2016 – Day 25

Start writing a story that...

Step 1: includes the words: salutation  fatigue  origin

Step 2: include a dialogue that begins with: I know you're hiding a secret

Step 3: add this word: exhausting

Step 4: add this word: change

Step 5: add this word: away
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"Salutations to you, good sir," says the man, speaking with a formal English accent. He wears a white ruffly shirt and a tall black hat with an orange band and a footlong white feather sticking straight back. I had sat down next to him on the bench in the subway platform and assumed he was an actor who would mind his own business, as any working guy on a subway platform would. But the moment I sit down, he turns to face me and, looking me up and down with great interest, gives a look of grave concern.

"You look fatigued, sir," he says. "But here you have found a resting place, and I am glad of it."

"Thanks." I consider the odds that he will follow me if I get up and stand elsewhere on the platform. Would he cause a bigger scene?

"Might I ask the origin of your travels?" he says. "Or perhaps it is more important to speak of your destination."

"Work," I say, then look down at my phone to end the conversation.

"O, how full of briers is this working-day world!" he says, shaking his head. "I am a writer and poet by trade. For which profession must you toil?"

"You know, guy?" I say. "I'm just waiting for my train."

"We are all awaiting something," he says. Then he smiles, but I don't feel warmth or friendliness in the look.

"Uh-huh." I stand up and crane my neck to see if a train might be arriving soon to rescue me.

"I know you're hiding a secret," he says, voice low but unmistakable.

I turn back toward the bench and stare down at him. Although I have heard every word, I can't make sense of it. The man cocks his head to the side and stares back at me.

"Carrying secrets is exhausting," he says. "Perhaps that is why you find yourself on this bench with me."

Finally I hear the train and, without a word to the man, step toward the crowd forming at the platform's edge. My ears are still tuned in to the sounds behind me as I try to gauge, without looking back, if the man is following me. I hear the clicking of heeled shoes and sense, rather than see, that he is directly behind me.

"Fair sir," he says, voice barely audible over the approaching train. "I wish to provide you with important instructions. You must change trains at 7th avenue."

"Go away!" My anger overrides my fear and I glare at him, ready to throw punches.

He takes off his hat and bows before me, eyes staying fixed on mine. I hear the train wheels squealing as it slows down and the crowd around me surges forward, but I am transfixed by the man. There is something familiar about him now. The crowd behind me jostles onto the train car and the beeping of the doors about to be closed echoes across the station walls, but I don't move.