The Window Seat by Lauren Alexandra

What was all that about?

This was the only thought that ran through Lu’s mind as she looked out of the window. The obnoxious station sign stared at her with knowing eyes from behind the glass, taunting her. She felt like she couldn’t breathe and, sinking back into her seat she felt the presence of all the other passengers as if they were passing through her. Their chatter seemed too loud, too jolly for Lucrecia. Evening was fading over the city slowly, the sky turning to a washed out grey as the station lights clicked on.

Letting out a big sigh Lu began rummaging around her bag. Her phone was somewhere at the bottom, was it ringing? Pulling it into view she rolled her eyes at herself.

Of course your phone isn’t ringing, stupid. Who would be calling you exactly?

“Sorry my dear, is this seat 11B?” A kind old voice asked from the aisle, gaining her attention. She nodded, smiling kindly at the old woman as she sat down beside her. It was odd, having a presence so close to her again. But something about the woman reminded her of her own grandmother, offering her a small slice of comfort. She had to stop herself from laughing out loud, the irony! Comfort only seemed to find her as she was leaving this city. The sign felt as if it was closer to the window when Lu looked out again, a train across the platform arriving with a bubble of passengers.

Are they on holiday, or arriving home?

The sign loomed over the other passengers and in desperation to distract herself, she pulled out her journal. It was a small thing, but heavy with all the additional items she’d jammed into its pages. Scrapes of paper, post-it notes, paper clips, ticket stubs, polaroids. They all jutted out of the cover, waving to her from her memories. A thin bit of pink elastic was wrapped tightly around the journal, holding everything together. Unbinding it, it fell open to what she considered her favourite pages just a few days ago. She’d been sat on her bed in the spare room, coloured pens flowing around her. Sticking in the polaroid they had taken the night before, she drew flowers and planets all over the page. In black ink were the words ‘no departure pulls you from me,’ stretching out along the page in an uneven line.

What was all that about? What happened? Where do I even begin?

Lu tried to follow the threads in her mind but quickly came up short. The train blew out a scream, announcing its departure from the station. Her eyes moved quickly to the platform, but all she could see was her own reflection in the glass. The sign tried to whisper an apology to her, the window between them blurring as the train began to move.

I’m sorry, she whispered back. The train was already moving through shades of green.

“Did you say something, dear?” The kind old woman asked, peering over her newspaper.

“No, no. Just thinking out loud.” Lu laughed, feeling like she was going to cry.

“Have you made sense of all that has happened?” She asked, causing Lu’s head to snap up in shock. But when she turned to look at the woman, she wasn’t there. Lu looked frantically up and down the train, her eyes coming to rest on the same image of herself in the window as before.

But this time, she wasn’t too sure it was herself that was looking back at her.