A Journey Into Mystery
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”I was standing on a high bridge. The wind was blowing in my face with all its might.” – Robert Frost, “The Gift Outright,” 1922 (New Hampshire).
It was late at night and raining when the train pulled out of New York’s Penn Station for Boston. My mother had gone to sleep hours before; I was reading in my compartment when she came up to me. She’d been drinking.
“Where are you going?” I asked.
She took a breath as if about to speak, but didn’t. She looked away from me for an instant, then back at me. “Are we really alone right now? Can we be absolutely certain that nobody will overhear us?” Her hand found mine. We both held it. It felt like the last time her hand would ever be warm.
We stood there holding hands while we waited for our compartment to empty out into the corridor. A man walked by our door. He seemed to stop in his tracks. There were others walking too—they must have seen him too. But nobody spoke or made any motion toward our door until he disappeared from another car.
Then I heard a few giggles from two girls who lived behind us at boarding school. They had come up to see how many people they could annoy.
My mother said nothing for an uncomfortably long time. She turned away from me again. I followed her gaze and saw a young woman, probably around twenty-five, leaning against the wall just outside our room. She wore a raincoat. The raindrops glistened on her face. When I looked at her, she looked back at me. We met each other’s eyes, then looked away.
“What’s wrong with you?” my mother finally asked me in a low voice. Our faces were close together. She grabbed the hem of my raincoat and shook it slightly, then let go. I knew that she hadn’t been thinking clearly; otherwise, she would not have taken the chance.
“Nothing,” I replied, and turned away from her again. In truth, everything changed after that moment.
When the train reached Providence in Rhode Island, I left with one change ticket in my pocket. My mother woke up early the next morning when the conductor announced the name of the town we were approaching, and the station where we would disembark. “You’re coming home today, aren’t you?” she asked me in a whisper so quiet I almost missed hearing it.
I couldn’t reply to her, and instead, put my head down on the seat. The girl in the raincoat watched this. When she saw us look at her, she raised her hand as if to wave goodbye. But no words came out. She was trying to say something, but what it was—I don’t know.
As we were about to pull into the platform at Providence, my mother stood up quickly and headed for the door. When I stood up too, she gripped my hand tightly once more, looked me in the eye, and said, “Goodbye.” Then she went out of our compartment without looking back.
I stayed inside for only a second until I heard the train’s wheels squeaking across the rails in preparation to leave the station. That was the last time I ever saw either of them.
In that short period of time, everything about me had changed: my thoughts, my feelings, and even my physical appearance—my hair, which had been cut short in boarding school, suddenly grew a little longer. I didn’t need a mirror to tell me that. And as I walked through Providence and into the station, I could feel my body growing stronger too.
That day, Providence’s train station wasn’t crowded—it was early Sunday afternoon. I looked over to find the train that we’d boarded in New York still sitting there, idling. The engine and some cars had already begun to move off, but most of the cars were still stopped at their designated stops along the tracks.
There were a lot of passengers who weren’t getting off the train at Providence, though, because the next train wouldn’t depart for Boston for a few hours yet. A few dozen people were milling around the station, talking in small groups.
The train that had just arrived was pulling away from its tracks as fast as possible, but a train waiting to go south would keep bumping into ours as it tried to pull out.
The girl from Providence was also still there. She’d gone into one of the restaurants attached to the station; her coat was unzipped. The train’s brakes squealed loudly for a moment before stopping completely. For a brief moment, the air was filled with sparks as they flew off the train’s metal wheels.
Then the conductor began calling names and handing out tickets. “New Haven! Hartford! Boston!”
A young woman, perhaps in her late twenties, with curly brown hair got off first; she was heading for Boston. She wore a white blouse, a black dress, and a dark blue sweater over her shoulders. She carried a heavy canvas shoulder bag. As she passed by our door, she looked at me briefly and smiled; she must have recognized me from the train ride up.
I returned her smile with a slight nod—we had never actually spoken before, but she looked like someone I would know from somewhere.
A boy around ten or twelve years old got off the train. He seemed excited, but his mother pulled him away immediately to the ticket window. They both got off in Connecticut, where the mother would get a bus back home. A man, probably in his early fifties, came out with two suitcases and an electric wheelchair, which he pushed away from the station with ease.
His face held such a stern expression that I didn’t even recognize him as being someone else’s father. He was wearing a navy-blue sport coat and a dark-gray tie with a pattern of tiny red and green stars on it.
It was so bright that I thought it might be a mistake at first, but when we passed each other on the sidewalk, I realized that it was really there—the same tie he had worn on board the train. The colors of the sky matched well with the color of the starry pattern on the tie.
And finally, after a pause to let all these people pass us by, my mother exited the train. She had on a pair of jeans instead of a skirt or a dress, and a pair of sandals under her high heels. I couldn’t see her shoes very clearly, but when she walked past, she bent down to pick something up off the ground.
She then walked into the station restaurant, which had a big poster above its doorway advertising a sale on fried clams.
The train’s wheels squealed again when it began pulling out of the station. Once it reached the end of the tracks, there was nothing to stop us now—the train would continue on to Boston. There was no one left at Providence except a few travelers heading north toward New York.
But for a brief moment, there was just enough room for the doors of our car to open up. My mother leaned forward to look out the window once more, and for one split second, we shared a gaze. We both knew what we wanted to say to each other.
I watched her turn back around and head into the restaurant. Just like that, she disappeared from my sight forever.
For a long time afterward, I stared at the empty space where she’d stood—just for a fraction of a second—until a woman sitting next to me tapped my leg and pointed out the window. “Look,” she said, pointing toward the front of the train, where a young couple was standing at the exit.
I turned and saw that they’d just gotten married. The bride wore a white silk dress; her bouquet, made mostly of roses, had fallen to the floor of the train as she ran to get onto the platform. Her groom was looking at his watch and muttering quietly, not paying any attention to her.
Their eyes met as they were about to step off the train—and then they looked at each other. He took her arm gently and led her to the stairs. Then he went into the station; she continued walking through the open doors and across the station yard.
The train rolled slowly away from the station and headed west toward Boston. The last things we could hear were shouts and applause coming from a group of teenagers behind us. A little while later, I heard an announcement telling everyone to return to their seats. We sat down quickly and waited until the train arrived at another station; it would be a long ride before we reached Boston.
***
When the train pulled into Union Station, we all got off at the same time. The young couple hurried off towards a waiting taxi; my mother and I went to find a cab to take us south toward Providence. Our feet pounded against the pavement, carrying us away from the train and out of the station.
In the distance, I could see some clouds floating by overhead; there was still snow on the ground. The wind blowing in from the ocean felt cool to me as it brushed against my cheeks. The streetlights shone brightly on the sidewalk, illuminating every corner.
As we passed underneath a bridge, I stopped abruptly. My mother turned to look at me, worried that I’d been struck by a sudden attack of vertigo or something similar. I didn’t know how to tell her that I needed to go back inside for a moment.
But if I tried to explain it, I wouldn’t be able to do it in a way that made sense to anyone but me. So I simply said, “I want to go back,” and turned around.
There was only one small building near the tracks that had lights on, and I could see people coming and going, hurrying along on their errands. When I looked closer, I realized that most of them were homeless men and women.
I hadn’t seen any of this during my first trip to the city, but when you’re a kid it’s easy to miss things like that. I walked slowly through the entrance of the tunnel and headed towards the light, which was shining somewhere ahead of me.
A man and a woman who appeared to be my parents’ age sat huddled together in a corner by the door, sharing the only chair. They were holding hands and staring blankly ahead, and I assumed they must have been homeless. As I approached, the man turned to look at me. His hair was gray; his face had deep wrinkles, and there were streaks of dirt smeared across it.
His eyes were so dark they were almost black, and when he smiled at me I saw that his teeth were crooked. I recognized him instantly: it was the father of the young girl who had gone to the hospital with my mother. She’d told us all about him, how they used to run together and play ball after school.
The two of them had become very close friends when she’d lived with us, and the two of them had even talked about getting married someday. The man who held her hand was my father, but he was no longer my dad.
He stood up as soon as he saw me approach. “Hey, sweetheart,” he said. “How’ve you been?”
I knew that I couldn’t lie to him; he’d already found out too much about what I’d done. I also remembered how much he loved her; it hurt me to realize that I might never get that back again. It was strange to think that we were both the same age now—he’d been forty-five and she’d been seventeen; now we were the exact opposite.
He’d always called me Sweetheart—it was how he signed off on our letters. So I simply nodded and smiled at him. Then I looked at my mother and said, “We can’t stay here.”
“What are you talking about?” she asked, turning to look at me. “It’s cold out; let’s sit down here for a minute.”
She was trying to ignore the pain that came over me when I looked at the old couple. We sat down on an empty seat next to the wall of the tunnel. When I took her hand in mine, she gripped it tightly and leaned forward. We sat silently for several moments before I finally spoke up.
“Dad, I’m sorry.”
My voice broke when I started talking, making it hard to continue. When he understood that I’d been lying to him all these years, I could see that it hurt him deeply. The tears streaming down his face were like daggers slicing into my heart. After a long pause, I said, “But this is important. You need to help us.”
“Help you? What are you talking about?”
The man who used to be my father was looking at me with such sadness in his eyes that I wanted to throw myself on top of him, hug him tight, and beg him not to cry anymore. But instead, I shook my head and wiped away his tears with my free hand.
“You remember the other night when I ran out into the street and nearly got hit by the car? Well, your daughter did the same thing last week. Only she wasn’t running across the road.
She was going back inside that abandoned house where we found that body, so she could go back in time and warn the girl’s sister about the killer. I can’t just keep doing this anymore; it hurts too much, so I need to stop right now.”
When I’d finished speaking, my mother reached out to touch me, but then pulled back quickly when she saw how badly I was shaking. She stared at me in silence, as if she couldn’t believe her own ears. The old couple who had shared the chair by the door began to sob quietly; their faces twisted in anguish.
When the old man saw that his friend was crying, he put his arm around him and whispered, “I’m sorry.”
Then she grabbed my other hand in hers. I looked at the ground and squeezed my eyes shut. When I opened them, I saw that my mother had gone white. My eyes followed her gaze to a point in the distance, past the old couple and the homeless people who were standing nearby, watching us.
It took me a while to realize that something was moving in the distance, beyond all of those buildings. There were no sounds or smells, but when I looked carefully I could make out what seemed to be a dark shape walking towards us from the darkness, a figure with its back hunched against the cold wind.
When the figure drew nearer, I saw that it wasn’t human at all, but rather that it had two large, hairy legs, which were covered with thick gray fur. Its skin was pale yellow, and it had a long snout full of sharp, pointed teeth. It was wearing a heavy parka, but it didn’t move easily as it moved along the sidewalk, kicking up small amounts of snow with every step.
A long tail swung freely behind it, adding to the sense that the creature was more animal than human. As we watched, the beast stopped in front of a building and turned slowly, staring straight ahead at nothing in particular.
Then it walked a short distance further and disappeared between a pair of parked cars, disappearing from view until the next time it passed through a lighted doorway. It was a big cat, but unlike any feline, I’d ever seen before.
As I looked at the beast walking away, I realized that I hadn’t seen it before. I’d never really thought about the idea that there might actually be some animals living in New York City—but I’d known they existed for years. Just because we humans have forgotten most of our ancient past doesn’t mean that animals haven’t continued to exist.
In fact, we know a lot about them today. We have photographs, recordings, and even preserved DNA samples to prove that they’re real. But what about their ability to travel through time? Could they be coming back again after thousands of years? Or were they here all along, hidden within the city, waiting for their chance to strike?
After watching the creature vanish inside one of the buildings, my mother and I sat down on the steps of the nearest entrance to the subway station. We stayed there for a few minutes longer, watching the streets of the city below.
After a while, we both began to shiver, and then finally stood up and climbed the stairs. The lights in the tunnel were off, making it easy to find our way back to the train platform.
Once on board, I turned and looked at my mother, taking her hand again. “Mom, I need you to promise me that you won’t do anything crazy.”
She nodded, wiping her eyes with her free hand. I could tell she wanted to say something but was trying hard not to start crying again, so we rode silently until I felt like I could stand the noise and bustle around me no longer. I turned to face my mother, who was sitting beside me, holding tightly onto my hand.
“Do you know why I left the house yesterday morning?” she asked, once her voice had returned to normal.
I nodded, but before I could speak, my mother continued. “Your dad and I had agreed that if either one of us came home late at night without telling the other one where we were going, the other person would pack up a bag for each of us and leave a note explaining where we’d gone.
So I packed a bag for myself last night before I went to bed. I didn’t think there was any reason to hide it from your father.”
My eyes widened at this news. I knew that my parents had argued often about me going to school alone. I also knew that my mother hated it when I did it. Yet she hadn’t told me that my father was worried about my safety. Maybe he’d been right, and maybe my mother wasn’t doing the best job of protecting me from the world’s dangers.
I shook my head quickly to try to clear it. “Don’t worry, Mom. You can come with me now.”
For several seconds my mother looked confused; then she suddenly smiled and pulled me closer to her side. She leaned over and kissed me on the cheek. “Thank God,” she whispered, kissing me again and stroking my hair with her free hand. “You’ve grown up into such a fine man.”
The End