On his way to the office, Vernon would stop by the newspaper stand to visit with Rosie.
Rosie, a plump British woman, always asked Vernon how he was keepin' with an accent that made Vernon think she really meant it. She came across, at least to Vernon, as very appropriate for her job. She stood behind, or beside her newspaper stand, in her floral shift dresses that she always wore, warmly asking folk about their day, and suggesting what paper or magazine they may enjoy. Rosie always kept business and accounting magazines aside for Vernon, because (Vernon suspected) she felt he was rather special.
Vernon liked to have special visits with Rosie, but preferred this at the end of his day. At eight o' five am, he had only just ejaculated down Jane's throat less than an hour before, and even Vernon needed a little more time to gather his ... thoughts.
Paper in hand, Vernon blended into the crowd, his fawn trench coat, buttoned and buckled carefully over his navy suit, and red tie. Sometimes he wore a cap (hound's-tooth), if it were cold, and a fawn colour scarf. However, even in the heat of summer, Vernon wore his trench outside. He just didn't trust the train with his well dry-cleaned suits.
Vernon bustled, anonymous in the crowd, to the train. The crowds at eight fifteen (exactly) were heavy. Women and men of many ages clustered together like bunches of irrevocably entwined cherries, jostling their way on to the trains off the platform, swaying precariously as each body depended on those around it for support. It was the same every day. The shoving crowds vied for room on each and every overcrowded, hot sweaty train.
And very often, opportunities presented themselves to Vernon.
On this particular day, he stood on the hot underground platform, inhaling the coal smelling air, keeping his eye on the clock that hung over the platform that informed him he was on schedule. Usually, under these circumstances, Vernon could feel a woman breasts pressing into his back, or feel an ass press in against his own. Vernon always ignored these approaches, assuming they were part of the normal hustle of the busy crowd trying to get to work.
It simply never occurred to Vernon that not all men had these experiences. He assumed subtlety and social convention meant polite people didn't discuss it, and for Vernon, this was appropriate.
The rough tin foil train arrived, and its rumbling, quaking doors opened, spilling a wave of people out of it and into the waiting crowd. Somehow, against all odds, people made room for the folk alighting. However, tension remained in the air, as each person braced themselves for the forward thrust, as the last of the exists were complete and the new travellers had a chance to hop on the train.
As soon as the final person got off, the flood pressed forward, and Vernon felt swept, just like every other morning, in the tidal wave of commuters, onto the train, filing it to standing room only.
Vernon found himself, on this day, thrust down a set of small stairs to a heavily packed lower half of the carriage. As soon as he hit the bottom of the stairs, he belted into a large woman, her breast flesh giving under the pressure of his hand that clutched his brief case to his chest. He looked up in horror at her eyes, to find her staring at him with surprise, the faintest hint of a smile about her lips. As Vernon felt her nipple harden, he pulled away, as best he could, and turned to face the stairs.
However, a man in a darker blue suit stood on the bottom step, and his lower back, pressed firmly into Vernon's face prevented any chance of Vernon moving up the stairs. Wriggling to his left, Vernon peered around the man to see that bodies were completely filling and blocking the stairs, providing no where to move beyond where he stood.
Behind him, the fleshy, wheezing woman inched her way forward to lean into his back, and in front the immovable rigidity of the man's back wedged Vernon into a kind of rock and hard place.
As soon as the train began to move, it's first lurch propelled Vernon to his left, and the intensity of the squeeze he was in, slid him out from his hard place and almost into the lap of an angry woman who sat to his left, trying to read her paper in the cramped space. So as not to fall on to her again, Vernon reached past the man in front, while staying where he was, and grasped a little ways up the side rail on the steps, providing him with some clinging stability as the train rocketed toward his destination.
Vernon had a twenty-minute trip in this position. He couldn't actually see his hand. He couldn't see past the man's back, but he wasn't going to let go of that rail for anything in the world.
Vernon looked out the window. The black tunnel outside, gave the window the characteristics of a mirror. Vernon looked at everyone cramped into the train and thought, that this was just the way things were. Even though it was cramped and difficult, it was pleasant to know they were all in this together.
And then, Vernon felt something else rather pleasant.
His hand, the one on the rail, had soft, warm skin against it. At first, it felt like velvet, as though it were someone's velvet trousers. However, soon Vernon recognised it as human flesh. 'Probably', he deduced from the softness, 'female flesh'.
Vernon had no way of looking around the man in front, and even if he could, he wouldn't be able to see up into the sea of people to identify who was rubbing her bare leg against his hand, but Vernon chose to ignore it anyway. It was probably just with the business of the train.
Soon they arrived at a stop. The doors opened, and Vernon and those around him strained to see if people would get on. No one did, and soon there were more people trying to squeeze into the already crowded space of the carriage.
