Young Hearts:

She’d woken up early, climbed out of bed without him stirring, made her way downstairs and slipped out of the door. She’d walked two miles before sunrise to reach the station and then she planted herself somewhere between the yellow line and the platform edge. The morning dew dripped from the treetops, birds chirped as birds do and spring smelled just like spring. Clouds clouded, lights lit, traffic trafficked, and the moon hung around past its bedtime. All was as it always was which struck her as strange, because nothing was as it always was. Coffee tasted as bitter as the day before and her cigarette butt hissed in a puddle as though it was a regular day. There was a hole in the sole of her left converse, that the big toe relentlessly dug deeper. It gyrated back and forth trying to break free and reach the concrete beneath, it too was in disbelief that they’d made it and probably wanted to test the ground itself. Big toe, subconscious, it’s all the same. The notice board flickered in her peripheral, the train was delayed, her train. Not by much but enough for nerves to set in and maybe even change her mind, she feared. She was finally cashing in her ticket; an abstract one-way freedom pass she’d dreamed up a few years prior. The idea manifested and was used much like a comfort blanket, one that she slept with each night, smuggled in her bag to work, and kept close at all times. At any given moment she could escape into the idea and put some distance between herself and the present. She’d likened it to Bukowski’s bluebird or Dorothy’s slippers, but it wasn’t either, it was Faith’s ticket.

It had taken her three years to walk two miles, and some kind of cosmic injustice delayed the train. Fifteen minutes to go, and the toe was almost out of the sole. She kept a flip-phone, partly because he’d smashed her android and partly because it reminded her of a simpler time, it was buzzing in her pocket, earlier than she’d anticipated. She rejected the call and the two thereafter. She didn’t know if it was Jeckall or Hyde on the line, she was through with both. She turned on airplane mode and plugged her ear phones in. There was only one song downloaded on the device which she’d had on repeat for weeks. It drowned the sounds of the world out. She didn’t care for the four to the floor, or the wall of sound. She honed in on the words that cut through the music, the words written for her alone.

“What’s the sense in sharing, this one and only life/ ending up just another lost and lonely wife/ you count up the years/ and they will be filled with tears.”

Hair stood on her arms and neck, her eyes widened, and a euphoria released from the centre out. She replayed from the beginning, only adding to the drugs potency, each repeat felt like another hit, like tapping a limitless morphine switch.

“Young hearts, run free/ never be hung up, hung up like my man and me/ young hearts, to yourself be true/ don’t be no fool, when love really don’t love you.”

Twelve minutes, and the big toe was closer to the concrete. Her left hand raised to her right brow where a small scar remained. A reminder of what she was removing herself from. It wasn’t that she needed the validation, that ship had sailed, it was a reminder of how far she’d come. It was an ode to the lyrics now filling her ears and soul, a subtle nod back to the lady pouring her heart out some decades prior. She thought it to be a strange thing how music could reach out across the vastness of time. How simple truths woven into poetry would be simple truths in any era, and how pain and heartbreak went unchanged despite any

generational gap. Somehow without her noticing, the platform was drip fed by people, there was four then six and so on. She diverted her eyes from each of them because a single glaze into the window of another soul might thwart her ambitions and stifle her exit plan. She had a unique ability of seeing the child in anyone, a homeless woman begging for change, a rude waiter, a colleague facing hard times, even her man who brought undue displeasure into her life on a daily basis. Seeing the child in anyone would be enough to send her home to the sweet narcissist, because even the broken need nurture. She replayed the song again, the ambition it bolstered seemed to be perpetual as long as her battery lasted.

She was as anti-social as could be, distant from the growing crowd, headphones in and as loud as her ears could stand, she couldn’t help but notice the distance. Almost everyone was gathered at the far end of the platform and shooting strange looks in her direction. She pulled the chord from her ears and shot a look back their way. “Faith, for Christ sake.” Hyde, no doubt about it. He was calling from the car park behind her, his face pressed against the galvanised steel bars. Judging by the numerous faces, he’d been there a moment or two and was hurling abuse. “Look at me.” He demanded, she did, he was red faced, blotched by madness, confusion, perhaps a mixture of both. “Get in the car.”

“I’m done.” Faith said. “I can’t live like this anymore.” Three minutes and the toe had finally dug itself out of the shoe, now only a thin cotton veneer stood between itself and the concrete it so desperately needed.

“We’ll talk in the car.” He half smiled but his canine tellingly sunk into his lip. Jeckell spoke, Hyde smirked.

“No. I don’t want to speak. I don’t want another apology or promise or fight or another night alone. Please, just leave.” She never said things like that, she was unrecognisable to herself., not even in the mirror was she so brazen.

“Faith!” He shouted, but his eyes drew quickly to the small group of on-lookers. “Get the fuck in the car.” He whispered through the fence. Two minutes, and the toe was wearing through the sock at a rapid rate.

“I’m tired.” She placed just one earphone back in, just for the courage. She kept her eyes on him, taking comfort in the fact he’d never cross the line in front of so many witnesses. Queue bass, queue trumpets, queue Candi. She stood like that for a moment, deaf to the sounds of pleads and snipes, blind to the growing rage. One minute and thirty seconds, now she could really hear the clapping of coming thunder racing along the tracks. It was finally time to do what she’d prepared to, what she’d envisioned would emancipate her. She thought it was time to end the story, to step back off the platform. Impact to black, no fade, no outro, no credits, one clap, no applause. It wasn’t quitting, not in her eyes, it was what Candi was saying, to run free. She took a step back, closer to the platform edge.

“Faith. What the hell are you doing?”

“I told you, I’m done.”

“This is how?” He laughed. She wasn’t sure what she expected him to do, but laughing wasn’t it. She pictured her friends and family, the obituary, perhaps even an article in the local paper depicting the abuse and the tragic end. Now, simply looking at him, she knew he’d spin it to his advantage, play the role of broken lover.

Thirty seconds, the toe had ground against the concrete enough to break through the sock. It was only then that she truly became aware of the hole in the sole, it was cold, and sharp.

The train squealed, its breaks bringing it to an eventual stop. It was time to tip backward and end the story. She couldn’t. To her own surprise she remained, the train cut close to her back. Chasing it was a cold and cutting wind. Abuse hurled through the fence, young hearts bellowed in the left ear and the train came to a slow halt. The doors hissed open, the toe calmed to a slow curl, symptom or symbol? She shed a tear for the maddened boy on the other side of the fence as he pounded his fist against the bars. Similar to her dream, she stepped back off of the platform, the free toe was the first of herself to connect, and the rest followed. Huge leap, tiny step, big toe, subconscious, it’s all the same. The doors slid shut and she placed the right earphone in.

“Oh, young hearts run free.”