The D Train

Esmé Goldman (she/her)

It had been almost three years since I had been in New York City. I had matured a lot physically and mentally, and like the rest of the world had gone through the upheaval of a global pandemic. I had started High School, not knowing who the fuck I was, and never getting the chance to even see my whole class in person for the entirety of my Freshman year. The last time I had been in New York, I was a dorky seventh-grader, obsessed with Musical Theater and cheap Forever 21 skincare. But this New York was different. Different than when I had last been there, and way different from when I last lived there. The streets weren't as lively as I had remembered, the smell of the sewage not as pungent. But the important things were the same. The people were the same. Friends of my parents, rushed over to embrace me in front of Saks Fifth Avenue, with big smoker smiles. Kids who I had grown up with, from Brooklyn and the edges of the other boroughs sat awkwardly across from me at family dinners. And Stephanie. My close friend since I was a baby, one of circumstance, as our parents were best friends, but one of deep love. Whenever we saw each other, once or if we were lucky, twice a year, it was back to how it always was. Squeals and hugs and whispers about our lives. Stories about people that the other didn't know, and would never come to know. 

During this particular trip, July 2021, was her birthday. A Cancer/Leo cusp, and a fitting one at that, she had planned to invite a bunch of her friends over to go to the beach and a concert in the park later. A multitude of girls I had only ever heard about in the stories she had told me. I was ardent to see them, they were almost gods to me, a fictional creation of humans that I had only ever heard of in Stephanie’s voice. In Stephanie’s blasé way, she had messaged the other girls craftily. Not to make them feel too much pressure to show, but to make it seem like an activity that they had no business missing out on. But an hour later, she came to me, teary-eyed. 

“None of them can come.”

She had replied casually, she didn't want them to think that they had hurt her. But her desire to please led to a birthday party for two.

“Steph, we can still do it, we should still go.”

She shook her head. What was the point of going if it wasn't a party? Unexpectedly, an equally blonde head of hair, with a similar sweet smile, poked her head in.

“Hey Stephanie, you and Esmé should still go! I can get you guys a reservation Faun?”

Faun was a hot Italian restaurant in Prospect Heights, close to the park where the impromptu concert was being held. Stephanie still seemed defeated.

“C’mon, Steph, it’ll be fun!”

And so Stephanie led me to a bodega right by her Brooklyn apartment complex, far enough as to where she wouldn't get caught, but close enough as to where we could take the D straight to Coney Island. Stephanie knew the owner of the bodega. She told me to follow her lead. She picked up a six-pack of Corona Beer and put it on the counter. Not knowing what I should choose, I grabbed a Mike's “Harder” Lemonade, the biggest and most colorful drink in the room. She paid in cash, and when it got to me, I pointed my shaky finger at the pack of Parliaments stacked on the wall behind the man. He nodded, and grabbed it for me, calculating my total. 

We left the bodega, a newfound excitement in our step. We crammed everything into our beach bags and went back to her apartment to put on bathing suits. I wore a neon green bathing suit and put a short skirt and pink tank top over it. I had just recently pierced my septum a month before and I had a mixed black and silver nose ring that I had hidden from my parents but got to let free as we were getting ready in her bedroom. After that, we walked down to the subway station and took the train to Coney. We were one of few sizeable groups on the train, eager to decompress on the beaches. The D stopped in Brighton Beach, yards away from Coney. We found a perfect spot, in between the two, a nook in time.

We sprawled our bags and our bodies onto the warm sand, the beers clattering in the pack. We smiled at each other. We could do anything we wanted to. Across from us, two little girls and their mother were making a sandcastle. The two girls looked almost identical, complete with matching swimsuits, though one was a little bit taller. They grinned at us as they flung sand at each other playfully. We beamed back. Stephanie yanked the drinks out of her bag. A grin took over my face again. Stephanie didn't care, so why should I? We were the city, and we were summer. We were the faint smell of boiling garbage under the daylight, we were the sound of radios turned up too loud to irritate the neighbors, and we were the taste of cream cheese on a poppy seed bagel at 8 AM on a Monday morning. 

As I sipped on the vodka-sweet lemonade, Stephanie, beer in hand, waved over a man. At a closer glimpse, the man carried a cooler. He was shouting something unheard to me, but Stephanie heard him loud and clear.

“A Sangria, please! Thank you!” Stephanie beamed and passed him a five-dollar bill.

He pulled out a plastic bag, filled with a yellowy liquid with pineapples at the base. The man had dissipated before Stephanie sipped blindly at the drink.

“Can I try?”

She nodded, and I grabbed the bag from her, sipping slowly.

“That's not Sangria, is it?” I asked.

“No.”

“Should you give it back to him, ask for a Sangria?”

Stephanie chuckled, reclining back and taking another sip of the mysterious drink.

“It’s a Pina Colada. I like Pina Coladas.”

It was a summer convention in New York, or maybe just a beach thing in New York.  There’ll always be a man with a cooler giving out Sangrias or Pina Coladas disguised as Sangrias, and they will always taste as sweet as your first breath of air. 

I didn’t know how long had passed at this point, possibly a minute or perhaps an hour. All I knew was that the girls and their mom were still sitting across from us, playing with the sand. 

“Do you want to go into the water?”

I nodded. Stephanie turned to the mother and daughters, asking them if they would protect our things. The mother agreed as the two girls squabbled over a pail. Stephanie guided me into the ocean, gripping my hand tightly. I could scarcely keep up with her stride, but she dragged me along, expectantly. We were abruptly chest-deep in water. The shore was far, but the rest of the Atlantic was farther. 

My body began to shake with laughter. I couldn't contain myself. It pealed out like a cyclone stalking a coastal town. Stephanie raised her eyebrows.

“Are you ok, Esmé?’

As I regained composure, I whispered to Stephanie.

“I just peed in the ocean.”

Now it was both of us failing to stand up straight. Stephanie opened her eyes widely.

“Me too.”

And as her white-blonde hair shone in the sun, our laughter echoing in my ears, I realized how happy I was. 

“I love you, Steph.” 

Stephanie smiled back. She was my influence, she was my idol. I knew her before she was born, as my parents held me in their arms while they observed her mother’s growing belly. She introduced me to Hairspray, and to RuPaul’s Drag Race. Our deep obsessions grew together, and whenever I was in New York or she was in Los Angeles, we would spend hours obsessing. She would always be a big part of my identity, even if we continued to live across the country forever. And to that, I would forever be grateful.

“I love you too, Es.”

We raced back to the shore, her winning as always. The little girls giggled as we fell to the sand, Stephanie grabbing something shiny from her bag.

“Jewels!” She exclaimed.

Stephanie put them on her chest, like a makeshift necklace. I beamed as the two little girls approached. I accepted the jewels from Stephanie’s outreached hands and applied them to my own chest. 

“Here!” Stephanie pulled out another pack of gems.

She split the sheet in two.

“You guys can put this on your face, like this.”

Stephanie took some of her own jewels and applied them to her forehead. The girls watched with amazement. When we left, the girls waved to us, the fragments of shiny plastic still clung to their heads.

The train ride back to Prospect was much longer than the ride there. Our eyes were both droopy, and we took turns resting and keeping our eyes open for our subsequent stop. Between the two of us, we looked perfectly at home on the D train. I, in a neon green bikini, lazily covered with a miniskirt and jewels on my chest, my wiry damp hair trickling onto my skirt. And Stephanie, in a sheer pink dress, the intense leopard print bikini of hers peeking through the sides, two delicate necklaces layered on. When we reached Faun, I half expected us to get turned down. But the two wet and intoxicated teenage girls were permitted to stay. And so we stayed. We both ordered the penne pasta. It tasted like paradise. We both decided it was the best penne we had ever had and no penne would ever be better. Our feet dead, and our senses following suit, we paced our way to the neighboring park.

Stephanie still had a couple of beers left, and I hadn't smoked a single cigarette. The night was young, and it was slowly getting darker. The teenagers of Brooklyn had crawled out of their bedrooms to see their local counterparts play. No one but a few drunks and locals walking their dogs were in the expansive park, as the shaggy-haired teens picked at their guitars and hurled out a tune. It was a community and one that I got to be a part of for one night. Three different girls in fishnets bummed a cigarette off of me. I was delighted. I couldn't find Stephanie. Where was Stephanie? Her blonde bob was common in the large crowd. Feverishly, I saw the tail end of her pink slip across the park. I ran towards the spot she was sitting in, to my friend. 

She was sitting by a monument of an old white man, her back up against the pedestal. I heard the whisperings of a song, as I sat down next to her quietly.

“When Do I Get To Sing ‘My Way’?” The crooning voice asked.

The sounds of a band that had bonded us lulled me. 

“Are you okay, Steph?” I asked, quietly.

“Yeah. Just wanted to look at the sky. It’s quite beautiful, looking up, isn't it?”

I laid back and looked up to the sky. I conceded. This is exactly what I want every single summer to be like for the rest of my life.