Mind Your Business
I noticed him on the platform, an older man with broken capillaries on his nose and cheeks, his bulging body squeezed into an old black leather jacket. As he entered the train, he complained of a woman’s bag hitting him, then once settled, felt it necessary to cap his disapproval with an audible “fucking chink.”
“Hey,” I said, turning to him, confrontational yet calm. “That’s uncalled for.”
“Mind your fucking business,” he yelled back.
“If you want me to mind my business, don’t say things like that.”
“What are you—a professor?”
“I am, actually.”
“Go teach somebody something.”
“I will.”
Thinking it was over, I returned to my book, The Handmaid’s Tale (really). And that’s when he lost it.
“Fucking liberal bitch. You’re why the world’s so fucked up.” And he kept on muttering hatefully at my back the rest of the ride.
Should I have said something else? But at that point, I chose silence, like everyone else around me who said nothing, who kept their heads down.










