The old man whistled quietly as he pushed his brush along the ground, sweeping the remnants of the day into the little articulated dustpan which he carried around on the end of a stick. His job was to maintain order, to keep life in the railway station tidy. He enjoyed it, there was a quiet satisfaction to be had by doing a good job.

The area around the vending machine on platform two always needed more attention than the rest of the station. It was something of a meeting point for travellers whose paths crossed on their journeys through life, so there was often someone stood there waiting, and dreaming.


People thought he was just a cleaner, but appearances can be deceptive, and not everything in this world is always quite the way it seems. He restored the station to pristine condition every day with a few good strokes of his brush… but sometimes he swept up more than just dust.


Alan looked quizzically at his cell phone. The last call had been especially puzzling. The call setup time was usually very short, but it had taken three attempts to get through, almost as if it was having trouble finding the number. He glanced to his right, where the track disappeared into a tunnel near the end of the platform. The signal was green. In the other direction the rails gleamed in the moonlight and curved gently away into the distance. No train was approaching.

Lisa had said her train was delayed, running slow for some reason, but she’d told him they were on the bridge over the river which meant it was about five minutes away. That had been ten minutes ago. You could just about see the entire bridge over the river from the platform. There wasn’t a train on it, or anywhere near it. You’d see the lights of the carriage windows against the sky, but nothing was there. He tried the number again… and again. Only a long wait followed by the message: ‘Call Failed’.


On the train, Lisa finished up her coffee and tidied away her papers. Working on the journey was a good use of time, especially when you could get a seat with a table. Nearly home now, she thought. It was always good to be home with Alan. They’d been together a long time and were building a life.

Of course they argued occasionally, and sometimes they annoyed each other, but that was only to be expected. One day perhaps they’d be able to be together all the time, and not have to go their separate ways to work, not have any cares, and not have to be responsible for anything. That was always a good dream, but it was only a dream, at least at this moment in time. She sometimes wished it could be different. Maybe there was another world where that could happen, but then there could also be one where they weren’t together at all, so it was probably best to be careful what you wished for.

The glow of train lights appeared faintly in the gloom. Alan looked at his watch absent-mindedly. Meeting up at the station of an evening and walking home together to the little flat they shared in the town centre was nice, when the trains ran on time, which was almost never these days. Outlying towns and villages like this little place could be dull and boring, but they were a whole lot better than living in the city. He watched the train in the distance reach the end of the bridge and begin to curve around the corner onto the stretch of track that led to the station.

Lisa stood up, collected her coat from the rack and threw her empty coffee cup in the rubbish bin. The train had slowed down now and was rattling its way over the points and crossovers at the approach to the platforms, as it did every night. If she was asleep that always woke her up. Three or four other people had also left their seats and were making their way towards the carriage door. Several fellow passengers got on and off at the same stations as she did. Sometimes she spoke to them on the journey if they happened to sit together. Alistair the insurance agent, Morag who looked after the street repairs for the local council, and William who worked for a firm of accountants where he dealt with the smaller businesses. They were all on the train, though she hadn’t sat with any of them on this particular evening.

And now the train was stopping. She glanced out of the window. Unless there were no seats she always sat in the middle carriage and Alan would be waiting on the platform, near the vending machine, which was where the rear door of that carriage came to a halt.


Alan watched the train roll gently up to the platform. He could make out the passengers as the windows drifted slowly past. There they were. The man who worked for the insurance company, the lady with the curly grey hair, and the accountant in the smart suit who carried a briefcase. He knew them, not actually to speak to, but he saw them getting off most evenings, and Lisa sometimes talked about them.

The carriage door opened with a familiar mechanical clunk and the passengers alighted one by one into the yellow glow of the platform area, where they made their way towards the ticket barriers and exit stairs. Alan looked through the window into the carriage, puzzled, before walking back along the platform to peer through the windows at the rear of the train. That was very strange! He ran to the front carriage, but that was almost empty, she certainly wasn’t in that one either. The conductor blew his whistle, the doors closed gently with a hiss, and the train moved slowly away leaving only a warm smell of diesel to drift across the station in the gathering darkness.

He ran to the little ticket hall between the platforms where the old man was attacking a particularly stubborn bit of dirt with vigorous strokes of his brush.

“Hey! Excuse me!” he cried.

The man turned and looked at him with a flash of recognition.

“Yes sir?” he said, rather enigmatically.

“Did you see Lisa get off the train?” asked Alan, now extremely concerned.

The man thought briefly.

“No,” he replied. “She wasn’t on it tonight.”

Alan’s face wore a blank expression.

“I would have noticed,” continued the old man. “I was there when it arrived… and so were you as I recall,” he added, with a smile.

Alan reached for his phone and tried to call Lisa again. It still came up with ‘Call Failed’. He put his ticket in the barrier and made his way up the steps.

“Ok thanks,” he shouted back. “I can’t get hold of her, but maybe the signal’s better outside.”


Lisa stepped off the train onto the platform behind William, the accountant. There was no sign of Alan. She walked further up the platform. Perhaps he was in the little waiting room? No, it was empty. She stood for a few moments. By the time she’d made her way towards the ticket barriers all the other passengers had left the station, but the old man was there. She recognised him, he was always pottering around doing something.

“Hey!” cried Lisa, walking towards him. “Did you see Alan tonight?”

“Alan?” repeated the old man thoughtfully, putting his finger to his lips as people do when they’re thinking hard. “Alan?”

“Yes,” replied Lisa. “Arrives on the 19.20 every night and waits for me on platform two by the vending machine.”

The man appeared to have a spark of recognition.

“Oh yes!” he said brightly. “Of course! I know who you mean!”

Lisa took a sharp little breath.

“No,” he continued. “Haven’t seen him tonight. He definitely wasn’t on the 19.20.”

“Ah… ok,” replied Lisa, rather sceptically.

The old man detected the signs of uncertainty in the lines on her face.

“I know, because…” he said, squinting at her and touching the side of his nose with one finger, “…I was out sweeping that platform when that train arrived, and I didn’t see him.”

Lisa looked around again at the empty station and reached for her phone.

“And I can’t seem to get hold of him.”

The old man winked at her, and went on his way, whistling quietly and stopping every now and again to sweep something into his dustpan.

“That’s odd. I’ll go and check outside!” she called back to him as she put her ticket in the barriers and began to climb the steps that led up to street level.


And now it was nearly midnight. The old man looked up at the destination board. The last train had just left, there would be no more travellers today, so he could close up the station until morning.

He produced a big ring of keys from his coat pocket, locked the doors at the bottom of the steps and turned off the ticket barriers, before ambling away to check the rest of the station. The lights went out one by one as he walked up and down the platforms, closing doors and turning off switches.

When he got back to the ticket office, he emptied the contents of his dustpan into the big metal bin with a satisfied expression, dropped the lid on, put the brush and pan back into the grey metal locker and switched off the lights. A jangling of keys could be heard as he let himself out of the doors at the bottom of the steps.

After a moment or two the few remaining lights went out, the door at the top of the steps closed with a satisfying thud, and the station settled into silence and darkness, as it did every night.


As we move through life our paths sometimes cross and become connected. But then, sometimes they don’t. The world is a tangled web. Nobody knows how it comes together, and nobody knows how pieces of it break apart again, or why.

There may be a higher order that determines these things, or they may simply be the result of chance. If we understood how it worked people would want to harness it, to be in control of their own destinies, and who knows where that might lead.

Dreaming is all well and good but, as Lisa observed, it’s wise to be careful what you wish for, and it’s never a good plan to ask questions about how the world works.

If you were to find out, you might not like the answers.


In the silence and darkness of the deserted station something stirs. Tiny specks begin to glow and flicker slowly in the dust at the bottom of a bin. They gently move and touch, as if they seem to recognise each other, before sparkling and swirling and dancing with the joy of lost souls reunited.

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