cupid is a straphanger
i will live a thousand years and love a thousand men and i will never understand the rules of attraction. what mystic force determines the subtle nuances between the moment you want to simply stand closer to someone and the moment you decide you want to rip their clothes off? what is it about the slightest hand gesture from a stranger in a cafe or on the street that makes it impossible to pry your eyes away?
yesterday i stood on the subway with a casual friend, having invited him down to a concert in the village. the downtown N was unusually crowded, consummate new yorkers suddenly thrown into tourist-mode by the recent subway changes. we held on to the same pole in an airless corner of the car and had an easy conversation about sailing. suddenly the train jerked and a wizened little woman shoved me out of her way and into my friend’s shoulder.
i straightened up and smiled, and listened to him continue talking. but by then, i was close enough to notice the way his shirt collar was crooked, to notice the curl of the hair tucked behind his ear. but more than that, there was a smell. a distinctive smell that never fails to make me just the slightest bit lightheaded… soap and cigarettes. not cologne, not laundry detergent, not hair product or incense or any of the other million ways a man’s smell can attract a woman. nothing draws me more than the smell of soap and camel lights. and he had it. clean skin and cigarettes. it reminded me of mornings, of post-shower sex, of holding hands in the front seat of a car in winter, of wearing his sweaters. soap and cigarettes is like intimacy and desire. there i stood, still chatting with him, but my mind had gone somewhere else completely. a million things that had never happened between him and i flashed through my mind and knocked the wind out of me, like the grinding movement of the subway itself.
usually the michievous god of romance is depicted shooting arrows. but it seems that in the big apple, when cupid snaps his fingers, trains jerk and a crush is born.

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