At 9:37 pm, November 12, 2021 on State and 18th in Chicago, Illinois, a body tumbled down from the sky and no one saw.
I was on the train, sitting in my favorite seat with my headphones on. The red line loops around downtown so in those days I would get on where I got off each night to be a stranger somewhere else (I guess I thought my sadness might change if the backdrop did. Still every song droned the same tune: This is not the right city. You are not the right man).
I was staring out of the window with my coat buttoned up to my chin, fiddling with the empty wrapper in my pocket when I saw it, just like that, clear as day, a twirling ray of light and then a splash, right into the Chicago River. I gasped and looked for reactions in the other passengers: a woman bouncing a child on her lap, a man speaking Polish on the phone, a group of teenagers giggling, a lady leaning on a sturdy shoulder. “Did you see that?” I thought I said it out loud but there was no reply.
I got off when the doors opened and ran towards the Riverwalk. I weaved like a shadow through full-bellied crowds who took up whole sections of sidewalk in their twos and threes.
When I got to it the body was small enough to fit in my hands, but it rose as if possessed in front of me, not a drop of nasty river water to drag it down, I swear it. Face-to-face over the barrier, I was agape. And then there was a warmth, then a sharp pain in the back of the neck, then a feeling of solidity, like I had swallowed the dull ground. I always heard the wind, but there was music this time. The being’s skin pulsed like an invitation and I reached out to it, but it jerked away at the last moment. I touched my own face instead and it was wet with tears.
Then there was a chase, and it beckoned me, weightless on its wings, through the howling city. If we were noticed then no one made any indication. Breathless I dove through tunnels, toll booths and parking structures until the mouth of Lake Michigan gnashed at my feet. Over the water my creature delicately flew, then looked at me to follow. “I can’t go any farther! I would freeze! I would drown!” was my plea, but it only frowned and came no closer. So there we stood, transfixed, as the cargo ships bejeweled the horizon and the clouds wove a ceiling enclosing us. How long we stayed like that I do not know, but the light of its body glowed so warm, so heavenly, I soon found myself undressed, numb to the fingertips, and ready to be enveloped by the inland sea.
If my eyes were closed, it was gone before I opened them. That was all—no blinding flash, no whooshing sound, no gentle caress. For a moment I waited. Then in darkness I collected my clothes, save for my coat which had been fed to the water. I went straight to the station and let every car, delivery bike, and midwesterner pass on through me. At the apartment I washed up quietly to not wake my roommate, and then I went to bed. I don’t remember what I dreamed about.
I will confess I returned to that place one time only, years later with my own honey. We were Californians and I had gotten a receptionist job that kept my nights occupied and a car that brought me place to place. She had never been to Chicago before, and I chose an unusually warm week in March to make my return.
When we held hands down the sidewalk no pedestrian could overtake us. And when we jaywalked on Wabash, cars honked and braked for us. We had lunch on the river and the waiter smiled at us with all his teeth. The tour boats scored our afternoon walk with music from a confident age.
I wish I could say I happened upon it accidentally, but it was a detour we took. I stood at the edge there again, taming the waves this time. I searched for evidence—a button, a wrapper, a shimmer maybe—some wink from the universe. For a second I thought I saw something but it was just a seagull.
She came up behind me and asked what I was looking for. “Nothing,” I said, but I was crying again, I don’t know why.
Then she asked if we could go to the museum now, so I kissed her head and went to hail a cab. I looked back just once.▲
