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11/16/2002 12:00:14 AM
Waiting For the Last Train Home
It's Friday night, about 1:40 a.m. I'm waiting at the Gallery Place Metro stop for the last yellow line train of the night. A bunch of people are milling around, waiting for other trains, and more keep arriving off the escalator.
The cast: Me, Joe, Mary, Jess, Linda, Well-Dressed Drunk Girl, Super-Drunk Guy, his friends, Pam
Note: All names have been changed because I don't know any of them.
Me: Tall, skinny white girl wearing a pair of headphones, a knee-length black jacket, jeans and red sneakers. I look up at the board which will tell me when the next yellow line train is coming. Unfortunately it only flashes: "GREEN LINE, 18 MINUTES."
African-American pre-teen: We'll call him Joe. He suddenly realizes that he lost his umbrella. It's actually his aunt's umbrella. "Shit! She's going to kill me!" he exclaims loudly, laughing.
Young, petite Latino woman: We'll call her Mary. She asks if I know whether the last yellow line train has already left. "I don't think so," I say. "But I'm not completely sure." We exchange sympathetic smiles.
Joe's older sister: We'll call her Jess. She looks about 16, has a cast on one foot encased in a huge bright red sock. The other is just in a black boot."Where'd you get your sneakers?" she asks me. My sneakers are the same color as her sock. I tell her that I got them for Christmas, so I don't know, but they're Steve Madden. She looks annoyed.
I slip my headphones off. Mary and I discuss the yellow line train some more. The train's projected arrival time is not appearing on the board, like it should. We fret.
Young Asian woman in bright yellow jacket: We'll call her Linda. She asks Mary and I if we know when the next yellow line train is coming. We don't. We all exchange sympathetic smiles. We fret.
A Well-Dressed Drunk Girl, in a group of girls, yells: "I lost my cell phone!"
Joe and his sister Jess look over and give her the what-a-freak look.
"I lost my cell phone!" she yells again.
"I think she lost her cell phone," Joe tells his sister sarcastically. Well-Dressed Drunk Girl takes off running, scrambing up the "down" escalator. "I hope I see you guys again!" she yells to her friends.
Three middle-aged men in polo shirts stumble onto the platform. The two on the ends heavily support the guy in the middle. Wet patches on their chests prove there's already been much puking. "Hey ladies," Super-Drunk Guy leers at Mary, Linda and I. The friends lean Super-Drunk Guy up against a column. He hugs it, eyes half-closed. "You know it's bad when you've got puke on you and it's not even yours," one friend says to the other.
Mary, Linda and I edge away from the column, silently bonding in our moment of peril.
Super-Drunk Guy starts throwing up.
Joe and his sister Jess freak out and move away.
Mary, Linda and I exchange horrified looks and shuffle to the left about four feet.
"GREEN LINE TRAIN, 5 MINUTES," the board says.
The three of us fret about the yellow line train.
I ask a skinny woman with short hair (we'll call her Pam) whether or not she's taking the yellow line. She is. "Do you know if the last train has left?" Mary asks.
(Loud puking in the background)
"No, it hasn't," says Pam. She explains her theory of when the train will arrive. She's the kind of girl who was probably a know-it-all in elementary school. I explain my theory. She nods.
(Puking)
(A bottle breaks somewhere)
Mary asks about which stop Pam is headed to. They're both headed to the same stop.
(Puking)
The four of us exchange horrified looks and step even farther to the left in unison.
A green line train arrives, and the friends help Super-Drunk guy on to it. It's Joe and Jess's train, too. "Don't let him on this train!" Jess pleads loudly.
The women and I chuckle. We're glad he won't be on *our* train.
"So are you all from Washington D.C. originally?" Mary asks.
We talk about where we're from. We realize we're all about the same age, and relatively new to the D.C. area.
Our train arrives.
We rejoice.
We board.
We talk about Chicago (Mary's hometown), Northwestern (Pam's friend went there and studied journalism too), Pentagon City (where Linda also lives), and how D.C. seems like a such small town.
I get off the train at Pentagon City, and realize I don't actually know any of their names.
"Nice meeting you all," I say anyway.