Often in my male-dominated business and he was always proud to hear how I handled myself. He knows I come across strange characters When I told my husband this, he was surprised. I wasn’t planning on taking the subway anymore, at least during peak hours. Except I didn’t intend for it to happen again. Get away from me! Back off! Maybe I would toss a few expletives in. My husband and I practiced how I would react if it happened again: I would use my voice. Read previous contributions to this series. Pushed their way through the layers of fellow riders. Mostly, though, they were sure they would have been tougher: they would have kicked the abuser, screamed, Later, when I told my friends what had happened, they hugged me and a few shared their own similar experiences. I nodded my head and quickly turned in the opposite direction. I hesitated, afraid to have the groper see my face, but the officer stayed by my side. He asked me to walk by the bench to identify the man. It had, but I had never reported the incidents and had only defended myself once, calling the guy disgusting and moving to the other side of the car. He asked if I rode the train often and if it had happened before. I clung onto his words, grateful for his empathy. Had picked the busiest train at the peak of rush hour for that very reason. Makes me sick.” He assured me there was little I could have done, that my groper “I have daughters and a wife, so I knew right away what that look meant. The other officer, a man wearing camouflage cargo shorts and a ripped T-shirt, told me they were watching for pickpockets, but that groping was “the real epidemic.” I hadn’t even realized they had stopped him, let alone that they were arresting him.
He satĬalmly, hands cuffed behind his back with a plastic zip tie. There was the man in the navy sweat pants.
She said her partner would come talk to me in a minute and pointed toward a bench. Finally, I handed her the sheet filled withĬrossed out inappropriate words replaced by slightly less inappropriate words. My hand shook as I wrote, my words jumbled. I nodded, and she handed me a piece of paper. The undercover officer asked if I would give her a written statement right there. Why hadn’t I yelled, or elbowed him? Why didn’t I ask the people around me for help? I thought for a moment that I might be crazy, that I was making it all up. If I made a scene he could have taken out a knife,” I said, looking at my feet and feeling like a coward with a bunch of excuses. I knew that she knew and I just started talking. “I think something happened back there,” she said. We stepped to the side as people rushed past. “Oh, no, ” I said, reflexively panicking the same way I do when I pass a cop car parked on the side of a highway, even if I’m driving 5 miles below the speed limit. I said nothing as I glanced down to see the bulge below his waist.Ī woman approached me as I made my way to the exit, relieved to finally be off the train. When we arrived at Times Square, I pushed passed him with the force of the other riders behind me. I held my breath until we got to the next stop. When none of their eyes met mine, I wanted to say something but My eyes darted to each of the commuters around me, mutely asking for help. I shifted my hip to the right and then the left, but his body shifted with me. I looked over my shoulder thinking theīuckle of his bag must have been digging into me but there was no bag. I tried to evade him but couldn’t move an inch in any direction. As the doors were closing, one more person shoved his way in and the car let out a collective groan.Īs the train pulled away from the platform, I felt a man pressing harder and harder against my backside. I pushed my still wet hair out of my face and found a sliver of I was on my way downtown to my job at my family’s taxi business, casually dressed in leggings and a striped orange dress. I was late as usual, weaving through the 72nd Street subway station, rushing down the stairs to catch a departing train, and managed to squeeze into one of the packed cars just in time. A gallery of contributors count the ways.