As I Fade (One Breath at a Time: Book 1) (2 page)

I had a tendency to nitpick to death the HOWS and WHYS of whatever randomly sparked my interest. Today’s question, WHAT is the possibility of life after death? The inevitable dichotomy of our existence plagued my thoughts as I made my way toward the subway. I couldn’t get out of my head the bizarre day I had and how it would end.

The powerful prongs of the wind stung against my cheeks and cut through my coat. Technically, it was still winter, just eleven days shy of spring, but still unusually brisk. I couldn’t wait for the season to change and if it came tomorrow it wouldn’t be too soon.

I nearly stumbled when a rush of impending upheaval twisted through my gut. Waves of nausea bubbled up into my throat every few minutes. No, I wasn’t pregnant, that was impossible. The nausea accompanied that heavy, bloated feeling that sticks with you after eating a bowl of steel oats, forcing its way into your system, but I hadn’t eaten anything all day. The pangs were physical manifestations brought on by my frayed emotions. The knot intensified until it sat there like a weighted brick. My intuition screamed out that my life was on the brink of changing forever. Would it be for the better or worse, I wondered. There was no way of knowing. But a change was coming. Of this I was certain.

It had been a long year, and I’d grown up in a fraction of a minute when I’d made a split decision to sacrifice all I had for the sake of another. I deserved a medal, but there wouldn’t be one. It didn’t matter if the world never knew what I had done. I knew, and soon so would he. I was proud of my accomplishment. It felt good. Now what? I knew the past, but I wasn’t too sure of the future and what it would bring, but I surely wanted it.

“
Hurry, spit out my ticket,” I scolded the automated machine as if it were human. A line of impatient people was thickening behind me. Their angry sighs grew louder.

I didn’t have time to deal with any more curve balls thrown my way. Not after the gripping ordeal I’d just gone through, something comparable to falling down the rabbit’s hole in Alice’s far-fetched wonderland. My nerves were still buzzing from it, but I somehow managed to project an unflappable mien to the outside world. No one would have believed what I’d been through, even if I’d bothered to tell about it.

“I can’t believe this,” the
la-te-dah
woman behind me grumbled under her breath. She bore an air of affected superiority.

“
Believe what?” I asked, controlling my tone, in her direction and swiped my card again.

A breath of hot air landed on the back of my neck. “Maybe something’s wrong with your card. Seriously!” the woman snapped. Her impatience elevated my already nervous state of mind.

“Nothings wrong with my card, it’s the machine,” I retorted and swiped it again. My face flushed. I could feel a case of hives traveling across my décolleté.

Round two escaped her lips. “Oh my fucking God, this is ridiculous. You’re going to make
all
of us late,” the angry woman huffed. She flipped her head back and cast prissy glances at me. She would have been attractive if not for the ugliness bubbling up from inside of her like the clotted foam I’d once seen at a sewer plant.

“
You’re so rude...” I intentionally muttered, loud enough for her to hear. My voice trailed to a raspy whisper. “Potty mouth.” She probably didn’t hear that one.

The woman wasn’t backing down. “Why don’t you let me go in front of you? You’re the rude one if you ask me. Little Bitch,” she breathed out, barely audible, but I heard. If she had stopped at the end of her question, I probably would’ve considered her request.

An elderly man came to my rescue. “Give her a second. You’re only making matters worse.”

The female day wrecker snapped at him, “Mind your own business!” Pushing up through the line, she stood right beside me and brashly continued to argue her point. “I have somewhere to be
now
and I don’t have time for anyone’s shit today.” That sounded familiar, except I’m not one to advertise my problems in public.

She ranted on, “I have VIP tickets to attend the most elite fashion show of the year, it’s tonight and I can’t be late. So, hush up,” she scowled at the man behind me.

Damn, who the hell did she think she was?

The elderly man took no mercy on her, using old wisdom, and did his best to put her in her place.

“Spare the rod and spoil the child,” the old man quoted, his tone riddled with righteous indignation.

Trying to block them out, I followed the instructions on the machine. I could hardly concentrate with their hostile banter going back and forth.

“This is maddening!” the woman quipped as she flung her long dark hair over her shoulder, dramatically thrusting her body forward, turning her back on the man.

“
Someone should have turned you over their knee and spanked the
mean
out of your hiney when they had the chance to,” he retorted, backed by wisdom of the ages. The crowd behind us burst into a laughter. The woman didn’t flinch; she had nerves of steel.

I tried to focus on getting my ticket and escaping the heated scene that was well on its way to boiling over.

Just then a cute metro-attendant stepped up. “Is there a problem here?” he asked.

“
Yes, this girl is taking forever, and she going to make us all late,” the snotty woman piped out before I could speak.

“
You’ll have to be patient, Madame. The machines are all malfunctioning today because of the strong winds interfering with the signal,” he said, addressing Ms. Mean. He politely advised me, “Try hitting the buttons slowly; that seems to be working with the other machines.”

“
Okay, thanks.” I flashed him a big bright smile as he went on his way. Gliding my eyes back to the keypad, I ignored the woman giving me the Evil Eye. Judging by the look on her face, I would’ve been dead if she had the power to kill.

Ms. Relentless did not relent. Driving her point home, she had to get in a final jab. “I still don’t think it’s the machine. It’s you.” I chose to ignore her dig so she addressed the others still snickering in line. “And all of you seem to be finding this funny...at my expense.” Her chilling voiced carried through the expansive corridor.

I found her sense of entitlement, bullying others around revolting. I’d noticed she donned an engagement ring with a diamond the size of a nickel. Despite her pretty face, I felt sorry for the man in her life.

The machine made a strange grinding noise and kicked out my metro ticket.

“Thank God, you figured it out. Imagine that,” she said in the most derisive tone. My patience hit a brick wall.

“
Enough already!” I barked at her, louder than I intended. As I grabbed my metro pass, turning to retreat my feet involuntarily stopped in their tracks. What was happening? Everything in my line of vision moved in slow motion, and then suddenly sped up again to real time. It was like watching a movie where the tracking mode skipped then reset itself.

Face to face, toe-to-toe, I stood head on eyeing my day’s nemesis. A quiet little voice inside of me whispered, she wasn’t worth the air that I would have to breathe to tell her off.

“By the way...you’re a real bitch,” I said smoothly, not raising my voice. The dark haired beauty stood in utter shock, batting her long fake lashes with her mouth gaping open. The line of people all began to clap, which felt semi-gratifying. Acknowledging the crowd with a quick victorious smile, I pivoted on my heels. “Good luck,” I called out to her as I walked away with my head held high.

Okay, none of that happened. If I were one to embellish the truth it would stay as is; however, it was just a momentary vision of how I wished it had played out. Head-on confrontations weren’t my forte, unless greatly provoked. At the time, I didn’t have the guts to say anything directly to her face. Growing up in New York City, I’d witnessed worse than this lady’s lofty attitude. Public arguments were a daily occurrence in Grand Central Station, and I chose to pick my battles wisely.

What really happened
: I grabbed my ticket, barely breathed “Bitch” and headed on my way. Even though no one heard, getting in that last word felt gratifying enough. Besides she’d already publicly humiliated herself, and from the sounds of her foaming at the mouth, again, it hadn’t taught her any lessons. “You stupid, fucking machine!” Her voice echoed, bouncing off the underground walls.

Pardon her French!
I burst into laughter, as she continued to cuss out the machine. As I floated through the metro with a bag of donuts tucked beneath my arm, heading to my destination, and even while crossing the E ramp approaching line 14, I could still hear Ms. Mean carrying on. Unbelievable! Sweet vindication released another bubble of laughter within me.

The metro had narrow corridors at the entrances and widened as it descended underground, imitating the shape of megaphone. Voices carried far and wide, coming from all directions. I stopped and turned around. Oh my God, I could hear heels clicking in a deliberate hard-core manner, heading in my direction. They were
not
happy feet!

“
Oh shit, she’s coming,” I said aloud, and with a giggle, picked up my pace determined to avoid her. I wished my best friend Nuilley was with me, she’d get a kick out of busting this woman’s balls. Nuilley Lambert was a native Parisian and embodied every French attitude one could imagine, from classy and complicated, to downright crazy!

The sound of the train rumbled, vibrating down the strip of tracks. It shook the platform beneath my feet as it swiftly entered the station then came to a screeching halt. When the doors opened, a hot smelly wind from the gully kicked up into my face. The crowd entering the train pressed up against me. Riding the Metro, and getting jostled around was par for the course of not owning a car in Paris. I pushed back slightly.

In a hurry I scanned the train for a seat, spotting one in the far back right-hand corner next to a window.
Perfect!

“
Is someone sitting there?” I asked an extremely old looking woman who was sitting next to the empty seat.

She lifted her eyes, and her face lit up like a beacon. “Nope. I was saving it for you, Sweetie.”

Bemused, I smiled at her coy answer. “Really? Thanks.”

As soon as I sat down, I understood why no one else had taken the empty seat next to her. Pepe La Pew
,
the little smelly polecat cartoon character, would have thrown himself from the train. The scent of a heavy rose perfume, mothballs, dusty curtains, cat dander and dried apples assaulted my nostrils. The combination made my eyes tear.

“
Make yourself comfortable,” she said, breathing hot medicine-tinged air all over me.

Trying not to breathe in too deeply, I nodded and simply replied, “Thanks, I will.”

The elderly woman was dressed in an overcoat that swallowed her tiny, fragile figure. Her rough and wrinkled fingers poked through the holes of dirty black gloves, clutching a newspaper stained with coffee spills and who knew what other desecrations.

The automated doors closed, causing a subtle air pressure change in the cabin. The momentum of the train’s hydraulic system shifted as it made its slow departure. Within seconds, the train would transform into a silver bullet, racing through the dark tunnel beneath the earth.

“You made it just in time.” The little old woman pointed out the window. The la-te-dah bitch...er, I mean, lady who had been behind me in line at the ticket booth, raced towards the train, her arms flailing into the air, and her mouth yapping—God only knew what filth spewed forth. I allowed myself a tiny smile of satisfaction that she was still cursing me out.

The elderly woman snickered, “That’s what she gets for being such an uppity snot.”

I snorted slightly. “How did you know she was—?”

The old lady cut me off. “Wasn’t born yesterday. Look at me.” She squinted her eyes in my direction. The wrinkles gathered in the corners of her eyelids like a loose drape. She definitely spoke the truth.

“Oh stop.” I waved at her. “You’re not that old.” I lied to her out of politeness.

“
Aww thanks. My cold cream must be working. I thought it quit years ago. Guess not. Believe it or not, I’m as old as the apple.” She laughed.

“
Sin,” I corrected her, barely audible.

“
No, the apple,” she said pointedly, confirming that her hearing was still very keen. “Let me tell you something I’ve learned through the years. Peoples aren’t so complicated. They’re easy breezy. I can see right through them. It’s either light or dark in there.” She poked herself in the chest then shuddered, dramatically. “There’s nothing gray about peoples. I see what happens to ones like that holier-than-thou, angry lady all the time...” She rambled on and on, in a thick Irish accent nearly devoid of correct grammar. “Take yous...for example, yous got a light in there. It’s dim, but it’s on.”

Her backhanded compliment made me laugh. “Thanks, I think.”

Adjusting my weight in the seat, I checked her out over the course of several discreet glances. She was a very peculiar lady, eccentric and outspoken. Gray stringy hair hung awry beneath her Russian donut-type hat. The fur on the hat was matted and worn. I noted her hot-pink lipstick went beyond the vermillion border of her lips.