during the week. I hated it. So many people packed inside like sardines in a can, all the tired, joyless faces trying to prepare themselves for another day of inexorable drudgery. The formal fashionwear juxtaposed against the graffiti-riddled, key-scratched windows always made me wonder why people tried so hard to look clean and tidy when the world around them was full of filth. The smog in the air, the piss in the alleyways, the cigarette butts like breadcrumbs for the Hansels and Gretels looking for direction out of the forest of obligation and servitude. And yet the people passing by on the grimy streets garbed themselves in pearls and silk ties as if they were all trying to convince themselves they were richer than they were.

I wasn’t rich. I was drowning in student debt for a journalism course I was sure would be proven obsolete by AI in the near future. It was hard to be positive when I was sharing a basement apartment with three other people, and the landlord’s upstairs were constantly bickering in a foreign tongue I couldn’t identify. But at least I got to wear what I liked.

There was one suit-jockey I would see on the subway every day going to and from school. He was a spindly character, maybe a little too thin for his suit; it sagged off his frame and pooled around his shined loafers. I wondered how he always had a seat when so many people were denied that luxury, swaying against each other with the rock of the train like dancers in the most depressing nightclub ever. One day, I managed to fit in beside him as the previous occupant rose to meet their stop and wormed through the throng of pretentious fashion. He was reading the paper like he always did. I stole a glance at his reading and saw he was looking at the sports section from three days ago. I knew because the school had a subscription, and I would skim through it during lunch. I didn’t have a whole lot of friends, and I wasn’t the kind of looker who attracted the females. That kind of bummed me out. But I had made peace with the fact that I was most likely going to be single for the rest of my life. Probably poor, too. Not like the paper guy, who wore a shiny gold wedding band on his left hand. He looked like he was doing alright in life, always wearing a serene smile, in contrast to most of the subway riders who stared at their feet or up at the ads, desperate to avoid eye contact with the myriad faces closing in.

I asked him why he was reading an old paper, guessing he had been too busy with his work and wife to follow up on the sports he enjoyed. Maybe there was an important game he missed.

He faltered somewhat, surprised to be singled out. I didn’t mind talking to people. As I said, I didn’t have many friends, so strangers and my avoidant roommates were usually the only ones I conversed with. Them and the student loan department, on the many occasions I fell behind on my payments.

“Just catching up,” he replied with a friendly smile.

“Yeah, that’s what I thought,” I shrugged. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to disturb you.”

“Oh, no bother,” he returned. He folded the paper and set it on the briefcase on top of his lap. He always had the case on his lap or between his feet on the floor, depending on how busy the train was.

“Hey, I noticed you always have a seat. You’re never standing like the rest of us.”

His calm smile remained. “I get on early.”

“We must have the same schedule because I see you on the way home, too. Always reading the paper.”

“I imagine we do,” he said. He offered his name. Jeffery.

“I’m Alex,” I returned. I offered him my hand, and he stared at it for a moment, like he wasn’t sure what I was doing. Finally, he fit his palm into mine. His skin was a lot coarser than I imagined; more like a construction worker than a businessman.

“Tell me a bit about yourself, Alex,” he asked. “You seem like a nice young man.”

“Ah, I’m not that special,” I admitted. “I’m taking a course in journalism downtown.”

He gaped as if impressed.

I laughed.

“Maybe one day I’ll be reading your articles in the paper,” he said.

I frowned. “Maybe. If I get a job. There’s a lot of competition.”

“I’m sure if you work hard and put your mind to it, you’ll do just fine. Do you have a girlfriend?”

I looked down at my jeans and tugged at a loose thread. “No. I’m not so good with all that stuff.”

I referenced his wedding band. “But you seem to do all right. That’s nice that you got a wife. You been married long?”

Regrettably, he mentioned she had passed on.

“But I wear the ring to remind me of her and what we shared.”

“That’s too bad,” I frowned. “Do you ever think about getting remarried? You’re not too bad a guy. Handsome, well off.”

He was a decent-looking man, somewhere in his forties, with a shaved head and hard features. He looked tough, but not scary. His kind, dark eyes mitigated the roughness of his skin.

“Well, Alex, I found the one I loved. One day we’ll be together again.”

His smile bore pain, like a hopeful resignation.

“I get it,” I said.

I came to my stop and said goodbye to Jeffery. He nodded in his serene, glossy-eyed way and sent me off with a wave before returning to his paper.

Over the next couple of months, things in my life started to unravel. I was losing interest in journalism, and as a result, my work started to suffer. The bills were piling up, so I decided to drop out and take a full-time labor job to get some decent income. I still rode the subway, and every day, just like always, I would see Jeffery in his seat between the wall of bodies jostling with the sway of the tracks. He’d be reading the paper, his suitcase resting on his lap. I envied him for having such a put-together life and being so at peace with his situation, while my life was on fire and my future appeared dim and unfruitful. I wish that I were smart enough to be a guy like Jeffery, but I was just stupid me, not very smart, or ambitious, or attractive. Sometimes we’d meet eyes and nod, but we never talked again like we did that day.

I had taken to going to the bar frequently after work to drink away the aches and throbs of my joints and muscles. Some days I would forget the time and stay drinking until eight or nine, stumbling to the subway to catch a ride home to my dingy basement, where I would avoid my roommates to spare them the humor of my intoxication. I was ashamed of who I was, but the beer and whiskey did a good job of tentatively pausing my self-loathing long enough for me to get to work and stay busy enough for the next eight hours to keep those kinds of thoughts from my mind. It was the hours between work and the bar that seemed to be the worst for self-reflection, where a mix of panic and dull misery swirled inside me like a smoothy.

One night as I was leaving the bar, I saw Jeffery on the other side of the street, walking in the same slightly ill-fitting suit with his suitcase toted at his side. I lit a cigarette at the corner and watched under the streetlight as he turned into an alley, the illuminated marquees splashing color on the high-rises above.

He set his briefcase on the dirty pavement, opened it, and removed a heavy blanket. He closed the briefcase and lay down, throwing the blanket over himself and using the suitcase as a makeshift pillow.

I stood there, stunned, embarrassed, not for him, but for how I had complained to him so much about my life on that day we spoke on the subway, and he didn’t say a word.

I started to look at life a little differently after that night, knowing that not everyone’s clothes are a proper reflection of how they feel inside. And sometimes, a suit and a briefcase are all they have.