I Was Heading Home West

• Filip Stempien, Grade 12
• Short Story
• 2014

I was heading home west, on board an old train that from the outside looked like a tin can and from the inside smelt like one. I was almost home with only two stops left till the awaited conclusion of my long and tiresome trip. The tin can creaked alongside the platform and came to a sudden shuddering stop. Then the swearing began.
It came from directly above and involved quite a limited vocabulary. At first the voice criticised the train guard’s ability to stop the train smoothly. It had a harsh rusty edge like the sound of two rusty iron cogs grinding against each other slowly to create an incredibly painful audible sound. A sound created from vocal cords that have witnessed years of heavy consumption of spirits, nicotine and maybe even cannabis.
At first it was hard for me to believe that the metallic voice originated from a young lass. She had crashed down the stairs and banged on the train guards door, yelling at the top of her iron voice comparisons of the guard and a canine.
Her outfit was in compliance with the lass uniform; florescent sport sneakers (low cut socks, shoe laces tucked it), short black synthetic polyester shorts, low cut singlet that was clearly presenting but not revealing its contents and hair neatly done up in a ponytail but that was the only neat aspect about her.
Her profanities continued to stream out of her dirty mouth which was framed with cheap old cracked red lipstick. Her monologue wasn’t as much an opinion but a train of thought that rushed straight from her animalistic brain down the nerves in her neck to what was left of her rusty larynx bypassing the moral and rational parts of her brain.
The content of the monologue constantly changed and what began as complaint of the sudden stop was now a complaint of why the train wasn’t moving. It also included with graphic detail what her “boys” will do to the train guard and that the train guard should “watch his back”.
Then she made the classic mistake all public transport harassers make. She stepped out of the train, over the gap and onto the platform. She didn’t walk as much as a few meters when the train guard closed the doors swiftly and pinged the driver to leave the platform.
This clearly infuriated the psycho lass who increased her vocal disapproval and rushed up to the now speeding away tin can. As a good bye she sent one volley of yellow phlegm which impacted against the train window.
As I got off the train at the next station, I walked up to the train guard to ask if he was okay. He was one of those fedora wearing guys and he was fine. He simply looked into my eyes and said “You know what really gets me, is that from that platform you can see the police station”. But help is never there when you need it.