1,776-Word Writing Exercise Composed on Amtrak Train 125 from Windsor, CT to Philadelphia (7:58 a.m.-1 p.m. EST)

“Ya know, I see why you like these,” Sarah said during intermission. “Concerts are pretty cool.”

“I can’t believe you haven’t been to a concert in ten years. Last one was…?”

“J. Cole. This is a warmup for seeing Henry in October. I sent him a message that all I need is a hair tie and five minutes.”

“He’ll notice those perfect eyelashes and pluck you from the crowd,” I said then pretended I was going to wipe my hands on her new Paul Simon tee shirt.

“I’ll key yer fuckin’ car if you do that! Then shit on the hood!”

“That escalated. What’re you doing over there?”

“Checking out my tootsies,” she said while wiggling her feet above the grass. “Aren’t they pretty?”

“They look beautiful. Did you get a pedicure?”

“Nah, did it myself. I fucked up one of them, though.”

“I’d put ’em in my mouth right now anyway, Pumpkin.”

“Dude, gross. They’re filthy. How’d we get our nicknames again, Puddin’?” she said while squirting globs of hand sanitizer into a paper towel before cleaning her feet.

“You were in the E.R. and texted me that you were starving. I said that the hospital should have puddin’, especially butterscotch.”

“That’s right. But what about Pumpkin?”

“I dunno. I thought it was a cute nickname. Plus, they go well together. Pumpkin and Puddin’. Like Bonnie and Clyde or some shit,” I added unconvincingly.

“Okay,” she said in her soft tone, the hopeful second syllable lilting upward, a voice she was paid by Corporate America to employ when talking to callers about their insurance claims.

“Any gross men ask you out during a call this week?”

“One guy said he’d just moved to Connecticut. He told me he’d ask me out if he called back and got me again.”

“That’ll definitely happen knowing your luck. Me? I’d keep insisting you lick your lips loudly. You doing another feet heat check?”

“Can’t stop looking at them.”

She’d gotten a new pair of thong sandals earlier in the afternoon. Upon walking out of the outlet store, she kicked off her old flip-flops and along with the box and store-branded bag that housed the new ones, threw all three in a trash can one after the other.

“That was so liberating to witness.”

“Done with those trailer trash ones cuz I love my new flippies.”

“Plus, they match your off-white blouse.”

“This is from Walmart, so I don’t think it can technically be called a blouse.”

“Especially with that button your titties shot off.”

“That happened right after I put it on. I was gonna sew it but couldn’t find my kit. Oh, well,” she said while pulling the plunging neckline above her tan bra, a gag that recurred almost once a minute for the whole day, Pumpkin echoing Sue’s old chestnut that “fashion is pain.”

“You ever get self-conscious about people looking at them?”

“Nah.”

“Just dig the attention?”

“Maybe…”

“Man, I could go for another crepe,” I said, not divulging how I’d prefer the new one be breast-and-feet-flavored.

“I was just thinking about how you called that lady Cashier. Then I realized it said Cashier on her shirt.”

“She was a cool mule, although she didn’t get the bit I did at the table,” I said about how when she brought us our food twenty minutes after we ordered it, I mentioned how long it had been since we’d seen her, inquiring if her husband was doing well and how old her kids were now.

We traveled to another town in the Berkshires, the lush greenery striking during summertime. A surly woman with three children walking ahead of us lambasted her son as she took him and her other two spawn into a hardware store, a perfect choice to further rankle herself.

“She was a bitch,” I said.

“Probably caught her at the wrong time.”

“Good perspective. Imagine how she was at the start of the day? Even worse.”

“Reminds me that I should check on Mal,” Pumpkin said about her three-year-old son, fretting that his grandmother would be feeding him trash all day.

“I’m so glad you brought him to see the new Toy Story. When did he piss himself during it?”

“There was an hour left, but I didn’t wanna deal with him screaming, so I let him sit in it till the end. He can’t control his hose.”

“A good memory for his first trip to the cinema. I sent Glenn that meme saying how Pixar announced that Woody would say the N-word in the film. He was worried that some people might think it was real and that shitposts contribute to general misinformation. Humor evolved like anything else, ya know? And fuck anyone stupid enough to believe shit like that.”

“Right? Not our problem!”

“You wanna go in this candy store?”

“I guess,” Pumpkin said. Moments later, she impulsively grabbed a bag of sugared mango slices. “These’re my favorite even though I’m allergic to mangos.”

“You’re always logical. Remember when you were apprehensive about coming in here?”

“I like these, too,” she said while a nearby employee took inventory on a clipboard.

“Don’t mind my friend,” I told the woman. “She has awful taste.”

“We don’t judge here,” the lady replied while chuckling. “There’s something for everyone.”

“That’s what nice people usually say when they know somebody has terrible taste.”

“You’re the fuckin’ loser who likes licorice,” Pumpkin snapped back in jest, our mock-scornful rapport akin to two prepubescent kids who don’t want to admit they have a crush on one another.

“Check the price on those first.”

“$11.99?!” she said, placing her adamantine nemesis back with its extortionate siblings.

“The Berkshires are picturesque, but everything is so bougie. So…French bakery?”

“Yeah!” said the former bakery employee.

We each ate a custard tart with fresh fruit as I handed my final raspberry to Pumpkin, her a fan of their fuzzy texture and pronouncing the otherwise silent P in their name rather than my preferred Z’s.

“Do we really need a towel?” Pumpkin asked as I gathered the food, drinks, and chairs we were toting into Tanglewood, the venue permitting attendees to bring in various items.

“It’s in case we get all sweaty spaghetti.”

“Wonder if they’ll ever let us cross,” she said as we waited with the crowd across the street from the entrance.

“Is the bag check thorough?” a man with his wife asked us.

“Nah, it’s more a suggestion,” I said. “You could easily sneak in a gun.”

We talked to Peter, a guy who initially introduced himself as Frank then disclosed that he was enduring the initial stage of dementia, a tidbit I missed while nicknaming him Prank and persuading him that it was a portmanteau. Upon discovering we both were writers, I learned how he wrote copy at Time Life for years, was born in Oregon but now lived in New York, and had recently visited Australia with his wife, the woman ten feet ahead of us periodically looking back to confirm that Prank, in his white tee and blue jeans, was doing okay. He would email me the ensuing morning to inquire what I thought of the show.

“He’s an oven, not a microwave,” I wrote, explaining that while the opening acoustic set was a bit subdued, the hits from Simon’s songbook accompanied by his stellar band made for an exciting second half, “Diamonds on the Souls of Her Shoes” being my favorite. However, I failed to share that my line had been stolen from Sarah’s lips, fond of recycling my friends’ finest phrases in my writing as a tribute, not to steal their glory.

“Hand me that towel, please,” Pumpkin said, the chair she brought covered in desiccated mouse shit.

“Guess we needed it, huh?”

“Shut up, bitch!”

“Look to your left,” Pumpkin said during the show about an elderly woman playing Tetris on her iPad. “Why even come?”

“Giggity. I don’t get people at concerts, man.”

“Maybe cuz it’s so quiet?”

“What if I stood up and yelled, ‘SUCK MY FUCKING DIIIIICK!’?”

“I would die.”

“Then I could finally see your boobs! Did your boyfriend leave?” I said about a lean hunk she’d eyed prior to the sun setting.

“Yeah. How old do you think he was?”

“Twenty-ish, I’d say.”

“That’s too young.”

“Unlike my next wife,” I said, pointing at a braless woman in her sixties I’d commented on who now walked by seemingly lost.

“Would you…?”

“I mean, why not? She’s pretty. And I wouldn’t have to pull out.”

“Maybe a squirter, too.”

“That lady next to you must think we’re Beavis and Butt-head,” I joked.

“I’m sure we’ve annoyed her.”

“We bought tickets just like she did. We’re allowed to joke during shows. At least we’re not on our fucking phones.”

“True,” Pumpkin said then checked her phone mnemonically, texting her ex-boyfriend’s sister to inform the lunatic that she was with another man for the night.

“You gotta stop instigating and tell him you’re not interested then block him.”

“Or say how I’m racist now. No more black guys.”

“He’s latino.”

“Or browns. Just white guys.”

“It’s too bad you don’t know one who is single, intelligent, funny, has a good personality, is reasonably healthy, has money and a decent job, is nice to your son, understands that you’d never love a man more than him, couldn’t care less that you’ve only dated coloreds, has minimal baggage, and is nice to you. He’s out there…somewhere.”

“I can’t tell when you’re doing a bit. You think that’s it?”

“For sure,” I said while folding my chair.

“Not quite,” she said as he reemerged for “The Sound of Silence.”

“Can’t believe he’s not gonna play ‘You Can Call Me Al.’”

“Fuck him!”

“Piece’uh shit Paul Simon! You better adjust your blouse.”

“Still enjoying the view?”

“Of course. You should pull ’em out to show me for my birthday.”

“I bought you a crepe and a fruit tart. That’s your fuckin’ present.”

When we got home, I realized she’d forgotten her chair and brought it by the following afternoon. As Mal rolled around on the couch, I commented, “Not wearing undies just like your momma, huh buddy?”

“What’d you see, his balls?”

“Yep. He piss himself yet today?”

“No. If you weren’t here, he’d be naked. He never does it when he’s not wearing clothes.”

“Funny how that works. Alright, I gotta run.”

“Say bye to Alam,” Pumpkin instructed him, the boy routinely mispronouncing my name.

“You can call me Alam. Feet heat check?”

“Still cute,” she said, wearing her new shirt while fluttering her toes.

“Never doubted you. Boobs? For Mal’s nostalgia?”

“Bye, Alam.”