I scream so loud the MTA guy shoots out his hands like he wants to keep me from screaming myself to pieces. But I jerk sideways, out of his reach, and even though I’m screaming and I’m scared, I think, You can run now, and I do.
I go for the open door at the end of the train, but I overshoot it and smash into the end of the car. I grab on to the doorjamb and launch myself out of the subway car and onto the platform, though I don’t make it far. I land on the strip of little nubby yellow things that line the edge of the platform, meant to keep people from slipping and falling into the pit and getting creamed by a train.
The nubs dig into the soles of my bare feet, painfully separating all the little bones, until I get to the smooth tiles in the middle of the platform. I slip immediately, crash to my knees, and when I look behind me, I see the MTA guy running out of the train, talking on his radio. There are a bunch of other people on the platform, and some spread out away from me, some step forward like they want to help. I scramble back up and go for the stairs.
My mom says bodies like ours are made for football and slaying dragons.
Dollface, don’t you know the big-boned girls are the ones who’ll save the world? I don’t need my body to save the world, I just need it to save myself, and right now it’s doing a piss-poor job. Mom says I shouldn’t curse my body, I shouldn’t wage a war I can’t win, but right now, trying to heave my big-boned glory up these stairs, all I can do is hiss, “Come on!” I am a bear lumbering up a mountain. I am the mountain, too.
I want to shoot like fireworks from the subway station; I want to explode in the air above Manhattan before all of my color sizzles away and I dissolve into nothing. But by the time I see the light of day above me, I am gasping for breath, using the railing to pull myself up one step at a time, my body heavy like wet sand. It is rush hour, so people pushing their way to the surface surround me, and a few of them look back at me after they pass. I want to say, I’m fine. I want to say, Help me. But I can’t breathe, so I don’t say anything at all.
I worry the MTA guy is behind me, so when I finally make it out of the subway onto the sidewalk, I force myself to start walking.
Calm down, calm down, calm down, I tell myself, my breath still catching in my throat, tears still streaming down my face no matter how fast I wipe them off. The paint on my skin is so thick I can’t even feel my hands on my face. Under my fingertips the paint feels like hard plastic that’s been shattered with a thousand hairline fractures, a puzzle that refuses to come apart even though I dig at it with my nails. People look at me in alarm, and I pretend not to notice.
Car tires pull up the confetti carpet from last night’s Halloween parade as cars dodge and weave down Sixth Avenue. My bare feet pick up torn bits of papier-mâché, dried Silly String, and other, more organic things I try not to identify. I should figure out where I’m going. I should figure out where I’ve been. The scar on my forehead itches underneath the face paint, but I can’t seem to dig down enough to scratch it, so I rub it with the coarse fabric of the MTA coat sleeve instead.
I want to stop walking now, but I’m afraid to. It feels like if I stop, everything will stop. All the people around me, the cars, the noise, the wind, the world, it will all just stop and everything will fall over like cardboard cutouts and I’ll be standing on this freezing cold sidewalk by myself in a city full of dead things.
I keep walking.
I shouldn’t have gotten off the subway. That was a “bad choice.” That wasn’t a “good decision.” Dr. Friedman wouldn’t approve. She would want to know why. Why would you get off the subway, Nan? That man was going to help you. She’d give me that same puzzled look my mom always gave me when she wanted to know why, why, why I did the things I did. And the answer would be the same. I don’t know. I just did them.
If I had stayed on the subway, the cops would have come. And if the cops had come, they would have asked questions, and I wouldn’t have had any answers. And grown-ups hate it when you don’t have answers. They’d have brought me to the hospital. They’d have called my mom. Ma’am, your daughter is an idiot. You’d better come quick. They’d have poked me and prodded me and tried to make me remember.
What if I don’t want to remember?
Why would I want to?
Why would I want to know a story that ends with me waking up half naked with no memory and most of my hair hacked off? That’s what people don’t understand about blacking out. Most of the time it’s for your own good. Why would you want to remember stumbling into Saint Patrick’s Cathedral and puking into the holy water in front of a busload of horrified Japanese tourists?
Just for example.
That’s the sort of thing that’s funny only if someone else is telling the story, telling you what you did, laughing with you about it because it’s actually so terrible you think you might cry. That’s the sort of thing your best friend and you could laugh so hard over you pee your pants.
But I don’t have friends anymore. On purpose. I’m a lone wolf. And I’m stoic. I’m a stoic lone wolf who walks quietly through the halls of her new school, talking to no one. It’s better that way. Nobody gets hurt. Especially me.
My stomach hurts. Cramps. Like I ate something bad.
I turn down a side street to puke, and get slapped in the face by a screaming gust of wind. It stops me in my tracks, its chill so sudden and so cold it feels like my body is finally being shocked into wakefulness. The urge to puke is gone.
It is freezing, and it is wonderful. It feels like it knocks the darkness right out of me.
“What do I do now?” I ask the wind, but it only howls in response before dying down, leaving my skin tingling with its absence. I look up at the sky. It’s an ocean of gray clouds, low and flat and swollen with unfallen rain or maybe snow.
The wind comes again, this time from behind, and I let it move me forward. I slip my hands into the coat pockets to warm them. The fingers of my right hand brush against soft paper. It’s a five-dollar bill. I stare at it and then down at my bare feet.
I should buy some shoes.
And then I should go to school.
Most stores are closed at this early hour, but down the block I see a bright red awning being rolled open by a guy in jeans and a T-shirt. He must be freezing. The awning says 99CENT PLUS! As I approach, the guy yanks up the metal security gates covering the front windows and door, and starts pulling things out of the entryway onto the sidewalk—two white buckets of fake flowers, a torn cardboard box filled with black vinyl belts, a stack of white plastic lawn chairs.
I’m not sure he’s officially open yet, so I just walk right by him inside before he can stop me.
“Do you have shoes?” I ask, turning as I hear him walk in behind me. “I need some shoes. And maybe a hat.” He just stares at me. “It’s real cold outside.”
“Slippers are by the dog food,” he finally answers, going behind the counter so he can watch me in the security monitor. “End of the first aisle.”
I follow his directions, my feet breaking out in pinpricks of pain as they warm up. “Just slippers? What about shoes?”
“No shoes. Just slippers. By the dog food,” he answers. “Hats are there too.”
At the end of the first aisle I find a plastic bin overflowing with pairs of pastel slippers made out of cheap terry cloth. They are the kind with just a strip of fabric that goes over your foot, leaving your heel and toes exposed. They’ll do until I get to school and put on my gym shoes. I pick out a blue pair in my size and then study the knit hats that are hanging above the slippers. There are eight of them, and they are all bright orange.
I bring the slippers and a hat up to the counter. The man studies me for a moment, taking in my chopped-off hair, the makeup, the MTA coat, the dress, my disgusting bare feet, and I know in a second he’s going to pick up the phone and call the cops. He surprises me, though, and asks. “You want socks?”
I sigh gratefully. “Mister, that’s the best idea I’ve heard all day.”
“What color?” he asks, gesturing to the hanging strip of socks behind him. I’m not sure why socks warrant the extra security of being kept behind the counter, but I’m not about to ask.
This time, I can feel the darkness coming. I grab on to the counter as my vision narrows to pinpricks, and then to nothing. My brain takes a second to catch up when I come to. The man behind the counter is saying something. He looks annoyed. “Color?” he asks again.
“Um . . .” I look down at the blue slippers. “Purple, I guess?”
He nods and pulls down the socks, handing them to me. Thankfully, they’re knee-highs, but unthankfully, they are decorated with hearts and bunnies that are missewn, so both look like they’re bleeding.
“Wow, they feel so good,” I moan happily once I’ve pulled them on. They’re thin, cheap polyester for sure, but they’re warmer than nothing. And once I have the ugly slippers on over them, the feeling starts to come again to my toes.
I buy a giant bottle of water from the fridge by the counter and drain it all before I’ve even left the store. When I lower the bottle, I see the man watching me with wide eyes.
“Thirsty,” I tell him, handing him the empty bottle. “Could you please trash this for me?”
He nods, takes the bottle, and watches me leave.