He couldn’t really blame Alice or Olga. They weren’t so bad. It was his fault. He was only ever half-married to them. Only ever half in bed with them. His dreams had always been elsewhere. He understood why they had needed to find satisfaction in other arms.
He glanced round the carriage again, and sighed.
Two failed marriages and, with Alice, a child that probably wasn’t his, and who, thank God, lived with his ex-wife. In charge of a business that was destroying him. On the plus side? An obsession with a young woman he had seen on a train years ago. But, oddly, those moments when he would picture that English girl to himself were the most vibrant and the most exciting of his life.
*****
Miriam sat happily in the carriage, staring out at the rolling hills, the lush green vegetation and the breath-taking waterfalls. She was on the way back to Lyon. She often spent her weekends with her aunt and uncle in Sierre, that is, ever since she had returned to live in Lyon. She was working at the school where she had been the English language assistant all those years ago. Her uncle wasn’t such a bad sort, and she still got on well with her aunt.
Applying for the teaching job had been her salvation. She felt she was putting her life together again. Her aunt was particularly helpful, phoning her during the week and sending her text messages. She provided her with a link to the outside world, and Miriam was also constantly in contact with her mother of course. They had all been extremely worried about her. She owed them a lot. She needed to pay them back for all their help when things had been difficult. Two breakdowns in ten years, and on anti-depressants for a good part of them.
She hadn’t been able to cope after university. Life, work, relationships. She’d bungled them all. The only thing she had managed was to create weird, scary images in her head, and come as close as can be to becoming totally mad. She hadn’t been able to map out a route for herself, how to mix, how to make friends, how to put up with the knock-backs and cruelties of life, and the callousness and superficiality of people. Life had seemed a nightmare journey through an impenetrable forest, but now, maybe slowly, she was trying to start again, and mould an identity for herself out of her job, her little flat, her one or two slight acquaintances, and her trips back to her relatives in Switzerland, the country of her mother. She had even begun writing self-indulgent poetry again.
She glanced at the Swiss passengers in her carriage. She was growing fond of their character. Easy-going, rather shy, but uncomplicated. Maybe the terrain of mountains and lakes had made them like that.
This was the train on which that shy young man had handed her the note wrapped round his pen. She had lost the note somehow, but she still had the pen. It was in her handbag on her lap now. In the midst of some of her most terrible moments of despair, when she had come close to contemplating the most shameful of actions against herself in order to end the torment, she had held that pen between her fingers, even held it against her cheek, and felt its simple warmth on her skin. She had found a release and calmness that, for a while, took away the nervous dark thoughts which had run through her mind.
She regretted not having rung him, but what could she have done? She had been an innocent young woman at the time, scared of life and men. Men were just silly predators out for one thing, whom she nervously laughed at and walked away from when they ran after her and told her how beautiful she was.
Still, it would be enough if she could put her life back together into a semblance of normality. That wouldn’t be so bad to aim for: an old spinster with her memory of her young Swiss man and what might have been. Instinctively, she opened her handbag, and reached for the memento he had left her here on this train, in his land, amidst the valleys and the soaring mountains. For that, she would be forever thankful. She held the pen to her lips, slightly pursing them against its gentle pressure. She let it play against her lips and her tongue, giving it the slightest of licks, the gentlest of wet kisses.
“Thank you, my darling,” she said.
*****
Sebastian had settled into the routine of life again. A life without a wife, thankfully. A life where he could be alone with his dreams, and what might have been. What might have been both with his painting, and with his English girl. A life where he only really came alive on the Brig-Geneva train. He closed his eyes and settled back into the softness of the train seat, and into his dream-world.
*****
Miriam spotted him immediately he got on the train at Vevey. She hadn’t felt gob-smacked, astounded, or even mildly surprised. That came later. She was so used to his presence in her mind that for that first moment or two she felt as she would upon waking from a sweet dream, when the dream was still alive and reality hadn’t yet taken over.
Then she blinked. She rubbed her eyes. Was she losing it again? That man at the far end of the carriage, pale and tired-looking, now reclining back in his seat, was not a mirror-image of her young Swiss man but, with his troubled, worn features, was definitely how he could have looked thirteen years later.
The intensity of that episode on the train came back to her. How she had felt when he stood in front of her. His itch of body as he held himself against the lurching of the train. His warmth. His smell. His closeness to her. So close to her she could have reached out to touch and squeeze every part of him. She looked at him there amidst other travellers on the Brig-Geneva train. The picture unsettled her, and clashed with the strong images in her memory. It was him, she was absolutely sure, but she feared he wouldn’t remember her. Why should he? Why should he remember a silly, romantic gesture of his youth amidst, no doubt, many other such gestures at the time and since? Those intense, passionate memories of hers could not be squared with a train-carriage in the here and now, where the object of her fantasy sat amidst other travellers engaged in the minutiae of their humdrum lives.
She opened her handbag and took out his pen, and her pocket-diary. She tore off a piece of paper. She nestled the pen against her cheek. A sigh, a soft release of breath, a groan even, escaped from her lips, enough to make the man next to her stir in his seat and cast a troubled glance at her.
She began to write a message, the message which had remained bottled up inside her for thirteen years.
She stood up awkwardly, as if she were observing from afar a character in a film, and experienced once more that disembodied strangeness she had so often experienced in her darker moments. She strode nervously up to him at the end of the carriage, steadying herself with her hands on the head-rests of the seats as the train buffeted her from side to side. She stopped in front of him. A woman to the left glanced curiously at her. Miriam coughed.
He stirred. He opened his eyes. He looked up. His eyes widened. His mouth opened.
“This is for you,” she said, holding out his pen with the piece of paper wrapped around it. She immediately turned round and walked back to her seat.
*****
Sebastian stared open-mouthed at her swaying, slim figure as it retreated down the other end of the carriage.
His throat feeling dry, and wondering whether he had gone completely mad, he unfolded the paper, his hands shaking.
“Do you remember this pen? Do you remember when you gave it to me? If you do, let’s speak. If you don’t, then please stay where you are. It’s your decision.”
Sebastian stood up and walked towards her in a delirious daze, his heart bursting, his eyes fixed upon that pale face and those blue, beautiful eyes that, however anxious, did not flinch from intensely scrutinizing him.
“I…I do remember you,” he stammered as he sat opposite her, drawing in her odour as if it were the perfume of the gods, and staring at her features and body as if they were the gateway to heaven.
They introduced themselves, and explained where they were going. Miriam told him of her return to Lyon, and her visits to her aunt and uncle. Sebastian spoke of Vevey, and his business in Lausanne. Then they fell silent, tense and embarrassed, both discomfited by the conflict between their private dreams ce
ntred on that day thirteen years ago, and their inability to speak freely of them, scared that the other one didn’t share them.
“You must have thought me a very silly young man, Miriam…I was too shy to speak to you, I wanted you to ring me…”
“But how could I?”
“I know…it was my mistake, but…”
“But?”
“But…you know, they say it’s never too late,” he murmured nervously. “Do you have, you know, someone serious in your life?”
She shook her head.
“And you?” she asked.
“No…Two marriages and two divorces.”
“Any children?”
“One child from my first wife…probably not mine…I’m not much of a catch, am I?”
“I’ve had my problems too, Sebastian. Two breakdowns, and more anti-depressants than hot dinners.”
She bit her lip. She couldn’t understand why she had told him that. Sebastian stared at her, and then suddenly moved forward. He took her hand, and her body gave a little jump. His flesh had touched hers. Life seemed to her as beautiful as it could ever be.
“Who knows? Maybe that only happened because I didn’t speak to you that day, or you didn’t ring me…Who knows what might have happened? Our lives could have been totally different.” He caressed her hand, hesitating, looking for the right words, breathing harshly. “Miriam, I must tell you something. Perhaps it’s a silly thing, something that shows I have never grown up, and live in a fantasy-world, but…I don’t think a day has gone by, since that day thirteen years ago, that I haven’t thought of you and what might have been…”
“But I’m damaged goods, Sebastian, I…”
“And I? Two divorces and a job I hate?”
And they spoke of his ambition to be an artist, which he had abandoned, and she spoke of her poems, and blushed when he asked what she wrote about.
“And you, Miriam?” he asked, looking intently, but anxiously at her.
“I?”
“That day, Miriam…What did it mean to you? What does it mean now?”
There was silence. She could feel her body trembling and Sebastian, still holding her hand, also felt its soft vibration. He waited for her to speak, and thereby determine whether he still had the chance to believe in dreams, or would be forced to pace out the remainder of a robotic life devoid of feeling and love.
“I also have thought about you every day, Sebastian…every day…”
Her words petered out, and she bowed her head.
The train slowed, jolting them out of their world. It was stopping at Lausanne Station.
“What shall we do, Miriam?” he asked.
“On Friday I’ll be on the 5 o’clock train from Brig,” she said, shyly raising her face to look at him.
“And so will I.”
*****
On Friday, after he had sat next to her in the near-deserted carriage, and they had finished with the pleasantries, they fell silent.
Sebastian reached into his inside jacket pocket.
“This is for you,” he said.
It was the pen, again with a piece of paper wrapped around it. Miriam smiled, and unfolded the paper.
“But there’s nothing written on it, Sebastian!”
“Yes, you see, my darling, it’s for you to write our future on it.”
“And what are the options, Sebastian?”
“I want to give up my business, Miriam. I want a future with you, whatever that future might hold. I want to start painting again. You will be my model. And you will write your poetry. We will live the lives we should have lived. We’re still young enough to deserve a second chance.”
“And the other option, Sebastian, is to stay apart, live our separate lives, and meet every week on this train. Keep our lives and our dreams separate…because, if we try to be together and it fails, I don’t know if…”
Sebastian clasped the hand that reached out to him. They didn’t speak for a while. Then he looked her straight in the eyes.
“Well, what do you say then, Miriam? Are we really just going to meet every few days on this train….and carry on with our unsatisfactory lives..? Or are we, as you say in England, going to go all the way..?”
“You mean, not get off at Lausanne but carry on to Geneva?” Miriam asked with a sly, yet radiant smile tugging at her lips.
Sebastian smiled back. He looked round the carriage. The one or two other passengers had left. They were alone.
“There are one or two tunnels between here and Geneva, my darling,” he said.
He moved towards her. She looked up, her big blue eyes dilated and vulnerable, her muscles tensed and stirring in anticipation. The pen and paper she had been holding fell from her grasp.
Alan Hardy ©2014
Wishes
Sitting close together
Warm, holding tight
Shooting stars glow
Blinding white lights
Showering the Earth
From such a great height
Feelings of love
On one special night
Dream-filled heavens
Given to lovers true
Magic in the air
Let it be you
Both wish forever
Hope you are mine
And with a sweet kiss
It’s sealed in time
William O’Brien © 2014
Love isn’t fair
By Madhu Kalyan Mattaparthi
I was sitting on a park bench, gazing at the blue sky, listening to the birds whistling and watching people as they passed by. A little bird pecking at the grains thrown in front of it by an old woman, sitting on a bench a few meters away from me. A little girl playing tag with her father and jumping with delight whenever he lost. A couple jogging away together on the tracks.
Just sitting and observing is so easy and in many ways delightful.
I was still enjoying my little peace when I saw a guy coming my way. He had a huge pair of headphones covering his ears, which I could see even when his head was covered by the hood of his jacket as he sat beside me. I could tell he was not here to work out because he was wearing a pair of blue jeans along with a casual T-shirt. I didn’t like the fact that he was listening to music instead of the sound of birds on such a beautiful day so I patted him on the shoulder. He didn’t seem to notice it (thanks to my overall smallness). I patted him on his shoulder again, still to no notice. This was getting on my nerves now! So, I gathered all my strength in my right fist and gave his shoulder a nice punch.
This time, he did notice.
“What the hell? Why did you punch me?” he yelled, taking off his headphones.
“Uhm……I just wanted to tell you something but you weren’t paying attention so I punched you,” I explained nervously.
“What?” he gave me a confused look.
“I wanted to tell you something but you wouldn't listen. So, I punched you,” I explained again, this time in a firmer voice.
He took off his hood and smiled in response. His face was a beautiful sight, making everything around seem so dim in comparison, and I couldn’t do anything but be awed.
He murmured an ‘it’s okay’ and got up to walk away but I pulled him by his hand.
“Can’t you stay with me awhile?” I asked with a smile, hoping he won’t think me a creep.
He looked around a bit before smirking.
“Two conditions.” Even his voice was beautiful, like an angel’s, firm, masculine and yet having soft undertones to it.
“What conditions?” I stammered out.
“First, you have to apologize to me. Second, you have to listen to this song with me,” he said taking out another pair of headsets, a smaller one, from his pocket.
“Uhm… It’s just.”
“What’s with the uhm again? Do you want me to stay or not?” He asked as he crossed his arms over his chest.
I looked at him, wide-eyed and confused. What was the matter with him? Did h
e really think I wanted to sit and listen to a song with him in the middle of the park? I went on with my explanation which he had so impolitely interrupted.
“It’s just that, the whole reason I wanted to get your attention was to have you enjoy the environment around us; what would be the point of sitting in the middle of the park if you can’t even take off your headphones and observe what’s around us?”
He looked at me for a while like I was an alien. I fidgeted under his gaze, being stared at isn’t something I’m very comfortable with. He probably saw my nervousness because soon he started to laugh.
“I guess you’re right but I’ll listen to your opinion once you listen to this song with me.”
I smiled and took the spare pair of headsets from his hand as he removed the pin of the one around his neck from the jack of his music player.
We sat there listening to a song I can never forget, it had no lyrics but the music was so beautiful, I couldn’t help but close my eyes and let it take over my soul.
I let my head rest on his shoulder as the beautiful music soothed me. I didn’t realise when I fell asleep but when I woke up, I felt something knocking my head repeatedly. I opened my eyes and saw his grinning face.
I also noticed that my head was now on his lap.
I quickly got up, embarrassed about our this intimate position, and stammered out.
“Wha- What happened? And why are you grinning like that?”
“Well, while we were listening to some music two hours ago, you fell asleep on my shoulder, then, I wanted you to sleep in a better position so I put you on my lap,” he explained.
“Two hours? Why didn’t you wake me up? Why did you knock on my head repeatedly?” I yelled as I held my head, which was throbbing slightly from the constant knocking.
“First, you looked so cute when you were sleeping. Second, it’s just revenge for you punching me so hard. Lastly, please stop with the interrogation,” he said and I pouted.
“You, pervert! After putting my head on your lap and staring at me for two hours, you’re all smug and holy?” I shouted.
“Calm down, I was just joking,” he smirked.
I calmed down and fixed myself. I was mad at him but, at the same time, I felt a weird pull on the strings of my heart. Something was stirring inside me, making my pulse race and limbs go numb. Something so indescribable and pleasantly strange.