Thursday, February 1, 2024: Leah Mueller's "The Other Passenger"

 Leah Mueller's work appears in Rattle, NonBinary Review, Brilliant Flash Fiction, Citron Review, The Spectacle, New Flash Fiction Review, Atticus Review, Your Impossible Voice, etc. She is a 2022 nominee for both Pushcart and Best of the Net. Leah's flash piece, "Land of Eternal Thirst" appears in the 2022 edition of Best Small Fictions. Her two newest books are The Failure of Photography (Garden Party Press, 2023), and Widow's Fire (Alien Buddha Press, 2023). Website: http://www.leahmueller.org.

You don’t like taking the last ferry home to the island. But you whooped it up in Seattle

at the Blue Moon tavern, so you don’t have much choice. If you fail to catch the boat, you’ll

need to take a drunken nap on the dock, car windows rolled up against the rain. The final ferry

leaves at 2:00 AM, and the next doesn’t run until 5:10. You’ve missed that damn boat before.

Longest three hours you ever spent in one place.

You reach the ferry with seconds to spare. The surly dock worker grimaces as he waves

you onto the deck. You park your Volkswagen and press the emergency brake.

No point in staying in the car when you can stroll upstairs for some air. You climb the

metal steps to the passenger floor. The room is spacious, illuminated by harsh, overhead

fluorescent lights that make your eyes water.

A sea of empty seats beckons to you. Most of the island’s inhabitants are home in bed.

Maybe you can snooze a bit before the boat reaches the Vashon dock. It’s only a twenty-minute

ride, but you could use the rest.

You remove your shoes and arrange your legs on the forest-green cushions. As you ease

your body into a reclining position, a man appears out of nowhere. He’s about ten years older

than you, with thick brown hair and a paunchy gut. There’s something peculiar about him, but

you can’t put your finger on it.

The man spots you and makes a beeline in your direction. He smiles, revealing a row of

luminous teeth. Without asking permission, he settles into the seat across from yours. “You look

tired.” His voice is oddly soothing. “Would you like a foot massage?”

Too tipsy to protest, you close your eyes and feel the evening’s beer undulate through

your brain. The stranger takes your right foot in his hands. His fingers are deft and practiced,

moving across the sole as if he had been there before. You detect his strong thumbs digging into

your instep, but the pressure feels good.

Before you can stop yourself, you emit a sigh. The man glides his hands downward. He

pulls gently on each of your toes, allowing his fingers to travel into the spaces between them. A

gentle, pulsating rhythm washes over your body. It seems to match the rocking of the ferry.

You remember reading that a body’s nerves end in the feet. Each pressure point

corresponds to a part of the anatomy. At the time, you thought it sad that feet endure so much

impact, yet receive so little tenderness.

The man lifts your left foot from its place on the cushion. He presses his hands against

your skin, effortlessly melting your tight muscles. You weren’t aware of how tired your feet

were, or how much they hurt. Like a magician, the stranger knows exactly how to get to the heart

of your pain.

With a sudden jolt, the ferry collides with the Vashon dock. Its impact seems even

stronger than usual. The boat has reached its destination, and you only have a couple of minutes

to return to your car.

Despite its familiarity, the impact startles you. Your eyes flutter open. The man is leering

as if you were a plate of food, and he hasn’t eaten for days. Like he could devour your body in

one gulp and come back for seconds.

How could you have been so foolish? You grab your shoes and leap to your feet. The

boat hits the dock again. You place a hand on your seat to steady yourself. Your companion’s

expression becomes mournful, like he’s about to cry. For the first time, you notice his strange

eyes. The irises have little dark streaks in them, like shards of a broken plate.

The stranger lurches forward, and you scuttle in reverse, like a crab. Despite your fear,

you feel like you should be polite. It’s your practiced but ineffectual defense for dealing with

predatory men. “Thanks for the foot massage.” You know how weak and moronic you sound, but

you plow ahead. “I need to head back to my car now. Sorry.”

“Please let me come with you. I don’t have anywhere to go, and I’m far from home.” The

man shuffles towards you, arms outstretched. “I promise not to bother you.”

You can hear the familiar sound of dock workers tying the boat to the terminal’s wooden

beams. In a minute or so, they’ll begin their ritual of ushering cars from the deck. Without

another word, you wheel around, dart across the floor, and head for the stairs. Your bare feet slap

against the metal. One step, two. The descent seems interminable.

Your vehicle waits at the bottom. You jump inside, lock the doors, and gaze nervously

around the deck. No sign of the man. Sighing with relief, you jam your key into the ignition.

Your engine roars to life, and you roll towards the safe expanse of the island. A thicket of pine

trees looms overhead. Vashon has never looked more beautiful.

You’re still haunted by the man’s eyes, however. And his voice. You turn on the radio to

drown out the cadence. In fifteen minutes, you will climb into bed. You’ll try your hardest to

erase the experience, but a tiny smudge will remain.

Eight years later, you’re unhappily married, living in a dilapidated farmhouse at the edge

of Port Orchard. You met your husband at the Blue Moon. Unofficial star of the tavern’s softball

team, he could outdrink anyone in the establishment. Now he rides the Bremerton ferry to a

grueling, low-paying job in Seattle.

Your husband unloads pallets of frozen seafood from incoming ships, then lugs them to

lines of parked semis. He hates every minute of it. The two of you have a bright, happy three-

year-old son. You both focus on him to ignore your dissatisfaction with each other.

Your mother decides to drive from Arizona for a visit, even though she can’t stand rain.

She sits at your kitchen table, smoking cigarettes and guzzling endless cups of coffee. Normally,

this would annoy you, but you’re glad for the company. Like many women of her generation, she

subsists on caffeine and nicotine. The toxic combo acts as a sort of weight-loss plan. Your poor

mother has long been terrified of getting fat and ugly.

You’ve put on quite a few pounds since your pregnancy, but you don’t give a damn.

There’s nothing you love more than eating. Your mother has volunteered to babysit so you can

meet your husband in Seattle for dinner. For the first time in months, the two of you will enjoy a

restaurant meal together. Perhaps you’ll even find something to talk about.

Your mother perches at the edge of her chair, cigarette held aloft like a torch. She lifts her

other forearm and squints at the sunspots. “Hard to believe that men used to come on to me all

the time,” she laments. “When did I become such an old woman?”

You feel quite elderly yourself, even though you’re only thirty-three. “Men don’t come

on to me anymore, either. It’s a relief.” You take a huge gulp from your coffee cup. “A few years

back, a man tried to pick me up on the Vashon ferry. He offered me a foot massage, and

I was too drunk to protest. After rubbing away for ten minutes, he wanted me to take him home. I got

the hell out of there before he had the chance to do anything else. It’s embarrassing to admit I

was ever so idiotic.”

Your mother stubs out her cigarette on the edge of a plate. “How did you manage to

escape?”

“I just ran back to my car. The guy claimed he didn’t have a home. It was the last ferry of

the night, too. I wonder what happened to him.”

Your mother shrugs. “Men like that always figure something out. You’d better leave now

so you don’t miss the boat.” She lights another cigarette and smiles. “The kid will be fine with

me. He’s no problem at all. Have fun.”

You reach the ferry with plenty of time to spare. It’s mid-afternoon, and the boat is half-

empty. After parking the car, you climb the steps to the passenger deck. You look forward to

curling up in a seat and staring at the waves. Hopefully, no one will try to initiate a conversation.

You intend to relish your solitude.

After the boat leaves the dock, you turn away from the window. A man looms above you,

grinning. He looks uncomfortably familiar. You raise your eyes for a closer look. Sure enough,

it’s the lunatic who gave you a foot massage eight years ago. The same person you told your

mother about. How could that be possible?

Somehow, your conversation acted as a psychic tow rope, pulling this maniac in your

direction. You gape at his face, speechless. It’s flush with triumph, like he finally captured you

after a long period of searching.

The man’s pudgy body looks exactly as you remember. He lowers his bulk into the seat

across from yours. “I still want you.” His voice sounds low and hypnotic, like he’s trying to

convince you to lie down on the cushion beside him. “I’m sure you must know that.”

The other passengers are engrossed in their books and newspapers, oblivious to the man’s

presence. Unlike the Vashon boat, the Bremerton ferry takes an hour to reach its destination. You

can’t imagine sitting still that long, listening to this man’s drivel. You’re not a young, stupid

woman anymore. And you’re not drunk. Getting older does have advantages, even though it

sucks to fall apart.

“I guess you found a home after all.” You rise to your feet and turn your back on the

man. “You’ll excuse me now. I’m going to sit somewhere else.”

Without another word, you stride across the floor towards the snack bar. The chairs are

close together, making unwanted conversation impossible. You won’t have a window seat, but

that’s a small price to pay for escape.

You order a cup of coffee and find a seat beside a tiny Formica table. The ferry system

serves cheap, brackish java, but you don’t mind. You take a sip and glance around furtively. No

sign of the man. He has vanished into the ocean of bodies. You won’t see him again.

The boat blasts its horn. You shift in your uncomfortable chair, trying to find a spot that

doesn’t hurt. In an hour, your husband will meet you on the Seattle dock. The two of you will

stroll to one of the overpriced seafood restaurants along the shoreline. You’ll check your wallet

to make sure you can pay for the tab. At least you’ll have an interesting story to tell your

husband. That must count for something.

© 2024 Leah Mueller

(previously published in Nonbinary Review)