Rigor Mortis

Monday 5.15pm

I am tired. My head is heavy. I walk towards the station. Nearing in the distance I hear the click clack of the electronic station gates, those blind little demons that suck our tickets into their bottomless voids or spit them out and let us pass. I admire their burning intellect, to know which ones to swallow and which to spit! The inexhaustible force that propels the tickets through the electronic gates is like the force within which I am carried towards the train station, towards the train. I walk into this vortex like a zombie, roboticised, lobotomised. The lights are on but nobody’s home—brain numb—unaware of where I’ve been or where I’m going, only vaguely aware of this force hurling me toward my destination.

Tuesday 5.15pm

The train is crowded and smelly. Trains smell like farts mostly but sometimes old food. A half eaten ham sandwich lies open on the floor, exposed, almost obscene. I’m forced to stand near it, the train is packed and I have no choice, but I refuse to look. I wish someone would pick it up and put it in a bin.

This 5.00pm train crowd annoys me. Notice the way nobody talks or makes eye contact. We all stare into the empty space in front of us, as if from different planets. City life, anonymous hostility despite shared realities. I want to jump up and start singing “We’re all going on a, summer holiday” and ask everyone to sing along. Nobody would sing and I may be put in a straight-jacket. I decide against it, white isn’t my colour.

Wednesday 5.15pm

Pressed together on the train our bodies traverse toward like destinies, homes and rooms, families and acquaintances. I stand, hold the pole for balance and consider my alienation. Do others experience it? Do others feel as lost and alone as I do? If they do, is this mutual alienation, alienation then? Or is it a defence to mask the scarier thought that we're actually all the same.

The train stops at Redfern and then the small station, MacDonaldtown. I stare blankly out the window at the distant buildings, grey and nondescript. In the foreground is a barren wasteland, sand with patches of grass and weed. The next stop is mine.

Soon after the train leaves MacDonaldtown I see near the track a human form hidden behind tall grass. A man lying still, asleep or dead, I’m not sure which. As the train gets closer, my view no longer obscured, I see that indeed it is a dead body. The man’s torso is twisted in a peculiar way. There is blood down the front of his shirt and smeared across his face. His head hangs backward as if the neck has been broken. His mouth gapes open like a fish on a hook and in a flash I see the whites of his eyes as the train plunges on.

For a moment I lose my breath. Hearing shocked gasps from fellow commuters, I realise that I’m not the only one who’s seen the body.

“Did you see that?” A man in a suit says.

“Was he dead?” A small blonde woman asks.

Everyone agrees that it was a dead body. Everybody is shaken.

“Goodness gracious!” an elderly woman exclaims. “What do you think happened?”

“He must have been hit by a train.”

“Should we tell the driver?” asks the blonde.

“He must have seen it.”

“I think we should call the police,” asserts the man in the suit.

We become intimate as strangers having all witnessed the gruesome sight.

At Newtown I am still in shock and unclear about what to do. As we get off the train the man in the suit says, “I’ll tell the police.”

“I’ll go with you,” the blonde woman says and we walk ahead together, parting ways at the station exit.

Alone now, I shiver. I don’t know what to do. I hurry home and close the door behind me. Living alone lends space to the imagination, both good and bad. The image of the dead body fills my mind and body with surreal dread and vulnerability.

Thursday 4.45pm

After a good night’s sleep images of the dead man drifted away, leaving me in peace. During the day I thought of him only once or twice, fleetingly, as one would think of a story in one’s head or a Hollywood movie, not real or threatening.

I leave work early and find myself on an emptier train heading home. At MacDonaldtown I think of the dead man, I wonder who he was. I didn’t see anything on the news about him. I’m glad of that.

As the train leaves MacDonaldtown I cannot believe my eyes, the dead man is still there. He’s in the same place, his body in the same position. His face, still covered with blood, is familiar to me now. I feel nauseous and breathless, confused and angry. I’m angry with myself for not doing something yesterday, for relying on the man in the suit and the others who said they would call the police. I can’t believe I’ve been so irresponsible.

I dial 000 on my phone and get off the train at Newtown. The automated voice on the other end asks me which service I need, I say police and then a woman asks me if it’s an emergency. I tell her that I’ve just seen a dead body. She asks me where I am and puts me through to the local police station.

“I’ve seen a dead man near MacDonaldtown Station,” I tell the constable on the telephone when he asks how he can help me. I hear him say something to other police officers in the background, there’s muffled laughter and then he returns to the phone.

“Are you sure he was dead?” he asks.

“Yes, I’m sure he was dead,” Indignant heat rises in my face. Thankfully his tone changes and he asks my name and the details of what I’ve seen. I’m relieved, it seems he is taking me seriously. I guess they get a lot of prank calls. I explain how I saw the dead body, what it looks like and where it is. He says that they will go and check out the area. He takes my number and says he’ll call me if they need any further help.

I go home. I feel strong in what I have done. I have coffee with a friend and she says she heard about the dead man from another friend and how disgusting she thinks it is that the police or the salvos or somebody didn’t move the body overnight.

Friday 4.45pm

The 4.45 train is all but empty. My thoughts go to the dead man. In the morning I bought the paper and read on the train about the unexplained death of a man by the tracks between MacDonaldtown and Newtown Station. The man had apparently worked for Australia Post, in a warehouse nearby. The reporter wrote that the man had been acting strangely lately and that his workmates were concerned. He appeared to have lost his memory for faces and names, forgetting who his workmates were, even going to work at Telstra rather than Australia Post - forgetting which pseudo government department he worked for. The man had apparently lost his memory and was suffering from what doctors called “a fugue state”. The paper said that this may have happened without any warning, and that it had happened to many people in The United States. His death was particularly tragic as the actual cause of death was unknown yet the accident was obviously gruesome and violent. The most likely explanation being, that in frustration at his memory loss, he had thrown himself under a train. The police commissioner was not making any comment at this stage.

I find myself thinking of the dead man and his fugue state. Imagine how scary it would be to lose your memory and to not have an identity, to not know who you are? What would you do? How would you spend your days? What would anchor you in this world and stop your mind floating away from your body like a human helium balloon?

After the train leaves MacDonaldtown I cannot believe what I’m seeing – there in the grass is the dead body in the same position, the same man. My eyes fill with tears and I feel a choking sensation in my throat. I am angry, really angry.

By the time I get off the train at Newtown I have the local police station on the phone. I am so confused I can barely think. My hands are shaking. A woman answers. I explain to this female police officer what I have seen and that I had seen it three days in a row now and that something should be done about it.

“Calm down darl,” she says, “yeah, we know what you’re talking about, we’ve checked it out and there’s no body there.”

For a moment I’m shocked, I don’t know what to say. As calmly as I can I explain to her that I had seen it and that I object to her accusing me of seeing things, imagining things, after all, I know what I saw. “What about the article in today’s paper?” I ask.

“That’s the press, darl,” she says, “it’s not factual.”

I can do nothing but hang up in this woman’s ear. I am so angry that it obliterates my fear and I resolve to go find the dead body myself. I have never seen a corpse before and I really don’t want to, but I have no choice - the police are not going to do anything.

I walk along the side of the track. Adrenaline makes me want to run, and fast. Soon I am approaching the area where I know the body to be so I slow. As I slow, I can see through the long grass a man, it looks like the man, the dead man but he is sitting up. I can see the top of his head and part of his body in profile. When I am within earshot I call to him.

“Hey, excuse me!” The man hears me, his head turns slightly, and he stands up and starts to walk quickly away. I run after him, “Hey wait, wait.” I reach him, grab his arm and turn him around to face me. Now I know for certain that it is the dead man. The front of his shirt and his face are covered in what looks like fake blood. Although not gaping anymore, I recognise the mouth. His eyes are sad. This is the same man.

“Oh God,” I say, suddenly confused and sickened by this strangeness.

“What?” he asks. He pushes me away gently and keeps walking.

I can’t decide what to do. What is going on? What does this mean? Is this man sick? Is he insane? For a moment I think I should just go home, forget about this strange individual, this strange act. But somehow I know if I do, thoughts of this not-dead body will plague me. I have to at least try to find out what is going on. I walk briskly after him.

“Why?” I ask as I tail behind, “Why do you do it?”

“Why do I do what?” he asks, a fragile timbre in his voice.

“Why do you lie by the track of the train and pretend that you’re dead?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he mumbles as he walks ahead.

“Oh yes you do,” I insist. “What do you call all that red stuff on your shirt? I’ve seen you, I’ve seen you three days in a row now and you know what, you make me sick. I have been so freaked out and concerned by the image of your death and then today all that stuff in the paper about your fugue state and I’m feeling really upset for you and then I come down here and I see, no, you’re not dead, you’re just some weirdo that likes lying by the tracks of the train pretending to be dead. Is this how you get your kicks or what? I mean what the hell is wrong with you?”

I grab his arm and pull him around to face me. Instantly I see that his eyes are full of tears. His breathing is fast and deep as he fights against the tears but soon he is crying, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry.” He covers his face with his hands as he sobs, his whole body heaving with his hurt.

I put my arm around him to steady his surprisingly slight frame. His body is shaking. “Sit down here” I say as I ease him down to the ground beside me, both of us near the empty tracks. I rest my hand on his back and try to calm him down. “I’m sorry,” I say as I find tears filling my own eyes, “I didn’t mean all that stuff I said. Come on, it’s alright.” We sit like that for a while, his eyes pouring with tears, my hand on his back. Slowly his crying subsides and when he’s calm he explains.

“I never had a job. I left school when I was fourteen. School was hard for me, I couldn’t understand what the teachers were sayin’ and kids were mean. I didn’t have any friends. I thought my problems‘d be over when I left school but things just got worse. Couldn’t find nothin’ to do. I looked for work but couldn’t find nothin’. I don’t bother lookin’ no more. I started gettin’ scared and angry, real angry. I felt sick every day and empty inside. I thought I might do somethin’ bad. Mum didn’t understand. She told me to get out the house. I went on benefits and moved into a hostel

I knew I had to do somethin’ cos I was going crazy and that’s a one-way street. But then one day I was eatin’ me lunch in the park and I musta fallen asleep. I do that sometimes, fall asleep in the day. Doctor says somethin’s wrong with my brain. Can’t drive a car or work machinery. This day, I musta fallen asleep when I was eatin’ my pie cos all I remember was a little girl tappin’ me on the leg and wakin’ me up. I wake up and there’s a crowd standin’ round me and they’re all cheerin’. They’re clappin’ an’ cheerin’ an’ pattin’ me on the back. They says they thought I was dead. Sometimes when I sleep, I sleep with my eyes open, can’t help it. Anyway this bloke says they’re all happy I weren’t dead and then they walk off. But after that I felt good. Like, this will sound queer to you, but I think that was the best time of me life when they cheered like that. Like for one moment they was all happy together and I did that. I made ‘em all happy.”

Tears of self-pity well in his eyes, “I guess ya must reckon I’m pretty hopeless?”

“No you’re not.” I am lost for words but feel compelled to go on. “You do it very well,” I say, “this pretending to be dead. You had me fooled.”

“I’m sorry,” he says as he shakes his head, “I didn’t mean to upset you.”

Just then, the city train full of 5pm commuters comes hurtling past. I notice the men and women in suits gathered together at the windows looking at us, shocked expressions on their faces. I recognise the man in the suit and the blonde woman from the first day I saw the dead body. The man in the suit points authoritatively towards us with one hand, and the blonde woman takes his other hand in hers. I wonder what they are thinking, what the people are saying. I see a flash of a camera and wonder who it is taking a photo of me and the alive-dead man. I imagine that it’s the reporter who wrote the story in today’s paper. It all seems to happen in slow motion, like a scene from a movie or an early morning dream, the confused stares, the unheard conversations, the excited voyeurism or casual disinterest. All this is captured in a split second of time, a memory's snapshot, as the train surges on into the night.