Breadcrumb #143

JILLIAN LUCAS

At Penn Station, a man stepped onto the train and stood close to the doors, his left hand clenching the pole. A tan line of a missing wedding ring clung to his left ring finger and Jeremy immediately felt uncomfortable, but couldn’t look away. The man’s wispy, thinning hair was plastered to his forehead in a way that made it look like a cartoonist hastily drew it on in a few swipes of a pen. His clothing, a pale green, short-sleeved button down and pair of khaki slacks, were wrinkled and stained, but not so much to assume the man was homeless, maybe just messy.

    As the train doors closed, Jeremy watched as he made the sign of the Cross with his hands, kissing a rosary bead necklace that he pulled out of his halfway-buttoned shirt. He exhaled onto the glass and kept his eyes closed for a moment before slowly looking around the car that had filled slightly. Jeremy caught his eyes enough to see the start of a smile creep across his sweat-shined face but quickly looked away. The last time he got caught in a conversation with a religious subway rider, he was condemned to an eternity in hell for being an atheist, although he didn’t necessarily call himself one, Jeremy was just unsure, like he was with so many things more important to him than a chosen deity. He didn’t mind the judgment, just the annoyance of being bothered to converse with a stranger. 

    After scanning the car once more, he locked eyes with his reflection and noticed a girl, not more than 8, had sat next to him and stared up at his unshaved chin. “You look like you were crying so I came to say hello,” she said, in that slightly twangy cadence of a young kid, just starting to correctly form words. Jeremy looked down at her from the corner of his eye.

    Jeremy swallowed a gulp of air, his throat feeling like a bullfrog’s as he tried to quell the acidic churning under his rib cage. It wasn’t that talking to strangers made him sick, that wasn’t it. It was more that all he could think about during the exchange was about the expectation this person had of him. Jeremy hated when people expected things from him. It took too much effort, in his mind, to succeed in meeting someone’s expectations, so he wouldn’t allow anyone to make any of him.

    The girl looked at him like a confused puppy, head slightly cocked, mouth ajar, eyes wide. Jeremy smiled, “Thank you.” The corners of her mouth spread apart into a large grin. Feeling incredibly accomplished of herself, she let the train come to a stop, hopped off the seat, and grasped her mother’s hand, who was standing at the doorway diagonally across from where the girl and Jeremy had been sitting with a look of slight disapproval on her face.

    He looked around again, watching a melancholy woman in sheer panty hose and sneakers methodically eat popcorn. He could feel the sweat of the mid-July subway ride dripping down his shoulder blades and settle into the material of his waistband. It wasn’t an altogether unpleasant feeling, he thought as he watched the woman brush kernels from her blouse. It reminded him that although these subway rides so often made him feel like he was a corpse, he was, in fact, a live human being with bodily functions and working sweat glands. 

“He could feel the sweat of the mid-July subway ride dripping down his shoulder blades and settle into the material of his waistband.”

    Jeremy leaned his head against the framed subway map he sat under and finally felt the car’s AC sink into his heat-thickened skin. His waves of nausea dissipated while his feelings of uncertainty and unsettledness remained. Those were not caused by the insatiable summer heat, so the cold of the subway air conditioning did little good to cure them. He swallowed hard and stared up at the ceiling. An exasperated sigh escaped his mouth like it was being dragged across his lips one molecule at a time.

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Breadcrumb #142

BARB ROSINSKI BENINCASA

Life equals a big, big mess. Nobody plans it that way, but shit happens. It begins with those diapers. When you become a parent, nobody tells you that you will be changing not only the diaper, but the cute little outfit and the perfectly coordinated crib sheets, multiple times the day you come home from the hospital. So much for the illusion of the perfect life.

    When you get the middle of the night phone call that your parent is dead, you think that life cannot go on. Who is going to love you unconditionally? Who is going to slip you a few bucks to buy something that you don't really need? Who is going to call you "kid?" Yet, you look into the eyes of your child and realize that it is your turn to do those things for somebody else. Life does go on and it is a big, big mess.

    When you find out that the love of your life doesn't love you anymore, you panic. You say "I cannot be a single parent." You go to therapy and courtrooms, places you thought were for "other people." You come out of the ordeal wounded, just hoping your pain won't ruin the lives of those beautiful children. Life does go on and it is a big, big mess.

    When you watch your best friend in the world lose her child, it is so fucking unfair. You rail at the universe, wondering why it is so cruel. You attend a funeral you never expected. You never forget his name, his birthday, or to talk about him. Life does go on and it is a big, big mess.

“You rail at the universe, wondering why it is so cruel. You attend a funeral you never expected.”

    You step on Legos and action figures in the middle of the night, because you hope that leaving them out encourages your children to build worlds in which they are powerful. You buy paints and crayons and markers and get giant refrigerator boxes so that your kids can build structures to take them to the safe, happy places of their imaginations. Life does go on and it is a big, big mess.

    You get in trouble at work because you just cannot keep your mouth shut. You want others to see that children are important. You speak up for what it right, even though it does not win friends or influence people. You go to a job every day in which you know you make a difference, even if your superiors feel otherwise. Life does go on and it is a big, big mess.

    But life is more than the shit that happens. It is also the realization that lagniappe comes out of those messy experiences. It is watching your children grow into men who create more beauty than you ever thought possible. It is seeing the children you've helped over the years become people who like to communicate. It is watching that best friend devote her life to bringing joy to children, in her son's memory. Here's to a life filled with big, big messes.

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Breadcrumb #140

DIMITRIOS FRAGISKATOS

“When it comes to basketball, Jimmy is the best,” Joe would say, referring to my trash-talking. The reality is I couldn’t hope to compete with the likes of him or Vineet; they were the best players to hit the court on Chambers Street, but there were other ways to stand out. 

    I would “oink” when Vineet had the ball, since he was a ball hog. I described various sexual (and sometimes romantic) positions I’ve engaged in with Joe’s mother. I would also mime stamping Larry’s passport, since he took so many steps before letting go of the ball. It was these gestures and a seeming fearlessness from being punched in the face that kept me in the games. Sure, I was the last one picked, but I was picked unlike poor schlubs such as Michael.

    Every play of high school ball went the same: Someone passes you the rock, you dribble it on the gray asphalt, and then you decide to egotistically take a shot or pass the ball to someone who can make it. Oftentimes, bad players like me can grab a drink from the water fountains without affecting the game or chat it up with the person they’re guarding or who's guarding them. Besides that, we gelled excellently as a team. We beat local college students in half-court games to 21 on a regular basis. We knew our capabilities very well. Joe was great with the layups; Vineet made outside shots; Larry was good for getting rebounds; and I caught every opportunity to mock my opponent's physical appearances. Again, not a good player, but even pawns have their uses in chess. 

    Our school team name — the Peg Legs,  implying a handicap — was one of the most common elements of my insults.

    “If you fall on your face one more time, they might recruit you to the Peg Legs,“ I started, adding the politically incorrect "you fucking Chinese version of Corky from Life Goes On."

    Aside from my racism, the malice toward our school mascot could have been jealousy. I was convinced my friends and I were better than the school team but would never be recognized for it. The basketball court was right at the entranceway to our school, but none of the members of the team ever joined us in a game. We weren’t even sure who was on the team; we just knew it had to be from the same group of white kids who ran the student government and our school newspaper. They were probably the same players in our football team, too. It was the kids whose parents could afford to buy them uniforms. They can stand to be told what to do because that was what life was going to bring them. They got to put “basketball team” on their college applications for extracurricular activities, and even if we played every day, we didn’t. We were stray dogs enjoying an unrewarding freedom, and we didn’t identify with anyone who trained and played in that air-conditioned gymnasium. This is why it was surprising when I barked to some passersby one night. 

“They can stand to be told what to do because that was what life was going to bring them.”

    There was a cold winter darkness in New York, but we were warmed by our hours of playing. The street light illuminated the court, as some kids were grabbing their jackets to go home. I had my usual obnoxious grin, shouting “ In your face!” to Larry as I took a shot. Of course, it missed. I wanted to pick new teams among the people staying. A group of black kids came out of the school wearing varying combinations of pinks and grays, holding gym bags and a couple of basketballs. They weren’t familiar to me, as our school was mostly white and Asian, with the majority of the nonwhites being in our group itself, so I inferred they were a visiting team. 

    “Stuyvesant sucks!” yelled the shorter one in the group. His followers laughed. 

    “Why don’t you come in here and say that?” I shouted back, reminding my friends of my fearlessness.  

    We were immediately surrounded by them. Even those of our friends who were not planning on leaving initially had grabbed their stuff and headed in, leaving Joe, Larry, Michael, and me. I couldn’t tell what their immediate reactions were as I was busy staring up at some pretty tough faces while grinning stupidly, saying,“In a game of basketball, I mean. Why don’t you tell us by beating us in a game of basketball?” 

    And like a Daffy Duck cartoon, I managed to avoid yet another well-deserved beating, as our now-opponents started picking out their five players, jumping, raising their hands, as the short guy who made the remark initially confirmed who’d be sitting on their sidelines from their group of 12. Meanwhile, on our side, we were trying to figure out how to make our team of four work in a full-court game. Relief came when one of the rejected players from our opposing team put himself in our group. 

    “Y'all need a fifth? I’m Eric. I got the best layup.”

    Who were we to argue? The game started, and it was quite a spectacle. Michael and I played guards, while Larry and Joe were under the basket. Joe was a small guy, but he had a great jump, which is why he could play a position normally reserved for taller players. He was everyone’s first pick, and he was a funny guy, too.

    I stepped up to the short guy, their leader. He extended the ball out, dribbling it in front of me, daring me to try to take it. I didn’t know my opponent, but he shouldn’t know me either. Maybe I was skilled enough to take the ball from him. Besides, his team just lost to our school. People shouted in the sidelines about my “broken ankles” as the ball bounced between my open legs. They scored with cheers, and Joe passed it to our new teammate, who just as quickly got the layup in, taunting his friends with some inside jokes.  

    Coming back up from their side of the court, my nemesis smiled, pointing out how "I haven’t learned.” He hit the ball off my hand, and before I could retrieve it, had taken steps toward a layup. It didn’t matter that he missed the shot; he still embarrassed me by getting past my outreached arms. I still looked bad to onlookers. Joe retrieved the ball, passing it back down to Eric, who scored again. 

    “My turn! My turn!” Someone else wanting to get past me. He had his fun, too, as he spun around me, breaking through my already-worn-down defense. 

    “Oh, there he goes, there he goes. Oh!” The onlookers who clearly supported their friends were laughing while expressing empathy for the pain I must have been feeling. 

    But I wasn’t embarrassed. I had my mouth uncharacteristically shut, and I was determined to help my team get the advantage. Our opponents liked to switch it up, going after all our players. Eric though, like our opponents, showed no interest in playing defense, choosing to expend his efforts taking shots and driving the ball into the hoop instead. Vineet played like that. I wondered how the game would have turned out if he were with us. 

    The player shouting the score from the opposing team stopped when he started practicing his jump shot on me. I was a little angry, but I couldn’t deny how much fun everyone was having. My friends played a fierce game too, with even Mike getting a three-point shot in. Shorty stepped up to me again with his usual smile, then suddenly stopped and turned to a girl in the sidelines.

    “Yo, is that them? Yooooo!”

    I couldn’t see who they were referring to, but I knew. Everyone, including Eric, immediately evacuated the court, with the girls and some of the guys picking up their stuff and walking toward them. I asked that same girl as she collected someone else’s jacket what just happened.

    “That was the basketball team. They went to go fuck them up.”

    Joe came up to me asking the same thing, as a smile sneaked onto my face. I realized I had more school pride than I thought — just enough to defend her honor to some strangers, but not enough to care for other schoolmates. I also dragged my friends in what could have been a hostile situation, and they didn’t run. In turn, I tried my best to play defense, even as I became the butt of other people’s jokes. All those points gave me a reason to smile to Joe and say, “I don’t think they're coming back to finish the game, and we’re winning 16 to 14.” 

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