OK, one adventure, and miles of sore butt.
(Insert minor rant here for the shapeless yet mysteriously uncomfortable seats on the Amtrak Coast Starlighter (west coast, LA to Seattle). Never, ever decide to travel overnight in Coach on a Saturday night.)
So, recognizing that another moment of agony sitting in one position while trying not to disturb my disturbingly large seatmate would drive me into spasms and very loud screaming, I took the opportunity of said seatmate’s bathroom break to get up and go to the lounge car.
Where I could at least move around and/or sit on chairs that, while smaller, were nevertheless more comfortable. Downstairs in the lounge car is the snack bar and some restaurant-style tables and banquette seats. I sat around down there until the snack bar closed (midnight). A moment later, realizing I was the only one down there, and noticing that in the back were a couple of very long banquettes facing sideways, on which it would be possible to lie down and stretch out. Ahhhh, sweet relief. Not very sleepy yet, and they don’t turn down the lights, but I could have lain there all night. If only.
15 minutes into this idyll of restfulness, I hear steps coming down, followed by a murmur of disappointment. But the murmur dies down and the steps go back up. I drift back into semi-somnolence.
A few more minutes go by, more steps down the stairs, but no voices. Two people, whose youthful legs I can see under the table, pass by and go into a room at the end of the corridor that I hadn’t noticed before. The door slams, about two feet away from my head, still lying down on the banquette. I look up and see the sign next to the door of this room:
Restroom.
Oh, I thinks to myself, what could two young people be doing in a bathroom in the middle of the night on a train. What, indeed. I didn’t hear anything. At first. And then . . .
OK, you’re way ahead of me. “Oh, oh, mmh, oh, yes, baby, oh baby, oh, harder (many rhythmic slaps of flesh against other flesh), harder, oh, oh, no wait wait, oh oh, yes” et cetera. I’m still laying there, wondering why I didn’t feel any prurient interest in this real life porno movie playing itself out just inches from my ears.
At first I’m thinking I’ll wait them out, let them leave and pretend to have been asleep the whole time, just because I don’t want to get up and lose this precious long soft place to lie down. But after several minutes of the above, my embarrassment surpasses even my inertia, so I get up and go back upstairs, to wait them out in the lounge. I wait about 45 minutes, and since I had seated myself specifically so I couldn’t see them when they left (I told you I was embarrassed!) I quietly walked back downstairs. No sounds, no people apparent. So I lay back down, prepare to snooze, when what to my wondering nostrils should appear but the lovely smell of high quality skunkweed. I guess sex wasn’t enough, they had to spend the next ::two hours:: smoking dope in there. I know that because I went back upstairs, and then saw them when they finally came up.
I went back down a bit later to try to sleep, but the magic was gone. I was no longer able to even close my eyes on that banquette seat. I managed to curl up somewhere upstairs and doze off for the next two hours until dawn.
So there is a lesson here. If you are on an Amtrak train, with your sweetie, or you meet someone interesting, there is one place you can try to carry on your tryst - the bathroom in the lower level of the lounge car. You won’t be bothering anyone, really.
The other lesson is that I’m apparently not the dirty old man I thought I was. Hm.
Roddy