Just Hanging

Standing in front of two sitting girls on the New York subway, I caught a few words of what they were saying, their contemplation a response to the crass jeering of nearby men. Something about a self defense mechanism in the form of finding humor in the taunts—how in such situations that is all you can do, but "it just sucks sometimes". It made me want to be their friend. They seemed sweet, and genuine. They didn't bully the smiles off their own faces the way others did, the way I was pressured into doing as I attached to the subway pole of their city, foreign though it was to me. My stop came. I tumbled out of the metro, realizing I'd never see them again.

On the streets I looked at people, half expecting them to have airbrushed skin. Masha muttered something about feeling like everyone was a character from a movie. I acknowledged the strange sense of disconnect mingled with empowerment that pervaded the walk down city streets, though I soon realized the latter was an allusion. The humidity lingered on my hair, inciting my hands to push through the thick air and clutch helplessly at the frenzied locks.

Black choker with black onyx stones dripping onto the swell of my collarbone; nestled in the web, a black cross, stripped in my possession of any meaning it would have to another, and lain powerless to rest on my neck; velvet vest, black; black tube under; black skirt tangled around the length of my legs; black hat; boots, blackness broken only by a spattering of studs. I roamed a shadow.

The strobe lights worked in layers, new intensities slipping over old ones like color transparencies. I found Masha's left hand, then her right, weaving both through the fog. On my own hands, black exes flickered gently in the sifting light, resembling a cult symbol but really a stamp to brandish my still-youth. Dancing, words mouthed, and smiles. Energy, electricity. All of my worries melted into the music, while the beat of my feet against the floor shook free the remaining thoughts, except one: I love concerts.