Three Stops on the UptownTrain

Three Stops on the Uptown Train
Fifty-Ninth Street subway platform. 6 p.m. The uptown train arrives. One car stops in front of me, another in front ofhim. Our stares are interrupted as we board the crowded train. He races closer to me, bumping into a mother holding a baby. He comforts the baby from crying, then keeps staring at me until my 77th Street stop.I get off. He holds his foot in the door to see if i'll turn around. When I do, he jumps off. Forty-two years later,and married, we still look at each other with the same intensity. -Mark Wolk