It Still Hurts

A short story about second changes and healing childhood trauma.

On each solstice, the train arrived at exactly midnight.

An impenetrable wall of fog fell upon the train station, where the tracks were barely visible. It swirled upward toward the platform in thick tendrils like a temptress, calling, beckoning. A chill, unrelated to the weather, racked through my entire body. Clutching my arms to my chest in an effort to stop the shaking, I peered around at the brave souls beside me who awaited the midnight train. Some stood huddled in small groups, perhaps the family of those who had passed. There were a few, like myself, who stood alone, the lamplight casting long shadows across their faces.

A storm of anxiety and doubt coalesced inside of me as I awaited the train. A flash of memories assaulted me as I gripped my purse tighter, willing my body to steady. “You remind me of your mother.” I remember my mother laying on the couch covered in bruises, her arms and hands swollen like balloons. His words rang through my mind, echoing and piercing my resolve. “You’re too loud. Be quiet.” The leather strap sliced into the palm of my hand as the memories quaked through me. “You think that hurts, I can make it worse.” Each word was like a dagger, cutting into my confidence and self-worth. I was twelve when my father left us at the doorstep of a homeless shelter. The shaking did not stop.

A high-pitched whistle cracked through the pressing dark, shattering the fog strangling my mind, as the train approached.

Inhale, count to four. Exhale, count to four. I repeated the process again and again as I attempted to return fully into my body. The breathing exercises were my therapist's suggestion. For the last six months, since his death, my controlled breaths acted as a thin armor from the anxiety, doubt, and fear eating away at me. With each exhaled breath, the electric buzz filling my limbs began to fade.

It looked like any other train as it pulled into the station, all sleek and black cold metal. It was the eerie quiet with which it arrived, as if gliding above the tracks which made me unnerved. Like a ghost of a train.

The doors to the train opened, and the Wayfarer stepped out without fanfare. His long black robes ripped and tattered with time. Beneath his hood, I could not make out the features of his face except for his moon white eyes, which shone unnaturally in the dark.

With uncertainty, I blended into the line of bodies approaching the car. I reached my hand into my jacket pocket and idly thumbed a coin, which weighed exactly twenty-one grams, the weight of a soul.

The Wayfarer stands as a sentinel to the underworld, his scales poised to precision, to measure the souls in currency, a coin the bridge to the realm of the departed.

Around me there were soft whispers which clung to smiling faces and light laughter coming from the group of people ahead of me. A look over my shoulder, there was a man who hung his head low and held flowers in his hands.

This journey was different for everyone. For some, this was a celebration of life. For others, it was an expedition of mourning. Doubt clouded my ability to articulate to my therapist the purpose behind my pilgrimage to the realm of the undead. But I knew at that moment, in my heart, I needed closure. If only I knew what I would say.

“Upon whom do you call?” The Wayfarer asked at my approach.

“My father, Robert Michael Davis, born the 5th of November.”

The Wayfarer stuck out a gaunt hand, and I dropped the coin in his palm in response. The unearthly creature wrapped his hand around the coin and carefully considered its weight.

“You may pass,” the Wayfarer’s ethereal voice responded.

The leather seat was cold like the day his fist collided with mom’s eye socket. The thud reverberated through my body as I attempted to put myself between them. It was when he came for me in his drunken rage that I fled the house with no shoes on my feet. I ran and ran until my body collapsed against a tree; the bark scraping my back. The tears streamed down my face, my clothes sodden from the rain-soaked ground, as the image of my safe home was shattered.

I wrapped my jacket around me as I felt the tremors stir again. Turning towards the window, I watched the station disappear in the sheet of dense fog as the train pulled away in its silent journey toward the underworld. I settled into my seat, attempting to leach any warmth it would offer me, as I prepared myself for the unknown. As I watched the indiscernible shapes and shadows pass through the window, my eyes grew heavier.

The sensation of weightlessness woke me from my sleep. It felt as if hours had passed but according to my watch; it was only 12:01 AM, as if time had bent and twisted.

I watched as the train meandered through rocky valleys and passed forests with no leaves. There was no sun in the sky, only clouds. The sky, the air, they all glowed a soft ambient gray. Like its inhabitants, this realm appeared dead.

The screeching whistle alerted the passengers of the train’s arrival at the next station. My heart decided this was the time to revolt and began pounding like a herd of horses. The noise rose inside of me and filled my ears with a deafening cacophony. It reminded me of when I was young, blaring Brand New in my room to drown out the sound of his yelling.

My tongue felt like sandpaper against the roof of my mouth. I didn’t know what I would say when in his presence once again. Too many years passed without us ever saying a word to each other. You weren’t there when I had my first son, or my second. You weren’t there for my divorce or when I earned my graduate degree. The last words I heard you say were not to me, but to my ex-husband. “She’s your problem now.”

As the doors to the car careened open, no one moved an inch. A pregnant pause filled the air. It was as if every living being on the train held their breath in wait.

A misty haze billowed into the train. Faint, nearly opaque figures emerged. A few of the spirits walked past my seat and I could make out the translucent outline of their bodies and clothes. A woman in front of me squealed and threw up her arms in delight at the sight of a departed loved one. The sound of crying, of joy soaked tears, broke out behind me.

There was no happiness or joy in my heart at the sight of him. I attempted to steel my heart. I would give him no satisfaction the moment his brown eyes caught mine. I was always thankful I was blessed with my mother’s looks. Thankful I didn’t share a resemblance with the man who drove a knife through my inner child. The ghost of my father slid into the seat next to me and smiled. I did not smile back.

The doors to the train closed and, without a sound, it departed the station. All around us were quiet conversations filled with smiles. Yet, the space between me and my father was a void of silence. The silence stretched into what felt like hours. When he spoke I was surprised when my father’s baritone voice didn’t flay open my heart.

“Surprised you’re the one who decided to visit. Glad to see I’ve been on your mind,” my father said.

“Why would you think anyone would come at all? Why do you think you deserve it?

“I took care of y’all, didn’t I? I put a roof over your head and clothed you. Did I not deserve to be happy too?”

“Happiness at the bottom of a bottle?”

My father let out a cynical laugh. “That’s all you remember is the bad. I did the best I could with what I had.”

I tried to identify my feelings. Of all the emotions which haunted me, it was anger who was the loudest and most demanding. Anger felt safe. Anger has always been a shield against the world. I wielded it as a sword to cut down the meaningful relationships in my life. Anger, my father’s one and only gift to me.

“You didn’t give me love. You didn’t give me a safe house to grow up in. You weren’t there when I needed you. You treated me as if I was a pebble in a shoe, a problem to be dealt with,” I lashed at him.

My father rose from his seat and roared down at me. “The pressure y’all put on me, it was too much!”

“You act like a victim.” I folded my arms in front of me and turned my face toward the window.

“Your mother's mental health took a toll on me,” his voice cracked with pain.

For a brief moment, I understood my father. At the age of twelve, thanks to my father, my mother’s mental health became my responsibility. She’d often forget to take her meds. I remember she’d go on spending sprees instead of paying our bills. When I opened the refrigerator in our state-funded apartment, barren shelves stared back at me. I worked thirty hours a week, as a junior in high school, to ensure the lights stayed on and food remained in the fridge. My mother's mental health hurt me too.

Even still, I wanted to scoff at my father’s words. His narcissism followed him to his grave. My therapist warned me I may not receive the validation I was seeking. I was not surprised to find out she was right. But it didn’t mean this journey was not fruitful.

As I looked up at my father, his wide frame towering above me, I realized anger would not fix my father’s inability to love me. It would not make me feel better. It would only serve to keep me from finding peace. If anything, if I continued to harbor this anger, I would be no better than him. So, I gave my anger back. I denied my father’s gift.

“So you dumped the responsibility on a twelve-year-old child?” A burning sensation built in my eyes. Tears threatened to break loose.

“I’m sorry.” My father slumped back down into his seat and dipped his head. He ran a hand through his opaque hair, a habit of his waking life.

I turned back toward my father and examined his disheveled hair. The wrinkles of time ran valleys along his face. He was just a man. A broken, scared man.

“You don’t deserve forgiveness.”

“I wasn’t asking for it.”

I stood from my seat and turned to my father, now slumping in his seat.His brown eyes peered up at me as the train whistle indicated our return to the land of the living. At that moment, I realized he was just a man.

“I am worthy of love and always have been,” I told him. A sad smile tugged at his lips as he gave me a cursory nod. I moved past his ghostly figure in the seat as the parting doors beckoned the living passengers to depart. I did not look back.