![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
The Lizard man and the Ghostgirl
Jul. 13th, 2004 10:25 am"Mister can you help me out? I need eighty two cents to get home..". His breath hits in a hot gust of cheap beer and cigarette butts, his beard is bananna yellow in stark contrast to his gray hair. His skin looks like it's been sufficently weathered by the elements. I take it all in, this strange lizard-man needing my time and money. I love this city sometimes.
"Get home?" I ask. I'm not a prick normally about these things, but I am however being accosted at the Art Center Station platform. Technically speaking he shouldn't really need any change since we're already on the MARTA.
"Um... I think you can just get on the train sir. Where you trying to go?" I should know better. I really should. Some vague liberal guilt in me, I don't know, I try to help I just don't want to get too involved.
"I jes wanna get home buddy."
Yeah we all do. An Asian couple behind me are yelling at their kid to stop playing on the escalator, two teenybop sisters are snapping gum and giggling at the two of us standing there face to face like gunfighters at high noon, while some suit scuttles like a crab away from the whole scene nervous that the Lizard man might approach him next for his ride home.I pull a crumbled buck out of my wallet. The five and the dollar look lonely in there, but they'll have to hold out another 48 hours.
"Here ya go chief." I pass him the buck and he looks at my hand suspiciously,weighing out the sincerity of my action like a judge,finally after dileberation he takes the dollar gently and nods and mutters a "Thank you". I watch him shuffle away and disappear up the escalator.
As I go to turn back to my book I catch her in the corner of my eye. The "Ghost Girl".
I've seen her before. Usually when I've gotten off work late I'll catch her at the Doraville station waiting for the #91. She's a brunette with a pink stripe that runs along her shoulder length hair, she's kinda short and thick but not fat, strong pale white legs in a black dress.Up close she has these intense gray eyes that make guessing her age hard. She seems young in the face but has this way of carrying herself that implies an unspoken savy or sense of street smarts. I'm not
"mister Gangster-gangster" or anything, but i've been broke, down and out enough to recognize the body language. I realize then that she realizes I'm looking right at her. She shoots me a quick smile. Patiently? Bemused? DisdainfullY? I really don't know - I just wish she'd do it again. But I dive my attention back into the book and try not to think about her, which means of course, I think of nothing else. I call her the "Ghostgirl" for one the moon white face and the milky thighs, but for another is that she doesn't read anything on the ride home, nor does she seem to bide her time talking on a cellphone. This is odd because when you ride public transpo people are either buried in the sports page or in some kind of constant dialouge via Nokia or something. But she just sits or stands there on the train or at the stop watching the world with those gray eyes. What is she seeing? What is she trying to see?
Beats me but it's like the rest of the world is on a different frequency than she is, and only I can really see her watching us.
I always debate saying something to her. But what?
"HI. I see you ride the bus. Me to. Wow! we have so much in common. Can I have your number?"
C'mon man. For all I know she's riding the train 'cause she's too young to drive right now. Some teen trying to do her Summer job or college freshman scoping out the High Mueseum- Who am I Humbert Humbert all of a sudden.
The guilt thing again. This time to justify my shyness.
Or maybe it's the illusion of the mystrey that keeps me quiet, The idea of her sweeter than she could ever be.
I don't know. I go to steal another glance of her, but she's gone, she most have gotten off at the Chamblee station or something. I go home and try to think of anything else.
"Get home?" I ask. I'm not a prick normally about these things, but I am however being accosted at the Art Center Station platform. Technically speaking he shouldn't really need any change since we're already on the MARTA.
"Um... I think you can just get on the train sir. Where you trying to go?" I should know better. I really should. Some vague liberal guilt in me, I don't know, I try to help I just don't want to get too involved.
"I jes wanna get home buddy."
Yeah we all do. An Asian couple behind me are yelling at their kid to stop playing on the escalator, two teenybop sisters are snapping gum and giggling at the two of us standing there face to face like gunfighters at high noon, while some suit scuttles like a crab away from the whole scene nervous that the Lizard man might approach him next for his ride home.I pull a crumbled buck out of my wallet. The five and the dollar look lonely in there, but they'll have to hold out another 48 hours.
"Here ya go chief." I pass him the buck and he looks at my hand suspiciously,weighing out the sincerity of my action like a judge,finally after dileberation he takes the dollar gently and nods and mutters a "Thank you". I watch him shuffle away and disappear up the escalator.
As I go to turn back to my book I catch her in the corner of my eye. The "Ghost Girl".
I've seen her before. Usually when I've gotten off work late I'll catch her at the Doraville station waiting for the #91. She's a brunette with a pink stripe that runs along her shoulder length hair, she's kinda short and thick but not fat, strong pale white legs in a black dress.Up close she has these intense gray eyes that make guessing her age hard. She seems young in the face but has this way of carrying herself that implies an unspoken savy or sense of street smarts. I'm not
"mister Gangster-gangster" or anything, but i've been broke, down and out enough to recognize the body language. I realize then that she realizes I'm looking right at her. She shoots me a quick smile. Patiently? Bemused? DisdainfullY? I really don't know - I just wish she'd do it again. But I dive my attention back into the book and try not to think about her, which means of course, I think of nothing else. I call her the "Ghostgirl" for one the moon white face and the milky thighs, but for another is that she doesn't read anything on the ride home, nor does she seem to bide her time talking on a cellphone. This is odd because when you ride public transpo people are either buried in the sports page or in some kind of constant dialouge via Nokia or something. But she just sits or stands there on the train or at the stop watching the world with those gray eyes. What is she seeing? What is she trying to see?
Beats me but it's like the rest of the world is on a different frequency than she is, and only I can really see her watching us.
I always debate saying something to her. But what?
"HI. I see you ride the bus. Me to. Wow! we have so much in common. Can I have your number?"
C'mon man. For all I know she's riding the train 'cause she's too young to drive right now. Some teen trying to do her Summer job or college freshman scoping out the High Mueseum- Who am I Humbert Humbert all of a sudden.
The guilt thing again. This time to justify my shyness.
Or maybe it's the illusion of the mystrey that keeps me quiet, The idea of her sweeter than she could ever be.
I don't know. I go to steal another glance of her, but she's gone, she most have gotten off at the Chamblee station or something. I go home and try to think of anything else.
![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif){kind=small}
