I hate when girls cry. (a short story)

I Hate When Girls Cry

By: Teya Donna

The doors crushed my navy blue Jansport backpack as I raced into the train, I yanked my backpack a few times, but it would not budge. Sweat formed on my forehead and I waited for the doors to open, the train could not start moving until they closed. The doors did not open, and I swung my arms out of the bag’s straps, rolled up my sleeves and yanked the bag out between the alligator jawed doors. They closed, and I turned to face my audience. An old woman with a nasty glare put her nose up at me, she clearly disapproved of my fight with the doors. A young emo guy bobbed his head to his screaming music and gave me a thumbs up, I smirked. A blonde-haired cutie looked quickly back down at her book avoiding my gaze. I thought about sitting next to her and starting a conversation, “That was a close one eh?” She would probably roll her eyes and go back to her book, girls were so snotty these days. Lastly, there was a young woman to my right, crouched in a two-seater, looking out the window and wiping her eyes. The audience was sparse, considering it was nearly midnight on a Tuesday, most normal people were home at this hour. I plopped down across from the emo kid and tossed my bag beside me.

My stomach growled reminding me of the dinner that I did not have, left cold on a plate in Jackastors. A burger with fries and gravy, untouched, the smell lingering in my nose, causing me to salivate. I should have gotten a bag to go, but that would mean staying, and staying was not an option. To sit in silent tension, to sit and look back at her watery eyes, I would rather starve. The burgers and fries were replaced in my mind with the image of Joanie crying. Her round chestnut eyes turned red and her face stern, she was a demon looking back at me. Her red eyes stared at me intending to laser me in half. I could not stay a minute after that, I threw down 40 bucks and sped walk out of there. I did not stop my quick pace until now, I did not even look over my shoulder in case she was lurking behind me with her dotty red eyes.

“You told me you loved me.” The sentence she repeated three times tonight, looking for an adequate response. Some declaration of how I did, or I do, or the ‘its not you its me’. The first time she said that sentence, I said I felt pressured to tell her that I loved her, she had told me she loved me after a quickie in her parent’s upstairs bathroom, and I foolishly let it slip. The second time she said it, harsher “You said that you loved me,” I reminded her that I felt compelled to say it back, and the last time she said it, I just shrugged and looked down at my watch. That was the wrong thing to do, she started crying then, and I began a staring contest with my watch.

I hated when girls cried. What was I to do? She started talking about ridiculous things like apartment hunting together and how her friend Karrie got married in Jamaica over the summer which was a dream that she always had. Six months we were acquainted, and she was talking about dream weddings? I had not even stayed at a job that long without getting bored, how could she know she wanted to live with me? She was a very pretty girl, dark smooth skin I liked stroking, curious eyes that kept me questioning every action or word I said, and strong pronounced pink lips that my lips got lost in every time we kissed. Her hair crowned her head in what she called a “kinky fro” and begged attention. She begged attention, she was slender and stood a foot taller than me, which never seemed a problem for either of us, except when she insisted on wearing heels.

“Why do you care so much Jayden? You are a confident man, or you wouldn’t have approached me.”

I couldn’t argue that, a compliment always strengthened my ego. And she wasn’t wrong, I approached her at Everleigh nightclub, here in Toronto, while she stood tall in high heels surrounded by her disapproving girls. My confidence never faltered even when she made me wait all night for her number. I waited, pretending to be patient, and I was rewarded with a 10-digit number that would eventually result in tonight. I grabbed my phone out of my pocket and searched her name, sliding my thumb across her number, I hit delete. Done and done. As I was putting my phone back in my pocket I heard a sniffle to my right, the young girl who was in the two-seater, was wiping her eyes again. She was looking out the window of black movement, only the left side of her pale face was visible, but I was sure she was crying. The tear slid down her cheek, and she wiped it away quickly. Then she turned towards me and I looked away, still watching from the corner of my eye. She opened her bright turquoise purse and pulled out a tissue, then she wiped the tissue across both eyes and tossed it back in her bag, looking back out the window. I turned to her now, and took her all in. She was so colourful, wearing dark blue tights, with mustard yellow knee-high wool socks, a red long corduroy coat and a large dark orange scarf. It fascinated me that she decided this look was a good decision. I pictured her looking in the mirror in her studio apartment, paint stained floors cluttered with unfinished artwork, and approving this look. Was she trying to wear every colour of the rainbow in some self professing goal? Or was she simply begging for attention? Maybe she was one of those girls who wanted to be trendy and had a “fashion blog” where the underlying message was to “Just Be You.” I wanted to laugh at my own joke but instead I just smiled without meaning to. I looked back in front of me and the emo whose face was practically hidden in his dark long unkept hair winked at me.

I looked down at my watch, it was 12:10 am and I had about 10 more stops till Shepperd West Station, my stomach groaned in anger with impatience. Joanie would have had a granola bar or a Ziploc bag full of mixed nuts in her purse, that she would pull out while mumbling how I need to take better care of myself. I would tell her I took care of myself just fine but would still eat the granola bar in two bites, thankful I could count on her. Joanie was the reason I was in this mess, starving at 12am on a Tuesday, going home to an almost empty fridge, where I would have to get creative in making a meal. I could have been full and satisfied with my burger and fries with gravy, then we would go back to her house, I would lay on her couch while she sat on the floor in front of me, making me watch that horrible reality TV show ‘Love and Hip Hop’, as she argued with every decision every person made. Her roaring laugh would fill the room and I would fall asleep with my hand in her soft coconut smelling hair. But Joanie had to ruin everything by asking me about Donte’s bachelor party, asking me about strippers, and then turning the night into a God damn interview about my intentions with her. All this just before our meals arrived when I just wanted to eat and not have her grill me on how many women I have slept with. It just became a series of ongoing questions about who I was and who I wanted to be with her and I didn’t even know if I wanted to be with her. I mean fully with her, and then she brought up “our love” and that was it for me.

“This isn’t working for me.” There I said it, it shot out of me like an arrow and caught her right in the chest. She clenched her chest with her fist, her pink plump lips hung open, and then her chestnut eyes turned red. I felt my fist clench on my lap as that image popped in my head, and I released it, watching the redness spread back into my palm.

The sniffles caught my attention again, the girl to my right buried her head in her purse looking for something, a tissue emerged a few seconds later. I hated when girls cried. Her dark chin length hair fell over her face as she dapped at her eyes and when she looked back up, she locked eyes with me. I don’t know why I did not look away, maybe it was because her eyes reminded me of Joanie’s, red and swollen. The train stopped, the doors opened, and a couple came on. She bowered her eyebrows at me and pushed her large purse close to her chest and looked back out the window. I wondered why she was crying alone on the train at 12 am on a Tuesday. A heap of possibilities crossed my mind, did she just lose someone close to her? Did she just get fired from her dream job? Did her boyfriend of 10 years just break her heart? Or was it just that time of the month, when girls were unreasonably emotional?

The girl’s dark hair and red swollen eyes reminded me of the first time I made my mom cry. She was sitting down drinking her morning coffee, and I had come home past my 9 o’clock curfew the night before. I think I stayed out till 1 or 2 in the morning. I was 14 and my mother was very upset. She wasn’t speaking to me, which was how I knew just how upset she was. Normally I would be greeted with a loud “Good morning honey, eggs or pancakes this morning?” in her sing song voice. I was her little boy, her only child, her pride and joy, as they call it. That morning I walked into the kitchen and she just sipped her coffee, ate her usual toast and deviled eggs and said nothing. I poured myself some cereal and sat down across from her, my head spinning, from the contents the night before. I could barely eat my cereal because the nausea was too strong, I gave up trying and pushed my bowl back, moaning.

“A grown man like you should be able to handle a hangover.” She said condescendingly.

I crossed my arms, “Whatever.”

“Whatever? Are you a grown man or not?” she snapped back loudly.

“Fuck you mom!” I shot back. The first time, but not the last, that I would lash out on her. There was no ‘Man of the house’ and I felt like she was testing me on whether or not that would ever be me. I felt like she was stabbing the wound left by an absent father. And I snapped. She gasped, and put down her cup. I stared down at my soggy cereal and then I heard her sniffle. Looking up I seen the tears fall down her cheek and my anger evaporated. I shot up, almost falling over from my dizziness, and ran upstairs. I could not watch her cry, and I was sure I was going to throw up. I slept off the hangover and when I met her again downstairs for dinner she had made me lasagna. We did not speak of that morning, and maybe that’s why it kept happening. Until I went off to college, where I only spoke to her through text messages and a few 5-minute phone calls.

The girl to my right had a tissue to her eyes again, and she patted her face softly before putting it back into her purse. I looked at the emo guy, but he was bobbing his head so hard we could not lock eyes again. The couple who had gotten on earlier, who sat in a two sweater on the opposite side of the train, were too occupied in each other’s eyes to notice the crying girl. I felt bad that she was sitting alone crying. And I felt like an idiot for leaving Joanie to do the same thing. It was not the first time I had done that.

The first girlfriend I had made cry was in high school. We had been dating for 3 months before I grew completely tired of her nasally voice and conversations about what we were going to do after graduation. So, I dumped her, through text. It seemed like the easiest way to do it, I knew how girls could over react sometimes and I had no patience for it. The text I sent was straight and to the point but in my opinion not nasty or harsh,

Kara, I am no longer interested in this relationship, and I think it best if we go our separate ways. Prom is in a few weeks and I thought I should end it now, so you would have time to find a new prom date. All the best to you.

I thought it was a generous way to end the relationship, she however, did not agree. The next day she cornered me in the hall way, her face soaked with tears and her eyes a soft pink,

“You’re a piece of shit! Breaking up with me over a text? You can’t even do it to my face?” She shouted ignoring the gang of eyes on us.

I was stunned, and I could not meet her wet pink eyes. I looked down at my shoes and did not say anything.

“You have nothing to say? Really Jayden? You think you are so cool because you got that basketball scholarship, but you are nothing but a creep!” She screamed, and the hallway became a soundtrack of “damn” and “oohs” and “ahhs,” until Mr. Davis rushed everyone off to class. She stormed away, and I stood there replaying the text message in my head. I guess it was a bad idea.

The train started to smell like left over Chinese food, reminding me of many nights of drunk eating and thrown-up stained toilets. It made my stomach turn and the nausea fill all my senses. Just 6 more stops to go. The young man who sat one seat away from the emo guy, was chowing down on his noodles, they sat on his chin and fell on his shirt. I was annoyed and envious. Joanie would never let me eat my food like that, she said that it was disgusting, and it made her stomach flip-flop. I had to eat slower and chew with my mouth closed whenever I was around her to avoid her usual moan, or comment,

“Can’t you pretend to be a gentleman?”

“What in the world ever made you think I wanted to be a gentleman?”

“I can see it in you.” She would say with confidence.

I never understood what she meant when she said she could ‘see things in me’, I was just me. I had nothing hiding or lurking, waiting to come out at the right moment, or the right time. I was exactly who I was right off the bat, at face value. Something my college girlfriend made me so aware of, as if it were a bad thing. She said I was one dimensional, and I told her to go to the movies if she was looking for something 3D.

“There you go again, just making a joke out of a serious situation like you always do because you never take anything I say seriously, you no that Jayden, you never take-” and it carried on like that while I slid out of her apartment as she started crying.

The girl to my right had unwrapped her big scarf and buried her head into it. This caused me alarm, was she about to go full on sob mode? No one else was watching her and I suddenly felt the urge to go to her. To go to her and do what? I could ask her if she was okay. If she needed assistance? Assistance? Who was I kidding, I was not going to approach her. I hated when girls cried. It made me feel uneasy, uncomfortable, and guilty. I felt like I was more powerful than I wanted to be. To have the power to make someone so upset, or so angry, that they let tears fall down their face…for me? I did not want that power, I hated it. The girl lifted her head from her scarf, her eyes were still watery, and the guilt grew in me. We were arriving at Wilson station; my station was next, and I felt like I was running out of time. I did not know why I had this feeling, but I suddenly felt compelled with urgency to do the right thing. I almost got up from my seat and then changed my mind, what in the world was I doing? I left my girlfriend, crying in a restaurant less than an hour ago and here I was concerned with a random girl crying on the train. Sitting here feeling guilty about tears I did not summon. But I could not stop the growing stubborn feeling of just making sure she was okay.

Joanie’s death red eyes stained my mind and I looked directly at the crying girl to fight the image. The rainbow clothed, pale, sniffling girl, looked like she was in need of support. Someone to make sure she was okay. It was the gentleman thing to do, and although that was not me, I felt like I could pretend for a few moments. Joanie would tell me it was the right thing to do. “A girl should not cry alone”, she might say. I might say I was finally becoming the person she seen in me, by assisting a girl on the train who was in distress. She might say I was worth a second look after all. She might say she was proud of me for doing the right thing. The girl brought the tissue back to her eyes and started to wipe away again. This was my moment; Sheppard West station was next, and my heart beat was racing from the approaching time. Tonight, I left a girl crying at dinner, after she told me she loved me, I ran away and did not turn back. I could not redeem that action, but I could at least go home tonight to an empty fridge with some dignity. I am sure the girl would be thankful for my concern. She may even get off at Sheppard West and I could make sure she got home safe. I may even get her name, her story, and her number. Her first impression of me, may be that I am a gentleman, and I could pretend for awhile.

“Remember that night when I was crying on the train, a total wreck, and you asked me if I was okay? Remember what a mess I was, and you still approached me and offered to walk me home. It was the sweetest thing anyone had ever done.” I can see her saying that a few months in, as we sat in her apartment, amongst friends, talking about the night we met. I cleared that from my mind, as I made up my decision to face the demon, the crying red eyes. I got up and made my way over to her, she clutched her purse again, but I ignored that and sat down on the seat across from her.

“Hey uh, sorry to bother you miss, I just wanted to make sure you were okay?” Her lashes were wet making them stick together, long and tangled, “I was sitting over there contemplating for awhile, but I finally decided, well because my stop is next, that I should make sure you are okay. You have been sitting here crying for my entire trip and I just thought it was the right thing to do. Sorry I’m being rude, I’m Jayden, and I do not mean to intrude I just think a girl should not cry alone ya no? If there is anything I could do to help, just tell me-” I could not shut up. I noticed the people on the train were watching, the emo guy had his headphones off to listen, and she just stared at me. Her red stained eyes looked amused and her highbrows raised up, creasing her forehead, “You just look so sad and I started to worry, you never know these days, with people, what sadness can do to a person, and I would not feel right if I did not at least ask you if you were okay. A girl should not cry alone, I always say and I…”

“Um.” She softly interrupted.

I kept going. “…consider myself to be a gentleman, and no one else was doing anything to assist you so I manned up and here I am, so are you…”

“Hey.” she said a bit louder.

“…okay?”

“Dude. I am not crying,” her red eyes darted through me and a snake of a smile slid across her face, “It’s just allergies.”