3. Interludes

Flash.

I opened my eyes: the passenger car was black, but not empty; a few misplaced silhouettes were dusted in faint, flickering moonlight, their owners rumbling with sleep in accompaniment to the gentle, snore-like drone of the tracks beneath. Like rain on a tin roof; the sound of contentment.

Outside the car was darker: shadows of trees and mountains, unseamed, one immense black organism, sliding past. Through the opposite windows, the same: blackness, beauty.

I slept.

Flash.

Still black inside and out.

The snake of train cars spilled out of darkness onto an open bridge, and the earth fell away on both sides; the moon speared a vast, dark, lethargic river with white slivers of liquid glass. It happened in a moment and was gone; it happened in a moment, and was magnificent.

Another flash:

The conductor's tinny voice announcing Portland, next stop.

Two dark figures struggled from their seats, lumbered to the doors.

Squeals of brakes.

Another:

The conductor again: "Next stop, Eugene."

Through sleepy eyes and glass I observed a million pinpricks of white punched into the black fuzzy mountains; moonlight and snow fell and rested in stark contrast to the dark earth. Laura Bailey sat beside me and said, "Ray," and I looked at her reflection in my window. Her quiet sea-foam eyes faded slowly to black.

As did I.

© 2005 Jason Gurley