Right as I reached the top of the train platform on Friday, I heard, “You look out of breath. What’s your name? I’m Chris.”
I looked up and, as I suspected, it was my oddball train companion.
“Hi, how’s it going?” I must have given him a weird look because he said, “Wait, have we met before? I’m sorry if I don’t remember.”
As the train pulled up, I replied, “Yes, we’ve met a few times. I’m Blair.”
“Oh great,” he said, “than that means you already have my email. Have you tried to email me yet? Because if you have, I probably didn’t get it because I’ve been having email problems. So you might want to send it again.”
Me: “No, I haven’t emailed you yet, but thanks for the heads up.”
As usual, he stood about a foot in front of me on the train, facing me.
“So, what do you do for a job?” he asked. He’s never really asked anything about me, other than if I wanted to hang out, so this took me a bit off guard. How much is safe to reveal to someone who seems harmless but could very well be carrying a severed human head in his bag?
“I work in public relations. You know, like publicity.” Blank stare.
I thought for a minute and said, “Like, if you read a newspaper article and there is a person in there talking about something. I’m the one who gets that person interviewed for the story.” Blank stare.
He thought for a while and slowly began, “So….I’m a filmmaker. I just haven’t made a film yet. I’m trying to get funding from social security disability. If that doesn’t work, I guess I’ll have to get a Hollywood studio to fund my film because I’m going to need a lot of awesome special effects. And then that means I’ll have to move out to Los Angeles. The reason I’m saying this is because I’ll need an agent and a publicist. And I’d like you to be my publicist.”
Blank stare. Only this time from me.
