The Age of Home

At 6:23 AM on the dot, the MBTA commuter rail pulls into the stop in West Roxbury. A single 30-something year old man drifts onto the train. He’s quite inconspicuous—his tangled brown beard, worn shoes, and dusty clothing give off a vaguely homeless air, but that’s not an uncommon sight in Boston. His one defining feature is a long red scar across his left cheek, perhaps from a fist fight long ago. 

Twenty-seven minutes later, the train arrives at South Station, and the passengers begin to clear out. As the man stands up to go, he bumps into another man, about the same age as him, but dressed much more sharply. Morris Stafford, reads a badge pinned to his suit jacket. Senior Operations Manager.

“ ‘scuse me,” the man grunts in apology. 

“—oh—no—I mean it’s fine,” stammers Morris Stafford, Senior Operations Manager. He glances towards the man’s scar, takes a sip of his coffee, and follows him off the train. 

The sun is barely out, and what little light there is seeps through the cracks in the overcast sky. As Morris steps out of the station, the wind worms its way under his coat and pummels his back, pushing him down the street. Good ole Boston, he thinks. Even the wind is impatient here. He hurries east, towards the Prudential Center in the distance. As he joins the throng of people heading to work—mostly men in suits carrying briefcases, like himself—he lets his mind wander back towards the man from the train. There was something familiar about that scar… a memory long buried by time and experience. The feeling of dust choking the air, and sunlight scorching skin. Sweat dripping into eyes. The mob of suits in the lobby of the Prudential jostle Morris as they sweep past, and in the past, a flurry of hands push him into the center of the ring. A ring of children, cheering him on as he faces his opponent, a lanky kid with bare feet and matted brown hair. The kid takes a swing at him, but he ducks out of the way and blindly brings his fist up in an attempt to catch the other kids face. It makes contact, his fist gouging a long scratch down his opponents cheek. The kid howls in pain. 

The ding of the elevator brings Morris out of his memories and back to the reality of work. A sea of cubicles in the dark office stretches out ahead of him. He makes his way to the back of the room in silence, the air heavy with solitude and the discomfort of fifty software engineers trying to avoid his gaze. Morris is used to it by now. He knows that he messes up when talking to people, and it’s probably better for everyone if he limits his interactions with society as much as possible. That way, nobody is subjected to his disastrous social skills. 

Morris takes a sip of his coffee (now tasting more like cold bean juice) and boots up his computer. The cold blue light of the LCD monitor illuminates his small office. What he wouldn’t give for an office with a window—one that takes up an entire wall, and has a million dollar view of the city. If only he had the guts to ask about it. He loves being high up. He remembers the kid with the scar; his childhood best friend, Jimmy. They used to sneak onto the roof of their school, and watch the people down below. Sometimes they would bring milkshakes up there and spray them down on unassuming passersby through their straws. Now, that seems like a lifetime ago. Morris hasn’t had a milkshake since he was in high school. It’s just not the same, getting shakes without a friend. 

At lunchtime, Morris blinks out of the fog that he’s been in for the past six hours. He wanders back through the office, into the elevator, and out of the Prudential lobby, passing crowds of faceless people that he probably should know. The light of day is jarring after sitting all day in a small, dark room, and the sounds of the city are almost overwhelming. Morris drags himself to Subway and orders his daily club sandwich to-go, then sits down in Copley Square to eat. A piece of turkey falls out of his sandwich, and is promptly snatched by a nearby pigeon. More pigeons crowd around him, eager for a morsel of food. He aims a kick at them, and they take off in an agitated cloud of gray feathers. A young couple at the other side of the square tosses the pigeons some bread. The girl turns to her boyfriend, and they share a kiss as the pigeons mob the bread. How romantic. Morris’ heart aches at the sight. If only he could have had that—in college, he had been much too poor and unrefined to satisfy the sophisticated city girls. He never really felt like he belonged amongst all of the kids from wealthy families at the elite private college that he went to, and he was never even able to make friends, let alone date. They all talked like lawyers, and spent more money in a week than he had ever had at once in his life. How was he meant to keep up with that, coming from a tiny town in Kansas on a full scholarship? He had left his family, his friends, and his responsibilities behind on the promise that that school would lift him out of the dust and dirt he was born in, but now he’s here on the East Coast, and all he can think about is the dust and his family. His friends, if he even has them anymore. He hasn’t talked to them since high school. Jimmy, Cole, Ace—they probably don’t even remember him anymore.

Another seven hours of work. Morris probably has a vitamin D deficiency at this point. The stack of papers on his desk has grown exponentially, and his eyes are decidedly bloodshot from staring at a screen all day, but everyone else has left the office, which means that finally, he can as well. He gets to South Station just in time to catch the 7:30 train back. It’s a relief to not have to wait for the 8:50 train. 

As he boards the train, he catches the eye of a familiar man. It’s the man with the scar—the one he had bumped into that morning. The one who reminded him of Jimmy. Morris hesitates in the aisle for a second, takes a deep breath, and sits at the other end of the car, where nobody else is sitting. The train starts to move, and he drifts off to sleep to the sound of the wheels on the tracks. 

At 8:10 pm, the commuter rail pulls into the stop at Needham Heights. A man bends over another man and shakes him awake. He’s strong, tan, and covered in dust, as if he spends his days working in the outdoors somewhere dry, and his one defining feature is a long red scar across his cheek. He bends over, and a name tag slips out from under his wrinkled shirt. Jimmy Henson, it reads. Site Engineer. 

“Mo. Wake up,” grunts Jimmy Henson, Site Engineer. “It’s time to go home.”