1 00:00:05,200 --> 00:00:08,519 Speaker 1: Hullo. I'm welcomed stories all the time. Glad you are here. 2 00:00:09,160 --> 00:00:12,320 Let's get into it. Last night I must have gotten 3 00:00:12,320 --> 00:00:14,839 in a round quarter to eleven. I remember my key 4 00:00:14,839 --> 00:00:17,679 scraping the lock, the old door, protesting some scattered rain, 5 00:00:17,719 --> 00:00:20,480 glazing the flags, and the stale, familiar hash of my hull. 6 00:00:21,039 --> 00:00:23,199 I shoved off my jacket, letting it slip from numb 7 00:00:23,199 --> 00:00:25,480 shoulders with a practice flick. It caught on the banister 8 00:00:25,559 --> 00:00:27,800 post as always, as if to say welcome back to 9 00:00:27,839 --> 00:00:30,440 the usual. There's an autumnated hash in the house that 10 00:00:30,519 --> 00:00:33,000 I are a kind of emptiness that grows clever with routine. 11 00:00:33,479 --> 00:00:35,399 My back hit the floor with a soft glapse, beside 12 00:00:35,399 --> 00:00:37,560 the umbrella stand, and I made my way straight to 13 00:00:37,560 --> 00:00:39,799 the kitchen, rubbing the stains of daylight from my temples. 14 00:00:40,399 --> 00:00:42,280 It wasn't until I reached to hang up my coat 15 00:00:42,320 --> 00:00:44,240 to finally retire my armor for the night that I 16 00:00:44,240 --> 00:00:46,600 felt at Wedsden's idea. In a pocket, A crumple of paper, 17 00:00:46,960 --> 00:00:50,039 soft from damp, warm from my body. The faint metallic 18 00:00:50,079 --> 00:00:51,799 trace of ink met my thumb as I drew it out, 19 00:00:52,520 --> 00:00:55,880 A train ticket stop of all things, slightly torn the date, 20 00:00:55,920 --> 00:00:58,000 blurring at the edge where it had leached into the fibers, 21 00:00:58,719 --> 00:01:01,200 but not to night's date. I stood there in the 22 00:01:01,200 --> 00:01:03,799 thin kitchen light, feeling the linoleum chilled my feet, and 23 00:01:03,880 --> 00:01:07,640 stared the stub reed platform two eleven fifty three p m. 24 00:01:08,000 --> 00:01:12,000 Yesterday Except yesterday evening, I was here in this same kitchen, 25 00:01:12,040 --> 00:01:15,159 half asleep over tea in an old paperback, my memories 26 00:01:15,159 --> 00:01:17,400 pinned resolutely back her yawning ire under the lamp, the 27 00:01:17,480 --> 00:01:21,200 radio droning, the wind against the eaves, no trains involved. 28 00:01:21,840 --> 00:01:24,680 I hadn't ridden the rails since the previous morning, hadn't 29 00:01:24,680 --> 00:01:27,359 I From the hallway, the house seemed to lean closer, 30 00:01:27,439 --> 00:01:30,599 old timber straining as though they too were curious. The 31 00:01:30,640 --> 00:01:32,680 stub was oddly warm in my palm, as if having 32 00:01:32,680 --> 00:01:35,319 been pressed close to flesh for arrows. I pressed my 33 00:01:35,359 --> 00:01:37,959 thumb to the ink, then turned it over. The reverse 34 00:01:38,040 --> 00:01:40,680 was blank, except for a faint water mark in the 35 00:01:40,680 --> 00:01:43,599 brush of silence. The smallest echo, A voice draped in memory, 36 00:01:43,799 --> 00:01:46,280 called my name from a near empty, drained carriage. The syllables, 37 00:01:46,319 --> 00:01:49,799 benign but unfamiliar, startled. I squeezed my ass tight when 38 00:01:49,799 --> 00:01:52,560 I opened them. The house was silent. The ticket's stub 39 00:01:52,560 --> 00:01:55,439 felt heavier. I tried to steady myself at the table, 40 00:01:55,480 --> 00:01:57,959 gaze sliding over the detritus of my life, outdated bills 41 00:01:58,079 --> 00:02:00,400 and open bank statements, my laid answer of a frame, 42 00:02:00,480 --> 00:02:03,000 family photos, my parents and the coast, my brother in 43 00:02:03,000 --> 00:02:06,680 his skull blazer, me sullen in someone else's garden. I 44 00:02:06,719 --> 00:02:09,840 shut my phones, crawling through miss messages. Nothing from colleagues, 45 00:02:09,919 --> 00:02:13,199 nothing from friends. I flipped through my calendar, were seats 46 00:02:13,199 --> 00:02:16,039 scattered from my battered wallet. It was all exactly as 47 00:02:16,080 --> 00:02:20,319 I remembered, no gaps, no mysterious expenditures, no impulsive cross 48 00:02:20,319 --> 00:02:23,960 country jaunts. Yet the stop the more I stayed, the 49 00:02:24,039 --> 00:02:27,400 less sense it made. I slept outsigh, half expecting to 50 00:02:27,439 --> 00:02:29,879 find muddy footprints or some stray signed beneath the sodium 51 00:02:29,919 --> 00:02:32,319 street lamp. But the slavs were clean, save for rain 52 00:02:32,360 --> 00:02:35,479 puddles and an old hedgehog's path. My breath fogged in 53 00:02:35,479 --> 00:02:38,800 the cool air. At the threshold, I hesitated, ticket in hand, 54 00:02:38,919 --> 00:02:41,240 as if some answer might ride the wind in. But 55 00:02:41,319 --> 00:02:43,520 nothing came, just the dutiful tick of my own heart 56 00:02:43,520 --> 00:02:45,159 and the distant growl of a late lorry on the 57 00:02:45,159 --> 00:02:48,639 bypass back inside, the faces and the wholeway frames regarded 58 00:02:48,680 --> 00:02:51,719 me solemnly, their eyes bright and reflected light. I slumped 59 00:02:51,759 --> 00:02:55,039 into the kitchen chair. The house felt smaller for my confusion, 60 00:02:55,039 --> 00:02:57,879 walls retreating behind that single inexplicable fact. I held a 61 00:02:57,879 --> 00:03:00,120 ticket for a journey I never made. For time, I 62 00:03:00,199 --> 00:03:03,639 was sure I'd been at home, or was I Flickers 63 00:03:03,639 --> 00:03:06,199 of a station platform, misted in gray, shivered at the 64 00:03:06,280 --> 00:03:08,879 edge of my thoughts. It was as if beyond the 65 00:03:08,919 --> 00:03:11,240 solid comfort of my front door, another me, one deeper 66 00:03:11,240 --> 00:03:13,120 in exhaustion or need, had slipped off to ride the 67 00:03:13,159 --> 00:03:16,479 last train home. The next morning, routine tried to sweep 68 00:03:16,520 --> 00:03:19,400 me up. The kettle steamed its little ghosts, the bathroom 69 00:03:19,439 --> 00:03:21,479 towels chilled my feet, and a cup of coffee I 70 00:03:21,520 --> 00:03:24,199 brewed was just the right kind of bitter. In the mirror, 71 00:03:24,199 --> 00:03:26,120 I looked much as I always did, a face softening 72 00:03:26,159 --> 00:03:28,919 around the eyes, harry, the prematurely silvering or resisting home 73 00:03:28,960 --> 00:03:33,280 and reason, depending on the mood. Slacks, jumper, windproof coat 74 00:03:33,400 --> 00:03:35,960 bag slung at just the right angle. I made a 75 00:03:35,960 --> 00:03:38,080 point to pat my pocket, mumbling to myself, and the 76 00:03:38,120 --> 00:03:41,120 stub now over so slightly brittle, was still there. I've 77 00:03:41,159 --> 00:03:43,479 lived this way few years, a commuticut between what feels 78 00:03:43,520 --> 00:03:46,560 like two worlds. My job in Manchester isn't much to 79 00:03:46,560 --> 00:03:48,439 write home about, though there's no one much left to 80 00:03:48,439 --> 00:03:51,080 write to, just enough admin and minor crises to fill 81 00:03:51,080 --> 00:03:53,479 a week and leave the mine tired. The house is 82 00:03:53,479 --> 00:03:56,159 still legally my aunt's, though the letters now bear my name. 83 00:03:56,719 --> 00:03:59,280 Her ghost has long since found better haunts. I sometimes 84 00:03:59,319 --> 00:04:02,159 think the routine is a tight weave. Every morning, I 85 00:04:02,240 --> 00:04:04,400 check the forecast, slip down the lane to the station, 86 00:04:04,599 --> 00:04:07,080 and blend with the other ghosts of the platform. Miss 87 00:04:07,159 --> 00:04:09,280 Cess Hackett greets me with her near tooth smile as 88 00:04:09,280 --> 00:04:12,159 she unlocks the ticket office. Neonm Vess flickering in the mist. 89 00:04:12,879 --> 00:04:16,120 Mister Billings, twice retired, appears precisely at seven eight is 90 00:04:16,199 --> 00:04:19,160 cane tapping and his gaze worry for delays. The guard 91 00:04:19,199 --> 00:04:21,439 on the late service rarely makes eye contact, though I 92 00:04:21,480 --> 00:04:24,639 sense an understanding in our brief glances, and as are 93 00:04:24,639 --> 00:04:26,680 the only nearish thing in town, pouring coffee as if 94 00:04:26,680 --> 00:04:29,199 it were wholly always with a softer morning love that 95 00:04:29,319 --> 00:04:31,399 seems to mean something, though neither of us ever says, 96 00:04:32,040 --> 00:04:34,319 the town is a patchwork of memories. I no longer 97 00:04:34,360 --> 00:04:37,879 bother trying to collect faded brick, low murmuring terrace houses. 98 00:04:37,879 --> 00:04:40,399 A single public does lost orders before ten and expects 99 00:04:40,399 --> 00:04:43,759 no rebellion. You can see railway embankments everywhere, slicing the 100 00:04:43,800 --> 00:04:47,040 town into manageable pieces. The station sits at the confluence, 101 00:04:47,079 --> 00:04:49,680 half artery, half barrier, at the comings and goings, defining 102 00:04:49,720 --> 00:04:53,639 what little life endures. On foggy mornings, the platforms seem infinite, 103 00:04:53,639 --> 00:04:56,399 stretching into haze of uncertainty. On bright days, they just 104 00:04:56,439 --> 00:04:59,920 look tired. My past is not especially worth recounting, except 105 00:05:00,040 --> 00:05:02,519 that it led me back here after university and heartbreak, 106 00:05:02,560 --> 00:05:05,519 A couple of loud family arguments and one small private loss. 107 00:05:05,519 --> 00:05:09,160 That dozen need words these old streets. Despite all a comfort, 108 00:05:09,759 --> 00:05:11,800 I've made myself at home in the edges of things, 109 00:05:12,560 --> 00:05:15,720 still lately I felt time thickening. Sleep is troubled. Mornings 110 00:05:15,720 --> 00:05:17,639 are heavy, and sometimes I wake to find that I 111 00:05:17,720 --> 00:05:19,519 left a glass in the wrong room, or a light 112 00:05:19,519 --> 00:05:23,439 burning in the attic. Memories shifting like misselled letters age 113 00:05:23,560 --> 00:05:26,199 I've told myself or else The mind slow protest at 114 00:05:26,240 --> 00:05:29,360 repetition that was until last night, when the stub appeared, 115 00:05:29,439 --> 00:05:32,439 and the world's invisible line seemed to twist bloodlessly beneath me. 116 00:05:33,040 --> 00:05:35,399 I let it sit on the entryway table, daring myself 117 00:05:35,439 --> 00:05:37,480 to brush it aside with the grain post office receipts 118 00:05:37,480 --> 00:05:39,279 in the rubber band I always forget to put away, 119 00:05:39,839 --> 00:05:42,439 but it drew my eye again and again. What I 120 00:05:42,480 --> 00:05:44,680 most wanted was to dismiss it, blame some mistake or 121 00:05:44,720 --> 00:05:48,439 a prank of tiredness. Yet each routine gesture, coffee, shower, packing, 122 00:05:48,480 --> 00:05:50,800 the lunch fells slightly altered, as if the house itself 123 00:05:50,839 --> 00:05:53,800 was waiting to see what would come next. Something or 124 00:05:53,839 --> 00:05:57,000 some one was expecting an answer. The days that followed 125 00:05:57,000 --> 00:05:58,920 refused to return to normal, as much as I wish 126 00:05:58,959 --> 00:06:02,079 they would. On Tuesday, while reaching for a scarf on 127 00:06:02,120 --> 00:06:04,519 the whole peg, my fingers brushed another slip of paper 128 00:06:04,519 --> 00:06:09,279 wedge between my gloves. Another ticket stub slightly damp. I 129 00:06:09,399 --> 00:06:12,279 pall last night stayed the same time, same platform. My 130 00:06:12,319 --> 00:06:15,160 breath caught a pulsive, unwelcome recognition raised through me. I 131 00:06:15,240 --> 00:06:17,720 tore open the kitchen drawer, rummaging through spare batteries and 132 00:06:17,800 --> 00:06:21,079 old take away manews. Two more stubs, curled and fin 133 00:06:21,120 --> 00:06:24,000 and sticking together, tumbled out. Each one was stamped for 134 00:06:24,040 --> 00:06:27,199 a different night, always the previous, Always near midnight, you know, 135 00:06:27,399 --> 00:06:29,680 I told Sara, folding the creased ticket on the countertop 136 00:06:29,720 --> 00:06:32,240 while I collected my usual. Either someone's pranking me or 137 00:06:32,279 --> 00:06:34,439 I've got the most boring case of sleep walking in history, 138 00:06:34,959 --> 00:06:38,240 she laughed, though the sound came hollow. You too, weird 139 00:06:38,439 --> 00:06:40,800 that old miss s Atkinson was an earlier, said she 140 00:06:40,879 --> 00:06:43,160 keeps finding the tap running in the morning. Mister Billings 141 00:06:43,160 --> 00:06:45,439 told me he woke up in his dressing gown, choose 142 00:06:45,480 --> 00:06:47,959 and all. I smiled at the jerk, but could see 143 00:06:47,959 --> 00:06:50,720 the shadow flicker behind us. Mare. By the time I 144 00:06:50,720 --> 00:06:53,439 got to my desk at work, I searched through my phone, photos, 145 00:06:53,560 --> 00:06:56,720 calendar reminders, even called my scatter shop manager Phil to 146 00:06:56,759 --> 00:07:00,319 confer might had no late emergencies, nothing missing except asleep 147 00:07:00,360 --> 00:07:03,360 from my bones. The arrows after sundown were starting to 148 00:07:03,360 --> 00:07:06,000 feel thinner, condensed, muffled, as if I were living less. 149 00:07:06,000 --> 00:07:09,000 Each night that evening, I wandered through the house as 150 00:07:09,040 --> 00:07:12,879 if hunting my own footprints. Streams always so lost, began 151 00:07:12,920 --> 00:07:15,319 to stir on the edge of her headlight. Flickering glimpses 152 00:07:15,360 --> 00:07:17,839 of long platforms curved into infinity, a child sing song 153 00:07:17,959 --> 00:07:22,040 voice skipping in impossible directions. I shuddered. If I saw 154 00:07:22,079 --> 00:07:24,199 anything out of place, it was only how routine had 155 00:07:24,199 --> 00:07:27,319 taken on a watery cast. The next morning, standing on 156 00:07:27,399 --> 00:07:30,399 Platform one in the cold, there stung with understatement, the 157 00:07:30,480 --> 00:07:33,319 regular crowd of re papers nodded, shuffled, yet they two 158 00:07:33,360 --> 00:07:35,920 eyed each other side on. One woman clutched a train 159 00:07:35,920 --> 00:07:38,120 ticket as if she feeled losing it. Mister Billings double 160 00:07:38,160 --> 00:07:40,800 checked his watch, mouth working as he counted under his breath. 161 00:07:41,240 --> 00:07:43,439 I sat in the cafage, odding notes, stubbs lined up 162 00:07:43,439 --> 00:07:46,480 beside my mug, feeling absurd? Was there the only one 163 00:07:46,480 --> 00:07:49,000 who noticed? For merely the only one to speak? The 164 00:07:49,079 --> 00:07:51,399 idea of a collective mystery, of half the tent stumbling 165 00:07:51,399 --> 00:07:54,319 through vanishing eyros, returning each dawn with aching bones and 166 00:07:54,319 --> 00:07:56,519 the nickling sense of having just missed something began to 167 00:07:56,519 --> 00:07:59,120 settle like a weight of blanket across my mind. The 168 00:07:59,160 --> 00:08:02,680 suspicion grew roude. The stations were more crowded than usual 169 00:08:02,680 --> 00:08:06,000 at dawn, as if people myself included, were finding themselves 170 00:08:06,040 --> 00:08:09,120 on the platform before even waking. The pattern was too neat, 171 00:08:09,160 --> 00:08:12,480 too consistent for chance. The late train, always to last 172 00:08:12,480 --> 00:08:15,319 ourt near midnight was haunting us, perhaps more literally than 173 00:08:15,360 --> 00:08:18,399 anyone wanted to admit. The puzzle refused to lie still. 174 00:08:19,000 --> 00:08:21,319 I needed proof, if not for the world, then for myself. 175 00:08:22,040 --> 00:08:24,439 So I dug out my old concorda barely functional, the 176 00:08:24,439 --> 00:08:28,120 battery sputtering, but honest enough to catch the mundane. That evening, 177 00:08:28,240 --> 00:08:29,720 I set it up on top of the shoe rack, 178 00:08:29,920 --> 00:08:32,519 aimed at the door, blinking red in the dusk. My 179 00:08:32,600 --> 00:08:34,759 plan was simple. If I left, if I dreamed myself 180 00:08:34,759 --> 00:08:37,080 on to the last train out, I'd see it no 181 00:08:37,200 --> 00:08:40,200 more doubts. In the morning, I watched the tape longs 182 00:08:40,200 --> 00:08:43,679 held still, nothing, friars, just static, the muda creek of 183 00:08:43,679 --> 00:08:46,799 the hall, the fridge humming through plaster. Then, at eleven 184 00:08:46,840 --> 00:08:49,120 forty eight p m. I appeared, slow, shoulder squared in 185 00:08:49,159 --> 00:08:52,639 some one else's posture, face slack, ayes opened but empty. 186 00:08:52,679 --> 00:08:54,960 I took my coat, slipped outside, and closed the door 187 00:08:54,960 --> 00:08:58,440 behind me with careful politeness. Thirty minutes later the hallway 188 00:08:58,519 --> 00:09:01,759 was empty again. My recorded self returned, face and change, 189 00:09:01,799 --> 00:09:04,720 and vanish up the stairs. I pressed back in my chair, 190 00:09:04,759 --> 00:09:07,840 hand clutching the mug so tight it quaked. The finality 191 00:09:07,840 --> 00:09:09,919 of the footage was as cold as a blow. But 192 00:09:10,039 --> 00:09:13,120 it was only me. Conversation was missus Hackett took on. 193 00:09:13,200 --> 00:09:16,039 You wait. The next morning I caught her before opening. 194 00:09:16,600 --> 00:09:18,840 I need to ask you something on, I said, careful 195 00:09:18,879 --> 00:09:21,799 not to name, I fear too soon. She adjusted her scarf, 196 00:09:21,840 --> 00:09:24,440 smile slipping. If it's about the benches, I find them 197 00:09:24,440 --> 00:09:27,159 occupied more mornings now, sometimes by people I know. They 198 00:09:27,200 --> 00:09:30,279 never remember why. Olivron at number seventeen sound asleep at 199 00:09:30,279 --> 00:09:32,799 five thirty, called on and ticket crushed in his palm. 200 00:09:32,879 --> 00:09:36,200 You too, I suppose, so. I spoke to the station manager, 201 00:09:36,360 --> 00:09:38,320 a man warm then by delayed freight runs and the 202 00:09:38,399 --> 00:09:42,840 uncanny art of deflecting complaints. I invented a story about local vagrancy. 203 00:09:42,879 --> 00:09:46,759 Suggested checking the CCTV. He too tired to object, led 204 00:09:46,799 --> 00:09:49,720 me to the cramped office, screens flickering and monochrome. We 205 00:09:49,799 --> 00:09:52,759 scrubbed back through files. There I was every night at 206 00:09:52,799 --> 00:09:55,440 midnight platform two. I boarded the train alone and steady, 207 00:09:56,000 --> 00:09:58,759 the same on four other night, always returning before dawn. 208 00:09:59,320 --> 00:10:02,200 On some night, others from town joined me equally blank 209 00:10:02,240 --> 00:10:04,480 face heads bout as they stepped through the carriage doors. 210 00:10:05,200 --> 00:10:08,200 None of us could remember why. Attempts to approach people 211 00:10:08,200 --> 00:10:11,120 at the station yielded little mister Billings forced a laugh 212 00:10:11,159 --> 00:10:13,480 and changed the subject. A younger woman paled and muttered 213 00:10:13,480 --> 00:10:18,399 about sleep deprivation. Every explanation felt hollow, staged in a panic, 214 00:10:18,480 --> 00:10:22,559 I rang my doctor, stammering through symptoms, doubts, fears. After 215 00:10:22,600 --> 00:10:25,159 a run of tests and sympathetic shrugs, my jeeki found 216 00:10:25,200 --> 00:10:28,320 nothing as sleep cycles, labs and scans need as accounting 217 00:10:28,320 --> 00:10:32,720 sheets try to reduce stress, she offered, sometimes our minds 218 00:10:32,759 --> 00:10:35,799 lived to protect us. Still I pressed on mapping the 219 00:10:35,840 --> 00:10:38,720 ticket stobs, cross referencing dates, scrolling on a note by 220 00:10:38,720 --> 00:10:41,399 the sequence of each night. There was a rhythm. Every 221 00:10:41,399 --> 00:10:43,600 seven days, A cluster of us rode the midnight train, 222 00:10:43,840 --> 00:10:46,279 just as blank and lost as eye. The stacks of 223 00:10:46,320 --> 00:10:49,360 local newspapers, yellowing musty in the library's dim back room 224 00:10:49,399 --> 00:10:52,559 offered a wider context. A story decades old, barrowed beneath 225 00:10:52,559 --> 00:10:56,200 reports of winter snow and football scores. Ghost train returns, 226 00:10:56,360 --> 00:11:00,080 read one headline dated nineteen seventy six. The store r 227 00:11:00,240 --> 00:11:02,840 recounted rumors of tannsfolk vanishing for a night each March, 228 00:11:03,000 --> 00:11:05,840 reappearing at sunrise by the old mill, confused and exhausted, 229 00:11:05,919 --> 00:11:08,600 unsure how they got there. Some swore it was nothing, 230 00:11:08,720 --> 00:11:11,799 an old wife's tale. But beneath the words at chill Ran, 231 00:11:12,440 --> 00:11:15,159 I found myself deep in the archives on a Sunday afternoon. 232 00:11:15,440 --> 00:11:17,720 The clock outside the reading room, measuring out the slow, 233 00:11:17,840 --> 00:11:21,240 relentless fold to dark summoned a local astorian. By the 234 00:11:21,240 --> 00:11:24,039 look of the very neat pan haatanitated the article accident 235 00:11:24,080 --> 00:11:27,320 date see parish records. It seemed the story had happened before. 236 00:11:27,919 --> 00:11:30,480 Another ticket appeared on my nights and Tuesday folded into 237 00:11:30,519 --> 00:11:34,080 my library receipt that day Basiscan the parish files from 238 00:11:34,120 --> 00:11:37,080 nineteen seventy nine, I stumbled upon a thin, yellowed envelope 239 00:11:37,080 --> 00:11:39,639 talked into the margin of an old report. Inside was 240 00:11:39,639 --> 00:11:42,360 a clipping eleven killed as early trained to rails outside 241 00:11:42,360 --> 00:11:45,720 town March seventeen. I read it three times, throat tightening. 242 00:11:46,240 --> 00:11:48,600 The deuryilment happened in the same line we all used 243 00:11:48,639 --> 00:11:51,279 on a clammy in distinct March night nearly fifty years ago. 244 00:11:51,919 --> 00:11:55,120 The names listed were both familiar and strange. Henderson's clements 245 00:11:55,200 --> 00:11:57,600 one or two spelled differently but echoing the town's careful 246 00:11:57,639 --> 00:12:01,039 stoic surnames. Then my own sen named, acting quietly near 247 00:12:01,080 --> 00:12:03,679 the bottom. Just seeing it amowed me. I pressed my 248 00:12:03,759 --> 00:12:06,600 nails into the arms of the chair. My memory twisted 249 00:12:06,799 --> 00:12:10,080 Nasa climbing my throat. There was something else, a woman's cry, 250 00:12:10,240 --> 00:12:12,360 low and urgent, warning me not to board, the benchy 251 00:12:12,360 --> 00:12:14,799 scrape of metal, the walt'spinning. For a brief instant, I 252 00:12:14,840 --> 00:12:17,759 thought I tasted blood, rust and fear, tangled as one, 253 00:12:18,120 --> 00:12:21,600 then nothing. I hurd home to rewatch the camcord of footage. 254 00:12:22,039 --> 00:12:25,080 The same scene played out to myself leaving, returning, but 255 00:12:25,200 --> 00:12:26,840 this time in the middle, just for a second, that 256 00:12:26,840 --> 00:12:28,600 there was a double of me, feigned as a breath 257 00:12:28,639 --> 00:12:31,240 on a frosted window, seated on the stairwell, watching myself 258 00:12:31,279 --> 00:12:34,919 walk by her eyes. My eyes were bottomless. It became 259 00:12:34,960 --> 00:12:37,000 clear that the train Jonas were not just sleep walking, 260 00:12:37,080 --> 00:12:40,360 but some twisted echo of the accident, the pain, the confusion, 261 00:12:40,399 --> 00:12:42,639 the lost names and faces. Each year we boarded, because 262 00:12:42,639 --> 00:12:45,320 in some way we always had every one I saw 263 00:12:45,360 --> 00:12:47,840 on the footage, everyone caught in This pattern had a link, however, 264 00:12:47,879 --> 00:12:51,200 distant to those long lost passengers. I took this trembling 265 00:12:51,240 --> 00:12:54,440 to missus Hackett, expecting her to laugh ordousness, or at worse, scold, 266 00:12:55,000 --> 00:12:58,080 But instead she guided me into her cramped wall pippered office, 267 00:12:58,120 --> 00:13:01,360 and voice shaking, handed me a notebook. The pages were 268 00:13:01,360 --> 00:13:03,960 covered in ferrantic looping handwriting, her own scribbled in the 269 00:13:04,039 --> 00:13:07,200 drawn IROs, recounting brief dreams and odd encounters each March. 270 00:13:07,919 --> 00:13:10,360 Most startling, she claimed to have found herself once sitting 271 00:13:10,399 --> 00:13:13,039 on platform benches in the early morning, unable to recall 272 00:13:13,080 --> 00:13:17,399 walking there, I think she whispered, We're all still traveling, sometimes, 273 00:13:18,039 --> 00:13:20,559 fingers stained with newsprint and dust from all files. I 274 00:13:20,559 --> 00:13:25,159 started to arrange what might pass as evidence, ticket stubs, camcorders, stills, 275 00:13:25,440 --> 00:13:27,919 all clippings, as sketches of the station. Mapped my attempt 276 00:13:27,919 --> 00:13:30,720 to model the recurrences. There was a passengery at all, 277 00:13:30,759 --> 00:13:33,120 a clasp of virtual The cycles peeked around mid March, 278 00:13:33,480 --> 00:13:35,360 just as the fog thickened and the clocks threatened their 279 00:13:35,360 --> 00:13:39,559 annual betrayal. The nights of the accident, coincidences abounded a 280 00:13:39,600 --> 00:13:42,039 full moon at the town's ancient festival, always the same 281 00:13:42,039 --> 00:13:45,039 bad weather as those scripts were being followed. I brought 282 00:13:45,080 --> 00:13:47,200 my findings Desire, who poured us both a cup and 283 00:13:47,279 --> 00:13:49,440 hunched over my paper. Mess with the seriousness were served 284 00:13:49,440 --> 00:13:52,720 for only the most pressing gossip. My mom, she said, quietly, 285 00:13:52,759 --> 00:13:55,679 tracing the list of surnames, always did something out each marked. 286 00:13:55,720 --> 00:13:58,080 Foundmud on her shoes, ticket in the wash, though she 287 00:13:58,159 --> 00:14:00,840 hadn't left the house. I never thought much of it. Later, 288 00:14:00,919 --> 00:14:03,639 old mister Billings reluctant, but Kagey confessed that as a child, 289 00:14:03,720 --> 00:14:06,759 he'd found his father outside the morning after the derailment anniversary, 290 00:14:06,960 --> 00:14:09,360 staring into the fog, refusing to say where he'd been. 291 00:14:10,039 --> 00:14:13,840 Sometimes he muttered, places, remember what people can't. The more 292 00:14:13,840 --> 00:14:15,720 I heard, the more I suspected this was not a 293 00:14:15,759 --> 00:14:18,080 haunting in the traditional sense, but a kind of communal 294 00:14:18,120 --> 00:14:20,879 sleep or katromacing through blood lines and habit tightening around 295 00:14:20,960 --> 00:14:23,919 us in spoken guilt. In the library, I uncovered a 296 00:14:23,960 --> 00:14:27,720 batter diary the survivors recored. Its author recounted being drawn 297 00:14:27,759 --> 00:14:30,159 to the tracks, losing eyes to the dream of tunnels, 298 00:14:30,200 --> 00:14:33,720 unable to resist boarding the train. Each year, on certain nights, 299 00:14:33,759 --> 00:14:36,879 the urge returned. I sketched the time table again the 300 00:14:37,000 --> 00:14:39,360 night of the derailment, and changing for decades with those 301 00:14:39,399 --> 00:14:41,759 involved for their kindri Levine the journey, unable to fully 302 00:14:41,759 --> 00:14:45,320 wake until the following dawn, trauma passed down inscribed the 303 00:14:45,399 --> 00:14:48,240 muscle and bone, the tracks beneath our humanity, hummindo, sad, 304 00:14:48,399 --> 00:14:51,720 patient refrain. As a day slipped toward another anniversary, my 305 00:14:51,759 --> 00:14:54,480 compulsion grew fear simple toward the station, prickling at the 306 00:14:54,519 --> 00:14:56,919 neck whenever the wind row is up to dark. I 307 00:14:57,000 --> 00:14:59,600 resolved to meet a pattern head on, to record everything. 308 00:15:00,159 --> 00:15:02,440 If the journey demanded a witness light, it be me, 309 00:15:02,639 --> 00:15:05,799 eyes open. On the morning of March seventeen, I scrolled 310 00:15:05,799 --> 00:15:08,759 reminders to myself on every available surface. Don't leave the house, 311 00:15:09,320 --> 00:15:13,159 lock the doors, wreck of voice memos. The town itself 312 00:15:13,159 --> 00:15:16,279 bristled with the knees, commuter's whispered, avoided each other's eyes. 313 00:15:16,919 --> 00:15:18,679 I kind of hung a seemed to stretch beneath the 314 00:15:18,679 --> 00:15:21,960 tedium of bags and coats. By dusk, the air sparked 315 00:15:22,000 --> 00:15:24,399 with static, and my nurse yoned open, cawing at the familiar. 316 00:15:24,960 --> 00:15:27,720 I had in my chair, fawn poised notebook, a hand 317 00:15:27,799 --> 00:15:31,559 every sensurraining, Yet as midnight loomed, a thick dressness rolled 318 00:15:31,559 --> 00:15:34,960 in a gentle drawer, irresistible and numb. My resistant slip 319 00:15:34,960 --> 00:15:37,639 grain by grain, the gravity of the old line becoming physical. 320 00:15:38,200 --> 00:15:40,919 At eleven fifty, I found myself lacing my shoes, coat 321 00:15:40,960 --> 00:15:43,799 half way on my head swam vision tilting gently, but 322 00:15:43,840 --> 00:15:46,679 my legs moved steadily. I caught the sight of myself 323 00:15:46,679 --> 00:15:49,240 in the whly mirror, pales a milkrem eyes betraying flickers 324 00:15:49,240 --> 00:15:52,720 of old sorrows. I stepped outside, inhaled the breathless fog, 325 00:15:52,840 --> 00:15:54,879 and walked down the lane toward the station, take its 326 00:15:54,879 --> 00:15:57,720 stub already pressed in my palm. The station was shrouded 327 00:15:57,720 --> 00:16:00,799 in miss platform lance buttery and low. A handful of 328 00:16:00,840 --> 00:16:04,159 others gathered on edge, equally silent faces, familiar eyes hollow. 329 00:16:04,240 --> 00:16:07,519 With the knowledge of this forced pilgrimage, with barely a word, 330 00:16:07,679 --> 00:16:09,600 we drifted on to the midnight train as it slayd 331 00:16:09,600 --> 00:16:13,440 it sundless into the platform. Inside the carriage was timeless, 332 00:16:13,440 --> 00:16:17,279 overhead lights stuttering gloss, impossibly dark. The few passengers sat 333 00:16:17,279 --> 00:16:21,559 in rutied cymmetry, hands clasped, gazes averted. I recognize Missus 334 00:16:21,600 --> 00:16:24,639 hacketts Ar's mother, even old mister Billings, all seeming to 335 00:16:24,759 --> 00:16:28,960 exist fractually beside themselves. Flashes of nightmare pressed in glimpses 336 00:16:29,000 --> 00:16:32,039 two rain street windows, the landscape melting and reshaping itself 337 00:16:32,039 --> 00:16:36,360 in impossible ways. I overheard snatches of conversation, words tumbled 338 00:16:36,360 --> 00:16:39,320 as though under water. Across the aisle, A child murmured, 339 00:16:39,320 --> 00:16:42,440 a rhyme voiced both young and ancient. At some point, 340 00:16:42,519 --> 00:16:44,279 a conductor I could not say if he was real, 341 00:16:44,320 --> 00:16:47,399 walk the aisle, reciting names from a faded manifest My 342 00:16:47,519 --> 00:16:50,639 own echoed painfully in my chest. With each iteration. The 343 00:16:50,720 --> 00:16:54,000 tension of ratcheted tighter, hearts racing in silent synchrony, the 344 00:16:54,080 --> 00:16:57,440 train lurch breaks, hissing, the light strobe viciously. I felt 345 00:16:57,440 --> 00:17:00,440 the moment before disaster, metal shearing, the universe cantonate terror. 346 00:17:01,039 --> 00:17:03,279 I saw flashes of my own family, a relative lost 347 00:17:03,320 --> 00:17:05,559 to history, as seat left empty by chance of fey. 348 00:17:06,160 --> 00:17:08,519 Somewhere in the screaming metal voices rose a chaos of 349 00:17:08,599 --> 00:17:11,480 demand and pleading, some desperate to let go, others determined 350 00:17:11,519 --> 00:17:14,440 to forget. I tried to speak, mouth dry as dust. 351 00:17:15,160 --> 00:17:18,039 Desperation sees me I shouted my own name, firm and full, 352 00:17:18,160 --> 00:17:20,839 and the spell cracked. The carriage stilled, my visions snapping 353 00:17:20,839 --> 00:17:24,720 into clouity. Gradually the train slowed. When it stopped, I 354 00:17:24,759 --> 00:17:28,400 stumbled off, feet hid in cold concrete. Morning light, biscus 355 00:17:28,440 --> 00:17:31,319 and blue seeped through the mist. The station was empty, 356 00:17:31,319 --> 00:17:33,640 saved for a dozen days, faces all adrift and blinking 357 00:17:33,680 --> 00:17:36,160 as if new to the day. In the weeks that followed, 358 00:17:36,279 --> 00:17:38,680 the town softened, as if some bandage had been removed. 359 00:17:39,400 --> 00:17:42,400 There were no new tickets, stubs, no unexplained absences from home. 360 00:17:43,039 --> 00:17:45,680 The faces at the station seemed lighter. Movements, less wary. 361 00:17:46,240 --> 00:17:49,920 I'd passed familiar travelers, Missus Hacketts or or even mister 362 00:17:49,960 --> 00:17:52,680 Billingson caught the faintest nods, a quickening of the eye's 363 00:17:52,720 --> 00:17:56,839 small gestures, mocking experience best left unspoken. Nobody discussed the night, 364 00:17:56,920 --> 00:17:59,119 yet between those of us who had boarded the last train, 365 00:17:59,240 --> 00:18:02,359 a current of silence acknowledgment ran. It was enough, a 366 00:18:02,440 --> 00:18:04,640 small mercy that each of us had not faced it alone. 367 00:18:05,319 --> 00:18:07,680 I set down my experience in a weather journal, weighing 368 00:18:07,759 --> 00:18:09,799 the urge to share the truth with the town's historian 369 00:18:09,839 --> 00:18:13,279 against the desire to let sleeping memories lie some mysteries 370 00:18:13,480 --> 00:18:16,279 I thought served the piece best by remaining private. The 371 00:18:16,319 --> 00:18:19,440 station itself thressed in a new coat of paint, ventures 372 00:18:19,480 --> 00:18:22,759 were mended, the departure board updated a tiny gestures toward renewal, 373 00:18:22,880 --> 00:18:24,599 or at least an intent to move past what could 374 00:18:24,640 --> 00:18:27,680 not fully be forgiven. Still, every so often, a mild 375 00:18:27,680 --> 00:18:29,559 shiver would run up my spine at the dust rattle 376 00:18:29,599 --> 00:18:32,960 of passing trains. I would find myself, just for an instant, 377 00:18:33,119 --> 00:18:35,440 catching my own reflection in dark glass, searching for the 378 00:18:35,480 --> 00:18:38,039 faint outline of that other self. On the night of 379 00:18:38,079 --> 00:18:40,440 the next anniversary, returning home from a meal share of 380 00:18:40,559 --> 00:18:43,000 hestant laughter, I found a slip of paper pushed beneath 381 00:18:43,039 --> 00:18:46,920 my door. Another faded tickets, step crease and worn, pinned 382 00:18:46,960 --> 00:18:48,640 to it, a half sheet of lined paper with a 383 00:18:48,680 --> 00:18:51,599 single line, and my own hurried hand. Some journers never end. 384 00:18:52,160 --> 00:18:55,759 I breakfast my phone, shind Sorrow's message glowed in the screen. 385 00:18:56,039 --> 00:18:58,119 Saw a group at the station at midnight, just standing, 386 00:18:58,319 --> 00:19:01,240 didn't get on, look like they knew some I watched 387 00:19:01,240 --> 00:19:03,640 from my window that night, lights off, gaze handle toward 388 00:19:03,720 --> 00:19:06,680 down moving road in the shadow station beyond the town 389 00:19:06,759 --> 00:19:08,880 slept and through the mirk. I glimpsed, just for a 390 00:19:08,920 --> 00:19:11,599 heart beats, streak of spectral lights, gliding past a train 391 00:19:11,680 --> 00:19:14,200 with no timetable, riding a truck on the memory could map. 392 00:19:14,799 --> 00:19:18,359 I sat back the stub press between trembling fingers. Memory, 393 00:19:18,640 --> 00:19:21,960 like grief, rarely travels in straight lines. Not all journeys 394 00:19:21,960 --> 00:19:24,680 are to be remembered, and not all passengers ever truly arrive. 395 00:19:25,400 --> 00:19:27,599 Some part of me I know, will always be waiting 396 00:19:27,640 --> 00:19:31,119 for the lust train home, and that is the end. 397 00:19:31,759 --> 00:19:33,440 Thank you for listening, and I will see you in 398 00:19:33,480 --> 00:19:34,000 the next one.