Old Man

Surreal, dream like story about two men in a train

When the train stopped at the station, a man entered and sat next to me. He was an old man, probably in his 60's or 70's, his face wrinkled and his spine was in the shape of the letter "s". I was looking outside the window, he was looking at his feet. The train continued, the man was the only one who got on at the station. After a while, maybe about thirty minutes later, the man lit a cigarette and offered, without words, to me. I took one, even though earlier that evening I had promised my wife that I would try to quit the habit. But for some reason, I didn't want to say no. "You know, I'm not sure you can smoke inside here..", I said quietly to the old man. He just looked at me, with a knowing smile, lit my cigarette (that was hanging in my lips) and turned his eyes back to his feet. When the train conductor came to ask for his ticket, I was certain that he would ask the man to put out his cigarette. But I was wrong, the man showed the conductor his ticket and the conductor smiled. "Hey! You can't smoke in here!", he yelled at me, as I took a drag from the smoke. I quickly put it out against the window and apologized. The conductor left, with an angry face. "Why didn't he say anything to you?", I asked, even though I wouldn't know how the man would know. "Because he respected me. You were not sure should you smoke, I was", he answered without looking. I looked outside, it was beautiful. The stars in the night sky were lighting up the empty desert, the moon was hauntingly beautiful there too. "Isn't it beautiful?", I asked. "Wouldn't you wish the train would just stop and you could go outside and just walk in the desert?"

"You're sad"

"What do you mean?"

"You dream about going outside this train, but you never do. If the train would now stop, you wouldn't do that... You would stay in your seat and wait until somebody told you why has the train stopped... That is sad"

"What would you do then?"

"I would do that"

"Go outside you mean?"

"Yes"

"Why do you think I wouldn't?"

"Because I know you"

"From where? We just met..."

"So what? You are a human, and so am I. I may not know you personally, but I know you"

"That makes no sense"

"Okay"

The rest of journey through the night was quiet between us. It was a long way, almost three hours, the man smoked a cigarette every thirty minutes, offering me as well. I smoke only two, I am proud of that. Once the train hit the station, the man didn't leave. As I was picking my luggage I asked him "Aren't you leaving?"

"No.. I'm going back where I came from. As are you"

Author's Note

ignore grammar problems