Wendy

Her name is Wendy, and she is (or was, or whatever) in HR at a bank.  Her kid grew up and left home, her husband having done the same long before, and she’s worried that she’s going to turn into her grandmother, who died alone in a condo in Miami.  She refuses to play bridge.

She tells Jeremy this (after she coaxes him out from behind a bus shelter) over cigarettes and cappucinos that they make themselves in a Starbucks.

The guy sitting at the table with them doesn’t move, but his eyes flick like he’s trying to say something.

Water

It’s a few miles to the next town, but Jeremy takes his time.  Birds lie flat.  The sun doesn’t move.

He gets a water bottle out of a convenience store fridge, flips change onto the counter.  The clerk sits against the displays, watching him.

The people on the sidewalk eye him like wolves.  On the bench, there’s a woman in a sleeveless dress.  He sits, drinks.

“Y’know,” he lights a cigarette.  “I waited a long time for something like this to happen.  Now I don’t know what to do.”

He jumps a foot when she asks to bum a smoke.

Stopped

It winds down.  The man standing in the aisle sits on the ground; so does the woman on the way to the bathroom.  The whole train shudders and slows, stops.  Through the window, Jeremy watches birds land en masse, and the last listless flip of the wind in the trees.

The world fills with the sound of people holding their breath.

Then he can hear his own beating heart.  Blood crashes in his ears.  When he stands, it’s like he’s shattering the glassy air.

He opens the door, and a hundred pairs of eyes follow.  Outside, a dull heat roars.