Simon and I
had married young. I was not used to living or surviving alone. But
I knew in my heart my superficially responsible and respectable life
was a complete fraud and I must accept changes needed to be made.
‘Will this train ever move again,’ shouted the angry man,
now red-faced and breathless, demanding information from some invisible
and silent source. He was probably not used to feeling so helpless,
and paced the aisle in frustration.
The seat next to my new friend was now empty. He looked at it questioningly
and I nodded. He moved over to create more room.
‘Hi, I’m Kieran.’
‘Sally,’ I replied.
‘This is a total nightmare isn’t it?’
‘Do you mean being trapped here, or being trapped here with
these people,’ I grinned.
‘The latter,’ he answered, and the ice was broken. We
talked about our journeys. He was a photographer, going to London
to firm up the details of an overseas assignment. My disappointment
surprised me. I had begun to think of him as a fellow traveller. We
passed the time gossiping about imagined peccadilloes of other passengers.
Our |
laughter attracted frowns;
how could we be enjoying ourselves in the circumstances.
I was thrown from my seat by the force of the impact. I felt confusion
and pain. Time stood still and an eerie silence fell on the carriage.
Another jolt, the carriage was thrown into the air, appeared to
hang there, then fell to the ground and came to rest. Silence. Then
screams. Piercing screams. I was lying on the floor between two
seats, my body twisted awkwardly, my hands held protectively over
my head. The carriage rocked precariously, I could hear metal straining
and splintering.
It was impossible to get my bearings, everything looked distorted,
strange, unreal. But I was alive, although I no longer inhabited
the world of a few moments ago; nothing would ever be the same again.
Neither did I occupy the current one; I was a spectator, an observer.
I felt a strange sense of elation. Nothing around me was how things
were meant to be but I was unable to conjure sadness or fear. They
were emotions I had just left behind.
I could no longer see green fields from the window. My new view
through the shattered |
