I was ten years old the first time I rode a train by
myself. Next to me, at the window, there was a man
about my father's age. Before he sat down he took off
his suit jacket, his shoes and trousers. Once he was
seated he leaned his head against the window and,
within a minute, was fast asleep. Besides my father,
I had never seen a man in his underwear, and it made
me a little uncomfortable. I tried reading a book I
had brought - George Orwell's 1984. It wasn't at all
what I had expected - too dark and fearful - so I
turned my attention to the bare knees a few inches
away from mine.
A fly was crawling in circles on his left one,
sampling the man's pale skin dotted with a few ingrown
hairs. I reached over and shooed it away. But after
visiting the rack above us, it returned. So I shooed
it away again, accidently brushing the man's knee with
my pinky. When he opened his eyes I shoved my hands
between my knees, looking straight ahead. Just then
the train came to a stop. Outside the window there
were two schoolboys on the platform, fighting. One
pushed the other's face against the glass. It stayed
there only a second. Then he ran off toward the front
of the train, his enemy in hot pursuit. I looked at
the man, who shrugged his shoulders, then back at the
window. A trail of the boy's saliva was running down
the glass, interrupting a view of pinetrees growing
alongside the platform.
Suddenly, a tingling sensation on my right hand. The
fly? No, it was the man's finger writing something; I
think it was the kanji for dream. When he finished he
closed his eyes, letting his head fall against the
window.
For a long time I stared at my hand because it
wouldn't stop tingling.
