I felt sick to my stomach. I was going to New York. I was going to live the dream, my dream. I was just a small town girl, and yet I had been given the opportunity of a lifetime. New York, city of the sweetest imaginings and most refined of individuals.
I placed my worn Sunday dress into my solitary suitcase and slipped my brown flat shoes onto my feet. Shoes always had each other, they were lucky, like twins; yet I could tell my dress and suitcase were not such a happy union. What did they have in common? I took this unhappy couple towards the front door knowing that I faced a different world that morning to any I had ever encountered before. Grey light flooded into my open, willing eyes as I stepped out and walked towards the car.
It was a cold, still morning and, as I looked over to my mother in the driver’s seat, I felt a sense of achievement that this was the last time I would need her to drive me anywhere; soon I’d be behind the wheel of my own destiny.
I clutched my ticket anxiously and tentatively handed it to the looming figure of the ticket inspector. I sat engulfed by an outsized seat and glanced at what I was leaving behind. An unexpected, lonely tear trickled from my eye and crawled down my face.
The train slowly pulled away from the station. At the first stop a number of people piled on, some in groups and some like myself; alone. All of us were heading in the same direction and there was a feeling of need to be there, which propelled us towards New York. It was as though we were pushing the train forwards with our desires.
Between the next couple of stops the train seemed to become faster and faster as it sped towards our goal. People getting on now, as we drew nearer, seemed to have a stronger will to be going there and the train reacted. One woman who got on was like nobody I had ever seen before; her long straight blond hair acting in a beautiful contrast with her deep cherry lips and shiny red stiletto shoes. I looked down dejectedly at my flat, brown, leather footwear.
Eventually the train penetrated the heart of New York and made its first stop within the capital. The city appeared to reflect off her dress as she disembarked. I stared, transfixed and realised that her dress was ill fitting, puckered and clingy. As the train pulled away my eyes stayed fixed on her until she was hidden by a sea of darkly suited men, all smart in their attire with shiny patent leather briefcases and uniform haircuts.
The train jolted to a stop, my stop. I jumped up and dragged my suitcase down; it looked like a child at an adult party, awkward and unwanted. I stepped hesitantly out of the train door hoping to feel a bright sunshine rather than the dullness that had greeted me at home this morning. Instead however, an inescapable heat wrapped itself around me, swamping me. Light bounced off every surface and invaded my eyes. People rushed past from all angles, brushing me aside as they busily swarmed towards the city centre, like insects crawling and writhing and scuttling towards their destination. I had arrived, and it made no difference to anyone.
