Let Me Just Forget

The man with the fancy ties walks through the automatic door at seven A.M again; right on time says my wristwatch. He's the one with the two kids, the divorced wife and the affair with the woman in the skirt suits who gets on the train and sits next to him every morning at 7:12. The truth is I make all of this up. I don't know who this guy is, what his life is like. And I have no idea why he sits next to the Indian woman who looks like she could be a CEO for some high-end business. But what else am I going to think about when I've seen them in the same ties and suits every weekday for the last three months?
Across from them, standing next to the handlebar and listening to some track on his Mp3 player, a teenage boy with curly brown hair and closed eyes plays imaginary drums to whatever song is pounding through his headphones. Only after the train lurches forward or comes to a halt does he grab hold of the metal pole next to him and steady himself, then continue drumming.
At 7:16 a short redhead in a floral dress walks through the doors and grabs hold of the same pole, kissing the boy's cheek as he removes his headphones and lets them dangle around his neck. One of the most beautiful things about my spot in the corner of the subway has been the perspective of seeing this relationship blossom.
Three months ago, this girl and this boy would walk on this train and not even share a passing glance. Overtime, however, they talked, walked off the train together, walked on the train on the weekends together, and sat next to each other in the seats. For the last two weeks it's become routine that she walk on the train and stand next to him, hold his hand, kiss his cheek, when before he'd drum the entire train ride.
Along the ride of the day, people receive phone calls that make them burst into a fit of tears or laugh so loudly they cover their mouths. People read the newspaper and celebrity magazines and text messages and cover their mouths in shock after learning some new fact about the lives of people they shouldn't care about. People in pairs walk on and whisper in one another's ear, making the other scream and jump or start to cry and yell. Some people walk on with their faces red and their coats unbuttoned, some have the look on their face that they don't know where they're going, some are out of luck and their tears give it away. This city is truly a monster.
I never have to face this monster, never have to rise up and defeat it and come face to face with my fears and walk around with some ideal in mind like other people. I never have to wash the dishes or deal with awkward encounters with my neighbor, I never have to sit through family dinners or face the friends I left behind. I never have to love. And it doesn't seem fair, while everyone else is forced upon these everyday burdens, to simply avoid them. But I do. I do because it's easier than facing the sunlight.
The familiar hum of the subway tracks is all I listen to, day after day, save the minutes I step off onto the platform and buy myself a bag of chips. It's easy living when all you really need are constant things that never change. No one's taking those potato chips away from that newsstand, no one needs to check the one subway ticket I ever bought, no one takes away the corner of that train which I've marked with my obvious stench. While everyone else's lives change and shift and cause heartbreaks, sadness and grief, mine remains the same day after day, from my seat at the back of the subway. From the clothes on my back to the tin cup clinking by the penny, everything stays the same.