eternity’s train

Written by Cathoel Jorss, published 11 years ago

Because I have lots of fears I am constantly setting for myself little and large tests of courage. Where I am staying backs onto a river and it’s out in the country and quiet. So tonight as it grew dark I set out for a walk along the bank.

This might not sound very scary but the path is narrow and in places, eroded, and more importantly as it grew dark I had a nervousness of who might be lurking in the woods. I said to the trees as I stepped off the narrow footbridge onto a sandy, forested island, Protect me, trees. The water raced by at my side, gleaming and opaline, milky and green, crying out its river sounds. The bushes growing over the path are very often spiky; I think if I were a shrub growing around so many beavers’ nests I would be inclined to be spiky, too. I let my feet fall as quietly as I could. Rounding a bend in the path I saw firelight fluttering up ahead. I stayed quietly behind the screed of trees, knowing that while I could see them I would know that they couldn’t see me.

Three men; young men; really, boys. One of them was building the fire. The other two got up and flung themselves into the fast-moving current, surfacing with howls of pleasurable dismay at the cold.

I went round the path to where the boy stood, pulling leafy branches off a pile behind him and stacking them on the blaze. His fire of course was very smoky and looked like it wouldn’t flame so high for long. I was almost upon him. I said, in English, Hi, just loud enough that he would turn and see me before I got too close. As is usual with potential aggressors when you face them, they are a human who has worries of their own. Of course, I had seen that from many yards away, otherwise I would have taken a different path. He said, Gruezi, looking a little nervous, himself, and I said, Gruezi. When it was almost dark I crossed a railway bridge with the water piling and piling round its piers. It was foaming so loud I did not hear the train. It came rushing out of eternity into the moment where I lay, my belly exposed to the armies of darkness, lay in rigid smooth standing position, facing the train and with both my hands holding the narrow railing, there is only a meagre though adequate walkway built alongside the track, high above the river, and people’s faces and meals were passing in the dining car in shuttling fashion segmented by the fast windows, only an arm-length or two arm-lengths distant. Without meaning to I shrieked a long scream like a train’s eerie whistle. The train passed in seconds and I crossed over the high bridge, recovering, thankful.