The Girl Who Floats

The girl who floats didn’t remember leaving the ground. Or rather, she didn’t remember the exact second when it happened. She didn’t feel it. She remembers the scratchy, blood-red carpet that bore her family’s weight for two decades under her bare toes, but she does not remember the feeling of her feet lifting inches away, into the air.

The girl who floats says it’s not always that bad. She says a lot of people don’t even notice. Some think that her new clothing choices—maxi skirts and extra-long flare jeans—are just a new Gen-Z fashion trend. They don’t think she is hiding anything; what’s the point of covering something no one can see? Some think that she grips the stairway railing or the wall of the elevator because she’s claustrophobic or just clumsy. A boy once asked her if she hurt her ankle playing basketball. She giggled politely, then told him she played soccer.

But the girl who floats cannot always blend in. She used to love the subway. She loved standing up straight to fill her six-foot frame inside her metallic gold coat as she zoomed around the city and never felt out of place. Now, when it’s really crowded, and she can’t grab onto a pole, the subway car will jerk forward and her body will slam into the people next to her. Then the NYC chorus will sing:

bitch  
idiot
whatthefuckiswrongwithyou
ow!
learn how to ride a mother fucking subway
go back to Nebraska

She jokes about this to her friends. She says she can guess the expletive before it is said. But she doesn’t tell them how much she misses the balancing game between her feet and the winding subway track.

Although the girl who floats doesn’t remember the second her feet left the ground, she remembers her parents’ faces with perfect clarity. She could see every stray strand of her mother’s dyed copper hair that had fallen out of her tight low bun. She could trace every reddened vessel in the whites of her dad’s hazel eyes. She could hear her mother say, “We are not your biological parents.” At first it felt like she had dropped. Like an organ in her chest had turned to lead and plunged down to her pelvis. But then, she suddenly felt light.

Sometimes the girl who floats thinks it’s funny. She thinks it’s funny that a hole in her identity would cause her to float instead of sink. She thought it must be crueler to see the world from below it and be stumbled on top of. But viewing life from above without the ability to push back on it may be worse. Before she began to float, she felt like she was pushing herself on a swing. Her feet were planted into the ground as she pushed herself forward, soaring as high or as low as she wanted. She could see all of the world below her and jump off whenever she desired. Now, she was no longer on the ground. She sat on the swing stranded and immobile, dangling from the thin metal chains and swaying only if a breeze permitted her. 

The girl who floats thought that finding her biological parents would return her to the ground. So she searched, using the five photocopied pieces of paper from the worn manila envelope that had been tucked away in her mom’s locked file cabinet for twenty years and the websites that came up from the Google search: “how to find your biological parents.” And she found them. As the photo on the bootleg White Pages website loaded their faces, she felt like she was going to fall—no, crash—into the ground below her. As the thumbnail photo sharpened, she could feel the Earth come back towards her. Their faces undoubtedly looked more like hers. But the moment the last few pixels loaded, a moment so heavy with hope it felt both impossibly long and short, her free fall ended. Her feet were still suspended inches above the ground.   

She wrapped her hands around her thighs and pushed them into the ground with all of her strength. When her biceps gave in, she started a sort of pathetic, hammering motion with her fists, punching down on her thighs like nails. She stacked the heaviest set of books she could find on top of her knees until they buckled, and she thought they may snap. She looked at the soles of her feet and screamed. 

The girl who floats likes the subway pole that lies in the center of the car. She grasps it tightly and watches the people dance and hug and sleep and push around her. She stays on for every stop. So she becomes a fixed memory in these strangers’ eyes. She is The Girl from the 1 Train. She owns the route. It is hers. It has one beginning and one destination. But she knows it can go anywhere.

The girl who floats thought her genetic identity would weigh her back down again. But she did not need another set of parents. The biological explanations for her tall frame or green eyes did not give her any control. She needed to climb the ropes that suspended her. 

At the last stop, The Girl from the 1 Train floats off. At the edge of the platform she jumps onto the tracks in front of the train, her feet landing inches above the rails. She grasps on to the front of the train, balancing herself like a swimmer gripping the edge of a pool, ready to dive in. As the train pushes her forward, a hot gust of wind slaps her face and kicks her hair backwards. She watches the sparks from the wheels on the tracks fly up around her like fireworks as her feet glide ahead. The hot, thick air presses down against her face and she feels her own weight again. As the car eventually slows, she pushes away from it and continues down the rails in front of her. She jumps from track to track, gazing into the windows of the trains speeding by her. Most people who see her blink their eyes and shake their heads and continue staring back at their phones. But a few stare. Their mouths drop. She smiles back and continues her flight.

From the artist: How can one gather if her feet are no longer touching the ground?