The Hit Train.

To my left there was a hairy older fellow with a big beard. He was sleeping. There was a window. And the world was trying to catch up to us. There were flocks of birds. And the flaps of their wings were like little flip book pictures. It was early. I knew this because the staff was pouring orange juice and coffee. I could see a woman wearing red at the front spreading jam. I thought about the shallow funds in my bank account. But my friend back home reminded me to not worry anymore about money. And that it would replenish if I just learned how to be myself again. How could I be myself if I was always in a different world? I didn't even know where I was now. Or where this thing was headed. Matter of fact. I never ordered a train ticket. There was a ticket officer approaching my cabin. He asked for everyone's identification. But of course, I had no ticket. He was fierce. This was obviously an expensive trip. One man fumbled. He was sweaty and attempted to sprint to the restroom near the back of the cabin.

"Halt!" The burly ticket officer intercepted him with just one word. Two other officers appeared and grabbed his arms.

"We've got a cheater!" The big officer announced. And they tossed him out of the sliding door as the train slowed but didn't stop. I wanted to jump out of the car to avoid the sick embarrassment. I was next. I knew it. And he tumbled over the gravel and into the massive field.

I grabbed for my wallet. No ticket. I looked all around the cabin. There was nothing. Except for a... Ticket? I picked it up. There was a photo ID attached to it. It certainly wasn't me. But it was close. It really did look like me. He was slightly huskier. And meaner looking. He could be a cop. Or a crook. Depending on what outfit he wore. Phillip Redwood. It was printed on there. The ticket officer came to my cabin. The big bearded man woke up quickly. He flashed his ticket and the officer nodded. I pulled out my card but the officer eased me.

"Mr. Redwood. I don't need your photo. Did you get enough rest?"

I wanted to tell him so badly that I wasn't Redwood. But it was saving me from being bounced off this train. This train, that, I didn't even know the origin of. Or why I was here. Which, if I thought about, made me deeply and horribly uncomfortable. How would Mr. Redwood respond? He seemed like a pretty stoic and quiet kind of man. And he was obviously someone relatively important.

I nodded with a no nonsense kind of head. And the officer and his brutes carried on. I'd been saved by this wild happening of identity. But I wanted to be off this train. Even the countryside was foreign. It could have been America. It could have been New Zealand. And I wanted off.

I got up to the restroom by the back corridor. Maybe I'd run into this Redwood in there. Maybe he'd tell me how much I looked like him.

Before I could close the door, a large but lean and political looking man blocked it.

"Phillip,"

Oh, no, I was in it now. I was deep. They all think I'm Phillip Redwood.

"Yes," I responded plainly.

"I'm gonna need you the sharpest you've ever been. But I know I don't have to tell you that. I know you've rested. I saw you sleeping like a beast,"

I pretended to be calm about this stranger being so comfortable about telling me how he saw me sleep all night.

"See? You don't even get nervous when I tell you I need you. That's why you're the best. A real marine," he gazed into me proudly like how a captain would praise a grunt.

"I just got word that Dimeo's hitman is aboard. Right now this bastard's so hot for me he'd blow up this whole train just to take me out. But that's why I brought you. You're one in ten million," he kissed me on the cheek.

"Enough intensity," he rubbed my shoulder.

"I'll let you get to your business," he turned around and moved graciously to the other side of the secured cabin.

I looked at myself. I washed my hands in the sea shell sink. I looked for an exit. The only way out was through the toilet. A narrow crawl space that was moving a zillion feet a second. I wasn't as big as this Phillip everyone mistook me for, but I was too large for this hole.

Any moment Phillip would come in here. And he wouldn't notice me if I kept to myself. He'd be too calculated and focused on his mission of protection. And maybe I could still fool all the others until this train came to a stop. Then I could get back to me. All I'd have to do was improvise.

Before I left the bathroom, there was an opening. A wild air shrieked above me like a scared dog. Two hands clutched my back like they were grabbing a drowned man overboard. And I went backwards with their pull before I could touch the outside of the cabin.

I was outside. The air, as hostile and heated as it was, was also somewhat freeing. It made me sane. I knew, this was all as real as a speeding highway crash. My flesh was loose and my clothes blew like a scarecrow in a tornado. The hands that took me out here shoved me into an encased alcove beneath the roof. When I resisted, there was a

"Get DOWN HERE!" And I looked above and there was a bridge. It was approaching me like a high Pacific wave. And I sank before it decapitated this very head that was responsible for all of this.

It was black and darker than a cave off Route Sixty-Six. There was a gritty strike of a match. And their curious faces appeared in the rising orange.

"How the Hell did you get on here?"

One of them said.

"Actually, I'm not quite sure,"

My words were like little feathers tickling an angry Kodiak. And they all got closer. Their eyes were sinister. They were all hungry. There was a hunt. But it wasn't my blood they wanted.

"You're even better than your legend," the dark face in the middle grinned. These guys must think I'm Phillip, too. I assumed. It was almost entertaining now. Despite the brush of death above moments earlier.

"Why didn't you waste him when you were in the bathroom?"

An angry and bubbled voice, that was away from the flame of the match, questioned aggressively. It sounded like nails were boiling in his tonsils.

"It doesn't matter," the darker man interjected. "He has his methods. He's a master," he kept up with his admiration.

"Bullshit," I couldn't see him. But I knew he was large and nasty. The kind of man that made you go what they called yellow.

"Why didn't you kill him? I don't believe it. It doesn't make sense," he was tired of me. The other wise guys here may have trusted me, but he was ready to squash. It had probably been a few days since he beat an ass. He wanted a fight. He knew I wasn't who they thought I was. Even if he had the wrong idea. But he was a bull. And to him, I was just red. He didn't care what the reputation was.

I kept my words steady under my watery blood.

"Like he said, I got my methods,"

I waited for a pound. I waited for a shake. I waited for a thunder. But there was only the soft charge of the train. And then a trusted laugh rose from the dark man.

"He wants to save it up. That'd be too easy for him. To him it's like dessert. He's gotta wait until the feast. We are working with the master of death. The grim reaper himself," he was amazed as a kid watching a baseball hero at a meet and greet.

"The dinner is supposed to be in the back. Not the front. But it's the same game. The front cart and the back cart have the same cut. But you'll enter in the back. Right after he takes a toast. And we'll be on the sidecar," he spoke with a ferocious certainty. His words devoured through fear like a rat.

"You better not fuck it up," the nasty heavy fellow's breath was steamy and soggy like a canine's. He was closer. I was frigid as a twig smothered in ice shards.

"Tug. You gotta be respectful. You don't know who you're talking to. This is Hugo Bruce. I'm nervous to even say his name," the dark man presented a ticket.

"Luckily you got to the bathroom before they did security check. We were sweatin," he gave me my ticket. I glanced at it among the hot fire of the thick match. It was a similar looking man to Phillip. But broader. A little meaner. And with unkempt and thicker hair. As if he rolled down from the stony peaks of Sawtooth Forest in Idaho. Hugo Bruce. I was flabbergasted. Mistaken again.

"Get back up there. I'd tell you to be cool, but you're already a pro," the dark man smiled at me like I was a statue. And I climbed out of the alcove.

Inside of the bathroom, all I could think of was getting off this train. There was nothing unusual about yesterday. All I did was go to bed. I thought more about the man who found me here in the bathroom. Why did the gangsters want him dead? They wanted me to kill him. But I'm not a killer. I'm many things. I sold life insurance. I was good at that. I'd never murdered anybody. But they looked at me like I was a professional. These were mobsters. I wasn't sure what organization. But I was sure they were serious. If I tried to leave here. They'd see me. And they'd probably terminate me. Not like how I was fired from my first sales gig. But an execution. And this man who'd met me here in the bathroom. He was watching me too. And his presence read to me that he was pure business. Much like those insidious men below the train. Even if he was sharper and prettier. But he hadn't found me out. He was sure I was Phillip. Just like his adversaries knew I was Hugo.

I needed some food in my guts. My nerves were achy. They were still serving breakfast. I sat again by the hairy sleepy gentlemen. There was that woman in the red that I noticed when I woke up this morning. But she wasn't at the front. She was moving toward me now. Really, not just in my direction. She was looking at me. Like she had something to tell me. She got to my seat just before the food table arrived. She sat in the empty seat adjacent to the window. Maybe she thought I was Phillip. Perhaps she thought I was Hugo.

"I saw you above the train. I was looking out my window and I saw you almost get killed by that bridge. What.... What were you doing up there?"

I didn't want to say anything. I knew she would either think I was insane or that I'd get her in terrible danger. And she was too pretty for either of those things.

"It seems that,"

The breakfast table arrived.

"Toast and scrambled eggs?" the waiter asked.

"Do I get a second helping?" she asked with large doe eyes.

"Of course," the waiter smiled.

I chewed my food quickly. It gave me gravity. I felt anchored by it.

"So, are you going to tell me about why you were out there? I nearly alerted the captain. But then you vanished," she spoke with a silky French. "I almost didn't believe it. I thought I was going mad," she sipped her juice.

"Well. To tell you the truth. I don't know why I'm here. I didn't buy a ticket to this train. I... woke up here. But. I think there's... Some bad men on this train. And it's a little dangerous," she was so beautiful that it was difficult to worry.

"Bad people are everywhere. This is no secret," she was still intrigued but also had an assurance about her that was immune to evil.

"Yes. But I'm afraid something bad is going to happen. And I'm not sure what to do about it," I finished my meal.

"Are you paranoid? Has someone hurt you? Are you in shock?" she seemed to be the only one I'd met today who'd seen me. And wasn't talking to me like Phillip or Hugo.

"No. But... It's not safe. And I don't think there's a way out of it. But I like being here with you and eating.

"I enjoy you too. You are exciting," she chewed.

"I wouldn't call me exciting. But it seems like everyone I meet on this train thinks I'm something beyond what I am," I finished my coffee.

"How do you know you're not who they think you are?"

I didn't know how to answer. I wasn't sure. And uncertainty is the root of despair. I remembered who I was before I was on this train. I remembered my job. I remembered my fragmented history. I'd dropped out of college. I had debt. My memories were often distant. I rejected them. Sometimes I pretended that I didn't have a late teen phase. All the high schools I was thrown into. How I was fat. How in my early twenties I could barely hold a job. There were, back home, probably many different people who knew me as different things. As different versions. And this wasn't so different. To the crooks on this train, I was a top tier hitman. To this wonderful French woman, I was an exciting and vulnerable mystery man. But to myself, I was an insurance guy. A quiet and almost cowardly salesman. Who hadn't left much of anywhere except his hometown. A man who wasn't seen. A man who was afraid of himself.

"Are you okay?" she leaned into me.

"I think so. I mean. I like sitting here with you," I mentioned.

"I like sitting here with you, too," she replied.

"I don't think we can do this all day though. I'm afraid we're gonna have to split up," I looked into her.

"You are a dramatic one," she smiled.

"I try not to be," the ticket officer walked by and nodded at me like a hero after he saw me with her.

"You are someone important," she was bigger and interested but not impressed or naive.

"Am I?" I was asking myself.

She sat closer. I forgot about the enforcers. I forgot about what they wanted me to do. I forgot I was supposed to kill a man. I forgot I was slaved by the law and the mob. I was a part of each of them. And I was both of their enemies. They hated me and loved me. I was each of their secret weapons but also their greatest weaknesses. But I just wanted to eat here with this lovely French lady. I wanted to follow her. I wanted to know about her. I wanted to know her more than myself. I wanted her to be the reason I got on this train. The world was made of conflict. But she was as peaceful as a fire orange leaf in a pond among a Fall orchard.

"Well. I know whatever happens. I want to see you off this train. I want you to follow me when we get off," she smiled at me like a hidden devil who'd found the light.

"I'd like that. I'd like that a lot," I said. I didn't care about sounding cool. I just wanted us to be in a field away from all this.

"I know you would," she finished her coffee and I peeled myself from this sticky daydream. I knew someone was watching. I had to be away from her. It wasn't safe.

"You should probably get back up to the front. I'll be around to you a little later," I got up. She grinned again with that red glow.

"I'll be looking forward to seeing you. But I'm supposed to sing tonight for a private ceremony in the back. I'm a hired singer for some people here tonight," she began waltzing away with that red.

Of course she was going to be in the middle of all this. She was too perfect to be on the sidelines. She was like a butterfly seed in a hayfield that had blown from a meadow where it was wilder and more free. But, wait, I had to get her away from there. And as she walked down the aisle, I grabbed for her before being nabbed by a gorilla of a man. His arms were as long as an oak branch. His words fired short and like bullets.

"Get to the back," and I followed with his steps like a mime. There was no way forward. And she faded into the front as we arrived to the back.

"He's gonna be giving a toast to me. I want you to do him right there. It'll all be over. We'll have you outta here. It'll be like you vanished," It took a moment, but I discovered that the ape man who had pulled me into the back was fashioned in something like a secret service outfit. And this man was a candidate. An elect. Someone that the public was going to have operating their systems. An official who assigned me murder. They really are as dirty as the myths.

"And if you don't," the ape barked and leaned over me like an unstable bomb.

"He will," the candidate assured him.

"He has no other choice. It's who he is," he was confident and grandiose as if he were telling the country an economic promise.

"I know you won't let me down. And after tonight, you'll be officially retired," he handed me a cocktail. "I promise," he inquired.

But I wasn't this Phillip. I still hoped for him to come through the door. But if that happened, I'd surely be taken out. And not by the ticket officers. I'd end up in a trash barrel.

I couldn't do what they wanted. I wasn't a killer. I wasn't a warrior. I'd fired a gun once. And that was at paper and cans. I just wanted her red Autumn hair and French words. That was all I could focus on. I thought more about their guarantees. Each said I'd get away. They promised I'd be out of here safely. Retired, so to speak. But he was a politician. And they always made phony promises. And below they were thieves. There was no such thing as truth among thieves. So I'd shoot one of them. And then she'd see that I was a murderer. She'd be traumatized. If I shoot the candidate, I'll be chopped in jail. If I shoot the don, I'll be hunted for the rest of my days. After all, I wasn't either of these men. I was a life insurance salesman from Maumee, Ohio. All I'd done was gone to bed early after voting yesterday. After I helped elect another crooked fool. Probably not much different than this candidate pushing me to kill.

I picked up the gun in the bathroom that the candidate had told me was under the sink. It was a snub nose. It reminded me of those old noir films. And when I pointed it at the mirror, I felt like a real gangster. It was fun to pretend. But this was no imagination. In a few moments, I'd be expected to assassinate with it. But how could I? My stomach got heavy after stepping on my aunt's cat once. But to shoot another man with this. Watch his blood spray out from the cut of the bullet. Maybe he'd go somewhere. Maybe he wouldn't. Maybe he'd have a eulogy. Maybe they'd make a monument. Maybe they'd call me by my first and middle and last name. I'd be like John Wilkes Booth or Lee Harvey Oswald. Or, maybe I'd be a hero. But I doubted it. Maybe I'd kill the don and they'd say I saved the world from crime. But I wasn't here to be praised. I was a muscle. But I was gonna do something that needed to be done. And for a moment, that wasn't so bad. Maybe I'd be infamous. Maybe I'd be important. I was never big back home. Nobody ever spoke to me like the gangsters or the candidate.

There was a knock. It was a steady I know you're in there and it's time for business kind of knock. I opened the door and it was the service agent. He looked at me from those mysterious shades. I couldn't see him. But he could see me. And something told me that he knew I wasn't Phillip. But it didn't matter to him, or else I'd probably be dead.

"Let's go to dinner," his monotone was like a low piano key. And it never rose. Just a long hold on a haunted note. And we headed for the ceremony. I could hear her. I could hear the guile of her French vocals and it rang out an American jam. And I knew behind the song she was thinking of me. Just like how I was thinking of her. But I was about to put her life in danger. Maybe I'd be killed. Maybe I'd go to sleep. Sleep? A great an eternal sleep? That was better than to be here or back in that life I hated in Ohio. I pretended more there than I did here on this train. Maybe I'd prayed to become who I really was. And maybe this was the answer. All of that might be satisfying if she wasn't here.

They were all there. Watching me. Some were the gang. Some were the politicians. But they all looked at me with the same black vision. There was the end of the song. And she saw me. She was like what they wrote those old rocky pop songs for. And she looked at me differently than all the vampires that were watching me carefully. And I nearly broke from the character they thought I was. But it didn't matter. My character was as shallow as a porn actor. I could just do the thing they wanted and they'd be satisfied.

But, I HAD to do that thing. I had to. I didn't want to. I had to. But what if I didn't? What if I ran to her. Maybe they'd all see that I wasn't the killer. But that was hope. And there was no hope among the fierceness of this war. And that's what it was. This train. And there was about to be blood on it. All of the men were armed. They were all as dangerous as they thought I was. The dark man from below appeared. He shook hands with the candidate. After their hollow exchange, they both looked at me. And each of them winked. Any moment now, one of them would be dead. Or, I would be on the run. I would be a fugitive. She came in front of them. She came toward me. And all the black eyes got larger. She was smiling. She was coming to hug me. And she arrived like the warm blanket of yellow after a wrathful May storm. She wrapped me. And I whispered.

"No one's ever met me like you did today. I think you're the first person who's ever seen me. And I hate to do this," and before she could absorb the words, I looked back at them.

They were all waiting. As if each person in the room knew. The candidate and the dark man squeezed each other's hands and neither of them would let go. They gripped. Waiting for the shot.

I pulled the gun. I pushed her backward and she went out of the room. I knew, as I pulled the trigger, she would be gone. My old life I hated back in Ohio, too. But what options were there? I could feel her coming back from the other side before I squeezed the trigger. I eased off of it. And I shoved her back again. There was still no surprise. Only the hot second that was burning like a clean country egg. And I centered again. Most of the room hadn't sounded. They all knew except for the employed ones. And they were getting back to their clean ups or invested in the celebration. I pushed my finger a little more heavily. And I thought of her red. Her red was all I wanted. She saw me. I mean, she really did. She knew me. No one had ever known me. But she did. She knew me. As if I were a kid again. And I didn't feel jailed. I could make a choice now. I could put the gun down and go to her. What if I just.. Told them I wasn't him? But it was too late. The gun was drawn. Any second there would be roars. And probably more guns. And then, I bobbed the sight of the pistol between the two wolves. And I breathed. Tug from below was watching me like meat. And the enforcing service agent was hovering me, too. But, I wasn't who they saw. And then, I put it down. Tug began stampeding. The service agent grabbed me.

"What are you doing?"

He stared into me from the blackness of his shades. Like an outer space with no stars or galaxies or universes.

"I'm not a killer," I said. Tug was barreling at me like a torpedo. But I didn't brace. I just thought of her red. I thought of her laugh. I thought of her eyes. The only eyes that had seen me.

"HE'S GOT A GUN!" One of the waiter's said. And then most of the room drew their guns. And I was targeted by both sides. The agent gripped my neck with a jiu jitsu lock. Tug was headed for me like a shark. And then, Hugo dropped from the ceiling. And he locked onto the candidate. As if he'd been waiting above the party for his dessert. Just like how the gang below said he liked to. And on his other side, Phillip appeared from a hidden corridor like a phantom. A ghost who'd been haunting the train and waiting to visit for the work his spirit craved.

I watched the black holes of the guns. I waited for a star to bang out of them and erase my chapter from the train. And also from the existence of space that my deflated identity had been taking up in all these foggy years. But as the assassins triggered, the barrels became confused. I'd tossed my gun. The candidate and the dark leader were killed. Some of the guns were still on me. But most of them had opened on the assailants. And, as their legends told, they were almost dodging the bullets. A few of them were still hounding me. And one or two of the thugs or political groups engaged me. I saw the squeeze of the trigger. I couldn't move. I was locked by this damn agent. This was it. I breathed. I saw the explosion of the guns. But right as the fire came to scorch me, Tug thudded to the floor. And all his wicked throttle had intercepted their scattered bullets. But, still, there were one or two more guns on me. I'd been saved once, but the next round would obliterate me. I was absolutely sure of it. And I got ready for the blow. But, as I got prepared, I discovered that the agent had me in the air. And I wrapped the guard of my legs around his waist and sank beneath him. And I felt the bullets riddle through his thick flesh. When I peeled his python body from the heat of mine, he was empty of life just as the candidate and the dark man were sucked of theirs. And by now, all the attention had diverted to the gunmen who were fleeing from the speed of the train.

The train finally stopped. But now there were only seconds before marshals came. They were running from the front. There was panic. Blood had misted the air. But her red had appeared bolder than the blood. And she was there. Scared. Excited. But not any less magnificent. And I grabbed her.

"I wasn't who they thought. But we gotta go," the marshals and ticket officers were coming. And they weren't looking at me like Phillip. They were seeing me for whoever she saw me as now. And I pulled her out of the door.

"What happened? Where are we going? Are you okay?" she was keeping me.

"I don't know where we're going. But I know we're not going back to where we were before," and she took my hand and we vanished into the green away from the bloody train.