The Only Living Girl in New York
Jimmy Chen

Past her hair, the bleached strands on the seat in front of him, he could see the blur of window, most likely Virginia passing him, or he passing it, so fast that it could not be felt, the train's momentum the same as him, as each atom that was him was her, and the atoms between them; and her, she could not feel him, behind her, and behind both of them, the receding town pushed back further and further, and this would continue for ages, forever, until they arrived at Penn Station, a crowded place where guys like me would wait for their girl.
And if this seems so cinematic, a girl and guy meeting in front of Cinnibon, she from the south he from online, a collision of loneliness met, her small breasts making their weightless muted way through jackets, and he the guy who sat behind her for ten hours, what he saw matching how he felt seeing me hug my girlfriend in public, then let me tell you it isn't that way. Because though I was there, smelling Cinnibon so sweetly sick, we had not won the oneness of a hug. And this resident muse we are attending to, she was not really "there," save the Xanax cocktail in her head, from which a soft idea about love was let out, and left. Let me tell you about it.

1996 © 2011