The Runaway Train

I wake up to the sound of my alarm. Only today, it sounds different. Rather than the slow crescendo of the digital chime, it sounds more like the long, low, resonating blast of a train horn.

I blink my eyes open and witness a mesmerizing blur of landscapes passing by. It looks familiar, however once I begin to recognize the imagery, it seems to change. An ever so subtle morphing into another place. Grasslands turn to hilly valleys turn to sweeping mountains then to rolling sand dunes before becoming a pristine beach. All without any pattern, but with a seamless transition that is almost imperceptible, and all with a hint of nostalgia as they pass by at impossible speeds, as if I’ve been to all of these places already.

The place I don’t recognize is the train I’m traveling on.

I’ve been on many trains in my life and all of them have a standardized similarity that is boring at best when you rely on them for your daily commute, but welcoming when you’re traveling abroad in a country where you don’t know the language. This train is different, though. There is nothing familiar about this train other than the unsettling shifting views outside.

As I stand to explore my strange new surroundings, the door in front of the car slides open and a man is walking towards me. His hog head hat gives it away that he must be this train’s conductor, but his clothing (I wouldn’t call it a uniform) seems too…comfortable to be official. He approaches me with a bland expression and asks what stop I’m getting off at. I ask what train I’m on, but he only repeats the question with three options: before, during, or after. I tell him I don’t understand and ask again: where am I and where am I going. He only gives me the same question with the same three options. I assume this is a test, and before I give him my response, I need to gather more information so I can make the correct choice. I tell him I need some time to give the answer and he silently nods. He tells me the dining car will be open until I make my decision and walks past me to the next car. He doesn’t tell me which way the dining car is, but I can see a shadow in the car ahead, so I go that way.

The next car is, in fact, the dining car. The tables are set for service and I choose one to sit at. There is a pleasant-looking woman sitting at a table at the other end of the car, staring out the window next to her. She is crying softly, tears glistening on her cheeks. The windows in this car are smaller than the previous car, almost lens-shaped, but the soul-soothing landscape transitions can still be seen. The dining tables are set up in such a way that forces me to sit almost uncomfortably close to the window next to me. I need to focus my eyes differently to see the scenery shifting and passing by. There is no menu and no waiter, but there is an aroma that rivals the best restaurant I’ve ever eaten at.

As I wait for the waiter to arrive, I continue watching the strange world zoom by outside the lens-window next to me. Maybe its the shape of the glass, but it seems harder to focus on the beauty as it morphs. I focus my eyes on the beach that is outside now and I swear I can see a sign that reads, “Land’s Edge”. I grew up near Land’s Edge, but there were no trains anywhere near there. I blink my eyes to focus better, wishing this window was as large and clear as the one from the passenger car I came from, but the scene has changed again. Now its a small town whizzing by, too fast to make out street names or store signs, but still somewhat familiar.

The smell of roasting garlic and onions is coming from an unseen kitchen. The accompanying basil and rosemary makes me start to salivate. Then I get a hint of coriander. A combination of spices that makes my heart jump. The only person I’ve ever met who combined those flavors in those proportions was my mother. And she learned it from her mother. I start to worry about where I am. Everything seems too familiar, too almost-perfect. I call out to the woman sitting at the other end, but she doesn’t seem to hear me. I decide to go to her, hoping she has an idea of what’s happening.

I sit across from her in a seat that’s at an awkward angle to the table and again too close to the lens-like window for easy focusing on the scenery outside. She doesn’t seem to notice I’m there. I say hello quietly so as not to startle her. She turns towards me and I see she is smiling, still with tears on her cheeks. She seems happy and sad at the same time. After brief introductions, she asks me why I’m not crying. I don’t understand the question. I ask her where the waiter is and she tells me she has been in this car for a long time and no waiter has come, but she’s not hungry. I find that strange but realize I’m not hungry, either. She turns back to her window and starts to giggle, then she starts crying again. I ask if she scenery is making her cry and she tells me it’s what’s “in” the scenery that she loves.

I ask her if she knows where this train is going and she says no. I ask her if she understands the destination question of the conductor and she says yes, never turning from the window. I look out the lens next to me and see a forest going by just out of focus. I ask why the forest makes her cry and she tells me its not a forest, its a school. This confuses me. I look out again and it is definitely a forest, but then morphs into a meadow with wildflowers and mountains in the distance. I can see large deer, or maybe they’re elk? I ask her if by “school” she means the group of animals out there. She says no. Just her old school.

From my window, the meadow changes into a town, but not a school. Its not just any town. Its my old hometown. The train is moving too quickly to make out street names, but the layout is unmistakable. Its the town I grew up in and lived in for the first twenty years of my life. I pull back from the lens-like window with a start, my hand going up to my mouth to stop the gasp. How is this possible? How can I be in my childhood hometown? Just like the beach I grew up near, there was no train there. I look at the woman in front of me. She turns from her window to look back at me. The aroma of unorthodox Italian seasoning has changed to butter, cinnamon, and brown sugar with the perfect char. My mother’s French toast. A tear forms in my eye and rolls down my cheek. The woman smiles at me and tells me I should start to understand now. She goes back to looking at the window. She never speaks to me again.

I go back to my table at the other end of the dining car. The seat is still too close to the lens-window and isn’t adjustable, but the angle to the table is less awkward here. Now I smell charcoal burning and can practically taste the sizzle of the fat dripping onto the coals. My father’s old style of barbecuing. I decide not to wipe the tears from my eyes. They are tears of happiness. I look out the lens next to me again. The tears help me focus. I begin to understand.

Images begin to form and shift in front of the scenery, like a blurry stage play set in nature. I can see myself as a small child playing with my favorite toys, happy and content. My first memory. I see myself growing up, meeting friends, playing sports, high school, then college. I see my first crush, my first love, then my second. I see my first job turn into my career. I meet my wife and we get married. I start to hate my job, then I start to hate my wife. We get divorced with no children. I heard she remarries and has five in four years. I concentrate on my career and have an opportunity to make it successful. I get ready for the big meeting.

I know I’m driving too fast but I have a deadline. Fat raindrops pound hard on the windshield. If this meeting is a success, I can start a new life. My friends told me I’m selling my soul to get this job. I stopped talking to them. This is my choice, my career, my life. I decide not to risk that life and I slow down just in time to correct the hydroplane my car had just gone into. The meeting is a success. A seven-figure starting bonus and after five years, an eight-figure retention bonus.

The money piles up as the years go by. I meet women, lots of women, but rarely for longer than a night. I’m too busy to settle down. I make new friends, but don’t trust them. They’re out for themselves. I’m too busy for friends, anyway. My parents die one after the other. I hadn’t seen them in years. I pay for their funerals. Its the least I can do. I’m sitting in a restaurant one day and see a familiar face. An old friend. An old crush from my youth. She is with a man and has two children. She looks happy. I start to think about that kind of life. I down my whiskey and walk out. I go back to work. I start using blow to help with the day-to-day of the job. I start drinking more to help me sleep. I become more successful and the bank account grows. I make proposals and the company grows. I grow older I but don’t retire. I’m having too much fun.

Time goes by, technology improves, work paradigms shift, and the company starts to lose money. Younger people come in to manage the money and the products. Older partners start to get phased out. I’m one of the older partners. Soon, I have no purpose, but I have so much money. I buy houses and boats. I buy booze and drugs and women. I can’t spend my money fast enough. Its the only thing that makes me happy.

I wake up in a hotel room. The room is trashed. The trash that I picked up last night has already left. She took all of my coke, the bitch. I can get more. I find a guy in my regular spot, but its not the regular guy. It doesn’t matter. I give him five bills, he gives me five small bags. I go back to the hotel, but they won’t let me back in. I’m banned because the room is so damaged. I tell them their place fucking sucks anyway and I go to another. I get through one bag, then two. By the third I’m feeling fine, so I finish the fourth. Mid-snort through the fifth, a bolt of electricity shoots through my brain. I fall to the side, striking my head on the table on the way down. I’m on the floor and can’t move the right side of my body. I see blood spreading across the floor, but I don’t feel any pain from the gash on my scalp, only the pain inside my head. I can’t speak. I lie there for an hour with the pain increasing. I close my eyes. Finally the pain stops. Then my breathing stops. Then I stop.

I blink the tears from my eyes as I look away from the lens-window. The woman is watching me. She smiles and nods, then goes back to her own window. The scenes I saw were so real, but I have no memory of any of it after that rainy car drive. I look back through the lens, but only see scenery going by. As the aroma of clean laundry and fresh-cut grass permeates the dining car, the tears form again and the scenes start to reappear.

Childhood, school, college, work, marriage, divorce, more work, and next is the meeting.

I’m driving too fast as the fat raindrops pelt the windshield. I need to go faster. If I miss this meeting, it could all be for nothing. The money could change my life. Maybe I could finally be truly happy. I decide to go faster. Better to be early for such a big event than just on-time like everyone else. I’m a good driver and I have a good car. I speed up some more. Another car passes me from the other direction and a wave of water splashes onto my windshield. I make the wipers go faster, but its too late. I didn’t see the turn in the road. I hit the guardrail at an angle that allows my car to flip right over it. The rail was there for a reason. As I tumble down the cliff, I can see the airbags blowing up in succession. The seatbelt does its job for half of the fall, then it fails. By then the airbags aren’t full of air anymore. I’m tossed around the inside of my car like a rag doll, bones snapping, air escaping me. The world keeps turning in odd angles until finally the movement stops. I can smell oil and gasoline and smoke. I can taste blood, metallic and bitter, as well as something sweet and slick. I can’t move. Everything hurts. Then there is no pain. The rain continues to pound on the car. It lulls me to sleep. I close my eyes. I don’t wake up.

I turn abruptly from the lens-window, mouth gaping. The woman is looking at me again. She shrugs and goes back to her own viewings. I think about what I just saw. Did that happen? Will it happen? I don’t need any familiar smells to get the tears rolling this time. I peer through the lens to once more watch the familiar life I’ve lived up to that drive in the rain.

I know I’m driving too fast but I have a deadline. As the fat raindrops pound on the windshield, I have confidence in my car and my driving skills. The film of water on the asphalt doesn’t care. The rear tire slides and catches the edge of the shoulder. The car spins, then flips. There is noise and pain (so much pain) as the world turns upside down, then right side up, then upside down again. The airbags all go off in succession, but the seatbelt holds firm. I smell gas and oil, burning rubber, burning fabric, burning flesh.

I wake up in a hospital, my entire body in agony. I’m there for three weeks, then in rehab for six more painfully learning how to walk again. I missed the meeting months ago, the career opportunity lost. I wallow for months, then try to get back to work. One day there is a chance encounter with an old friend, an old crush. We have coffee and talk about our failed marriages.

We get married. Our friends think we’re too old, but we have children. First a son, then a daughter, then another daughter in quick succession. We’re poor but happy and we’re a family. Our children grow up. I see skinned knees and sports, band concerts and school dances, first dates and broken hearts. I see college graduations and first jobs. As the scenery speeds up I see happy times and sad times. I see financial struggles, but family persevering. I see grandchildren born to my son and his wife. I see my younger daughter get married once she has the courage to introduce her girlfriend to the family. As I age, I see I’m never content with my career, never financially comfortable, but I’m happy with my family.

Then I start to see death. First my mother, then my father soon after. They always did things together. I see my oldest daughter get engaged before its too late but she never makes it to the wedding. The cancer takes her too quickly. I see my son’s youngest son die suddenly and for no apparent reason. He was found not breathing in the crib. It was nobody’s fault. I see my wife start to change. Its still her, but something goes missing. The doctor says its progressive and eventually she won’t remember anything or anyone. Eventually she forgets her children and her grandchildren, but she never forgets me.

I start to loose weight and energy. I’m given six months to live. I’m lying in my bed at home eight months later as the cancer relentlessly feeds on my insides. My family is with me. We can’t afford the medical care I need, but all I truly need is in front of me. My wife is there, but she doesn’t understand what’s happening. I can’t move. A life of hardships and pain, of ups and downs, of choices made. I’m tired of the pain. I look at my legacy. I smile. I close my eyes.

I turn away again. This time the woman isn’t looking at me. She’s still watching her own scenes, her own lives. Tears are streaming down her face. How many scenes has she seen, I wonder. I get up and start heading back to the passenger car. I think about saying good bye to the woman, but I don’t. I enter the empty passenger car with the big normal windows. The scenery is still morphing into familiar locales as it speeds by. Clouds have formed and fat raindrops start to smack against the windows.

The conductor has returned. I didn’t see him enter. He asks me what stop I’m getting off at: before, during, or after. I understand the question now. Tears start to form in my eyes as I give him my answer.