Sanctuary City

Nathan Beard. Exit Music #60 (Lost in Translation). Acrylic on canvas. 24 x 18 inches.

Esme thought she'd been lucky, racing down the stairs against the first outpouring of commuters and making it onto the train. The car was crowded, but she wedged her way along the aisle, past the bulk of winter coats and handbags, into a pocket of space near a center pole. At rush hour, even this was something to be grateful for.

She stood expectant, anticipating the ding and the doors to close. But the seconds stretched on and she felt her palms moisten inside her gloves. A bitter wind had swept through the city, bringing snow, then a hard pelting of sleet, but here, underground, the train car was warm and airless. Esme pulled off her gloves, then unzipped her jacket.

More riders slipped on. There was a slight shuffling and the space around Esme disappeared. On all sides, she was hemmed in. She shifted her weight, and the motion sent a shooting pain into her lower back. Ay, ya … She wished she were home already, but then there'd be Junior, who was probably stretched out on the couch right now, and the excuses he'd make, or worse yet, his phony acquiescence. Someone's sour breath caught in her nose and she swallowed, lifting her chin. The doors shuddered closed.

Then, with a lurch, they were moving. Esme clung to the pole as riders swayed, bumping each other like fish on a string. The shoulder of a tall blanquita just inches from her face, Esme turned, looking up at the advertisements that lined the car. A subway advisory caught her eye. "It's nothing, you think. But can you be sure?" In the photograph, a backpack was framed beneath a row of empty subway seats.

Esme glanced around the car. She saw only body parts defined in relief: an arm extended, the sweep of dark hair, a tired face whose eyelids hung low and flickered in sleep.

Someone was playing a game with the volume up, ping, blip, bleep. No one told the rider to turn it down. No one said anything. She didn't see any backpacks, except one, on the car floor, sandwiched between a pair of trouser legs. A hand went into the pack and pulled something out. Esme couldn't see what it was, but a crumpled brown bag dropped to the floor next to the man's feet. Esme tsked, Pendejo.

She spent eight hours a day cleaning up after people. Pulling hair out of drains in the girls' and boys' locker rooms, reaching her hand into tepid, grey water to unclog sinks, scraping wads of paper towel from the ceiling. The mopping, the wiping, the emptying of things into other things.

She thought of Miss Perrell sitting behind the security desk in the school lobby, her portable TV on CNN, murmuring to herself: Mm-mm-mm, can you believe it? It's a sickness, it is. These days. Can't go anywhere. Miss Perrell liked to keep up with the news, her West Indian accent clipping pieces of her thoughts into the world. All those innocent, blood spilt, a travesty, it is. Travesty, tragedy. Esme never fully understood what she meant, her own English still imperfect after all these years in the United States. She'd shoulder the Hoover to her back and plug in. Miss Perrell glancing from the bank of monitors to images, terrible images, on the TV, as the vacuum whined and Esme worked the corners of the room.

Sometimes Esme took her breaks with Miss Perrell, but lately she'd been working steadily through her shift, a distraction from her own troubles. Three weeks ago, word spread that Mr. Duke, the manager of Building G where Esme lived, had been fired, replaced by a stranger whose name no one could pronounce. All her neighbors were whispering, Watch out, cuidado, they're checking leases, paperwork de todos. Already, the Guerreros from upstairs had been given notice, and Esme didn't know if they were going floor by floor...