of,” I said noncommittally, careful to keep my voice even. B. Douglas didn’t reply; he was waiting for elaboration. “I tried to jump over a storm drain a few blocks away,” I added. “Didn’t quite make it.” I shrugged and managed to assay a dopey gee-shucks grin. “Accidents happen, y’know.”
“Uh-huh.” He continued to study me, his monocle glinting in the streetlight. “Where did you say you were?”
“U-City,” I said. “Visiting some friends. We were having a little get-together and … y’know, kinda got sidetracked.”
It was a good alibi. The U-City neighborhood was only a few blocks west of the station; that’s where all us liberal types hung out, listening to old Pearl Jam CDs while smoking pot and fondly reminiscing about Bill Clinton. It fit. Maybe he’d pass me off as a stoned rock critic who had fallen in a ditch after going into conniptions upon seeing an American flag.
Off in the distance I could hear the first rumble of the approaching train, the last Red Liner to stop tonight at Forest Park Station. If Oberleutnant Douglas was going to find a good reason for busting me, it was now or never. After all, he would have to file a report later.
The kid knew it, too. He flipped my license between his fingertips, once, twice, then slowly extended to me as if he was granting a great favor. “Have a good evening, Mr. Rosen,” he said stiffly. “Stay out of trouble.”
I resisted the mighty impulse to salute and click my heels. “Thank you,” I murmured. He nodded his helmeted head and stood aside. The train’s headlights were flashing across the rails as I swept my fare card in front of the scanner, then pushed through the turnstile and trotted down the cement stairs to the platform.
The train braked in front of the station, bright sparks of electricity zapping from its overhead powerlines. A couple of my fellow riders looked askance at me as they stood up. One of them was an old black lady, wearing a soaked cloth coat, carrying a frayed plastic Dillards shopping bag stuffed with her belongings.
“What did he stop you for?” she asked as the train doors slid apart and we moved to step aboard.
I thought about it for a moment. “Because of the way I look,” I replied.
It was an honest answer. She slowly nodded her head. “Same here,” she murmured. “Now you know what it’s like.”
And then we found our seats and waited for the train to leave the station.
I rode the Red Line as it headed east into the city. Quite a few people got on or off the train at Central West End, most of them patients or visitors at Barnes Hospital, but my car only remained half-full. Most of the passengers were soaking wet. The train was filled with the sound of sneezing and coughing fits, making the train’s computerized voice hard to hear as it announced each stop. The Red Line sounded like a rolling flu ward; despite the fact we had just stopped at a hospital, somehow all those free vaccinations we were supposed to receive courtesy of ERA seemed to have missed everyone on this train. On the other hand, this wasn’t unusual; most of the people in the city had somehow missed receiving a lot of the federal aid that had been promised to us.
Through the windows, I could see dark vacant lots filled with dense rubble where buildings made of unreinforced brick and mortar had once stood; streets blocked by sawhorses because ancient sewer tunnels and long-extinct clay mines beneath them had caved in; shanties made of scraps of corrugated steel and broken plywood. Armored cars were the only vehicles on the streets, but here and there I spotted figures lurking in the doorways of condemned buildings. Night brought out the scavengers, the teenagers with tire-irons who prowled through destroyed warehouses and demolished storefronts in search of anything to be sold on the black market.
The train left the midtown combat zone and rumbled toward the downtown area. It stopped briefly beneath Union Station,
“Uh-huh.” He continued to study me, his monocle glinting in the streetlight. “Where did you say you were?”
“U-City,” I said. “Visiting some friends. We were having a little get-together and … y’know, kinda got sidetracked.”
It was a good alibi. The U-City neighborhood was only a few blocks west of the station; that’s where all us liberal types hung out, listening to old Pearl Jam CDs while smoking pot and fondly reminiscing about Bill Clinton. It fit. Maybe he’d pass me off as a stoned rock critic who had fallen in a ditch after going into conniptions upon seeing an American flag.
Off in the distance I could hear the first rumble of the approaching train, the last Red Liner to stop tonight at Forest Park Station. If Oberleutnant Douglas was going to find a good reason for busting me, it was now or never. After all, he would have to file a report later.
The kid knew it, too. He flipped my license between his fingertips, once, twice, then slowly extended to me as if he was granting a great favor. “Have a good evening, Mr. Rosen,” he said stiffly. “Stay out of trouble.”
I resisted the mighty impulse to salute and click my heels. “Thank you,” I murmured. He nodded his helmeted head and stood aside. The train’s headlights were flashing across the rails as I swept my fare card in front of the scanner, then pushed through the turnstile and trotted down the cement stairs to the platform.
The train braked in front of the station, bright sparks of electricity zapping from its overhead powerlines. A couple of my fellow riders looked askance at me as they stood up. One of them was an old black lady, wearing a soaked cloth coat, carrying a frayed plastic Dillards shopping bag stuffed with her belongings.
“What did he stop you for?” she asked as the train doors slid apart and we moved to step aboard.
I thought about it for a moment. “Because of the way I look,” I replied.
It was an honest answer. She slowly nodded her head. “Same here,” she murmured. “Now you know what it’s like.”
And then we found our seats and waited for the train to leave the station.
I rode the Red Line as it headed east into the city. Quite a few people got on or off the train at Central West End, most of them patients or visitors at Barnes Hospital, but my car only remained half-full. Most of the passengers were soaking wet. The train was filled with the sound of sneezing and coughing fits, making the train’s computerized voice hard to hear as it announced each stop. The Red Line sounded like a rolling flu ward; despite the fact we had just stopped at a hospital, somehow all those free vaccinations we were supposed to receive courtesy of ERA seemed to have missed everyone on this train. On the other hand, this wasn’t unusual; most of the people in the city had somehow missed receiving a lot of the federal aid that had been promised to us.
Through the windows, I could see dark vacant lots filled with dense rubble where buildings made of unreinforced brick and mortar had once stood; streets blocked by sawhorses because ancient sewer tunnels and long-extinct clay mines beneath them had caved in; shanties made of scraps of corrugated steel and broken plywood. Armored cars were the only vehicles on the streets, but here and there I spotted figures lurking in the doorways of condemned buildings. Night brought out the scavengers, the teenagers with tire-irons who prowled through destroyed warehouses and demolished storefronts in search of anything to be sold on the black market.
The train left the midtown combat zone and rumbled toward the downtown area. It stopped briefly beneath Union Station,
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