Crash Goes The Train

Poland 2012

A man on a horse passed by the window. His bare torso glinted in the sun, bouncing rays off his chest as he sat staring into the distance.

Simon paused what he was doing.

His book was making him tired. An academic tome on the dysfunctional relationship between industrialized colonies of magpies. It was required reading for his environmental course. Simon was beginning to have second thoughts.

The train chugged on, filtering the Eastern landscape through a double-glazed pane. The carriage smelled of old socks and rusted metal. A stench that had torn through his pastrami sandwich on rye and left a bitter taste on his tongue.

Simon looked back at the window hoping to spy the cowboy again.

Opposite Simon was Dan.

One year his junior, Dan was devouring the bloated corpse of a burger. Shards of grease dripped between his fingers etching a long line from thumb to elbow. The burger stood no chance against Dan’s gnashing teeth. Attempts at communication left Simon covered in small globules of meat spat ferociously by Dan. He was excited to tell Simon about his latest conquest, an unbelievable tale involving a golf cart and three country club members of the opposite sex.

Simon tried his best to block the Dan drone out of his mind.

In the booth beside them sat two older women.

They stared in symmetry, eyes void of life. Large plastic bags filled with rags lodged between them. Scarves wound tight above their duffel overcoats of chequered red and hospital greens. There was a menace to them. A vibe that was off-putting for two jovial characters such as themselves. Or so Simon told himself as he retreated further into his winter ski jacket, half-price on sale from Primark.

Behind them lay the only other passenger in their carriage. His denim-clad legs stretched across the seat. A baseball cap was lowered over his eyes. It had an eagle winking emblazoned on the front. Two wings carried swords. The man, arms folded, muscles bulging, wore a typical wife-beater vest. Both arms were covered in Nazi regalia and death insignias. Simon hoped the man would never wake up.

Outside, the country meadows of rolling hills and fresh crops had mutated into an industrial wasteland. Vast factories loomed large coughing and wheezing stacks of smoke. The clear skies were replaced by ominous plumes of pollution.

The view escalated fast into a dystopian world of 1940s rationing. Concrete courtyards of tennis nets and basketball hoops. Abandoned cars lay derelict by the roadside, some torched and charred and robbed of their identity, husks of their former lives. A girl in an anorak waved solemnly. A slow hand gesture like a princess trapped in a slow-mo time loop. She was struggling to smile.

“This is grim. Where did you say we were heading?”

“Szczekociny. Silesian Voivodeship.”

Dan shook his head and flicked a piece of burger off the table.

“It’s fucking shit innit? Your mate better be having top weed lined up when we get off. This place is fucked. Majorly off-the-fucking-grid. Last time I fucking listen to you, mate.”

Simon watched Dan’s mouth motor at pace before the train disappeared into a tunnel. The interior lights briefly flickered before they gave way as the entire carriage became consumed by the dark.

Dan’s mouth was the final image Simon was ever to see.

“Two trains running on the same track have collided head-on in southern Poland, killing 16 people and injuring 58 in the country’s worst train disaster in more than 20 years.

The collision just north of Krakow late on Saturday came after one of the trains ended up on the wrong track. Neighbours in the town of Szczekociny were alerted by what they said sounded like a bomb and rushed to the scene as survivors emerged.” Source, The Guardian.