There was a girl I used to see waiting for the 8:30 train at the station every morning. I suppose she was a pretty girl – pretty in an unconventional way. She had short brown hair, a mess of tight curls. She was slender, but with a full bosom and round behind, such that her waist was formed into an attractive inward curve – an hourglass figure. Perhaps to extenuate this she always dressed in very high waisted black pants, cut well above the navel, probably to an inch or so below the bottom of her ribcage. The pants were tight, and very unlike the baggy men’s business shirts she wore above them. Tight and feminine below, voluminous and masculine below - she looked, in a word, ridiculous, but ridiculousness for its own sake appeals to me, and after all she was an attractive girl, so every morning as I walked onto the platform and saw her I couldn’t help but shoot her a grin. She wouldn’t quite smile back, just sort of roll her eyes and look away, but I could see that part of her at least was flattered by my affections.
This went on for some months, and I never saw her anywhere but on the platform of the 8:30 train. A creature of habit, and compelled toward efficiency, I would always ride on the fourth carriage – toward the middle – the carriage that best aligned both with the entrance at my station and with the exit where I disembarked. She rode on a carriage somewhere further up – the second last, maybe, or possibly even the last.
One Thursday morning, however, she was running late. I always boarded the train last, loitering on the platform and only joining the scrum as the last few people pressed onto the train. I much preferred to have the door on one side of me, rather than to be completely encircled in the claustrophobic cage of people in the centre of the carriage. At the very least it let you get a little fresh air at each station. On this particular morning I had boarded the carriage and just as the doors were closing she came running up the ramp. I held the door for her, and she leapt on just as the train began to pull away, grinning herself this time, her face flushed with running and the pleasure of a near miss. The crowd was such that morning that she had no choice but to stand pressed between me and the door. I could smell her hair, just below my nose. Her back was too me and the upper part of it rested on my chest where I could feel the distinct hard shape of the buckle on her bra. Her firm buttocks were pressed against my crotch where she could probably feel the distinct hard shape of an erection – slight, but growing fast. We rode in that anonymous embrace for fifteen minutes. I got off at my station, and briefly turned my head to give her my usual smile. It was not returned.
That night, as every night, I caught the train home around six. We were passing through the loop stations around the central business district and as usual I was engrossed in my novel (the morning trains were too packed to read, but in the evening I was usually able to get a seat). I glanced up as the passengers changed at each station, not really expecting to recognise anyone, but there she was; my pretty girl in a man’s shirt. I grinned at her, surprised to see her out of our usual habitat. She saw me, and our eyes met for an moment, but she sat down some seats away, her back to me.
The next day was Friday and I ran a little late, missing her on the train. After work I went out for Friday drinks with friends. We started around half five, I suppose, and like most young office workers with plenty of money to spend, no wives to go home too, and memories from a week of cubical life to drown, we hit the bottle hard. By ten o’clock I was trashed, and, barely able to stand, I caught the train home. I stepped onto the carriage and saw her straight away, sitting in the corner. She saw me too, and as usual, did not return my delighted grin. There were plenty of seats available, but none where I wouldn’t have to invade someone’s personal space, and as the train ride was short, I decided to stand, choosing the inactive doorwell and swaying quietly from side to side as I leered at the girl.
The train began to slow for our station, and I sauntered forward. An Indian man had the first place at the door, my girl was next, and then me, still swaying and still smiling. The train came to a final halt, and the tone sounded, indicating that the doors were unlocked. The girl shoved roughly past the Indian and wrenched the door open, leaping through it as soon as there was room and taking off at speed toward the exit. It took me a second to figure out what she was running from. She was running from me. She thought I was going to rape her.
Acting on instinct I did what any man would do. I chased her. She was fast, running with the adrenaline of panic, but when it came down to it, drunk or no, I was a man and she was no match for me. I caught her and threw her to the ground and dragged her inside the black mouth of a laneway. I punched her in the mouth until her piercing screams became a soft whimper. I pinned her down, my left elbow and forearm across her chest, while with my right I tore open her tight black pants, ripping them along the fly and plunging my fist into her thick black bush. I undid my own pants, and withdrew my cock which by this stage was as hard as it had ever been; hard as titanium; so hard it hurt. I fucked her till I came, her pussy wet despite her terror, and when I did I rolled off and lay on the ground next to her, panting, spent. She didn’t run now; just lay there with me, whimpering, tears making trails through the blood and the snot on her face. When my breath was back I stood up and zipped up and looked down on her.
“I wasn’t going to rape you.” I said. “I didn’t want this. I like you. I only smiled at you because you were pretty and because the clothes you wore amused me. When you ran from me it triggered something in me. You triggered it. I raped you as a kind of a parable, I guess. Don’t think the worst of people. Don’t run from people unless you know for sure that they’re a threat. When you don’t give people the benefit of the doubt, when you treat them like you expect them to act badly, then you make them live up to your expectations.”
Her head lolled slightly, and the whimpering stoped, but there was nothing there I could call a response, so I left, walking off into the night, the few blocks to my house.
I didn’t see her waiting for the 8:30 train again.
The 8:30 Train
