It’s 3 a.m. on a Saturday night. Here I am way out in West, heading back from tonight’s batch of parties, and I have to get all the way back to Myles in Kenmore Square to return three bottles of Windex and half a roll of paper towels to one of my buddies. Boy that was a crazy party. Who knew you could get windows that transparent?
I’m walking down Comm. Ave. and there is a major feeling of dampness all around, partially because it is pouring down rain, and partially because I think one of the bottles of Windex is leaking. It is going to take me forever to get back. There is no one around, and all I can hear is the sound of the rain and the occasional rat sneeze (and if in a more refined neighborhood, one would hear an immediate rat-response like, “God bless you, Clarence. You know you are allergic to English muffins.”). My elbow begins to tire from the weight of the paper towels, and in self pity I start to whimper in a Canadian accent.
Suddenly a light appears from behind. “Eh?” I say to myself, and turn around. I stare in bewilderment at the approaching vehicle. It is a T train in service at 3 a.m. In shock, I lose consciousness for a moment, and once I come to my senses, I spring up and run to the stop. The T slows as I scamper toward the train. As the doors open, I look into the lit entrance and feast my eyes on the driver, immediately recognizing him as Sir Sean Connery.
“Hello, Mr. Connery,” I say, drool falling from my mouth that hopefully he will dismiss as rain.
“Hello, young Zachary,” he replies, and I immediately wet myself at the beautiful sound of his voice – I again can only hope that he dismisses this for rain.
“I, um, would like to take this T. Is it still running?”
“For you, of course it is,” Sean Connery says. “And laddie, I will make an exception tonight and waive the fee.” He smiles, lightly touches the tip of my nose, and I board the train. I feel a little frightened, but his voice is so damn soothing I don’t care.
I turn and face the interior of the train, and I don’t quite know what to make of it. The inside of the T looks exactly like a Tibetan temple, only with couches and an impressive entertainment system complete with the entire series of The Mary Tyler Moore Show on DVD. I could have sworn I wasn’t in a T at all if it weren’t for the glowing sign that reads, “Destination, Government Center.”
I sit down and keep an eye out for my stop. There are people on either side of me, but they are both reading newspapers and I can’t tell who they are. Within two minutes one of them begins to eat his newspaper and hum the Star Spangled Banner. Once he starts to repeat, “I am Spartacus,” I realize that he is just one of those crazy guys you find on every T. The man on my other side lowers his newspaper, and reveals himself to be Dean Elmore.
“Dean Elmore, why are you taking the T this late?” I ask. Dean Elmore smiles at me and winks, saying, “I hope you are enjoying Boston University.” With that the ceiling above him opens up, and he flies away into the night like a superhero. I begin to think things are a little stranger on this train than most others I have traveled on.
I get up and return to the driver. “Sir Sean,” I say, “will we be reaching Kenmore Square soon?”
“Yes, it’s just after the next stop. Ah, here we are. Moons of Jupiter,” he announces over the intercom. The T stops and the doors open. Two tigers and Samuel L. Jackson thank the driver and float into the abyss. I look out and see the overwhelming beauty of Jupiter and an IHOP on the moon Europa. The doors close and the train moves on. Within two minutes it stops, and the doors open at the Kenmore stop. I exit the train and turn to face Mr. Connery.
“Your Knightness,” I say, “Will I ever see you again?”
“No,” he chuckles. “This is all a dream you stupid pheasant. I would never have a job driving this infernal contraption!” Connery lets out a maniacal laugh, and the doors close. The T disappears immediately.
The next day, I wake up. What a crazy dream. I put on my clothes and go to the BU Central stop to wait for a T so I can get into the city for an English muffin. Finally one approaches and the doors open. Sean Connery is the driver. It turns out he does have a job driving the T, as he lost all his money in investments toward a failed Broadway musical adaptation of The Rock. He turns his head to the door and we make eye contact. Connery stares at me, and I back at him. Minutes pass. In the distance, a rat sneezes.
This is an account occasionally used by the Daily Free Press editors to post archived posts from previous iterations of the site or otherwise for special circumstance publications. See authorship info on the byline at the top of the page.
