1.
One hundred fifty tourists. Many of us teenagers. Many of us feeling the urge to pair off for our thirty days in Europe.
She was on my tour bus. We hung out. I liked her because she was a runner, tall and pretty, her dye-blond hair swept back in a ponytail that was always dancing.
Which is why, as we waited in the Tube, toeing the “mind the gap” line, I wanted to push her. Give her shoulders a little shove. Just enough to get a squeal. That’s how I was taught to flirt with girls.
The force of my hands surprised me. As if they belonged to someone else. A man. In that slowest of seconds, I knew I had made a mistake. She screamed. I grasped at air and then air and then air. I watched her fall in the train lights.
Disembarking passengers flooded the platform, but no one got on that train. Our Europe trip was cut short. Everyone went home. Except for me. And her.
2.
She was on my tour bus. We hung out. I liked her because she was funny. Once, she watched me punch in the key code to my hotel room and stored it in her photographic memory, threatening to prank my roommate and me later.
Which is why, as we waited in the Tube, leaning over the edge to see the train wailing into view, I wanted to push her. Give her shoulders a harmless jerk. Nothing dangerous. Just enough to get a squeal. That’s how I was taught to flirt with girls.
The force of my hands felt like a mistake. In that slowest of seconds, I wanted to take it back. To push her scream back inside her lungs. I grasped at air and then air and then her arm, the back of her shirt.
You could’ve killed me, she said. She was laughing, but her eyes were wide as train lights. Serious. I’m sorry, I said as disembarking passengers flooded the platform. I watched her ponytail flounce away through the seethe of bodies.
3.
She was on my tour bus. We hung out. I liked her because she seemed to like me, wanted to talk. Once, surrounded by our tour group, she passed me a folded note with a question she was too shy to ask out loud.
Which is why, as we waited in the Tube, standing above the electrified tracks, I wanted to push her. Give her shoulders a teasing nudge. Nothing dangerous. Just enough to get a squeal. That’s how I was taught to flirt with girls.
I felt the urge rise in my body like a sneeze, but in that slowest of seconds I grasped the infinite, infinite, infinite possibilities, so many iterations of regret, and forced my hands into my pockets.
She smiled at me in the train lights. Come on, she said as disembarking passengers flooded the platform, and she grabbed my arm so I wouldn’t get lost in the crowd.
Brian Wallace Baker is a poet and essayist from Erda, Utah, who holds an MFA from Western Kentucky University. His writing has appeared in Little Patuxent Review, River Teeth’s Beautiful Things column, Split Lip Magazine, Whale Road Review, and elsewhere. You can find him on Twitter @bbrianwallace.