All seats on the tram were occupied when I boarded it to go home tonight, save one.  A man was sitting in the window seat but had his arm sprawled out across the top of the seat back, holding the pole next to the aisle seat.  I tolerated this with all the tolerance I can usually muster in these situations and headed toward the seat.  To give the fellow time to retract his arm before I sat, I deliberately fumbled around in my briefcase for a few seconds and he retracted his arm partially, allowing me to sit.

It was not particularly comfortable with his arm perched on the seat beside him since his forearm was firmly pressed against my upper arm and I figured he’d move his arm once he realised.  A few seconds later I felt his arm moving away to a position I felt would be out of the road.  I didn’t expect him to resume his original position of clutching the pole in the aisle since that meant his arm was now draped across the back of my shoulders in a sort of pseudo-hug.  Now, even when it’s not ~35C I take umbrage at strangers hugging me, and since today was very hot I was doubly displeased with this new development.  I assessed my two options:

1. Ask the SPOTD politely to move his arm out of my personal space.
2. Adopt a more Trav-like approach to achieve the same aim.

I chose the latter.

I turned toward him as though to request him remove his arm then faked a “oh, I know you” happy look and placed my hand upon his leg.  “Oh!” I cooed, “I haven’t seen you in ages, my love.  Go on, give us a kiss!”

Presented with this unexpected invasion of his personal space, the SPOTD suddenly recoiled so sharply there was an audible thump as he slammed into the wall of the tram.  A split-second later the first thump was followed by a second as his arm shot off the central pole and quickly joined his body in colliding with the tram wall.  He blurted out some sort of mumbled response but his panic was intense and he garbled the words so they made no sense.

His leg had already retreated rapidly away from me so my hand was no longer making contact with him.  He babbled quickly about “not being like that” to which I replied that I didn’t care, so long as he didn’t want to invade my personal space by hugging me.  As he sat half-sideways facing me warily watching me for other bursts of over-friendliness, I quietly resumed reading the article I’d had in my hand when I sat.  Ten seconds later he stood up from the seat and scampered down the aisle, preferring to stand than sit next to me for the remainder of his travel.

Categories: SPOTD