I have just missed the train.
We are running down the hallway. I am grasping a heavy turntable in a black bag with my right hand. He goes to take it from me, but knowing that it's quicker for both of us to run with half the weight I say "I'm a swimmer you know! I can handle it."
Pounding feet, the Uptown 4 racing by in front of us, just starting to slow.
We are back where we started, the Borough Hall 1234 entrance. The connection to the N/R is a long adventure though the underground maze, and at the end of it we only found a sign, "No Brooklyn bound N/R trains at this station."
Frustration at 2:30am. It didn't occur to him that he could still go uptown. I didn't remind him. I didn't want him to leave me just yet. We retrace our steps.
"you could always come back to brooklyn," I suggest.
"Tempting, but I have to be at home tomorrow morning to meet my friend C."
Bummed. No reason to be.
He puts his arm around me for a few seconds after his answer, as if to indicate that the declining of my offer was not the rejection of me. A pervasive sadness swells from my center as I realize how much I do not want to be alone tonight.
Awkwardness because of the two turntables, so we untangle and I take one of them. We turn the corner, and the Uptown 4 is entering the station.
Racing down the hallway. The doors fly open right as we get there. He takes the turntable from me, and plants a big, wet, unexpected kiss on my lips. He turns away, and the doors close behind him. Screech of metal. I debate whether to look though the windows at him while he leaves, to linger for a moment. But rushing trains do not linger. I decide not to either.
The breeze. I am alone in the station. Exhausted. Drunk. Wil is far off, and he...he never existed.