Read by Dan Starkey (first story in podcast, at 3m 45s)
It’s 8:45 in the morning, we’re in the middle of the worst drought in New York history, and the F train can’t seem to get any momentum as it hiccups from station to station. I’m running late to my meeting with Janiyah and Mel, who are presenting their plan on using TikTok influencers for my biggest account, a new men’s scalp lotion. It’s a rare hair product because it works. Sort of. For me at least lately, it’s starting to work.
I peep out over my reading glasses as he lifts an old, browned toaster oven and cradles it as if it were a child.
“Say, aaahhhh,” he murmurs as he waggles his blackened grimy fingers into the little door. “My name is Jesus Alfama Las Vegas Rodriguez. Who’s your papa?” Then he yanks out the grill like he’s removing a rotten tooth and frisbees it down the length of the car. A small church lady with a bright blue cap and black lace veil deftly moves her knees out of the way while never missing a bead on her rosary.
“I said, ‘Who’s your papa?” Jesus shouts.
The guy across from me looks about 75, wears wire rim glasses, work boots, his steel gray hair buzz-cut like a former Marine drill sergeant. He rolls his eyes at me and goes back to playing Crazy Birds on his phone.
“It’s busted. Only 2 bucks. Anyone want to help a guy out?” Jesus then picks a set of Venetian blinds out of the cart – his wrists and arms become entangled in the pull cords, and the slats start slapping back at him. He’s cursing in Spanish, and I think that if this bozo makes me one minute later than I already am to my meeting I’ll curse God till it rains for thirty days straight.
He ditches the blinds on the subway floor on top of the toaster and hitches up his pants. He shimmies out of his Navy pea coat.
“Is anyone in here a Christian? Anyone hear of charity? No one’s going to help me pick up my stuff?”
I guess we’re all New Yorkers because not a soul makes eye contact. He bends over to reach deep into the grocery cart, rummaging around, his ponytail swishing between his shoulder blades. My estimate of his age lowers from mid 40s to early 30s. He’s tied his hair with a blue plastic New York Times home delivery bag. His shirt, made from that waffled fabric used for winter underwear, is stained with a brown that you’d guess began as one bodily fluid or another. He almost tips into his now half-empty cart as the subway brakes seize.
The doors to the East Broadway station whoosh open to reveal a tiny woman holding a pink parasol in one hand. In the other she’s carrying a red plastic bag with Chinese looking characters on it from which huge green tails of fresh carrots fan out. Behind her, a young boy has a fistful of the hem of her blouse. I assume he is her son. His blistered lower lip protrudes like he’s been pouting it out a lot lately. She sits him down in the empty seat next to me. She folds her parasol and places it on top of the bag now under the boy’s dangling feet. She kneels facing the child and starts licking a cocked thumb before trying to smudge dirt off the kid’s cheek. He doesn’t move, like he’s having a pedicure. His mother peels a mandarin and places slices in his mouth as if feeding a cockatiel.
I realize I have no phone signal and can’t text Janiyah or Mel.
Jesus straightens up triumphant. He’s holding a hurdy-gurdy kind of hand accordion. I think they call it a concertina. He pushes and pulls at it but no noise issues forth. The boy finally notices him, and his eyes widen.
“Would you like to play?” Jesus asks. The mom turns her back to her son as if defending him from a wild lion.
“Here,” Jesus offers the accordion.
The boy struggles to get up from behind his mother, but she won’t let him budge from his seat. Something’s got to give, so I stand.
“Let me?” I ask Jesus, nodding to the kid.
He lets the accordion fall into my hands. I sit back down and turn to the boy who grabs it so fast his mother can’t stop the object from entering their orbit. Within seconds, the child is playing “Mack the Knife” or what could pass for the first few bars. He repeats this riff over and over, and now everyone’s amazed and staring as Jesus yanks a black doctor’s bag from his mound of possessions, extracts a Miami-blue boa, and starts a slow jig around his cart.
That’s when the electricity goes out.
The car darkens, the motors hiss, the train stops humming. The subway car wheezes into a sea of quiet, except for the boy’s hurdy-gurdy and the slip-slap of Jesus’s soft shoe routine. He’s partnering a standing lamp around his grocery cart.
Yellow emergency lights pop on at either end of the car. It’s the same aura you’d find in some scuzzy hookah bar or at the wrong kind of night club. The conductor announces there’ll be a short delay, and a chorus of snorts, harrumphs, and groans sing backup to my silent primal scream. I turn back to the crossword. I don’t see Jesus pull out the American Girl doll, or the bocce set, or the air rifle with a cork on a string in the muzzle.
I only look up when the church lady, in the most pleasant Sunday school voice, says, “Wouldn’t you like to put that gun down, my son?”
Retired Marine Mike, as I’ve named him, says, “Don’t worry, lady. It’s just a pop gun.”
Jesus skates down the aisle in his sandals to the woman. He gets on one knee, bends his head, and offers the toy rifle across the palms of his hands like he’s yielding a sword to King Arthur. She pats him on the head, lifts the pop gun and aims her right eye down the barrel, roving the car as if searching for a target. She’s aiming at me. She pulls the trigger just as I turn back to my puzzle, shocked and embarrassed I was caught staring but chagrined that she’d made me the object of her dead-eye shot. What have I done to deserve this? I’m just trying to get in a day’s work.
The Reverend Al Carmine’s 1970s anthem “Praise the Lord” gurgles into my brain and I start singing it softly to myself.
The conductor comes into the car and checks if everything is okay.
He is a slender man with a mustache thicker than a John Waters but thinner than a Will Smith. He’s wearing an unbuttoned MTA sweater vest.
“Power’s down. There’s a blackout. We might be here awhile. I’m just going car to car to check on folks.” He eyes Jesus standing amid his junk pile. “Nice boa,” he says before swiveling back to us. “Will someone help this poor fella put his stuff back in his cart in case we have to evacuate through the emergency exit in the roof?” He pirouettes on his polished leather shoes and slides by the shopping cart on his way into the next car.
“It’s not going to be easy getting that out the exit,” I say, pointing to the cart.
“Nothing’s easy in this shit world, Superman,” he says.
The boy with the hurdy-gurdy slithers past his mother and drops the instrument into the metal basket. The woman with the pop gun approaches. A teen girl in a hoodie follows behind her, the toaster grill dangling from one hand. They each drop their item into the grocery cart and return to their seats.
Not sure why, but I stand up and lift the toaster oven off the ground. Jesus crosses himself. Just as I begin to lower my offering into the basket, the train’s engines whir to life. The emergency lights flicker off and the full white, fluorescent lights blare back on. I place the appliance carefully on top of some burgundy velour curtains.
My morning meeting has definitely started. I touch my hairline without thinking, as if assuring myself the hair lotion has indeed done at least one job right in its short product life.
The door at the end of the car opens. The conductor steps in, grinning and shaking his head.
“Power has been restored. We’ll be on our way shortly, ladies and gentlemen. Power restored.”
(c) John Istel, 2025
John Francis Istel’s poetry & fiction have appeared in many journals, & he’s written about theatre for Atlantic, Elle, Village Voice & elsewhere. His story “The Metaphor Game” won a contest judged by Jonathan Lethem & was published in A Public Space. He lives in Brooklyn but roots for Arsenal.
Dan Starkey is an actor & voiceover artist, best known for the BBC’s Doctor Who & the BAFTA-winning children’s series Class Dismissed. He was also a member of the BBC Radio Drama Company. Recent theatre includes Habeas Corpus & The Government Inspector.
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