Junction

Soft light passes through the gaps in the trees to land upon your cheek. You can feel the warmth spreading across your face and down your neck. "I'll be home just before five," you think. Still asleep, you can feel the train passing over the tracks, bobbing gently along the path.

A sudden lurch wakes you. Your arm is asleep, having been pressed perpendicular against the window and holding your resting head it its palm. You massage your shoulder and look around the train car. Empty. The view outside the windows is a shining emerald, stretching out endlessly to the east and west. The tingling in your arm creeps up to your shoulder, and working its way up your spine, spreads a dull numbness around the back of your head. You run your hands over the spot, feel that mole at the crown of your skull, but otherwise no other disturbance. If you hit your head, it was relatively minor.

The unbroken greenery continues outside. Craning your neck with your head pressed against the window, you cannot even see the tops of the trees. Vines snake through the canopy and what ground you can see is speckled with moss and lichen. "Huh, April showers really do bring May flowers. We must have needed that rain badly," your mind makes small talk with itself. A lump builds in your chest and claws its way into your throat. Your watch has stopped. You give it a couple of winds. It starts ticking again, the date reads "10." The lump grows, climbs further up your throat.

Your breathing quickens, becomes sharp. The lump slithers to the back of your tongue and cracks past your teeth: "Excuse me," you chirp at first, "Excuse me, Conductor? I seem to have not wound my watch enough before my trip and the damned thing has stopped on me. Would you happen to have the time?" The window to the conductor's cabin is a dark, mirrored tint. No reply comes from within. You slowly approach the door, and try the handle. Locked. Of course, why would the conductor leave the door to the controls open? Gazing into the glass, you see a shape reflected on a seat you had not noticed before. A bundled coat, a bag nestled against the window, and a pair of legs curled up under the coat.

Your breathing slows, and you try for the Conductor once more. It's possible his compartment is too loud for him to have heard you the first time. You give the tinted glass a few raps with your knuckles, "How many stops before Grand Central?" The train bounces and jerks again, before the trumpeting sound of the horn bellows from the cabin. "Hellooooo!" You holler and slap your palm against the glass. The horn bellows again, this time echoing into a sharp shrieking noise.

The bundle begins stirring after your commotion. A young woman rises, her sleek black hair catching green reflections through the window. The corners of her eyes are flecked with sand. "Sorry, I didn't mean to wake you, just trying to get this horse's ass conductor to tell me how many stops until Grand Central." The woman's eyes are focusing on you. She wipes her chin and mouth with the back of her hand and croaks, "Whaaat?"

"The Conductor! He thinks he's some kind of rockstar or something with this stupid tinted window. Every time I ask him something he just blares the horn and speeds up a little." The woman runs her tongue around the inside of her mouth and over her teeth. "Well," she sighs, "Probably because this train isn't going to Grand Central." You laugh, "What is that supposed to mean?" Ridiculous, stupid, she is putting you on for interrupting her beauty rest. "This train is going to Brewster." You laugh again, slowly clapping your hands together. "Why is that funny?"

"Of course! YOU don't KNOW." The woman gives you the look women give their ex lovers when they unexpectedly run into them, "And I mean no disrespect. It's just so OBVIOUS. I fell asleep on the train to Grand Central, and that train must have been rerouted to go to Brewster next. Honey, when they tell you not to drink at a wake, believe them." Your laughing subsides and you sink into the seats across from the woman.

She sits up, kneeling into the seat. "This doesn't look right, does it? It shouldn't be so, SO green for so long."

"Sister I have never once been to Brewster, but if you're willing to be my tour guide-" she stops you short. A lump is now growing in her chest. "How long has it been since we stopped at a station?" Your lump returns to seek its kin. "You've been trying to get the Conductor's attention. Have we even passed a local station? How long have you been up?" You check your watch. You have no idea what the time actually is, but thirty minutes have elapsed since you wound it.

"Okay, okay, but we should be pulling into a station, ANY station soon right? You've taken this train before, I'm assuming you'll know how far from Brewster we are?" She shakes her head, tears beginning to form in her large eyes. "First time. Going to visit a friend who just moved up there." She blinks and the tears vanish, and she charges over to the Conductor's door. With the flat of her first she pounds on the mirror, shaking and distorting the images it holds of you both "Hey! Tell us where the fuck we are! Where the fuck are you going!" The horn bellows again in a slow, warbling drone.

The rumble of the train over the tracks and the woman's panting are all you can hear. She starts sobbing, quietly at first, and then full of rage and fear. She bangs against the mirror with her fists, using the entire force of her body to launch into the door. "Hey, hey, hey," you try to pull her away. "Don't you fucking touch me! Who the fuck are you anyway? How do I know you didn't try to get some upskirt action while I was asleep, you shithead psycho creep!" She starts pounding your chest and shoulders with the flat of her first, before taking a real swing at you. "Take it easy! I'm just trying to get home! You're the one screaming, acting like a psycho." Between the sobbing and screaming and anger she runs out of steam, and slowly lowers herself back into her seat. Her glassy, red eyes stay fixed on you.

"Look, we're not gonna just, jump off this train, right? So we wait. Sooner or later the train will stop. I mean, the thing's on a track for God's sake." Her stare softens and she relaxes against the window. "Right? So if we get off in Brewster, great. I'll get on the next train to Grand Central, you'll see your friend, and we can both give this jackass an earful." You spit in the direction of the Conductor's door. "Oh you're gonna get yours, asshole!" You laugh to diffuse the tension, hoping it doesn't betray your nervousness. The young woman offers a few small laughs in kind. She looks toward the back of the car. "None of the train operators came running when we were banging on the door." You slouch forward, throat tight and chest heavy. "Yeah, and they probably would have heard at least some of that." The woman laughs again, "I KNOW they heard me." She begins shifting impatiently in her seat. "Do you, and this is going to sound crazy, do you think we're the only ones on this train?"

The train continues to rock steadily along its path. Commanded every so often to favor one side or the other. That unbroken verdant expanse stretches out past the windows. There is stillness in the car, silence between you and the woman. You start to form words with your tongue, to ask her name. Air starts to travel up your throat and expel the question.

"What's your...friend's name?" So close. The young woman thinks a moment, keeps a small laugh for herself. "Her name's Georgia. Ya know, like the state?" The woman's eyes roll and she presses her tongue into her bottom lip. "What made Georgia move to Brewster?" Stop it. She looks back at you and shakes her head, "Sorry to burst your bubble, but I really don't think you're her type. Plus there's the whole 'Random Person I Met on a Train' thing." She stares out at the passing emerald walls. "Her ex...was, IS, a monster. The plan was to move to the city with me, but then Michael came along and..." the young woman's reflection had cast her eyes down, you could see her lips tighten and synch to one side. "Things became...complicated. She has family in Brewster. I was just going up to visit."

'Complicated,' the word is a thick syrup pouring into your ear. You breathe it in, and it coats the inside of your mouth and drips down your throat. The woman glances at you again, and stifles another small laugh. "You said something about a wake. Who died?" The train jerks powerfully back and forth.

"Hell's Bells, man! What are you trying to do, take this thing off the tracks?" The lowing horn answers. You emerge from your seat and stretch your back. Raise one leg bent at the knee off the ground and rotate it in a circular motion. Then the other. The woman is still staring at you, expecting an answer. Complicated.

"Well," you sigh as you return to your seat. "To borrow a phrase from someone I just met, it's complicated." You grin sheepishly and her eyes dart to the floor. "No...it's um..." you grasp the air for appropriate words. They are dandelion seeds drifting away on a summer breeze. "It sucks," another small laugh, "It just sucks." Salt burns the corners of your eyes and chars your vocal chords. "My, um, father and my...baby brother. They both..." your eyes float up to the ceiling. The woman moves over to your seat.

"Look, I..." her hands open and close, "I didn't think it would be so...That really fucking sucks, man." She gently wraps her arms around you. More small laughter to ease the tension. Your eyes are still up in the ceiling, keeping more salt from flooding your eyes. A thin smile works its way across your mouth and silently you form the words, 'Thank you.'

Another powerful heave forward from the train sends you and the woman into the seatback in front of you. The vines and canopy outside the window now little more than a lush blur. The woman's breathing quickens, tears flood eyes. "God I just want to get off this fucking stupid train!" she beats her fists against the seat in front of her, beside her, behind her. You pull back, out of the way of her wailing. In the aisle you see the glass door to the Conductor's cabin shift and waver. The mirror had been distorting your image, but now you see your reflection clearly: Your hair is greasy, and your eyes are bloodshot. You look starved, emaciated, hollow. The woman too, is in clear view. Her hair no longer a neat bob, but a long mesh of tangled knots.

The woman is curled into a ball on the seat, sobbing into her knees. You approach the glass, bracing yourself on the seats along your path. The mirror no longer reflects the car. Seats and windows and the aisle have all bled together, leaving only crystal clear images of you and the woman's ghoulish forms. You amble and shift, keeping your balance best you can as the train races ever faster. There is a gap between the last row of seats and the Conductor's Glass. You can see your mirror-self wheezing, desperate to catch a breath. "To Hell with it," you grit your teeth, bend your knees, and make a slingshot of your arms and the seats. You are about to leap, when the train stops sharply and abruptly, sending the woman to the floor and you sliding over to the Conductor's cabin.

Your ears are ringing slightly, you can feel a low buzzing emanating from the back of your skull. Somebody turned the lights in the car off. You can hear the woman groaning quietly on the floor. Your eyes dart to the glass. It is slick darkness. A plane of ink suspended in the middle of a doorway. Cool, clear light breaks through the windows. There is no canopy overhead, no thick woods on either side.

Slowly rising to your feet, you can finally see out the windows. The woman has gotten up as well, a hand pressed against her temple. She whimpers softly, "No, no, no, no." You join her side, putting your hands on her shoulders. You make small, stupid shushing sounds, concluding with "It's gonna be okay."

In each direction, as far as either of you can see, stretches placid, dark water. The tracks are resting on shiny black rocks, but there is no sign of the verdant womb the train had come from. A long wake trickles just beneath the surface, snaking its way closer to the train. It dissipates just before one edge of the tracks, and reemerges on the other side. The woman is crying quietly now, "What the fuck is that? What the fuck is THAT!?" You keep trying to soothe her with your pointless noises. She does not hear you.

A quiet click and a low hiss emanate to your left. The mirrored door slowly slides open. The woman pushes past you, muttering "Motherfucker," again and again and again. You are right behind her, your hands balled into fists and your jaw clenched tight. "Motherfucker!" you echo, resolute on delivering a terrible beating to the Conductor. The woman grabs the door and violently slides it open. There is no control panel, no cabin for the Conductor to sit. The door opens onto the tracks ahead. You can only see the dark blue water, still save for the small presence that periodically drifts under the tracks.

Your stomach is writhing its way into a knot. Your chest is heaving, and your shoulders and neck are shuddering. The woman is crying again, her wailing punctuated by hiccups and small bouts of manic laughter. You try placing a hand on her shoulder, think of more silly, calming sounds to make. She flinches and pulls away. She makes a shawl of her arms and sinks to the floor. You can taste blood. It makes you gag a little. You would throw up, but you can't remember when you ate last. The taste of food escapes you. The comfort of home is little more than the memory of a dream to you. You cannot recall the joy of rest.

You glance down at your watch again. The date reads "23." Salt burns your eyes, the knot made of your stomach is expanding, writhing into your chest. Every tendril seeks to pull more of you into it, to twist you inside out. You are trying to catch your breath, when you hear the rocks on the tracks shift. Your eyes dart down to see the woman dangling off the edge of the train car. Her legs kicking frantically, trying to reach solid footing.

"What the hell are you doing?!" you shout at her. You extend your hand out to her. The knot loosens. She shifts further out of the train car, waving you away with one hand, balancing her weight on her opposite elbow. "This is fucked. It's a dream. YOU are a dream, and I mean that in the WORST possible way," she shoots daggers into you. "Stay here if you want, I'm waking up." A probing boot manages to catch an edge of track, she steadies herself and begins gently scooting out of the train, balancing now on her one foot.

You look back at your suitcase, her backpack, "Hey Sleeping Beauty," the woman looks back at you. "This might all be a dream, but it wouldn't hurt to bring our things just in case, right?" You smile sheepishly and extend her bag out of the train car. She snatches it out of your hand, jeering "What's this OUR business? There is no WE. I'M having a nightmare that you, unfortunately, are part of."

She takes a step back onto the sleek black rocks as you throw your suitcase onto the tracks. "Yeah, well," you face the train car, and feel the knot slithering tighter inside you. Dropping to your belly, you shimmy your legs out of the car, borrowing the woman's kicking method. As you extend your arms and let your body hang out of the car, you can feel your muscles burn and tear from the effort.

Your feet are uneasy on the small, shifting rocks. They extend maybe a meter beyond the tracks. Tiny waves press against these shiny black stones. Indigo tongues lapping up coals. Closer to the water, you can see it is not so still beneath the surface. Undercurrents swell and cascade in black spirals beneath the dark blue surface. Even stranger, the serpentine wake continues to slink beneath the tracks, reappear, and glide up and down the length of the train.

The woman carefully bends down, picks up a stone, and twirls it around in her fingers. She holds the bottom of her jacket taught, and pulls the edge of the stone across it quickly. The stone cuts through her jacket easily, leaving a clean, diagonal slice. "God dammit!" Frustrated, the woman flings the stone into the water. It makes no sound when it contacts the water. As the ripples grow and drift toward you, they are accompanied by the same lowing call you heard earlier on the train.

The knot in your stomach is made of iron and lead. It sends you to your knees, your palms are pierced and cut by the black daggers beneath the tracks. The woman is on her knees next to you, arms at her side, her eyes flooded. A monster rises from the depths. What your logical brain might consider a sea serpent. Seeing this creature has stripped your mind of logic. You perceive it has scales, but they are all human faces twisted into morose grimaces. There is a large collection of scales just behind the creatures head, similarly horrific. A mane of death masks. Looking at its face makes you gag and retch.

You can hear the woman sobbing next to you. Tears coming so forcefully her throat tears and sends her into a coughing fit. Her knees are gouged by the stones and her arms are extended in front of her. She looks like she is praying. You cannot see her, though. Your eyes are glued to the edge of the water. Anything to avoid looking at that face again. The small crimson embers in its skeletal eye sockets are still burning into you. You try to block it out, to think of something else, but the sound of the train's horn blares again.

The woman lurches forward, landing with her hands in the water. The creature shifts its fiery gaze onto her. Her crying stops for a moment as her eyes gaze into the water's surface. Her cries of fear are replaced with a softer, sadder sobbing. She lowers her head and you can just make out "Sorry" and "been there" and "you" and "hurt." Her head lifts to meet the monster's stare. A deep, throaty rumbling bubbles out from its mouth: "Grieve."

She stands, her knees now slick and a deep carmine. She sniffles, and shakes her head quickly. You hear the train horn again, and a piercing ringing sound from the creature's maw. The woman staggers a moment, her eyes close, and she falls into the water. She makes no sound and the surface of the water is undisturbed. You extend a bloodied palm to the water, but she is gone in seconds.

Closer to the water, you can feel the creature return its gaze to you. Your eyes stay staring at the small current pushing against the stones. The iron knot in your stomach is tightening, twisting every inch of you as small as you can be. Anything to avoid the monster's horrible stare. The horn blows again. Your concentration wavers for a moment, and your eyes drift to your reflection in the water. The knot loosens.

Staring back at you from the water are your eyes, and your nose. The reflection is hazy, but you can make out your father's mustache and that awful beard your brother had started growing. Their soft faces are in the water looking back at you, shifting and shimmering in the water's surface. Your mind empties of fear. You can hear your father scolding you for coming home late from Dylan's party. You hear your brother in the garage with his friends, playing their instruments too fast and too loud to sound like anything. Every joke your dad ever told at a cookout. Every time your brother begged and pleaded with you to buy him beer. All the triumph and heartbreak and sorrow and joy of your life with them. You experience every moment all at once, again and again and again. The knot unties itself, and you laugh, and dive into the water.

You hate Grand Central on the weekend. It's beautiful, of course. But damn all these lookie-loo tourists standing around. In the way! If you're going to admire a work of art, at least stand to the side so people can get to where they are going.

You feel uneasy on the train. Compulsively, you check your watch. The date has read "26" all day. "That's a good sign," you say quietly. "You making good time?" A young man comes and punches two holes in your ticket and slides a small card with two similar holes in it into a small loop in the seat in front of you.

You laugh. Of course HE doesn't KNOW. "As long as it stays today, all day, I've got all the time I need." The young man checking tickets scrunches his face and nods, "Sure thing, man." He proceeds to punch more holes in tickets and slide more cards into seats.

The cemetery is about a 20 minute walk from the train station. You could have cut your time in half by crossing the interstate, but that would be too ironic; Run over on your way to a cemetery. You wish cemeteries had a more robust way of being organized. Fortunately, the obituary posted last week mentioned the Sullivan family plot. Shouldn't be too hard to find.

A young woman is kneeling before a new headstone. Her hair is in a neat bob, and she is wearing a black dress and a black leather jacket. There is a small, diagonal cut in the bottom of her jacket. You stop short, maybe a meter away. A lump grows in your chest. It extends up into your throat, ties itself into a knot. You might upset her. Is this for her, or for you? It isn't too late to turn back and pretend it was all a dream. Don't be selfish. You swallow it. She deserves to know.

"Hey Sleeping Beauty. Glad you made it to Brewster." The woman turns to look at you. Her eyes are slick and a bright carmine. She rises to her feet. You can see small embers smoldering behind her obsidian pupils. You offer a small laugh to ease the tension. Her face is still. "How are you here?" she asks, bristly.

"It's complicated." You shrug, inhale sharply between your teeth, and shake your head. "The internet is useful for all kinds of things. Search for 'Georgia,' and 'Brewster' and sort by 'Date.' It, uh, it really is that easy sometimes." More small laughter. You start to walk closer to her. She does not move. "I, uh, also found an article. About what happened to her." Her eyes dart to the ground, and then back to you. "If it's any consolation," the little laughs continue, "that piece of shit, Michael?" Her eyes become daggers, and her shoulders square up. "Well, after he did...what he did, he ran from the police. Took them on a car chase across the state." The lump rises in your throat again. Swallow. "In fact they might not have caught him, if he didn't crash into another car, killing both the passengers. A father and his son."

The young woman uncrosses her arms, her eyes start to flood. It makes your eyes sting with salt. "So, there it is. I don't know if there is any," you exhale and search through every corner of your mind for the right word, "meaning? I guess? Whether any of that..." You wince and press your thumb and index finger into the corners of your eyes. Too much salt. Another exhalation. "I just wanted to know, for my own sanity. That I wasn't just part of your nightmare." You laugh again, deep and genuine this time.

She stands in front of Georgia's grave, staring at you. She says nothing, she brushes a few stray tears from her eyes. You check your watch, the date reads "26." The next train is coming in thirty minutes, then in an hour, then in an hour and thirty minutes, again and again and again until the date reads "27."