The Stranger on the Subway I Couldn’t Get Out of My Head

The quarter to eight subway was always packed. I got on at the same station every day, made myself a space however I could among the sleepy bodies, and clung to the metal handrail, hoping the ride would be over quickly. I lived far from downtown, so the commute was long, and over the months I’d learned to entertain myself by watching people get on and off at each stop. That had become my distraction, my little private cinema first thing in the morning.

The city had changed a lot in recent years. People had come from everywhere, and in the gray crowd of office workers it was impossible not to notice a few. Tall men, broad-shouldered, dark-skinned, with huge hands gripping the same pole I was, just inches from mine. I couldn’t help it: I’d glance at them out of the corner of my eye and my mind would wander off where it shouldn’t.

What does he look like under that clothes?

It was a silly question, one I asked myself every morning without expecting an answer. But that thought was enough to keep me tingling between the legs for the rest of the ride, with a smile I hid by looking out the window.

***

I started recognizing one man in particular. He got on two stations after I did and always ended up more or less in the same place, by the back door. He was one of the tallest people in the car, so tall that he had to duck his head a little so he wouldn’t brush the ceiling. He wore his hair short and curly, a dark jacket worn thin at the elbows, and a pair of headphones leaking music I could never quite make out. He had the biggest hands I’d ever seen in my life.

I don’t know exactly which day I started waiting for him. I only remember that one morning the subway came without him and I felt an absurd disappointment, as if something that belonged to me had been taken away. That was the first time I admitted, to myself, that this stranger had become part of my routine. The part I liked most.

On the days he did show up, I managed to stay near him. Not too close, just close enough to feel the heat of his body when the car braked and inertia pushed us all forward. In those seconds when the distance shrank without either of us doing anything, my heart raced as if I were doing something forbidden.

If he knew what I think about him, he’d die of embarrassment. Or maybe not.

***

The fantasy always began the same way. I imagined the car suddenly emptying out at one of those intermediate stations, people pouring off in a mass and leaving the two of us alone, standing face to face, holding onto the same pole. He looked at me without saying anything and I didn’t look away. No words were needed. There was something in the way he watched me, slow and certain, that made me feel small and desired at the same time.

In my head, he took a step and closed the distance we took such care to keep in real life. He rested one of those huge hands on the handrail, right above mine, trapping me without touching me. I felt his breath near my hair and the nape of my neck broke out in goosebumps. The subway kept moving through the dark tunnel and nobody got on at the stops, as if the whole city had gifted us that moment.

—You shouldn’t look at me like that —he’d say in a deep voice I invented differently each time.

—I can’t help it —I’d answer him, in that version of me that didn’t exist in real life, that daring woman I would have liked to be.

And then his hand would slide down from my waist, slowly, until it settled on my hip. He’d turn me so I was facing away from him, toward the black window of the tunnel, where our reflection trembled with every jolt of the tracks. I’d see his eyes searching for mine in the glass and feel his body pressed to mine, his chest against my back, all of him surrounding me.

***

In that part of the fantasy I always had to catch my breath a little, even there, standing among real strangers, pretending to read the ads inside the car.

I imagined his hand slipping under my coat, tracing my stomach, moving down to the waistband of my pants. In my head I was so wet that I felt like anyone around me could tell. He’d undo the button with one hand, unhurried, savoring the wait, and slide his fingers inside until he found how wet I was for him.

—Look how you were waiting for me —he’d whisper in my ear, and I’d close my eyes in the reflection.

His fingers were thick, clumsy from sheer size, and he’d rub my clit with just the right pressure, making me bite my lip so I wouldn’t moan in front of everyone. First one finger, then two, easing in carefully, testing how much could fit, how much I could take without falling apart. I’d arch against him, wanting more, and he’d laugh softly, pleased to have me like that.

The reflection in the window showed me the face I’d make: lips parted, cheeks flushed, eyes half closed. A face I would never let anyone see on a crowded subway in real life.

***

The part I liked most to imagine wasn’t the rush, but the waiting. That instant when he pressed himself against me and I felt, through the fabric, what he was hiding. It was big, so big that in my fantasy it scared me a little and made me want it even more. I wondered, standing there in that real car, whether a man like that really existed or if I was making him up entirely.

In my head, he’d pull my pants down just enough to expose me, and I’d hold onto the handrail with both hands so I wouldn’t fall when he started. I’d feel the tip searching for the opening, opening me slowly, millimeter by millimeter, and my breath would start slipping away little by little. He didn’t go in all at once. He took his time, letting me get used to him, letting me feel every centimeter as if it were the last.

When he finally fit completely inside, I’d go still, pierced through by a sensation I couldn’t tell was pleasure or too much. I felt filled in a way I’d never felt before, so tight that the smallest movement from him went through me all the way. And he knew it. He’d stay still on purpose, inside me, waiting for me to ask him to start.

—Please —I’d say, not recognizing my own voice.

***

The rhythm would start slow. His hands on my hips set the beat, held me firm against him while the subway jolted and hid our movements. Each thrust pushed me against the cold glass and I’d rest my forehead there, watching the darkness of the tunnel pass by, feeling him grow inside me with every sway.

Then he’d speed up. What had begun as a caress turned into something hungrier, deeper, and I had to clench my teeth so the whole car wouldn’t hear me. In my fantasy no one watched us, no one existed, it was just him and me and that movement that fit us together until we lost count of the stations.

I’d imagine enduring as much as I could, stretching the moment out, because I knew that when it ended I’d be just another woman hanging from a handrail on my way to work. And I didn’t want it to end. I wanted that ride to go on forever, for the tunnel to keep stretching on and on, for him not to stop.

The climax, in my head, came just as a metallic voice announced my station. As if reality were suddenly stepping in to remind me that all of it was a lie.

***

“Next station,” the recording said, and I opened my eyes all at once.

I was still there, standing, dressed, sweat damp under my coat, gripping the same old pole. The stranger remained in his corner by the back door, headphones on, completely oblivious to everything he had just done to me in my imagination. He hadn’t even looked at me. He probably didn’t know I existed.

I got off the car with my legs a little weak and my pulse still racing. On the platform, the cold air hit my face and slowly brought me back to my real day, to the coffee waiting for me, to meetings, to the normal life of a normal woman. But the tingling was still there, throbbing between my legs, insistent, like a reminder of what my mind was capable of doing with a stranger and a long ride.

That morning, while I walked to the office, I knew I wasn’t going to be able to focus on anything. I dragged him with me all day: in the elevator, during the lunch break, every time I closed my eyes for just a second too long. The fantasy didn’t fade; on the contrary, each time I repeated it, I added a new detail, a word, a hand in a different place.

***

I got home at night, tired and still hot. I took off my coat, my shoes, and let myself fall onto the bed without turning on anything but the little bedside lamp. And there, finally alone, I let myself finish what the subway had started.

I slipped my hand inside my clothes and found myself just as wet as in my fantasy, as if my body had been waiting all day for this moment. I closed my eyes and went back to the car, to the handrail, to the reflection in the window, to those huge hands that had never touched me and yet that I knew by heart.

I touched myself slowly, just the way he did in my head, stretching out the wait the way I liked. I imagined him completely, his weight, his invented voice, the way he filled me until I couldn’t take any more. And this time there was no recording to interrupt me, no station to drag me back to reality.

I came thinking of him, of a man whose name I never knew, whose voice I never heard, who I would probably never see again. And when it was over and I was lying there, breathless and with a silly smile on my face, I thought that maybe that was the best thing about my subway stranger: that as long as he lived only in my imagination, he could be exactly how I wanted him, every morning, never failing me.

Tomorrow, at quarter to eight, I’ll be there again.