Tenements and tract housing stretched to the horizon, drowning in the blinding rays of another waning winter sun. The shifting mass groaned under his feet and he glanced down, spying for orphaned change dislodged and rolling, a habit from childhood. He caught something with his instep. A quarter. His backpack slid down as he bent to snatch the coin, the strap clawing through his sleeve. He heaved the canvas behemoth back to his shoulder, eyes never leaving his prize.

The faint smile on his face felt foreign, alien.

The train used to feel alien. But it beat the hell out of hearing his mother drone on all the way from suburbia about her surgically altered contemporaries, the incompetent housekeeper and the shortcomings of moneyed husband number three. He had come to appreciate the time spent in transit, the flux and sway of people.

It was his reprieve before breaking the plane of his father’s sky box condo suspended above the river. Big city cool enough but replete with a stepmother closer to his age than the old man’s and a whiny two year old. He’d enjoyed it when his dad first hooked up with her; she was hot without question. But with the onset of motherhood, she was a bitch. And his dad’s clumsy attempts to bond were annoying, sixteen years too late.

He braced with his free arm as the train’s momentum ebbed. The doors split; one group replaced the other. These were people who didn’t have time or energy for the bullshit engulfing those in his parents’ world. They were getting from point A to point B, trying to make a living, maintain a relationship, stay alive, if only for one more day. He contemplated their lives, people he’d been raised to pity and avoid, albeit tacitly. He looked for familiar faces and worried when he hadn’t seen one in a while.

Damn. There she was.

His heartbeat rose and a surge went through his body. Blond hair fell over his eyes as he bowed his head. His gaze followed her legs, ankles, blue satin high-heeled shoes, his face flushing hot. This girl did it for him, different than the occasional make out with Missy Ashton or being in the backseat of Troy’s car last weekend with Kendall Connor. Just a few years older, this girl was centuries beyond him in every way.

She had a tainted style of leggings under short skirts, multiple piercings, straight black hair and a killer ass. It was painful. She’d glanced sideways at him twice but it ended there. She always had a book with her, constantly reading. Contradiction amplified intrigue and the image of her as tortured soul whet his fantasy. He had expounded on it over the past months in his mind and otherwise on his own. He imagined her wild, never intimidated. He wouldn’t know what to do with her if given the chance. But he’d walk out that door with her in a heartbeat, never looking back.

He closed his eyes. Tight. He needed to think about something else.

He looked up at the slight Hispanic man, a recent addition. The man sat quiet, watching people but never making contact, most likely heading to a menial job to keep his family going. Across from the small worker sat the elderly lady with the faded green shopping bag. The frail man that had been with her in the beginning hadn’t been there in weeks. He wondered if he’d died. He wondered if she was all alone.

Next to the lady was a pale man, hunched and gray, worn out. A younger man in a navy wool coat and plaid scarf sat with his hand on the man’s arm, his face taut and troubled. The older man closed his dull eyes and rested his head on the window.

His heart clenched as he thought of them as father and son, a relationship built on years of mundane happenings, parental corrections and making do without. They were not woven together with every other weekend, spring break in Vail and three weeks every summer. It wasn’t sealed by throwing money at it and apologies for broken promises.

The tin voice of the subterranean convoy declared the six block trudge to his father’s for another round of crying toddler and stilted conversation. In its stead, he wanted to make love to the beautifully flawed girl, be sure the old lady had all she needed and help the Hispanic man hone his English. He wanted to know the outcome of the crisis of the man and his son.

“Seventh Avenue stop. Doors open on the left….”

Loose Change