The Afterlife Express

Grief is like a runaway train, which track do you even choose?

She smelled smoke before she even opened her eyes.

Cigar smoke.

Cigar smoke and… freshly brewed coffee?

It was a combination she’d woken up to for most of her childhood. Curled under wool blankets with satin binding, it was a silent alarm clock that woke her nearly every morning. The reminder that her father was home, that breakfast was coming together and the day was fresh and new.

It had been many years since she’d smelled the two together, and the scent seemed like a distant memory had come creeping in to her dreams.

Her eyes opened to sunlight, blanketing her from a window to her right. She held up a hand to shade her eyes as they adjusted and she jumped as she focused on a figure seated across from her.

“Up and at 'em! There you go!” The figure chuckled. It was a voice she’d nearly forgotten but familiarity came rushing in with a wave of nostalgia that almost knocked her to the floor.

“Dad?” She managed to choke out and he retorted with a chuckle.

“Hey sailor, it’s been a while.”

She looked around the train cabin, studying herself, her hands & whatever of her body she could see. She turned her attention to her father, taking in the details of his face and recognizing his clothing. The clothing he wore when he died.

“Am I…?” She swallowed, not able to finish her question.

“Dead?” He asked. He shook his head immediately.

“Sadie… this here is the afterlife express. The very engine that takes you to your final destination. You and I are sat here on the very last car, the observation car. The caboose if you will. I remember it was always your favorite….” He chuckled.

“So I’m no-“ Sadie began before her father interrupted.

“Sorry sorry let me continue,” he said, clearing his throat. “We’re at the back of the train, kid. You’ve got to make your way to the engine, before the train reaches the last station. You shouldn’t be here. It’s not your time yet… you’ve got to remind the other passengers of that.”

Sadie tilted her head and gave her father a questioning look, “How do I do that?”

Her father laughed and leaned forward to pat her knee, “I can’t give you all the answers, can I? I’m already telling you more than I should. Most of our loved ones I guide through… it’s small talk and old memories til we hit the final stop. But you? You’re not ready to call it quits yet.”

He stood, the same tall, lanky man who guided her through childhood, who held the seat of her bicycle and let her go as just the right time the day she learned to ride for herself. He extended the same calloused hand she’d held a thousand times, a hand that saw many types of labor and never failed to extend love to her. She pressed her hand against his and he squeezed it as he pulled her to her feet.

Sadie paused and pointed to the back of the train, through the wide back window of the caboose they stood in. “Why can’t I just go back? Jump off here?” There were storm clouds gathering behind the train, a stark contrast to the sunlight to her right.

Her father shook his head and pushed her to the door of the caboose that lead to the next train, “You can’t go back, you can only keep moving forward.”

He gave her a gentle shove towards the door and she opened it to the loud sounds of a speeding train on a track in the middle of nowhere. She stepped over the gap between cars and turned the knob for the next car, but stopped for a moment to look back into the caboose, only to find it empty.

Furrowing her brow in confusion she opened the door into the next train car and looked around. It looked to be some sort of common seating car, filled with nearly empty seats. The only occupied seat was taken by a figure, caught up in a newspaper.

Sadie cleared her throat and the newspaper lowered and Sadie couldn’t help but gasp.

“Grandma?”

The old woman’s eyes sparkled and she beckoned Sadie closer.

“My child, it isn’t your time yet… you know, I was just reading the paper from the last day we spent together,” she said, petting Sadie’s hair, “You were still young, still learning… and you are still young & learning. Not your time yet… nope, not at all!”

She handed a cookie to Sadie, who held it in her hand for a moment before realizing it was still warm, just like the fresh cookies her grandmother would give her to taste test. She said that her opinion mattered most and she needed it right away.

Her grandmother held up her own cookie, and the two sat together for a moment, eating their oatmeal raisin cookies together. It tasted like stepping into a memory she’d tossed aside in the stress of becoming an adult. She felt every warm moment shared with her Grandmother course through her veins and fuel her, even more so than the warm cookie she finished off with a smile.

Her grandmother patted her thigh and nodded towards the door to the next train car, "You better get going dear, you don't have much time."

She hugged her grandmother and took in the scent of her sweater, and let the hug linger for a moment so she could package it up and keep it all for herself in her mind.

Sadly she stood and moved towards the door to the next train car, minding the gap as she headed in.

The next train car was the dining car, filled with delicious scents of various flavors. She inhaled with a smile, suddenly filled with a near ravenous hunger. There was no one but a small child, coloring as they sat at one of the tables, stopping now and then to eat some pancakes that always seemed fresh and hot. The butter was always warm and glistening and steam rose from the fluffy tan discs.

Sadie sat herself across from the child, who offered a blue crayon. She didn’t know their little face and was confused by their connection. There was a familiarity about the little girl that she couldn’t quite place.

“I never got to live on earth,” she said in a small voice, “but I’m still yours right?”

It was then that she realized that the child before her was the one she lost, lost in her womb after she’d come to terms with being a mother. She remembered bleeding, crying and saying goodbye. She remembered being madly in love and how that love was broken by the loss of their child. A love never mended but cemented in the stars she saw in the little girls eyes as she looked up at her.

“You’ll always be mine,” Sadie sighed softly, realizing it was a loss she never truly sat with and recognized. She sat with the little girl for a few moments and together they colored a rainbow and a sky filled with stars.

“Can I have a name?” The little girl asked and Sadie thought for a moment and nodded, thinking back on the name she had settled on before she lost the baby.

“Rose,” she smiled softly, ruffling the girls red hair.

“I could have done things different…” she started, but stopped when Rose put her hand on hers.

“No.”

“But I should have…” she tried again, but Rose shook her head. She patted Sadie’s hand and climbed out of the booth and motioned towards the next door.

“You gotta go now,” Rose sighed sadly, “But I’ll still see you from the stars.”

Before Sadie could speak, Rose pushed her through the doorway and she pushed her way into the next train car.

“Shhhhhh,” a dark haired woman peeked out of her cabin and then lit up at the sight of Sadie.

“My girl!” She laughed, covering her mouth to stifle the joyful laughter that escaped. She pulled Sadie into the cabin and closed the door, speaking just above a whisper… or at least trying to.

Sadie studied her face for a moment, but her voice was the biggest clue. Francine, her mothers best friend & their neighbor as Sadie grew up. Her house was like something out of an 80’s sitcom and young Sadie often found herself watching soaps and eating snacks at Francine’s house after pre-school. Her mother knew, that if she couldn’t find her, she’d walked down the driveway and right over to see Franny.

“Franny?!” She hugged the woman right and was suddenly flooded with memories of General Hospital and Pepperidge Farm cookies. She remembered a pink crushed velvet couch and giggling on the kitchen counter as Franny snuck her another cookie. If anyone came close to being a second mother to Sadie, it was Francine. She laughed at the irony of Francine being in the quiet car, and wondered how difficult it was for her. She watched her talk with her hands, telling a story from their shared past and listened to her voice raise and lower everytime she caught herself.

Sadie furrowed her brows when Franny mentioned how she passed, throwing it around like it was nothing. Just something that happened.

“You were there laughing with us!” Sadie growled, bawling her fists in anger, “then they caught the cancer in your brain and you were gone in just a couple months, it wasn’t fair!”

She swallowed back tears, none of them should have died when they did, but Franny, so full of life, brimming with love and laughter seemed like the the most unfair. She wasn’t elderly, she was strong, passionate and lively… and then one day…she was gone.

Franny cupped Sadie’s cheek, “You’ll always be that kid munching on cookies on my counter, no matter how old you get. Things happen though that we can’t change. They don’t seem right, make us real angry even… but I’m at peace. Watching my loved ones live on? That’s my soap opera now girlie, you guys keep me entertained.”

Fran kissed her forehead and squeezed her shoulder, “I’ll always be with you. I always have been.”

Sadie didn’t need the push this time, she herself nodded and left the cabin for the hallway to the final door.

The last car before the engine was a lounge, complete with a bar and a bartender wiping down the bar, whistling a tune that seemed familiar to Sadie, but she couldn’t quite place it. She tilted her head and studied the face of the bartender that locked eyes with her.

“Took you long enough, nerd,” they laughed as they tossed the bar towel at her and Sadie caught it despite her shock.

It was someone who to this day, she had difficulty talking about. Someone whose loss still seemed like a nightmare she’s been stuck in for a decade. Her best friend, her partner in crime through high school, the one who knew all her deepest secrets first.

“Diana…” she gasped, an ache in her heart throbbing up into her throat. She couldn’t stop her body from walking around the bar and taking her friend in a bear hug. She couldn’t even remember the last time they embraced or even the last words she said to her, but she could never forget the sound of her voice or the way her hugs felt.

“Hey now, no sappy shit, right? You’ve cried enough over me,” Diana teased, playfully punching her in the shoulder.

She HAD cried many tears for Diana, but she never thought them too many, every tear in her memory meant keeping a part of her alive.

“It was a stupid accident, it shouldn’t have been you,” Sadie let out.

“If it wasn’t me? It would be someone else’s friend. Someone else’s secret keeper, hair braider and prankster extraordinaire. If the car I was in didn’t crash, it would have been the one after me. Maybe that was someone’s mother. The only person in the world they had.”

Sadie exhaled slowly and swallowed back the sobs she’d been trying to digest since the very first train car with her father. Diana was right. Loss was a human experience, something every soul would witness, but it was how we recovered from the loss (if we even did) that would truly change us.

Diana gripped both of Sadie’s shoulders and shook her a little with her words, “Love with all you’ve got for those you have left.”

Yet again, Diana was right. Sadie wasn’t surprised, Diana never failed to tell it like it was and be painfully honest doing so. The trauma and loss of Sadie’s past had left her scorned, keeping the love in her heart for those she had lost. She was too afraid to share her love with anyone new for fear of losing them too. She’d locked her heart away to protect it from pain, not realizing she’s deprived herself of the affection she deserved.

Sadie kissed Diana’s cheek and wrapped her in her arms again.

“You better think of me every time you hear Tangled up in Blue,” Diana winked.

“Listen, every Bob Dylan song makes me think of you!” Sadie laughed, wiping stray tears from her eyes.

“Good,” Diana nodded, just as the train engine began to whistle.

“Time to go,” Diana said hurriedly, pushing Sadie from behind the bar, “You’re ready this time, right?”

With a strong shove, Diana pushed Sadie through the final door.

Diana slowly opened her eyes to dull fluorescent lighting and a scent that belonged to only one place - the hospital. Her body ached, her head was spinning, she felt like she’d been drowning for years.

She could see movement out of the corner of her eye and her mother jumped up to move closer.

“Sadie… sweetheart…it’s Mom, you were in a kayak accident… you scared us there,” her mother spoke between joyful sobs. She gently touched her hand, tying not to overwhelm her. Sadie gave her Mom a weak smile and tried to speak.

“I love you, Mom,” she managed to squeak out. There wasn’t much else she needed to say. She was grateful to be alive, blessed by a second chance and blanketed with a new sense of closure for each loss in her life. There were a million thoughts in her mind, but the brightest thoughts were the reminder of how loved she was, and how loved she would continue to be.