A very awkward train ride, written in novel form (to practice) but with GIFs!!!!

A very windy Tuesday night in March, after seeing a Russian ballet performing Swan Lake, three attractive young women in their early twenties get on the train from Newcastle back to Durham. They find three seats that are close enough together, one right behind the next. Across the narrow hallway sits a middle-aged man who smiles politely at them as they are seated. One of the girls, the one sitting closest to the man, continues to be on a reverie about the muscular legs of those strong Russian men, who were totally wearing make-up. The girl in question, Elizabeth, thus smiles back at the balding man as she asks herself why did she always think that ballets had speeches. The man takes the smile as an open invitation for conversation and begins uttering what can be considered as either drunken remarks or regular Geordie speech. 

'Oh, have you had a lovely time today, love?' he asks, or at least that's what it sounds like. Elizabeth engagingly answers in the affirmative, while her companions look at each other with worrying looks. Ria, sitting on the last seat of the cart, stares intently at Cristina, who only shakes her head and sighs. 

'Do you study in Durham? What do you study? What?'

'Chemistry, she studies Chemistry,' Cristina replies on behalf of Elizabeth, who always enunciates her words properly so the only reason why someone would not be able to understand her is because he is drunk, deaf, or--in the case of England--both.

'Oh, that's great! I have a son who is around your age who is going to XYZ Uni. What about you?'

'Liter'ture,' replies the big Texan, who had thought about taking her heavy black coat off--the train being so warm and all--but didn't want to give the chatty chap the wrong impression. Feeling torn between wanting to talk to Ria behind her and attempting to save Elizabeth from her own clueless self, Cristina attentively listens to the man as he interrogates her friend.

'Do you like Durham?'

'Yes, it's lovely.'

'What about you?'

'Yeah, I love Durham, a lot.'

'But isn't it like too quiet?'

'No, it's fine. It's nice.'

'Do you girls party on the weekend? Do you go to clubs?'

'No, not really.'

'You can't really talk to people in clubs.'

'Well, I was at Klute's the other night...' the man states with an air of pride. 

Cristina quickly turns to Ria, who is witnessing the oddest conversation in history from the commodity of her seat. Elizabeth attentively listens to the man's story.

'I don't understand half of the stuff this guy's saying, Ria.'

'He's crazy, mon,' says the Trinidadian. 

'So you girls don't drink?'

'Once in a while, but don't get drunk.'

'Yeah, it's very expensive.'

'Well, do you smoke?'

'No.'

'No, it's a dirty habit.'

'Do you like to dance?'

'Yeah, sure.'

'I suppose...'

'But you must have some bad habits, right?'

'Hmm...' Elizabeth replies as she begins an intensive search of her memory for a habit that would make her sound less of a normal person and more like a naughty girl.

'No, we don't,' Cristina interposes, losing her patience.

'Ah, well, you are going to make a very fine wife,' the creeper says--exclusively to Elizabeth--as he smiles.

'Oh no...'

'Yikes!'

'Well, tell me, do you have boyfriends?'

'No,' Elizabeth answers bluntly. Cristina, meanwhile, is figuratively hitting her head against a wall in despair because Elizabeth could have totally saved herself from this borderline sexual harassment if only she would have lied and said she has a hot atomic-physicist boyfriend who looks like Mark Ruffalo waiting for her in her flat with a beautiful homemade five-course dinner.

Why does Elizabeth have to be so honest all the time? Cristina doesn't understand this, but she manages to blurt out 'oh no, no boyfriends, we don't have time for that, too much studying, too much.' Cristina cannot take it anymore: the train feels like it's a pot full of water and they are just a bunch of helpless lobsters slowly boiling in misery, regretting all their bad decisions, and thinking of all their loved ones they never said "I love you" to. Is this a terrorist attack? No, but it sure is making everyone as uncomfortable as when they show you that footage of childbirth in Health class or when your supervisor at work audibly farts because he has his headphones on and doesn't realize how loud he's being.

By this point, Cristina has turned to Ria to converse. But the conversation revolves around the eeriness of this whole ten-minute episode. Why did God allow that horrifying man of bad teeth near them tonight? Why was the train so smelly? Why--by Jove--has Adele not released a new album? All these questions assault Cristina as she catches a snippet of conversation that turns her blood cold.

'Yes, I haven't seen my little girl in over six months now!'

'Oh no, why is that?'

'Well, I have been busy taking a class.'

'Oh, what kind of class?'

'It's a class for... err.... management.'

'Oh, that's great! But I don't get it, why would the class prevent you from seeing your daughter?'

'Well...because I can only see my daughter after I've taken it.'

'But, like... I don't get it... why?'

Cristina closes her eyes slowly and sighs. Why, oh why. God Almighty save us all. Please, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. No. 

'Well', the man breathes heavily, defeated, 'a few years ago I had a problem with my ex-wife. Her boyfriend tried to prevent me from seeing my daughter, so I almost beat him to death. I was in jail for four years. This class I have to take is an anger management course.'

 'Oh...' is all Elizabeth can manage to say, after inadvertently pushing the man to make a full confession. Cristina, meanwhile, is regretting not having gone to confession before being murdered by a middle-age British ex-con. But that thought passes quickly to propel her into action: she calls one of her flatmates to have one of them come to the train station to duel with the almost-killer to protect them (or to just come to pick them up). But her flatmate never answers the phone. They are on their own.

At this point, the train has begun stopping. They are in Durham. Time to flee! The man, unfortunately, is also getting off at this stop and motions Elizabeth towards the door. Cristina pretends to be moving right behind them and, when the guy begins walking, grabs Elizabeth and takes her (and Ria) out through the back door of the cart. When they step out into the platform and feel the chill of the mid-March wind, Cristina--with freakishly large fear eyes-- commands the other two to wait until the man walks away. Then they begin the journey home, walking in their high heels as if they were avoiding land mines (they had walked a lot in Newcastle and their ankles were very tired). 

As they stroll along the quiet streets of Durham, Cristina can't help but to sarcastically scoff 'well, that was not creepy at all!'

'What do you mean?' Elizabeth wonders.

'WHAT? That man was hitting on you!'

'No he wasn't. He was just being nice.'

This is what Cristina would have done to the man if she had a phonebook close by.

It was then that Cristina and Ria realized that they should not let Elizabeth near the stove at home and should have 'the talk' with her--you know, the one about not accepting candy or cookies from strangers. 

SO I MET A GUY (?)

Ah yes, the post you have been waiting for! Don't lie--you know it's true, mom.

Alas, if you know anything about me, it is that my life is just not normal, and therefore the words "I met a guy" are not necessarily encouraging, but just an introduction to a tragically hilarious story. This is true, I'm afraid.

The truth is, there has been a guy--a crush, if you wish. Do I talk to him? Well, of course not--what kind of question is that? This is a guy with whom I had one conversation once. Five minutes and he walked away with my heart (yeah, I went there. They call me Lady Corniness). I was struck by his friendly personality, his charm, and just a light about him that seemed like kindness. Mom says he's not handsome but, to me, he's beautiful. He's also American (yes, I realize you were hoping for a Mr. Darcy but you know what--like my friend Elena said: "why would anyone want to marry Mr. Darcy? He is cripplingly shy." He's also super handsome (and stuck-up). Plus, American is a lot more convenient than bringing a British guy back to Texas who won't be able to work or do anything but sit around the house or work in my dad's lawn-mowing business).

I won't go anymore into deets, but you get the picture: silent, unrequited love fo' life. Happy Valentine's Day, ya'll!

Speaking of cripplingly shy: My name is Cristina and I am mentally challenged to talk to a guy I like.

Case and point: the other day I went to the supermarket with my flatmates. As I was browsing the cheese section, I noticed two people from the corner of my eye--a man and a woman. Guess who the man was? YUP. But that's not all. Remember we had just arrived at the store five minutes before. I only had one product in my shopping cart at this point--the centerpiece of my shame. Let me give you a hint: this product made a special appearance on my flight back to Durham after Christmas.

Yes, you guessed it. So as I realized who it was that was looking down at my lovely pack of maxipads, I entered panic mode.

I kept my head down and RAN, RAN FOR MY DEAR LIFE. Then I went through a thousand six hundred and eighty-three aisles and grabbed as much stuff as I needed to cover that which is an atrocity Always™.

Then I resumed my orderly shopping and eventually ran into these people again, but now it was game-on because I had nothing to be ashamed of (except my ridiculous hat that I was still wearing... inside the store).

"Oh, hi!"
"Hey! How are you?"
"Fine, how are you?"
"Ok. Do you live around here?"
"Oh no, I have a flatmate with a car, so when he comes to the store, we all come with him."
"Oh... that's terrible..."
"No, he doesn't mind..."

After a few seconds of awkward silence, he resumed his shopping.

Naturally, the moment it was over, I could think of ten billion things to say: did you go home for the holidays? How was the Polar Vortex? Would you marry me?

But instead, I sounded like a horrible person who uses other people to get rides to stores (which is not entirely untrue--sorry, KK)

So, Happy Valentine's day to me, Queen of Awkwardness, Duchess of Forever Aloneness. Oh, here's something encouraging:

Time Magazine came up with this app that tells you the age you should marry based on how many facebook friends you have that are married and the median age in which they married. According to this sucker, I'm already  two months behind. And here I was thinking that pain at the pit of my stomach was heartburn when all alone it was envy and loneliness.

But, in all seriousness, don't you worry about me. I am very happy in my singlehood. I embrace it fully knowing that it's what's meant to be for the time being. It works out perfectly right now, and I much rather be single that have to settle for someone who won't let me be myself and do things like this:

Besides, God has given me great friends.

AND, well, there's God himself--I love that guy. In the past few weeks the Lord has granted me the gift of feeling in love with Him. Don't get me wrong, I love Him. But the thing about love, as you know, is that it is a choice of the will and it doesn't always feel like butterflies in your stomach. Yet you still love the person and you still care for them and you still want to make them happy and you would not wish for a time in your life when you were without that person.

It's the same with God. I love him, and I would NEVER wish to go back to the time when I seemingly had it all (by the world's standards) but in reality my life was empty because I didn't have him.

You don't understand--when I lost EVERYTHING I thought I had and was left with nothing, He rescued me. He took my hand and He healed my heart, little by little. It was a painful and long process and most of the time I was angry and stubborn about it, but He worked with me nevertheless. And even after all He has done for me I still fight Him and still get mad at Him at times (yes, I am basically the worst person you will ever meet), but I love him--imperfectly and insufficiently, but I do. And sometimes it's rough because you don't feel the love pounding in your chest, but you know it's still there and you hang onto your faith (which is not based in transitory feelings).

But when the Lord gives you the grace to feel in love with him, when you want to write Him poetry and dedicate a love song to Him, the Lover of your heart, then it's a pretty special place to be in, spiritually and emotionally.

So I'm ok. I got the one and only Creator of the universe as my Valentine's date. He is the best and, in truth, is the love of my life. My hope is that one day you may feel that. If you haven't or if you think I am delusional and out of my mind--well, I am, in the best possible way. And I ask you to challenge that "non-existent divinity" to prove to you that He is what your soul has been searching for since you came into being.