Just a Bad Dream

      Sonia awoke with a start. She was having that same dream again.

No, not a dream. It was a nightmare. A recurring one. She is walking on a train platform. A trenchcoated man with a blacked-out face rides the escalator down in front of her. As they approach one another the man suddenly pushes Sonia onto the train tracks. She regains her senses just in time to look up into the headlights of an oncoming train.

She always wakes up just before it happens.

You’d think after being killed by this man so many times in her dreams Sonia would be over it by now, but each time it’s just as vivid and frightening as the last.

The digital clock on the bedside table projects 2:37 A.M. in ghostly blue numbers on the bedroom wall. “Shit,” Sonia whispers to herself.

In the kitchen of her small apartment Sonia’s domestic shorthair, a bitchy cat named Twinkle, rubs up against her arm. She fills the basket of a coffee maker with generic, store-brand coffee grounds. A dish caked with pasta sauce and a stained wine glass form a simple still life in the sink.

After coffee, Sonia gets dressed. She puts on a grey, business-casual woman’s suit, the typical uniform of her downtown office gig. In one fluid full-body gesture, like a dancer, she scratches Twinkle’s chin, grabs her brown leather purse, and exits the apartment.

A miserable old lady on the elevator won’t stop coughing as Sonia checks her smartwatch. 6:15 A.M. Good, she thinks, just enough time to grab a train downtown. Maybe pick up a bagel from Schmeer Bros. before heading into work.

The metro station is only a few blocks from Sonia’s apartment. She swipes a magnetic card across one of its gate scanners and heads down to the platform.

A rattling, metallic train emerges from a black tunnel. Sonia boards and finds an available plastic seat near the back of the train car next to a large plexiglass window. She immediately takes out her smartphone and starts checking her emails.

As usual, there aren’t many people on the train car. That’ll change once they get closer to downtown, but for now Sonia pretty much has the place all to herself.

She scrolls through her email app. “What the hell?” she mutters under her breath. She taps into an email from her recent ex-boyfriend Jake.

“This idiot.” She says to herself while she reads Jake’s desperate plea to get back together, or if not, could she at least find it in her heart to have one more night of breakup sex before ending it completely.

Sonia deletes Jake’s email.

She looks up to scan the train car. A middle-aged man with a service dog sits several rows in front of her, near the middle of the train car. The dog is a golden retriever. It sits dutifully next to its master in a little blue vest looking at Sonia with wet black eyes.

  A bit further on is a mother and daughter, and near the opposite end of the car, the back of a teenager’s headphone-bedecked head.

Sonia looks back down at her phone.

At 7:25 A.M. the train reaches Sonia’s work stop. By now it’s filled with people and Sonia has to step over a sleeping man next to her in order to get off.

Aboveground, downtown is crawling with cars and people. Sonia makes her way past sidewalk vendors selling bootleg merchandise. Mostly DVDs and sports jerseys.

She weaves in-and-out of the living and mechanical crowd until she reaches the 613 Carlyle Street office building. Its thirtieth floor currently houses her workplace, Future Dynamics.

The company Sonia works for recruits young people for tech jobs. It’s trying to compete with low-cost overseas labor and failing miserably.

Sonia breezes past the receptionist’s desk, swipes a security card, and passes into a large room subdivided by rows of encubicled desks.

It’s now 8:30 A.M. Sonia notes the time in the bottom-right corner of her computer screen as she slumps down into an ergonomic desk chair, throws her bag on the floor next to her, and jiggles a wireless mouse resting on her desk next to an organizer brimming with assorted pens, pencils, staple removers, and other work-related paraphernalia like some office-themed art installation.

“Time to shine.” Sonia says to herself as her computer comes alive, its screen quickly populates with many windows containing document scans and reports.

The workday goes by uneventfully. During her lunchbreak, Sonia eats part of a Cuban sandwich at her desk while surfing the web. A YouTuber named FatPlaya20 has recently uploaded a video of his sphynx cats playing with a robotic toy.

The naked felines pounce and roll on her screen as Sonia’s co-worker Trish interrupts her viewing trance.

           “Hey momma, how you doin’?”

           She’s not completely sure, but Sonia thinks Trish’s accent is from New York.

           “Goo-” Sonia says, her mouth full of Cuban.

           “Hey, I know you’re busy, but I wanted to see if you heard anything about that guy Dan. Do you know who I’m talkin’ about?”

           Sonia shakes her head no.

           “Dan. The new hire from a few weeks back. He was working with the team that was doin’ the backlog applications. Tryin’ to catch everything up.”

            “No, I don’t really remember him.” Sonia wipes some crumbs from her mouth.

           Trish purses her lips in a frustrated sneer. Ok, well, he hasn’t been in in about a week. I wanted to get his numba.”

           “Did you check the employee directory?”

           “Hey there, what are you ladies talking about over here?”

           A short Puerto Rican man named Juan, who also happens to be Trish and Sonia’s supervisor, interrupts.

           “Nothin’ suga bear.”

           Sonia performs an interior eye-roll at Trish’s shameless, inappropriate flirting.

           “Hey, look, we got to get back to processing those applications. But you guys wanna go somewhere for drinks after work?” Juan asks both women but looks uncomfortably at Sonia.

           “I’d love to, hon. Murphy’s?” Trish suggests, Sonia doesn’t immediately reply.

           “Yeah, I’m buyin’ first round. How about you Sonia, you in?”

           Before Sonia can reply, Juan’s phone buzzes.

           “Hey, gotta go. Look, I’ll meet you guys by reception after work.” Juan walks away briskly like he’s got somewhere important to be right that moment.

           “Well, that should be fun, eh?” Jokes Trish, “Alright, babe, I gotta get back to it. Let’s have some fun tonight, ok?”

           Sonia nods slightly as Trish, who is no longer paying attention, goes back to her workstation.

           Despite her brilliant plan to sneak out early, Sonia is confronted by Juan and Trish who are laughing and bantering next to the reception counter.

           “Hey, there she is! You ready to go?” A too-excited Juan gestures toward the door like an idiotic valet.

           In the cab, Sonia is mostly quiet, listening to the sound of Trish and Juan’s work gossip over the driver’s fuzzy talk radio program.

           Murphy’s is a wannabe Irish pub tucked between a hotel and a parking garage a few blocks from the office. Its interior is furnished with some lacquered high-tops that have seen better days flanked by wooden booths amateurishly painted with the flags of Ireland. Somewhere something smells vaguely like old vomit. A few hardcore alcoholics are already perched haphazardly at the stools in front of the bar.

           Classic rock plays over the speakers in the dingy ceiling tiles while Juan and Trish order drinks and appetizers. Sonia doesn’t feel like drinking but orders a glass of red wine so as not to arouse the suspicions of her companions.

           Zoning out, Sonia looks alternatively at her wine glass, a menu that the waiter left, and her phone while half-heartedly listening to Juan and Trish continue the gossipy conversation they started in the cab.

           After a few more drinks and the ritual paying-of-the-bills the trio go outside. Trish lights a smoke.

           “You wanna catch a cab with us?” Juan is looking creepily at Sonia again.

           “Nah. I’m going to walk around a little.”

           “You sure?”

           “Let her, suga bear, let the woman do what she wants.” Interjects a slightly inebriated Trish. “We’ll catch up with her tomorrow.”

           Sonia waves as an Uber pulls up and Juan and Trish disappear inside.

           She walks toward the Franklin Metro, a few blocks up from Murphy’s.

           Sonia descends the grand staircase of the metro station under a dome of unwashed tiles illuminated by orange and yellow floodlights. She is startled by an overhead announcement echoing through the cavernous station. A robotic voice states that all trains on Sonia’s line are momentarily delayed.

           There is no one else on the platform. At the bottom of the escalator Sonia walks out onto the platform alone. About then a strong sensation of deja-vu pulses through her eyeballs.

           Something about the station, the situation is familiar. She can’t immediately place it.

           The whir of the escalator behind her goes quiet as the stairs stop moving. The floodlights flicker and go out. The power surge is over quickly, but the deja-vu and the brief but utter darkness put Sonia on edge.

           A loud metallic screech rings out like the cry of a robotic bat taking off into the darkness as the escalator starts back up. It dawns on Sonia. This is the metro station from her nightmare.

           She quickly dismisses the thought. It’s nonsense. Did someone drug her wine? Would Juan do something like that? He is creepy. Sonia looks around. Still no one.

The momentary comfort of her denial and aloneness dissolve, however, as Sonia witnesses a pair of dress shoes followed by a long trenchcoat riding down the now moving escalator.

           “What the fuck?!”

           She starts fumbling in her bag for the can of mace she kept there. A scene of her hands pushing around purse detritus in search of the aluminum cylinder is interrupted by quick shots of the man on the escalator growing in stature, ultimately debarking, and moving slowly and deliberately towards her.

           Her hands fumble but her fingers finally alert her that the can is there. She pulls the mace from her purse, quickly snaps off the safety ring, and holds it in front of her. But the specter has vanished.

           Sonia stands, arm outstretched, panting hard and aiming the spray nozzle at nothing.

           As the adrenaline drains out of her synapses, she looks down at her sweat-stained blouse. Her hot face starts to cool. She puts the mace back in her bag.

           What the fuck, Sonia, she thinks. What the actual fuck. You know this shit isn’t real. You need to calm down.

           During her mental pep-talk she takes in deep breathes of air. She closes her eyes and counts backwards from thirty.

           The robotic voice from earlier comes back over the intercom. “Trains restored to full service. No more delays expected. We apologize for any inconvenience.”

           Ok. Good. Sonia breathes deeply. It’s all good. Let’s just get on this train and go home.

           Sonia hears a train making its approach from behind her. The familiar, comforting sound of squeaking wheels in need of grease and the low rumble in the soles of her feet.

           She turns expecting to see a silver streak flashing in front of her but instead she’s looking into a gaping void where a man’s face should be.

           A strong shove sends Sonia sprawling onto the tracks below. Her head hits a rail giving her a concussion.

           When she opens her eyes again, her head is a throbbing ball of heat. She is staring down at metallic rails beneath her. Tiny drops of blood fall onto them from the burning mask that is her face. The rumbling in her feet is now shaking her entire body. She looks up. The black, featureless void of the man’s missing face is now a bright blue-and-white explosion of light.

           Just before the light completely envelops her, Sonia closes her eyes.