An attempt at creative writing

The woman who knew shame

She sat on the light blue bench on the subway. Nine more stops. She hated waiting, but she remembered her sunglasses and headphones. No one would bother her. Or at least she hoped so. She was headed home after working the early shift. All she wanted to do was sleep, but there were things to do at home. She had to stay awake.

Across the subway section sat two couples. One pair of 20-somethings who held hands and giggled. The other was a pair of 60-somethings who long ago stopped giggling, but had to still tolerate one another to stay together. On either side of the girl sat two men- one who also wore sunglasses indoor and had his headphones plugged in. He probably didn’t want anyone to bother him, either. He was really tall, but a bit skinny and had a light purple-yellow mark on his arm. He stared forward. The other man on the girl’s side was large like a body builder with skin tanned by the sun and secretly stared at the girl through the reflection in the Plexiglas window that otherwise only revealed the inside organs on the underground. It seemed like any other subway ride- ignoring the strangers who sat next to her and focusing on music or a book, while too distracted by a museum of shoes.

Bloody Mary by The Silversun Pickups was on full volume, but the sanctity of the girl’s headphones was shattered by the sputtering of a dwarf-like woman. She was not dwarf-like in the sense that she was small, but he face was red from rashes and her nose was incredibly round like something a make up artist for a Hollywood movie would construct. Her hair was greasy and covered in a black beanie that she pulled over her eyes as she doubled over sputtering enough for the entire subway car to watch her. The spectacle of spitting and pronounced coughing caused nearby passengers to flock to opposite ends of the car. People were oddly huddled together in clumps at the extreme right and left of the car despite the emanating empty space around the tortured woman. She coughed and coughed, and then stopped. All was calm and quiet for a minute. No one’s eyes strayed from the woman. She suddenly turned to a corner where the handrail met the bench and began to scream. She bent over as if she would hurl and allowed every exasperation that he body could afford into her screams. Both her missing teeth and whatever suffering she was battling were revealed to the entire subway car. For the length of the entire subway stop between 49^th Street and Times Square on the R train downtown, the haggard, tortured woman bore her soul. It disturbed the girl who sat with her headphones plugged in and sunglasses on.

Both couples across from the girl scrunched their foreheads in discomfort. The young girlfriend squeezed her boyfriend’s hand extra tight, so that he would understand she needed and felt his support.  The older couple looked around the subway care nervously, as if hoping there would be a place for them to move away from the screaming woman. The large, tan man sitting next to the girl appeared unfazed. The girl was thankful that the man who had seemed like someone intimidating could actually protect her from the woman she assumed was mentally ill- who knew what she would do? The guy to the girl’s left feigned his fear and sank back into the bench. The girl could see it. She saw more than other people did, or at least she thought so. She always noticed the small details- like a wedding ring, smudged makeup from crying, scars on her roommate’s wrists that were usually covered by long shirtsleeves. The girl picked at her thumb’s cuticle- a bad habit. She needed to paint her nails for her interview tomorrow, print out copies of her resume, and that screaming just didn’t stop.

How many of the people on the subway car also wanted to bare their souls?, wondered the girl. She considered how badly the others wanted to scream because of the ordinary monotony of their lives or the frustrations of their days. The overbearing shadow of normalcy or the incredible pressure of the unfair economic/ political/ social realities of the day. There was such immense pressure. Why did only the spitting, sputtering woman scream? Perhaps everyone felt that their souls could split at any moment. The girl did not know. She was both disturbed and intrigued.

The seemingly hushed voice of the MTA officer announced the arrival at Times Square. The hag turned from her corner, stood tall, wiped her mouth with the back of her hand, and walked to the frame of the open doors. Before she stepped out of the car, she looked back and said, “You should all be ashamed of yourselves.”