Short Story: The Train

This is my first short story that came to me one evening. It has some autobiographical elements, mixed in it are realities from the experiences of others. It is not always about me!!!

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Once upon a time there was a woman who was happily married. The marriage was not perfect. There had been hard times like when money had been tight or when it seemed that the passion has expired. There had also been terrific dreams that they had made come true. There had been depression and hurt and joy and so many other experiences, but overall a good marriage. That changed the day he came back from traveling and announced he was unhappy and wanted to separate.

Unfortunately, the cords of marriage don’t break with words alone leaving one magically free. Instead, with those words the woman died inside. She tried to hang onto the belief that this was all wrong, that it would all right itself and return to normal. But it didn’t. The woman sank deeper and deeper into despair. As that despair grew the woman believed that the pain could only be removed by death.

The woman prepared herself for the moment, the only real action she seemed capable of. With finality, she sat down, numbed by the deepness of her despair and pain; she looked around her not really seeing anything. Then she froze and stared because she thought she saw a shadowy shape of a female. She shook her head trying to clear it of the fuzzy feeling, the numbness but the shadowy female didn’t go away. Instead she spoke these words, “You have a choice. Come let me show you.” And with those words everything went from dark.

The woman didn’t know where she was, but intuitively she knew it was a place of between. In the distance the woman saw a train careening wildly out of control and at the back of the train was a platform with a rail and hanging onto that rail was a female. Then she was that female hanging onto the rail. She could feel the train running berserk, but all she could feel and care about was the despair, the pain, the blur through her tears. There was no joy or anger in this place; only coldness, yet she gripped onto the rail. The woman raised her head and at the same time the train turned confusedly and she glimpsed the head of the train and heard a soft “choo choo.” It had such a warm glow about it and together with the soft sound, the thought, “What would it feel like to be there?” pierced through her despairing thoughts.

“I am so very tired”, despaired the woman, “I really can’t make it.” And she let go of the rail with one hand. But the warm, calm feeling of the glowing image snuggled into her and she fought to regain her hold on the rail. And then as if by magic she was standing on the back platform. She had made the decision. She wanted to be there; to be surrounded by that calm, warm glow and to hear the “choo choo” again. She was tired of this dark, despairing place.

Then the memories of what had happened back in reality pierced her and she gasped with the pain of it. The door to the compartment at the back of the train automatically opened and she was uncontrollably tossed in. Falling to the floor she sobbed and sobbed with grief. She remembered the unmade dreams; she remembered the unanswered questions; she remembered the love; she remembered and grieved. Then she began to deny that this was happening to her. With this denial she heard the door of the compartment open and her body began to move of its own accord.

As she passed out of the compartment of grief onto the platform of between, she felt despair again and she wanted to stay. But denial was strong and drove her into the next compartment. “This isn’t happening to me. How could this be happening? Why is life so cruel? Things are going to return to normal, I just know it. If I just keep really busy then maybe things won’t really have changed.” So the woman sat a while in the compartment and thought that she could stay here because she felt numb but not despairing. Yet she kept remembering that warm glow and she looked towards the door. But she kept sitting, thinking this place of denial was better than despair. Then she began to feel joy and at the same time she saw the door open. She grabbed her hair and shook her head and yelled, “STOP.” The door closed.

The woman got up and walked to the door, opened it and stepped onto the platform between. She felt the familiarity of despair but she didn’t want to stay here at this moment. She wanted to visit joy. She opened the door of next compartment and stepped into joy.

She began to laugh. She remembered the wonderful moments, she remembered the tender times, she remembered the happiness. She remembered and laughed. Then she began to feel anger and she moved quickly out of the compartment into the next, feeling despair as she passed between. “Ah, she thought, “I remember you”, and opened the door of next compartment and stepped into anger.

She let the anger cover her. It felt so good. She was angry at herself for not understanding him, she was angry at him for not understanding her, she was angry at the lost opportunities, she was angry at his anger at her, she was angry at the world for not stopping for her, she was so very, very angry at it all. She was so angry she was paralyzed by it. But then she remembered the warm, calm feeling and she didn’t want to be here anymore. “I’ll come back and visit” she thought, “but I don’t want to stay here.”

She left anger and as she opened the door to the next compartment she heard the soft “choo choo.” She stepped into the heart of the train. The warm glow was everywhere; it was inside her, it was outside her. It was the center. It was all compartments; it was no compartment. The train no longer weaved aimlessly. It had found its tracks. She looked around her and for the first time she noticed that things were not blurry. She went to the window and looked out and saw with clarity. And she found that she could control the train in the direction that she wanted to go. The compartments would always be a part of the train. But she also discovered that she could add compartments and remove compartments and that she could visit any one of those compartments any time. After all it was her train, her journey.

Then the woman was back in the cold of the bathroom, sitting on the frosty tiled floor. She looked down at the pile of pills cupped in her hand. She stiffly got up, flushed the pills down the toilet and with a smile said out loud to the Universe “Choo Choo.”

For those of us who believe, she did live happily ever after. “Choo Choo”