This morning, I was on the Q-train going into Manhatten, when somebody collapsed. I didn't see him collapse at first. I was on one side of the car, leaning against a door. The passenger was on the opposite end. I don't think anybody much noticed him falling down. Another passenger—a friend of the collapsed man, or perhaps just the guy standing next to him—suddenly stood straight up and asked "Does anybody know first aid?" He asked two or three times. Apparently, no one on the train knew. I didn't know either, although, a long time ago, I learned some basic CPR moves from a health class in high school. But I don't eat out very often, so I never had the chance to try them. Anyway, I don't think the man in the subway car was choking on anything. From what I've seen in movies, people who are choking usually struggle before losing consciousness. They flail their arms. They pound their chests and utter sounds like Boris Karloff in "The Mummy." I don't think the man on the subway was choking. I think he quietly lost consciousness for some other reason.

So everyone stood around looking helpless. I guess none of us knew first aid. If I did know first aid, I think I would have helped. I also think I would have helped if the man had been choking. There isn't a lot that I learned in high school, but I did learn some basic CPR moves. We had health class in a big auditorium where all the desks had chewing gum stuck underneath them. Grayish wads of chewing gum, meaning they were old. They weren't sticky anymore, and only slightly malleable. Like block erasers art students use.

We would learn CPR, then test on these little plastic dummies. We learned CPR for both grown-ups and babies. When we tested, we drew at random for either the big plastic man, or the little plastic baby. I got to test on the little plastic baby. I did something wrong during my test. I turned the plastic baby down onto its face. I also pulled the arms back a certain way, that if it had been a real baby, I'm sure I would have broke its arms. Maybe I would have killed it. I guess I hadn't paid as much attention as I should have. I ended up with a "C+" on the exam.

I felt really bad the next couple of days. Not because I got a bad grade on the exam, but because I kept thinking, if the little plastic baby had been a real baby, it would be dead now. So I went to talk to the health teacher about it; actually, I wanted her to test me again. I wanted her to show me what I had done wrong, and what I should have done.

The health teacher let me into her office during lunch break. She was always nice—not to mention funny. She was very short, and she walked like a little kid. And because of her height, she spoke with a high, helium voice. Her class was the funniest during the week she taught sex ed. She told us about her own sex life. We had to keep our laughter to ourselves, which was hard, especially when she told us how the only man she'd ever been with was Mr. Health Teacher. The way the laughter expanded inside me, pressing against my insides as I tried to hold it in, made me feel like a balloon about to burst. The laughter kept growing and growing, every time I had to imagine Mr and Mrs Health Teacher doing it together...!

That afternoon in her office, I asked her,

"Mrs. Health Teacher, would you show me what I did wrong on the exam?"

And she said, "Sure, Jason. Let me get the CPR dummy out of the closet."

She unlocked the wooden cabinet that stood against the wall on one side of the room. As she swung the doors open, I saw containers of bandages and thermometers. Racks of thermometers resembled test-tubes, standing at attention in their places on the shelves. There were unopened rolls of paper towels, and boxes of paper plates and plastic tableware. Clear vats of green and orange dish detergent gave off a dull, lollypop glow. The health teachers taught home ec on alternate semesters. In the bottom shelf, beneath all the kitchen and medical supplies, sat a big plastic bag. Mrs. Health Teacher removed the bag and shut the cabinet doors behind her.

The bag was clear plastic; I could make out the objects inside: little baby dolls. Little CPR dummies. Whoever used them last had tossed them in without a care. The arms and legs were left in various poses. I could see little hands and feet poking out from the insides of the bag. The tiny toes and fingertips stretched the plastic without breaking it.

When I saw them—all those CPR baby dummies inside the bag—for a moment, I thought they were real babies! For a moment, I was terrified. They looked so lifelike. I couldn't help thinking it was a sack of real babies. Drowned, dead babies, their bodies yet to be discarded. It was only after staring at them for a while, that I got used to them and the terror subsided. Something else took its place. A different kind of thought. As if the cabinet doors were thrown open again, as if I saw the things on the shelves again for the first time. Strange, exciting—this new thought in my head.

I saw an image in my mind, of the little CPR dummies replaced by the real thing. A dozen faces, only less plastic now. And bleached out. I could see eyes staring back at me. They weren't so different from the little dummy eyes. Still eyes. Eyes that never blinked or twitched. Even as Mrs Health Teacher went on and on about what I did wrong, what I should've done, my mind was no longer focused there. Suddenly, I realized, it didn't matter what I'd done wrong. It didn't matter what I had or hadn't killed. The death which I'd committed, in a dark room with only my fears watching, was nothing compared to the death that was everywhere else. That one doll, its arms bent back, was just another dead face in a plastic bag full of them. Bleached faces, all of them. Eyes that never blinked or twitched. Mrs Health Teacher went on and on, but I had long since stopped listening.

Standing against the door of the subway now. A little face looking up at me. Eyes that don’t blink or twitch for the longest time. And a voice from the other side of the car,

“Does anybody know first aid? Does anybody know first aid?”

The little boy’s face staring up at me, skin bleached white with fear.

“Don’t worry,” I whisper softly to him. “Him—he’s just… Don’t listen to any of it.”

And I see the doll again, staring up at me through plastic, as the friend of the collapsed man—or was he just the guy standing next to him?—asks again, “Does anybody know first aid?” And I see the doll’s face again as the murmurs of concern start to ebb across the car. Fear that is tangible enough to feel. And I see the doll’s face again as that voice from across the glut of commuters says “He’s choking on something! He’s choking! Does anyone know CPR?” I shrug the doll’s face out of my mind. I can feel the train pulling into the station.

And I’m out the door, already up the stairs, as the voice in the background asks again and again, “Does anyone know CPR? Does anyone know CPR?”

I wish I could say what happened after that, whether the collapsed man got help, whether he choked to death—I wish I could say something. But I had long since stopped listening.