A SHORT STORY ABOUT TRAINS

I arrived at the train station, just twenty minutes’ walk from my house. I had ambled down the hill with time to spare, thinking about something distracting like words and labels, or how to define racism in order to tackle it, I can’t quite remember the details...

It was foggy and cold though - I remember that. The zebra crossing had loomed out of the mist with its flashing Belisha beacons, floating in the early morning air. At the station, the orange letters glowed as I approached.

07:23.

My train would be two minutes late, and I had thirteen whole minutes to wait for it.

And for some reason, all of a sudden, like a pale ghost, I thought about my oven, which I could not remember switching off. 

Was it off? I couldn’t say! Could I have left it on when I cooked my toast? Should I just trust it would all be alright? Why couldn’t I remember?

I bit my lip. My tickets were non-refundable. If I missed this train I’d miss my connection. Thirteen minutes. A twenty minute walk.

Should I leave it? It wasn’t the kind of thing I’d normally do. But then, I’d be out of town for the next two days and I knew, I just knew I’d be worried the whole time. Could I risk it? Could I still make it? What should I do?

Every second was deafening, and I was annoyed with myself.

I don’t know what you would have done. Perhaps you live with other people and you could have solved this problem with a simple text message? Perhaps you’re organised enough not to do this kind of thing at all, nor to let Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, or Anxiety, or whatever it is, get the better of you.

Well.

It was the wrong side of 7:15am on a foggy Saturday morning - no-one was going to help me. There was nothing for it.

I set a timer for six minutes, threw my rucksack over both shoulders and I pelted up the hill like Linford Christie. (I figured I needed to know when to turn around and run back again, so as not to miss that train.)

I’ve never felt so dead. This wasn’t a typical fun sprint on the treadmill in the gym; this was rucksack-laden SAS training for the overweight, and before long I was panting and spluttering up the hill with adrenaline coursing through me, and my chest pounding in my ears.

The alarm went off before I reached my front door. I went in anyway, leapt up the stairs and into the kitchen.

I expect you already know what I found.

“Oh why didn’t I just trust you!” I half-prayed, half-exclaimed. The cooker was off. It was very off.

I leapt down the stairs, locked the door behind me and glanced at my phone. Four minutes left. It was still a twenty minute walk - I’d have to fly down the hill.

“I should have just trusted,” I repeated to myself as my trainers hit the concrete, one heavy foot after the other. I was running so fast that my teeth were jarring and my heart was bursting. The rucksack bounced uncomfortably on my back. It was most unpleasant.

The timer vibrated in my pocket, and in the distance, above the station wall still shrouded in fog, I saw the roof a train move gently away from Platform 4. A tiny puff of black diesel fume evaporated into the cold air.