Take It Down to the Wire
I’m fixing to take it down to the wire.
That train was packed like a can of sardines standing up, the one on Concourse B at the Atlanta Airport, as I was desperately attempting to exit the airport to get to the lotto office on Williams Street downtown to cash in my forty-million-dollar winning lotto ticket, which expired at five o’clock today.
It was 4:25 pm and I knew if I didn’t get on that train I might as well kiss all that cash goodbye.
The announcement had just been made that the automatic doors were closing. While they were sliding closed, the instant before they did, I reached inside the train doors with my left hand and grabbed a good hand full of the lapels of a trench coat, pulled the startled gentleman wearing the coat through the door and slung him into the crowd behind me, and slipped through the doors into the space he had formerly occupied as the doors closed and the train pulled away. Whoever the man was, I hoped he would forgive me.
No one on the train said a word to me. In fact, they wouldn’t even look at me. Everybody kept their eyes downcast, wanting nothing to do with the person who had just high jacked the train.
The next stop was at Concourse A, where passengers began struggling to get off, while others pushed, shoved and dodged to get on. By the time the doors closed and the train took off again it was 4:31 pm. I had 29 minutes.
The next stop was Concourse T, and when the train arrived it was 4:32, but I felt like that if I could be in a taxi in five minutes I might still make it, if the train doors would only close.
I breathed a sigh of relief when they began to slide together.
Then, at the last second, a passenger leapt through the crack left between the doors. He made it, but his bag didn’t. It got sandwiched in between the two sliding doors, jammed, and wouldn’t budge no matter how hard he pulled on it.
The train didn’t move. Alarms went off, light began flashing, and my blood pressure soared up to a dangerous level.
By the time a technician arrived and reset the doors, and the train arrived at the last stop, baggage claim and ground transportation, it was 4:40. I only had 20 minutes left!
As I stumbled up the giant escalator leading to the baggage claim area, which I planned to sprint through and once I was outside, hope that I was fortunate enough to hail a taxi.
But about halfway up that escalator, I realized that I was physically as well as mentally drained, with all hope of reaching my destination fading away.
That’s when I saw him, standing at the very top of the escalator, the one who just might be fixing to be my salvation!
I hate it when I run out of space, but I’ll be fixing to wind this chase up next week.